OK – I didn’t actually participate in the official Blog every day challenge from WordPress. I just naturally set myself that target. In this post I write about
- How did I get started?
- What did I learn?
- What happened? and
- What’s next?
I actually posted a bit more than just a blog post every day – there’s my Newsletter too and I even managed to put up 8 videos on my YouTube channel (check them out, they’re actually not terrible) which means I managed to create a lot of stuff!
How did I get started?
First up, to actually do this I also had to setup a site and for this I used WordPress.com – I’ve had a site sitting there in staging (without any content on it) since I joined Automattic in 2019 but I hadn’t done anything with it.
Inspired by Paolo and his lovely corner of the web (check him out at: https://paolo.blog/) – 2022 was the year where I brought my site to life, chose a domain name (no, I’m NOT that guy from the office) and start adding content.
- I chose my domain
- I picked a theme (I’m using Spearhead)
- I put up the “supporting pages”
- Home
- About
- Newsletter
- and set my Blog page
I then started to write (with this productivity hack). I also planned my content in the most unusual places.
What I learned?
I learned some new things while writing and managing a content schedule, I learned
- Some GLORIOUS Gutenberg Hacks 😉
- How to structure your Google Calendar setup 🗓️
- A foolproof YouTube production planner 📼
- An INSANE time saver when it comes to prepping images for the web 🕸️
- Type how you text, not how you speak ⌨️
You might have guessed it, I’ll be writing about all these in future posts and videos (be sure to subscribe to this blog, and my YouTube).
What happened?
As I worked my way through the month, I found it really fun to be able to put “pen to paper”. It’s therapeutic for me and I enjoy writing about things that I’ve found useful. I hope you find it useful too.
I also love it when people reach out to me and drop me a message that they enjoyed a piece of content – just like Kevin below.
But, if you’re a numbers / traffic / growth kinda person. What happened with my traffic and my subscribers.
Traffic to the site
I grew my traffic by 3450% by blogging every day in January. Oooo that’s a clickbait title. Maybe I’ll use it on something. Here’s the view zoomed out showing that crazy 3450% growth (compared to November, in December I was tinkering around with pages etc and testing setups).
As I worked through the month and the content I wanted to share, I built a few more pages around the site:-
- My Resources Page covering what gear I use and other links.
- My Books (ok, Book) page with links to what I’ve written so far.
- The Launch Checklist which I’ve been using since 2016.
- Added a way for you to subscribe to be notified of new content.
Having content build up over time also means I was able to plan my storytelling, cross link quite well and keep the creativity flowing.
What’s next?
More of the same. I’ll be writing and making more videos and sharing everything I learn along the way. Be sure to enter your email to subscribe to blog updates and if you want to receive my weekly newsletter (includes content not on the blog) – you can do so using the form below (and read prior editions here).
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