August was a busy month for me and it absolutely flew by. I spent most of the month working on my Skillcrush Front End Developer Blueprint brushing up on my coding skills and focusing on the launch of my social media template design services (which have officially launched by the way).
I also participated in the beta program for The Shield Sisters Initiative. It is a coaching club run by Allie, Megan and Raewyn. So I spent a lot of time talking with them and the awesome members in the group about my goals, mindset and so much more. It has been an AMAZING experience and I am a proud lifetime member. If you are looking to connect with like-minded women who totally support you with access to not one, but three, coaches – then I would totally check it out. I hope to see you in there!
Now, let’s see how the month of August went since my focus was less on content creation and more on overall strategy planning and networking.
Blog Me Lovely originally launched in March 2015. I was not that active nor did I put much focus on the blog and growing it. So my highest traffic month between March 2015 and September 2015 was only about 300 pageviews, with an average of about 175 pageviews a month. In October I took a step back to focus on Peace Love Sequins so it is no surprise that my traffic plummeted!
I am sharing this because when I re-launched the blog in June 2016, I was basically receiving only 15 to 20 pageviews a month, essentially starting from scratch. I am going to share with you my traffic stats, social media counts, post overview, what I learned and my goals for the upcoming month.
August 2016 Traffic Report
August Traffic
- Pageviews: 4,814 (+32.33%)
- Sessions: 3,900 (+39.14%)
- Users: 1,672 (+23.49%)
- Pages / Session: 1.23 (-4.90%)
- Average Session Duration: 03:11 (+2.38%)
- Bounce Rate: 11.15% (-26.44%)
- New Sessions: 35.79% (-14.02%)
- Highest Traffic Day: August 10 with 274 pageviews
I came SO close to my goal of 5,000 pageviews. I wish I would have hit but I am still very happy with the increase.
August Traffic Sources
- Social: 90.44%
- Facebook: 65.27%
- Pinterest: 16.98%
- Twitter: 12.67%
- StumbleUpon: 2.92%
- Instagram: 2.13%
- Google+: 0.03%
- Direct: 6.82%
- Organic Search: 2.18%
- Referral: 0.56%
Social Media Report
August Social Media Stats
- Facebook: 422 fans (+31.06%)
- Twitter: 268 followers (+49.75%)
- Pinterest: 296 followers (+76.19%)
- Instagram: 1,100 followers (+295.68%)
- Bloglovin’: 93 followers (+43.08%)
- Google+: 36 followers (+9.09%)
- Email Subscribers: 85 subscribers (+80.85%)
Blog Post Report
Post Frequency
- Number of New Posts: 4
- Total Posts: 28
- Post Frequency: Once a week
Top Five Posts
- 10 Blogging Group Mistakes to Avoid
- Introducing Week of Code: A 7 Day Coding Bootcamp for Bloggers Free Email Course (on the list last month)
- How to Fail at Blogging
- How to Add a Meta Description to Posts (on the list last month)
- How to Start a Blog
What I Learned
- Just like last month, promotion is key for growing your blog. Most of my promotion is done on Facebook but that holds way too much of my social media traffic chunk. I would like to get a more even split.
- Instagram loop giveaways are great for increasing your follower count. My huge jump is Instagram followers was due to participating in a loop giveaway. I am still waiting to see how many unfollows I get when the giveaway ends. But I have got some great comments and think many will stick around!
- Focusing on the foundation and strategy of your blog is so important if you plan on turning this into a career. I did a lot of planning last month and I am so excited about what is to come.
- It is okay to post just once a week. Once I get my blogging schedule down, I plan on blogging probably two to three times a week but I know that even just once a week is okay to. You just need to make sure that it is really good content.
August Goals – Check In
- Work on my second course, get at least half way done – I actually have not started this yet. I have my idea and I have almost figured out the outline. I may put this off one more month though to focus on some amazing content and content upgrades first.
- Traffic Goals
- Reach 5,000 pageviews – I was SO close!
Reach 3,000 sessions– Achieved this and then some!Reach 1,500 users– Same as aboveMaintain a 3:00 minute average session duration– Happy to say that I am still averaging above 3:00 minutes!
- Social Media Goals
Reach 400 Facebook fans– So happy I reached this milestone!- Reach 300 Twitter followers – I did not reach this one, but I did start working on my Twitter strategy so I am sure the followers and engagement will continue to increase.
Reach 300 Pinterest followers– I technically missed it by 4 but I am going to count this as a win!Reach 400 Instagram followers– I actually hit this before the loop giveaway, but the giveaway gave me exponetial growth!
Post one to two times a week– I was consistent with once a week!Get better at scheduling social media content through Hootsuite and BoardBooster– This is half a success just like last month, but this time I was great with scheduling Twitter using Hootsuite but not so much with Boardbooster.- Create a social media strategy for Blog Me Lovely – I have started but it is not fully there yet.
Launch my services page– This was launched today, so a day late, but it is officially up! Check out The Silhouette – Oh So Shareable Social Media Templates if you are interested in custom social media Photoshop templates.
September Goals
- Add Click to Tweets to all posts, this is part of my social strategy. I also plan on redesigning how it looks so they stand out more.
- Add 3 content upgrades, I already have an idea for one and am excited to start creating it.
- Traffic Goals
- Reach 7,500 pageviews
- Reach 5,000 sessions
- Reach 2,500 users
- Social Media Goals
- Reach 500 Facebook fans
- Reach 400 Twitter followers
- Reach 400 Pinterest followers
- Maintain 1,100 Instagram followers (I expect some unfollows from the giveaway so I would like to make sure that I gain enough to even it out)
- Reach 200 email subscribers
- Post at least once a week
- Get better at scheduling social media content through Hootsuite (for Twitter, Instagram and Google+) and BoardBooster and Tailwind (for Pinterest)
- Create a social media strategy for Blog Me Lovely
- Rewrite my About Page
- Get my Resources Page up
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Final Thoughts
Treating my blog like a business is a full-time job. It can definitely be tiring at times but I remind myself why I do this. I want to work for myself one day. I know I am more than capable and am excited to work toward my full potential.
I am lucky to have made new connections this month in The Shield Sisters Initiative that motivate me and push me out of my comfort zone in good ways. Finding your tribe is one of the most important things you can do for your blog and business. It is something you don’t fully understand until you find it.
What are your blogging goals this month?
What great accomplishments! I’m just getting started and was struggling with what “reasonable” goals looked like, thank you so much!
It is so hard when you see people who has had an amazing first or second month. Or a post go viral. It isn’t typical. And I feel it gets people down who are just starting out. I like to be as transparent as possible on what I am doing and not doing. Hoping it helps people!
Very nice report! I love seeing how other bloggers are gaining traffic. Looks like you crushed most of your goals. Good luck with September!
Thank you so much! I love creating these, it is as much for me and it is for a learning experience for others.
Great work Lindsey! Keep doing your thing and you’ll see the success that you’ve defined for yourself.
Thank you so much!!
Thanks for the update! I’m going to keep following closely because I’ve been doing the same things, only times six, i.e. trying to resurrect six old blogs of mine. It should be very interesting to compare stats with you focusing on just one blog and me trying (with limited success so far) to juggle six of them!
I had tried doing two blogs at once and it was too much for me with all the other things I have going on. I can’t imagine six!!!