Ah, the first week of the new year! A fresh start! This is a time of year where many of us are thinking of our goals and aspirations for the new year ahead.
As well as thinking about my personal aims for the year – well, basically to just have fun with my family and remember people’s birthdays! – I have been thinking about my blogging plans for 2017. If you are a blogger, you might also be doing the same. If not you might be yawning right now – sorry! Maybe check out an easy recipe for Valentines instead?! Or read on if you are interested…!
Anyway, I like to hear about other people’s goals, as it gives me inspiration for my own. So here I’m sharing my blogging bucket list for 2017!
Inspired by the wonderful Aby at You Baby Me Mummy – my blogging guru – I’ve written down my goals. Do check out her site if you haven’t already!
My word of the year is QUALITY. As a full time mum I have little spare time generally and it can be hard to fit blogging in with everything else. Lately, I have felt overwhelmed with all of the tasks that I have to do – and want to do. Like many mums I sometimes feel like I am trying to do ten things at once, or rushing from one thing to another. Sometimes I feel like I can’t enjoy or focus on something, because I’m thinking about all the other things I need to do. And then there’s the mum guilt.. You know what I mean?! It’s time for all of that to STOP!
So my main priority this year is to SLOW down and FOCUS on one thing at a time. With QUALITY time and effort invested in that one thing I can be more productive. I love that this can extend to my personal and family life too. Whether it be writing a blog post, sharing on social media, or spending time with my kids, I aim to focus on the QUALITY of that thing or experience. Be present and be focused basically! I have a plan of how to divide up my time, so I can put this goal into place. Of course my kids always come first and I love spending time with them. But it’s time to also plan in blogging time so I can make my blogging goals happen!
Most of my blogging goals are a little bit statistic-y and specific – so I’ve condensed them a little bit here, to give you more of a general idea!
1. Email subscriber content
This is a biggie! Email subscriptions are something I’ve been avoiding like the plague, which is ridiculous as one of the most important things to me (blogging wise!) is to have regular, interested readers. I’m most excited about this goal, especially now I’ve finally committed to tackling it! Watch this space! I’m going to sort out my email newsletter, create exclusive new content for subscribers and start giving people more of a reason to read my blog!
2. Build my Twitter to 3000
This is relatively ambitious! (Currently at 1125). But I think doable with hard work. Twitter is my biggest following, so it makes sense to continue to build on it. Wait, are you following me yet?!
3. Start a YouTube channel
This is something that I have wanted to do for ages, but terrifies me! I’ve decided I just need to go for it though! I want to start by just experimenting with the type of content that I like and go from there…
4. Build my Pinterest following to 1000
My Pinterest following is small, but of all the social media channels it’s actually my biggest referrer of traffic. I also want to focus on more ‘how to’s, crafts, recipes and activities on the blog, so focusing on Pinterest a lot makes sense. I have basically done zero to encourage Pinterest followers thus far – apart from putting pinnable images on my posts! Having a properly planned out strategy is going to help me achieve this goal.
5. Increase my page views
Congrats if you’re still with me – told you was a bit statistic – y! My page views are currently around 2500 a month. I plan to increase to 4000 by the end of the year, by using a properly planned social media strategy.
6. Build Facebook and Instagram
Okay, so lots of my goals are based on building followers! I would say this is the part of blogging that I like the least, hence the focus on it. I LOVE being creative and creating new content. I love doing fun projects, taking photos and writing posts. But, promoting myself and building a following… I find harder. I get overwhelmed by the ‘noise’ of it all. I don’t use social media much in my personal time, so have found it hard to adjust in the blogging world. But social media is part and parcel of any blog or business – if you want to grow. So I’m committed to building my following! I’m aiming for 1000 on Instagram and 500 on Facebook. Come follow me!
7. Do two guest posts.
I have interacted with other bloggers a lot through linkies (where you link your posts up on someone else blog!) but am yet to guest post on anyone’s blog. I think this would be good for me to encourage collaboration – and fun too!
So that’s it! My blogging bucket list for 2017! Apparently you are 42% more likely to achieve your goals by writing them down – Aby says so it must be true!!!
I hope my blogging bucket list might be interesting to you if you are a blogger, or even if you are not! Although, if you are thinking about starting a blog, what better time to start?! Blogging is one of the best things I have ever done (part from becoming a mummy of course!) and definitely makes me a better mum.
Whatever your goals for 2017 – let’s all smash them!
What are your goals for 2017? Do you have blogging or personal goals for the year?
This is a fab bucket list and I agree quality is so important and I’m learning to have better quality than quantity. YouTube is a goal I’m working on but so so scary for me… it’s a huge hurdle to overcome.
You can do it!!!! Let’s both brave out of our comfort zone… xx
Yes this is a great list 🙂 so focused. I know what you mean about social media – I don’t really use it personally but I’ve been getting into for the blog. But it isn’t as fun as crafting posts 🙂 Need to work on that in 2017.
It’s so hard isn’t it? I think if you are not a big social media user personally it can be harder to get into. But on the plus side I perhaps get less sidetracked by it and see it more as work! Good luck with your goals! x
Great set of goals I need to look at my mailing list too as I don’t have it sorted at all!! Good idea to have numbers on followers too. Good luck with your goals and 2017 xx #thelist