Exactly two years ago, I started my blogging journey.
I started with the following:
No readers.
No blog posts.
No blogging experience.
No SEO understanding.
Two years after I've accumulated:
10k+ monthly readers.
100+ blog posts.
A ton of blogging experience.
Good knowledge of SEO best practices.
In this article, I'll share what I've learned in 2 years of blogging.
Let's start.
Stay consistent
"Stay consistent" will sound like a cliche, but successful blogging is more about consistency than anything else.
Staying consistent doesn't mean publishing an article daily (which I believe is unsustainable).
It means you stick to a blogging schedule that suits your needs and lifestyle.
Whether you decide to publish an article per week, every two weeks, or monthly, stay consistent with what you choose.
Blogging takes time
It took me just over 12+ months to reach 10k readers every month.
There's no overnight success when it comes to blogging.
Read How To Increase Your Blog's Traffic in 3 Easy Steps to learn how to increase your monthly traffic.
Blogging is still relevant in 2023
ChatGPT was released on the 30th of November.
When ChatGPT was launched, a lot of people believed it was going to make blogging obsolete.
This is far from the truth. Blogging has (and it will) evolved and changed.
I read a lot of online content and recognize when an article is AI-generated to manipulate the search engine.
Using automation—including AI—to generate content with the primary purpose of manipulating ranking in search results is a violation of our spam policies.[Google Search Central].
There's always so much to do
When I started my blog and had under 20 blog posts, it was easy to go back and update/delete/change content.
The more you add content to your blog, the more challenging it becomes to stay on top of the many tiny changes that make your blog better and improve SEO.
To combat this, I try to set aside some time during the week (ideally an hour) to update the most read blog posts.
Updating content means:
Adding internal linking.
Making sure information is still relevant.
Adding/editing images (or visual content).
Updating/deleting broken links.
Read Pros And Cons Of Running A Blog to learn more about the advantages and disadvantages of running a blog.
You don't always write for yourself
To grow your blog, you must write content addressing your audience's needs.
A successful blog is a blog that answers people's questions and concerns.
This means that you won't always write for yourself.
You'll have to find a balance between enjoying writing content for yourself and your audience.
Only accept collaborations that suit your blog
Blogging brings many collaborations opportunity.
From time to time, you'll receive partnership opportunities in your inbox. However, not all partnerships are worth working with.
Your readers can sense when you want to monetize your blog, even though that means collaborating with brands that don't suit your blog.
Treat your blog like a business
While blogging still hasn't allowed me to quit my 9-5 job, it has become a little side hustle that I treat like a business.
Ensure you have a dedicated business email for your blog. Communicate professionally with brands, whether you decide to collaborate with them or not.
Conclusion
I hope this article helps you! If it does, subscribe to my FREE weekly newsletter.
Happy blogging!