Blog Growth Stats for October 2017

Last updated on April 10th, 2019 at 06:15 am

I can’t believe it’s time for my blog growth stats for October 2017. It seems like these blog posts are coming around faster and faster every month. Thank goodness I just use the same blog template every month.

I’ve made it easy for myself and have decided to just keep the same template every month. I figure that I am sharing the same stats every month, so why recreate the template?

It’s much easier if I just keep the same layout to make it easy on myself. If I am missing something or you want to see some other stats, let me know.

I can’t promise I’ll add it, but I’d love to hear what you think about my blog growth stats.

Now Onto My Blog Stats for October

I know that you’re interested in seeing what I am doing for this blog and how I am growing it, so let’s get into it.

I want to be as transparent as possible to show you what I’m doing to grow my blog. My hope is that you can then use this blog to help you start, grow and monetize your own blog.

So now that you know I am NOT a traffic expert, let’s get busy and see how my blog did last month.

Video Walk-Thru of My Google Analytics

I’ve created a video that will show you the inside of my Google Analytics. I am only showing you this because I truly want to share what I am doing to grow my blog.

Plus, I am using it as a journal to help me keep track of my blog growth. If you’d rather not watch the video, I discuss my analytics below.

A Quick Look at My Blog Analytics

The only way that I know how to show you my blog traffic stats is to show you a quick snapshot of my Analytics dashboard for the month.

As you can see, my page views were the highest they have ever been since I started my blog.

I know that page views really don’t matter that much. However, if you can get more people to your blog, chances are you’ll increase your commissions and email subscribers.

Common sense tells us that if you can get more people on your blog, there’s no way that you won’t increase your earnings and subscribers.

Of course, you need to make sure that your blog is set up to convert properly. That’s why you need to keep testing things to see what converts the best.

Growing My Email List

Growing my email list has definitely been a huge struggle for me. I’m not going to lie, I’ve always had trouble growing an email list.

Right now I have 106 subscribers on my email list. That may not sound very big to you, but to me that’s a lot. It’s actually the biggest list that I’ve ever had.

So yah for me!

I make a it a point to send my email list an email every Friday. I do this because I don’t want to neglect them because I’ve been known to do this in the past.

As you can see, I have a 64.00% open rate. My click through rate is 15%. I don’t always get that high of a clickthrough rate, I just happened to for this newlsetter.

Like I said, I’ve never really grown an email list before. I’ve tried to in the past, but never put much effort into it.

[clickToTweet tweet=”Starting a blog is half the battle, focus on growth #GrowWithSusan at susanvelez.com” quote=”Starting a blog is half the battle, focus on growth #GrowWithSusan at susanvelez.com” theme=”style4″]

Blog Growth Stats for October 2017

Unfortunately, my page views went down from last month’s blog traffic report. That’s the one thing about blog traffic, it fluctuates so much. At least mine does.

Now that vacation is over, it’s time to get back to work on my blog. So we’ll see how next month goes.

Guest Posts Written In September

I’ve stopped sharing the places that I’ve guest posted on. It’s not that I don’t want you to know, because we all know that you can find that information out if you really want to.

I figured that I would stop sharing them because I’m starting to guest post on more blogs through the month. I don’t want to end up having to link to so many.

This doesn’t mean that I don’t appreciate you allowing me into your home. Even though I am not linking them on my blog growth stats reports post every month. I will be sure to link to them on my blog posts when it does make sense.

This will help both you and me over time. Anyway, last month I was able to write 5 guest posts. (one is still pending review)

Related: Grammarly Review My Experience and WalkThrough

Fixing My Links

Last month, I went back and changed the anchor text on some of my blog posts and changed the link from opening in a new blank window. I wanted to reduce my bounce rate and had read that you should have your links open in the same window.

All the links on my posts were set to open in a new window. Even the links that led to another blog post of mine on my blog.

I currently have 109 published blog posts. So it took a few days to go back and fix all those links. I’m not sure if this is going to hurt my organic traffic in the coming months.

But this was something that I definitely wanted to do. It’s now completed and all my links will open up in the same window and all external links will open in a blank page.

Did This Reduce My Bounce Rate?

I still can’t tell as I made this change in the middle of the month. I am sure that it will take a few months for Google to notice the changes and see what happens with my blog.

Anyway, this is something that I wanted to get done. Plus I also had to change out some of my old affiliate links. When I first started my blog, I was using YOURLS as my affiliate link cloaker. I’ve since then upgraded to Thirsty Affiliates and never went back and changed out my old YOURLS links.

I felt it was time to go back and update all my affiliate links. Now all my affiliate links are being cloaked through Thirsty Affiliates.

While I loved using YOURLS as my link shortener. The truth is that I liked all the features of Thirsty Affiliates because I can now track my affiliate stats better.

New Analytics Tool

Oh, and I got a new Analytics tool called Cyfe. While I am NOT a huge Analytics person. I do believe it’s important to measure metrics to see what’s actually growing your blog.

This helps you find out where to place most of your time and energy. Cyfe has allowed me to see all my stats in one place. I no longer have to log into my GetResponse account, email, Twitter or any other account.

Cyfe allows me to see what’s going on in all the accounts that I usually had to check one by one. It’s definitely a time saver and I love it.

If you want to check out Cyfe, you can download your free account here. You’ll get 5 widgets for free just to see if it’s the right one for you.

My YouTube Channel

As you know, I create a new video every Wednesday. I batch create all my videos. Just like my blog content, I am currently 1 month ahead on my video creation.

This is great, especially with the holidays coming up.

At the time of this writing, I only have 59 subscribers. That’s because I haven’t taken the time to really learn how to promote my videos. Maybe one day, I’ll start promoting my videos. But right now, I am just enjoying creating them.

Videos Uploaded in September

1. September 2017 Blog Growth Stats
2. How to Restore Your WordPress Blog on BlogVault
3. How to Moderate Your WordPress Comments
4. Change Your WordPress Time Zone
5. Style The Genesis Author Box Using CSS

The great thing is that I’ve already got all my videos recorded for November. I am not really sure if recording more videos for my channel will help it grow?

After listening to this podcast, I figured I would try it. I still have a lot to learn about using YouTube and improving my channel, but I’ll get there.

My Promotion Strategies

I’ll probably end up taking this section out next month as my promotion strategies don’t really change from month to month.

When I first started this blog, I was trying to be everywhere. Now I am just focusing on using 1-3 blog promotion techniques. I’ve started really putting all my focus on mastering Pinterest.

I’ve heard so many bloggers say that you should focus 100% on mastering Pinterest before venturing into other promotional techniques. However, I’ve done that in the past with SEO and got burnt.

That’s why I am still spending time submitting guest posts and doing a couple of other promotional strategies.

I don’t want all my traffic coming from just one source. So I refuse to drop everything just to learn one channel. Maybe that hurts my blog growth, but I don’t want to go down that road again.

Using Pinterest To Grow My Blog

Right now, Pinterest is my main focus out of all the social networks. I have really started taking time to learn it. My goal is to hopefully tap into some of the traffic that all bloggers say it can produce.

Last month, I finally learned how to work with Pinterest Analytics and start using that information to help me grow my traffic. I admit that I am still learning to use this information.

However, I finally realized what I was doing wrong in the past. I am working on fixing this. I just figured this out this past month after really digging into the platform.

Now I realize why so many people say that you should choose one platform and master it before moving onto another one.

How My Pinterest Traffic Compares to Last Month

So after months and months of trying to improve my Pinterest traffic. I think I may have finally figured out something that is going to help me.

As you know, this month, I finally started using my Analytics to help me with my Pinterest strategy. I am happy to say that this is the best month of traffic from Pinterest. Take a look at the comparison from my Google Analytics.

So did I figure it out or was it just a fluke?

Honestly, I don’t know. I guess we’ll see in the coming months. I feel like I did figure some stuff out in October. One of the biggest changes I made in October is that I was actually pinning with a strategy.

Back in September, I was just pinning anything and everything. I’ve finally realized that it requires more than just pinning anything.

I’ll be sharing my strategy once I figure out if what I am doing is not just a fluke and one-time deal 🙂

After all, I need to give it a few months to see if it’s working or not. I’ve read that it takes around 6 months to see if this Pinterest strategy works or not.

I still have a lot to learn, but it’s definitely nice to see my traffic picking up from Pinterest. I’m not getting anywhere near the traffic that other bloggers are getting, that’s okay. I am where I am and I can’t compare myself to others 🙂

I’m still using both Board Booster and Tailwind to help me with my Pinterest strategy. However, I’ve just recently also started doing some manual pinning.

I’m testing things out to see if it improves my traffic?

Starting to Get Google Organic Traffic

I love getting Google traffic. In the past, I focused 100% on SEO because I’ve noticed that organic traffic converts very well. People who come to your site are looking for something and if you can help them, they’ll probably buy through your affiliate links, products, services or whatever you offer.

I’m happy to say that my organic traffic is increasing slowly, just like the growth of this blog 🙂

From this screenshot, you’ll see that my organic traffic has improved from last month’s stats.

The great thing is that I don’t spend any time focusing on building backlinks to this blog. Yes, I do promote it and guest post on other blogs.

However, I am NOT doing those activities for the sake of building backlinks. I’ve stopped playing the backlink game.

Instead, I am just focusing on providing the best valuable and helpful content that I know how to do. That’s all I can do.

I’m Struggling With

Growing my email list is still one of my biggest challenges. Not sure if maybe it’s because my opt-in freebie is not enticing enough or not?

I don’t plan on changing it yet. I’ll wait until I start getting more traffic to determine if I should change it or not.

Growing my community. I am trying to NOT focus on page views anymore as I know that I would rather grow a tribe of loyal readers than just a one-time reader.

To tell you the truth, I really don’t experiment with many different traffic methods. It’s hard to when I am still freelancing and working on other projects.

Whenever I publish a new blog post, I have a promotion system in place that I use each and every time. I promote each and every blog post the same way every time I hit publish.

In the past, I focused 100% on SEO. Thanks to this traffic eBook, it opened up my eyes to creating traffic from multiple places, this way I won’t have to worry about Google for traffic.

SO HOW MUCH DID MY BLOG GROW

We all want our blog to grow. Nothing is more depressing to keep working hard on our blog only to see that we’re not seeing the results we want.

[clickToTweet tweet=”Starting a blog is half the battle, focus on growth #GrowWithSusan at susanvelez.com” quote=”Starting a blog is half the battle, focus on growth #GrowWithSusan at susanvelez.com” theme=”style4″]

Your growth stats may be different than mine. The main goal of my blog is to grow my email list. There are certain things that I pay attention to every month to see if my blog is improving or not.

I have an excel spreadsheet on Google Drive that helps me keep track of my blog numbers. Unfortunately, I didn’t start paying attention to my stats until March 2017. But then I also waited until this blog was 5 months old before I started promotion.

Do yourself a favor and start promoting your blog right out the gate. Otherwise, it’s going to take you a lot longer to start seeing traffic. Don’t make the same mistake I made.

So let’s dive into my blog growth numbers.

September Blog Growth Numbers

• Email Subscribers (new opt-ins for the month): 11
• Overall List Size: 89 (2 unsubscribed)
• Twitter Followers: 1113
• Facebook Followers: 33
• YouTube Subscribers: 58
• Pinterest Followers: 468
• Page Views: 2,549

I included my September blog growth numbers, so you can see how my blog grew in September. Without knowing the numbers, you won’t be able to tell whether or not my blog actually grew.

October Blog Growth Numbers

• Email Subscribers (new opt-ins for the month): 17
• Overall List Size: 106 
• Twitter Followers: 1174
• Facebook Followers: 35
• YouTube Subscribers: 63
• Pinterest Followers: 505
• Page Views: 3,523

As you can see, my blog is slowly growing. I’m pretty happy as long as I continue seeing positive results.

When I started blogging, I knew that it was going to take a lot of hard work. I’m not scared of some hard work, plus I really do enjoy working on my blog. Hopefully, by sharing what I’m doing and sharing my beginner WordPress tutorials are helping you with your blog.

It’s just nice to see my hard work paying off. After all, who really wants to work this hard and not see positive results.

My blog did make money this month. Unfortunately, I don’t share my income results on this blog. All I can say is that I owe this affiliate course props for showing me how to make the most of my top posts.

My Top 3 Blog Posts for October

One of the things that I love looking at is my top blog posts for the month. At the end of every month, I’ll go back and see if I can improve them and maybe toss in some affiliate links.

I’ll also spend some time trying to find more post ideas that I can use to write more content. After all, if the posts have already been proven to be popular once, why not write more content.

Now before I can set my goals for this month, let’s see if I reached my goals from last month.

Continually Testing Things

One of the mistakes that I made in the past is that I would never test things. I would sit down and write and wouldn’t ever make any changes.

This blog is different. I am continually testing things to see if I can improve things or improve my content. I want to make it the best possible source for you.

My goal is to make this blog as helpful as possible to help you start, grow and monetize your blog. As you know, I’m NOT a PHP Developer or designer.

So don’t expect any complicated tutorials. However, I do my best to provide you with valuable information you can run with and start using today. Of course, if you want me to write a blog post that will help you out, let me know. I’ll do my best to help you out by writing a tutorial, if I can.

Tools for Success

Running a blog requires you to spend some money. You don’t have to spend a lot, but these tools have made my life a lot easier.

Tailwind: This tool helps me automate my Pinterest efforts. My favorite part of Tailwind are the Tribes. They are kind of like Groups, but anyone can join without having to wait days for a response. I’ve recently started using Board Booster to help me with the looping feature.

So I don’t really know how much of a positive or negative effect it’ll have on my account?

SiteGround: I am on the GrowBig plan and I love it. If you’re looking for a reliable hosting account for beginners, I highly recommend this hosting account. You can easily start for just $5.95 per month. Although, I recommend paying for 2 years in advance. This will give you enough time to grow your blog and start making money before another hosting bill rolls around.

Related: How to Start A Blog On SiteGround

GetResponse: I use this email service to build my subscribers. It makes it easy to send out my 7 day WordPress course as soon as someone signs up.

ShareSale: This is the affiliate program that I work with for most of the products that I promote on my blog. I make it a point to only promote the products that I use and love.

Social Warfare: This social sharing plugin has made it easy for me to get people to share the images and content I want to be shared. I started off with Monarch, which is another good one. However, my favorite is the Social Warfare plugin.

Thrive Leads: An amazing plugin that allows you to add opt-in boxes quickly and easily. It integrates with pretty much all the popular auto-responders.

Thrive Content Builder: I used this plugin to create the opt-in lead magnet page for my 7 Day WordPress course.

Genesis Framework: I am using the Daily Dish Pro child theme for my blog and I use the Genesis Framework as my choice for this blog. The Framework does have a bit of a learning curve, but I love it. If you want something quick and easy, you can go with Divi or Beaver Builder.

I’ve used both of those page builders for clients in my freelancing business. If you’re uncomfortable with learning how to code, you may want to check out these page builders.

My Favorite Affiliate Program

If you’ve been following my blog, then you know that I am in the process of moving away from my WordPress freelancing business and more towards affiliate marketing.

I really haven’t taken the time to sign up with hundreds of affiliate programs, but here are some of my favorites.

ShareASale

ShareSale: I love this program, it has literally tons of different products that you can promote.

Here are some of my favorite ShareASale merchants:

1. StudioPress
2. BackupBuddy
3. Tailwind
4. PicMonkey
5. Grammarly
6. WP Engine

Amazon Associates Program

Amazon is an extremely popular affiliate program. The commissions are smaller, but the great thing is that when someone visits a product through your affiliate links.

You’ll get credit for whatever they buy, as long as they buy in 24 hours. For now, I’ll keep using Amazon.

Final Take Away

I hope you enjoyed this my blog growth stats for September 2017. As you can see, I am still learning how to grow a blog. Growing a blog has never been easy for me. Instead, the techie side of blogging seems to come easier for me.

However, with a lot of hard work and consistent effort, your blog will start to grow.

Hand Picked Articles for You:

• 6 Month Blog Update
• Big Blogging Mistakes
• Pinterest Image Creation System for Social Warfare

It seems like it’s taking forever for my blog to grow. But what can I expect when I didn’t actually start promoting it until March 2017. The one thing you should take away from all of this, start promoting your blog as soon as possible.

I waited 5 months before I started promoting my blog. Who knows where I would be if I had started sooner…oh well.

Don’t make the same mistake I made and wait for people to find your blog.

Have a question or comment? Want to share your own Pinterest strategy? Please leave it in the comment below! You can also email me at susan(at)susanvelez(dot)com and I’ll do my best to help.