WOW! I can’t believe I’ve been blogging for TWO months now! I’ve always dreamed of having my own blog, and here I am – blogging and doing something I love, talking about a subject I’m insanely passionate about. I already talked about everything I learned my first month blogging. Well, now I’m back during my second month – and I’ve learned even more! Blogging is a constantly changing game and I feel you’ll always be learning something new to make your blog great.
I feel like this month had a lot of ups and downs. I had some days where my page views EXPLODED – and then some where they faltered off. Like, REALLY bad. Still, I keep my head up and keep going. I know hard work is needed to get me to where I want to go with this site, and it might take some time to get to that point.
Here are some things I learned this month that I think will help YOU with your blog as well!
**this post contains affiliate links! This means I may receive some sort of financial compensation from my recommendations. Please see my disclaimer for more information!**
Manual Pinning = More Pinterest Traffic
I am a huge supporter of Tailwind. There is no WAY I would be getting the traffic I AM getting via Pinterest if it weren’t for their Tribes and amazing scheduling system. The fact that they’re going to be rolling out a new “SmartLoop” feature, that repins your older, more successful pins to get them in front of your audience again, just reaffirms my belief that they’re the BEST Pinterest scheduler out there!
However I recently learned a fun little fact – Pinterest rewards users that manually pin by boosting their pins and recommending them to other users! So I’ve started adding some manual pinning into my schedule – I try to do at least 10-15 manual pins a day in addition to all the scheduled ones via Tailwind. Remember that if you try Tailwind through my link, your first 100 scheduled pins are free!
Pretty Affiliate Pins are a MUST!
I haven’t had as much time to invest in affiliate marketing as I would like, so I did what I read about in a few blogs about affiliate links via Pinterest. Simply make a pin using the image and BOOM! Instant affiliate sales!
Yeah, no. That’s not how that works.
None of my affiliate pins that contained JUST the shop image and a fun description got ANY clicks. Nada. I knew I had to spice things up a bit if I’m going to make any good money on affiliate sales.
I decided to spice it up a bit and start promoting products I had actual PHOTOS of – pictures of MYSELF actually USING said products. If I’m primarily using shopDisney, I have MORE than enough products in my house to do this. Check out this adorable pin I created for Rose Gold Minnie Mouse ears!
Much more eye popping than the plain old stock photo from the site!
MagicLinks
I also discovered a new affiliate program I’m excited to try this month. It’s called MagicLinks, and it’s very similar to ShopStyle. One thing I like about this program is that they have a ton of retailers to pick from that are less expensive than ShopStyle, and they also have a nifty little plugin for Chrome to make affiliate links INSTANTLY from products as you’re browsing. For example, I go to the shopDisney site (one of their partners) and search items I want to recommend. I click the MagicLinks button on Chrome and boom – link MADE. I’m excited to try them and see what they offer! If you’re interested in trying them out as well, check them out! (NOTE: You must have at LEAST 100 Pinterest followers to be accepted into their program. It should be easy to get to that threshold though if you’re using Tailwind!)
eBook
Oh yeah, did I mention – I wrote an EBOOK! I’ve been researching how to be a successful blogger for a lot longer than I’ve actually been logging, and I’ve been using Pinterest even longer. I figured I might as well compile all the best information into an eBook that is available for purchase NOW via my Etsy store! It’s full of helpful tips and tricks, as well as exclusive links to top Tailwind tribes and Facebook groups I recommend!
Well, I think that’s all I’ve got for now. My goals for this next month are to continue growing my email list and publish my first income report at the end of August.
Don’t forget to bookmark my Blogging Resources page to help you make your site as successful as possible!
Wish me luck everyone!
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