Inspiration.
It sputters and flickers like a candle flame. Blogging and I are in couples counselling. We are not on good terms, frustrated at one another. One of us is having an affair with the postman. ‘I have lost my mojo!’ She yells in the manner of Austin Powers from the bed (aka the office), laptop perched upon her pyjama clad knees.
Christmastime tends to bring a lull to the blogosphere, a time for us all to hang up our striped blogger stockings, pour a glass of wine and give Times New Roman a rest. Admittedly I had been floundering a couple of weeks prior to this, overwhelmed with trying to juggle work, family and laptop life. Burnt-out. Redesigning the site demanded I resize all the images, reshuffle widgets and generally spend copious amounts of time faffing!
The ‘to do’ list floods over three pages of judgmental scribbles and bullet points. Jumbles of ideas swim around my head at three am and then vanish by morning. AGRRRRHHHHH. Does this sound familiar? Berating, chastising, and belittling myself. It has to stop!
So, if you find yourself in the same position, tired, uninspired, overwhelmed then grab your leftover festive box of celebrations and follow these few simple tips.
To be a successful blogger sometimes you just have to step back.
RELAX.
Start by spending two weeks not obsessing over your stats. They can become all consuming, ‘look they have gone UP’ hurrah. Two seconds later, they drop and someone you didn’t know unfollowed you and it makes you cry into your cereal. Recognise your success in the comments you receive and the way that writing brings an unexpected smile to the corner of your lips.
REVAMP.
Freshen up your old posts and titles. Delete content (not collaborative) that is a bit wishy washy or overhaul the post. Revamp fuzzy images and resize so the photos are the same dimensions within each post. Do you have 500+ categories and menus? Tidy up time! Use Canva to create a wondrous Pinterest picture that will take you three hours and two glasses of wine to create. This will bring new traffic to those posts. If like me you are wading into uncharted social media seas with Pins then check out Elizabeth’s post how to drive traffic to your blog from Pinterest.
BRAINSTORM.
Plan five post ideas, or, if you have a journal full of half cooked ideas like I do then focus on a couple, research these well and get typing. Avoid the siren song of procrastination. Laundry can wait till later, dedicate at least half hour to actually getting something finished. Write what you want to write. If you don’t already, commit to posting regularly. This doesn’t have to be daily, it can be one a fortnight, but find your rhythm.
GO BACK TO BASICS.
I have yet to set up an email list, half my posts have not yet been added to StumbleUpon and Facebook is floundering. If like me you have tried to tap-dance before you can walk. Struggling with focus I found this post by The Joy Chaser to help me regain some balance.
IMMERSE.
Reading feelings of and reaching out to other parents was the reason I started blogging. Amidst the reviews, the deadlines, the requests time slithered by and along the way the opportunity to enjoy others works disappeared. Use Twitter lists to gather a list of your favourite bloggers and make time to pay them some attention each week. The lovely Mumzilla created #myjoyproject to remind herself about the best bit of blogging.
REFRESH.
My scheduler hates me, you all probably hate me as I added some post and left them to spin around like laundry that has been left in the drier to long.
Social oomph has run out of oomph!
No more, each day will be different, I want to get back to engaging on Twitter, getting my GIF on!
REGROUP.
I think I am a member of about 500 groups. I love to read and look through and all the notifications make me feel popular but I want to engage! If your in the same boat then sit down, pick your favourite five and make proper use of them.
So for the rest of this year my daily stats may be in the proverbial toilet. I may only post one post a week, but it will be a good post, one that I am proud of. I will tackle my email subscriptions, figure out how to use Sumo me (I am desperately hoping Aby from You Baby Me Mummy has a ‘how to’ post on it) and I will fall in love with blogging again.
So what are your New years blogging resolutions? – I’d love to hear how YOU plan to fall back in love with blogging.
