Social Media Monday—Blogging Milestones You Should be Celebrating

by Edie Melson @EdieMelson 

As many of you might have noticed, I love blogging. But what you may not know is that it wasn’t always that way. When I first started blogging it felt sort of like writing into a void. Days—and sometimes weeks—would go by without feedback from my online audience.

However, I knew the importance of growing an online platform, so I kept at it. And some of the things that kept me moving forward were celebrating milestones. I didn’t always announce them, or even share them with many people, but I noted them and gave myself permission to consider them proof of a job well done.

Today I’d like to share some of those blogging milestones you should be celebrating.

1. The First Post. There are a lot of folks out there who haven’t gotten past the fear of failure and actually published the first post on a blog. You did, and you deserve to celebrate!

2. The First 10 Email Signups. Ten is a number you can work with. It’s a diverse enough group to begin to spread the word. Do not despise small beginnings. Not sure where to find how many subscribers you have? Here’s a post on How to Find Your Blog’s Subscriber List. 

3. The First 6 Weeks You Kept to Your Blogging Schedule. I’m always educating bloggers about the importance of keeping on a regular blogging schedule—publishing posts on the same day, at the same time, every week. If you’ve done it for six weeks straight, that’s something to brag about. A lot of life happens over the course of 6d weeks. You’ve kept blogging a priority, in spite of the insanity.

4. The First Email You Get about a Typo in Your Blog Post. This may seem like something to be ashamed of, and I’m definitely NOT advocating slopping writing. But the truth is, we all make mistakes. If someone cares enough to make you look good, you’re in a good place.

5. The First Request from Someone to Be a Guest Blogger for You. If someone thinks enough of your site to ask if you accept guest bloggers, that’s definitely something to celebrate.

6. The First Request for you to be a Guest Blogger. Again, your blog has been read and what you’ve written has been found valuable. This is another reason to celebrate.

7. Getting 100 Unique Hits in One Week. This may seem small, but it’s really not. One hundred people have stopped by to see what you had to say. That’s a definite milestone.

8. Getting an email and/or comment sharing how your words impacted a life. This is why we’re doing this. It’s so easy to get caught up in the numbers and forget that they’re not really numbers at all—they’re people.

9. Comments on 5 Posts in a Row. It’s hard to get the right mix of subject matter, open-ended questions, and blogging magic to get comments on every single post. If you’ve gotten them on five posts in a row, you’re doing a lot right.

10. The First 25 Email Signups. You’re showing momentum, keep up the good work.

11. The 1 Year Anniversary of Your Blog. This shows real commitment. Don’t look back with an eye toward what you did wrong. Look at what you did right. Build on the positive, otherwise you’ll discourage yourself into a bad case of writers block.

12. Hitting 10,000 Unique Visitors in a Single Month. This doesn’t mean 10,000 different people visited. Unique visitors (hits) are time sensitive. If I visit your blog, log off and then visit again in an hour or so, I’ll be counted twice. But it’s still a number to be celebrated.

13. Getting More than 10 Comments on a Single Post. Pay close attention when this happens, it means you hit a nerve with your audience. Build on what works.

14. A Comment Saying they Were Referred to Your Blog. This means your audience is sharing your blog. It’s a big deal and important to celebrate.

15. The 100th Blog Post. Writing 100 blog posts means that you’ve published around 65,000 words (probably more). That’s almost an entire book. You have proven you can do it and it’s time to celebrate.

Other Milestones to Celebrate as Your Blog Continues to Grow:

• Yearly Anniversaries.
• 100, 200, 300, etc. Subscribers.
• 200th, 300th, 500th, etc. post.
• 100 Unique Visitors in a Single Day.
• 1000 Unique Visitors in a Single Day.

SPECIAL NOTE: These celebrations won't come in this exact order. Healthy blog growth isn't linear. Here's a blog post I wrote about How Fast Should My Blog Grow. 

These are the things I celebrated, and encourage others to make note of. What would you add to the list? Be sure to leave your thoughts in the comments section below.

Don’t forget to join the conversation!

Blessings,

Edie

TWEETABLES

Think you have nothing to celebrate with your blogging endeavors? Not true – #SocialMedia Mentor @EdieMelson (Click to Tweet)

Celebrate the progress with your #blog -#SocialMedia Mentor @EdieMelson has a list of things to look for (Click toTweet)