Because I was completely disconnected I had time to relax and fully enjoy my trip. This made me realize this was the first trip that had happened. In the past when I’d go on vacation I’d have Internet access and would feel like I needed to work on A Relaxed Gal.
Related read: 7 Ways To Prepare Your Blog For The Holidays
I also came to the realization that overall my life had gotten very busy. Between prepping for my vacation, my full-time job getting busier, homeowner responsibilities, and spending more time working on A Relaxed Gal I’ve been spending less time living and sleeping.
(This post includes some affiliate links. Should you click an affiliate link and make a purchase I may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.)
After my vacation, I had a day off before heading back to my full-time job. During that time I was able to sit down and formulate a plan for creating more balance in my life.
The interesting thing is I’ve seen other bloggers and business owners saying they’d come to the same realization. Many of them have changed the way they are approaching their blog or business. This is the approach I’ll be taking as well.
Related read: The Importance Of SEO For A Blog
Currently, I’ve been posting twice a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Starting this month, I will now only post once a week on Tuesdays. So I’m not posting on the same topic each week, I’ve designated a different topic to each week of the month.
- Week 1: Blogging
- Week 2: Hair
- Week 3: Finance
- Week 4: Beauty
Another change I’m making is I’ll no longer be posting traffic reports to provide monthly updates on my business and blog goals. This is a direct result of my new schedule. I don’t want my one post on blogging to always be a traffic report.
I will now be sharing my traffic reports only to those who subscribe to my Blogging Tribe. Here’s where you can sign up if you’d like to get my traffic reports. (UPDATE: I'm no longer doing traffic reports.)
I’m hoping with these changes I’ll be able to
- Have more free time and stress less about creating content
- Create more interesting content for you
- Spend more time on content promotion
- Have more time to engage with those in my community (followers and subscribers)
Now that I’ve shared with you the changes I'm implementing this month, I’m going to share my last traffic report on the blog.
How I’m Doing with My 2017 Goals
1. Fully optimize arelaxedgal.com site for SEO by the end of Q1
I achieved this goal on time. And over the last few months, I’ve been seeing my organic traffic increase by sometimes large amounts. While my organic traffic from May to June saw less than a 1% decrease, my organic traffic increased about 34% quarter-over-quarter.2. Retain readers on my site
June saw a slight increase in new visitors over May. The great thing is those new visitors were interested in my content because my Bounce Rate decreased by 0.54%, Pages per Session increased to 0.61%, and Average Session Duration increased by 2.09%.
Related post: Amazing Tools To Automate And Manage Your Social Media
3. Grow my social followers and increase engagement
Overall I gained the same total number of followers in June that I did in May - 170. However, I’ve been trying a few new things on Pinterest and Facebook that so far have increased my engagement on those channels. I won’t share what those things are yet, as I want to continue testing them out.After last month where my Pinterest stats decreased, some dramatically, I was so happy to see my stats rebound and steadily increase all month. Two stats that increased were my Average Monthly Viewers and Average Monthly Engaged. I hope to see those both continue to increase.
From the previous month, engagements on my Facebook page increased 146% and my reach increased 495%! This was an amazing improvement! I’m hoping to make this a trend and not an anomaly.
4. Grow my email subscriber list to at least 1,000 by 12/31
My total number of subscribers is now 97. Which is an increase of nine subscribers from the previous month. While I did some cleaning up and sent out emails last month I really ended up slacking in June.I didn’t send out many emails or do much to promote my subscriber list. I’m hoping that by not posting twice a week I’ll be able to focus that time I would have spent on the second blog post on emails.
Related read: Which Email Service Is Right For Your Business Or Blog
5. Do a least one paid post a quarter
I’ve had a few brands reach out to me about sponsored posts. I shared a contract with them but never heard back. So once again I had a quarter with no paid posts. Hopefully, the second half of the year will be more successful.6. Create an image library of at least 24 images by year-end
I only added one image this month bringing my image library to a total of 20 images. I’m now for images away from my goal of 24 images which I expect to exceed.
What changes are you making to your blog for the rest of the year?
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