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Purpose, Plan, Performance, Persistence and Payoff.

5 Days of Homeschool Blogging Basics.

Day 5 Payoff.

Read Day 1. Purpose here, read Day 2. Plan here, read Day 2 1/2. Plan here, read Day 3. Performance here and read Day 4. Persistence here.

Measuring the success of a blog is different for everyone.

Promoting Your Blog to Payoff

Before I discuss that though, I want to share a few more ways to promote your blog that will give you a measure of payoff.

• Purposeful Linking Up.

Linking up at other (not necessarily larger and will explain in a minute) blogs will keep your blog content out there and is a great way to promote.

Because a blogger took the time to prepare a post and has graciously allowed me to put content on her blog, I am sure to read all the guidelines and put on each blog post where it is linked up at.

When I say purposeful linking up that means I look for blogs in my niche of homeschooling, which means it may or may not have a large audience. My first priority is reach my niche and then my second priority is to join those link ups where my blog posts will be featured on more than one blog.

That is what I mean by the fact that one blog may not necessarily have a large following, but together with the other blogs, it may.

• Niche Round Ups

Another successful way of promoting traffic to your blog is a round up of posts about your niche.

It takes the work out of the research for your followers and gives them a specific place to find a lot of what they are looking for or want, whether it’s craft, organization or how to teach reading.

Other bloggers love to network, so you don’t need to ask permission to link to them, but using their images can be quite another thing.

I am careful when doing rounds up to read all I can on a blog if she has something specific about her images and respect copyright. Too, sometimes it’s better to have your own image. If in doubt, don’t use the images.

Some bloggers don’t mind you using their images if you ask and generously give you permission, but other bloggers make their livelihood off of their images and will not want you using their images.

If you do use images, use the same standard you want to be treated, which is give attribution or credit where it is due.

It does not make you a powerful blogger when you cannot graciously and generously give respect and credit when it’s due.

• Powerful content before Page views.

Again, the most important thing you can do to build your blog successfully the first year or two is to focus on powerful content.

What I didn’t do in my first year was to focus on page views, but to focus on my passion. Too, with the powerful Google analytics installed on your blog, you can check insights anytime.

I write my stats down about once a month and move on. They are a good indicator of whether my content was engaging or not, but they also can sidetrack you from payoff.

From Passion to Profession

Like I noted in my post on Day 1. Purpose, profit can’t be your only initial driving force.

You have to be passionate and enthusiastic about what you share because that spirit is contagious.

When you have benefited from some advice or a product and share that genuinely, followers know.

But knowing how to make a blog pay for itself is a must know because then your blog does become a business.

It’s got to be the ultimate payoff when you can do something that you are stoked about each day and that makes a profit.

Look at these ways that have all contributed to making a profit.

• When my blog reached about 75K to 1ook page views, which was about 4 months, I started selling ad space to sponsors in my niche. Believe me, I didn’t have much time for a learning curve with pricing. I had to learn quick. Can you see why I said on Day 3. Performance that you want to install Google Analytics soon? You can now bargain for ad space with potential sponsors.
• In addition, after about 5 months, I applied for Google Adsense, which is a way of being paid for ads on my blog. Again, because this is my blog, I can control what type of ads go on my blog. Google Adsense is almost a book unto itself to learn, but it’s easy to apply for and I read minimal information to get it started on my site.
• Affiliate links are another source of income. Affiliate links means that when somebody clicks on a link that you provide on your blog and buys something you get a percentage of the sell. This does not cost your follower more and most companies are glad to partner with you because it would be a sell they would have not gotten.
• Writing outside articles. Another source of income is writing articles for other companies.
• Homeschool or product reviews. Before I was with iHN, I was with another large homeschool review company, which still does not pay its bloggers for their time. Soon after joining them I left because I realized I spent hours on top of hours poring over all the curriculum or a product that a company gave me. I take reviews seriously and my time has to be compensated. Some homeschool companies still do not know how to work with bloggers and feel that giving us just free homeschool curriculum is enough for a review. From the beginning of starting this blog, I refused reviews where I was not compensated for my time. It’s up to us as professional bloggers to tout to sponsors that being paid for time is not being paid off. Do not start your blog off by underestimating your time. Companies need to recognize the power bloggers have to broadcast about their product. Never compromise your standard for a product and your followers will know that you are honest, candid and genuine.
• Having a product to sell. Something else I provide at an affordable price is a way for my followers to make their own unique 7 Step Homeschool Planner. I was bent on writing a book in my first year of blogging, but realized that I wanted time to mull over my thoughts. What I did right was to provide something (or a product) that my followers wanted, which are planner pages that are unique. Along each 7 steps of building their homeschool planner, my followers can choose from free or paid pages. My free pages too are pages I love and I give my followers my best always. Having a product that can be purchased night or day, year after year is passive income.
• Brand Ambassador. I am proud to be a brand ambassador for Bright Ideas Press. I value long term relationship and especially get excited about using and promoting products I believe in. Is there a product or curriculum that makes your heart go pitter patter?Then you may make a great brand ambassador for that company, but you have to pitch yourself first.

These are all ways that I have earned income that not only paid my blog expenses my first year, but gave me a profit.

Key to making more than just paying my expenses has been having multiple ways of making money.

When You Should Compromise the Trust of Your Followers

Even though my blog has scooted along to well over 100K page views, I am humbled by the fact that it has only been because of my faithful following.

What I have learned as I now finish up my second year is that the trust of my followers are worth more than any dollar amount any sponsor may pay me.

Making a profit in my first and second year of blogging has been a sweet unexpected surprise. But also, part of a successful payoff for me is being able to stay true to my conviction of being just who I am.

Following guidelines of treating followers how I want to be treated when buying my products, giving the good, bad and ugly of any product I review and sharing candid and genuine posts are ultimate payoffs for me too.

In this 5 Days of Homeschool Blogging turned 6 Days of Homeschool Blogging series, I feel I have barely scratched the surface of blogging, but wanted to give you a starting point to boost your blog.

I have so many more things to share with you that I have learned this past year too like:

• How to craft a well-laid out post
• How to take a deeper look at SEO
• How to design top rated graphics for Pinterest
• Understanding the analytics of Pinterest
• How to intentionally promote your content
• How to brainstorm topics
• How to choose blog courses that are worth your time
• How to pitch a company
• How to find your blogging voice and not lose it
• How to properly disclose and post legal information
• How to work with other bloggers
• How to price your time for sponsors’ reviews
• How to price ads on your blogs for sponsors

As I plod along, I will be sharing tips on those topics along with answering your questions because now you have the homeschool blogging basics.

Hugs and you know I love ya and threw a lot at you in this 5 day series turn 6 days,

I have enjoyed sharing different pictures of my Forever Blog Planner that I created much like my 7 Step Homeschool Planner. I know you would love it too because I help you step by step to choose the pages you want in your blog planner and and the best part is that you receive forever updates. Be sure to download the free printable from the planner set.

Also, check out iBlog Pro, Proud to be a Co-Author where you can grab practical tips from homeschool bloggers, like you!

Purpose, Plan, Performance, Persistence and Payoff.

5 Days of Homeschool Blogging Basics.

Day 4 Persistence.

Read Day 1. Purpose here, read Day 2. Plan here, read Day 2 1/2. Plan here and Read Day 3. Performance here.

Having a purpose, planning, and focusing on performance won’t help one bit unless you have dogged determination.

It’s easier setting up a blog by comparison than it is to blog day after day.

Though the postal service doesn’t really have a motto that I am aware of, I am tickled when I think about this motto that has been associated with them.

Rain or shine, snow or sleet, we deliver your mail! (But sunny days are optional…)

Blogging is similar if your purpose is to reach a wider audience.

It takes time to trickle down to your audience through social media, but day to day blogging is key to making your blog stand out from the millions of blog out there.

Defining your purpose will give you impetus to setting up a schedule. For example, your blog may be about just sharing with family and friends and posting one time a week may be perfect.

However, because content is the key way to build an audience, you will want to blog more if you want to grow.

How many days will you blog is only something you can answer, but it goes right to the heart of success along with savoring your passion.

Though I have had to blog pretty slim occasionally over the last year or so (one was a move overseas) by far my habit is blogging regularly, which for me is 4 and normally more times a week or even day to day.

I do love taking off time at the end of the year. I take time off to rejuvenate, step back and recharge because no amount of time or payoff is gained if your passion is lost.

Follow me along in this line of reasoning or example if you want your blog to grow steadily.

If  you blog one month every day with solid awesome content, compare that with somebody who blogs one time a week for the year.

A person who may have blogged longer but less each week may have 52 blog posts (52 weeks in a year) compared to your 30 blog posts for one month.

Can you see the big picture now? And content is exactly what spurred my blog on to having over 100K views now.

The easy part is having a beautiful blog, the hard part is filling it with meaningful, awesome content.

Get Connected! Sharing = A Steady Plodding

Hat 1. Social Media Manager

I’m glad I ignorantly blissfully started blogging because, like homeschooling, if anybody would have told me how many different hats I would be wearing, I may have ran the other way.

Persistence is essential because not only do you have to create awesome and premier content, but next you have to shout it to the world.

A strong social media presence is a must. Though I would rather pull you into my living room and sit down and chat about about all the topics on my mind, social media is the way to stay connected.

A heavy social media presence is key to being sure your content reaches as many as possible.

Think of social media as the second platform on which your blog stands.

Everybody is busy nowadays and that means a variety of social media presence is necessary to promote your blog.

How many should you have? As MANY as you can handle! You will lots and lots of information about the pros and cons of each social media platform.

In the end what I have learned is that you simply have to diversify. People that like facebook may have no presence on Google and vice versa.

One social sharing platform that deserves attention though is Google Plus and not necessarily because it is so social, which is ironic.

However, when your blog is connected to Google and you have a personal profile page, which is different than a page, you want to harness the power of Google to promote your blog.

You don’t have to know all the technical know how, unless you want to, but you do need to see the benefits of having a Google profile.

The most basic benefit for beginners is understanding that about 70% of the searches on the internet are on Google. Don’t you want to play with the big boys?

There are many, many more benefits that go into some technical know how, but bottom line is you want a heavy presence with the big boys, so join them.

Too, Jimmie Lanley is a Google girl and homeschoolmom and a guru in the Google world. She shares many free tips on her site  and it’s worth the visit or two, or ….. to pick her brain.

One key tip to sharing on your social media is to share different content on each social media because each audience is different.

Look at these free and fun ways to help you wear your many hats by using free schedulers for social media.

• Buffer. It is a great free and hard working scheduler. You link your social accounts, choose a schedule and schedule to your heart’s delight. Tip: Install the free extension on Chrome or Firefox and buffer a post or image anywhere you are at on the web.
• Do Share – Chrome extension. There are not any schedulers that I am presently aware that lets you schedule your Google profile. For a business page, it can be linked to Buffer, but not your profile. Downloading the free extension on your browser lets you schedule blog posts on your profile page.
• Tailwind – Though I use and was accepted by Ahalogy as a content partner for Pinterest, pins can be scheduled using Tailwind. Too, now Buffer allows you to schedule for Pinterest.

Hat 2. Technical Guru and Evaluator –

The second hat I had to embrace in order to keep my blog steadily moving along was to look beyond the basics now, which is why I had to pull up and take a closer look at Genesis.

Genesis is a theme, but it is the cadillac of themes. There is a lot to learn about Genesis, but Genesis has some built in help with SEO and the strongest point is the control over customization.

Because many themes do not have the flexibility that Genesis has like, right or left sidebar, multiple sidebars, footer layout, I purchased the powerful Genesis on my blog.

The themes of Genesis are called child themes after you strap on Genesis and from the child themes comes colors, layouts,etc.

So it’s not either or with Genesis or WordPress, you need both.

Think of WordPress as the foundation of your house, Genesis as the room layouts or walls that you may want to switch around as your family grows and the child themes from Genesis as the color of your walls and function of your rooms.

Genesis is slightly different than the other themes though too because once you purchase it, that’s it. You don’t have to purchase it again. Switch around and used free or paid child themes.

I hope that simple explanation helps to explain how they work together.

After learning about how a blog is well built and how much control I wanted, I reevaluated my blog and made upgrades to be in blogging for the long haul.

Look at a few of these fun tools that I enjoy using when I am thinking about design.

• WhatFont – is an easy and fun extension on Chrome. If you like a pretty and easy to read font on a web page, just go to that page with Chrome after you install the free extension, click on WhatFont and it will tell you what fonts are on the website. Fun and easy and no guessing what looks good when you see the font displayed on another website.
• WhatWordPressThemeIsIt – Another fun and nifty tool. If you see a site that makes you pine and you want to know what themes and child themes it is using, put the URL in and you get an idea of what they use.

Hat 3. Schedule, Brainstorm Content

One more free plugin that I intentionally didn’t mention on day 3. Performance was because it deserves a little extra attention and that is the WordPress Editorial Calendar.

I have used trial versions of paid schedulers, but found I like this free plugin better for my purposes right now. This is one of my very favorite plugins that help me to schedule my posts.

Brainstorming topics is different and I tend to write down thoughts right then. So my printable planner is close to me always.

This free plugin is a calendar that I can look at the back end, but more importantly it allows me to drag and move posts if I ever need to move them around. You can even edit right on the calendar.

For example, at a glance I can see what is getting ready to publish and look at the previous month to see what I blogged about.

Look at this snippet from my back end.

If something comes up and I need to reschedule a post, I can drag and drop it where I need to.

I can have several drafts going at one time and see them from here. It is one of my favorite organizing tools for my blog posts.

Sharing ways that I adjusted during the last year have been essential to keeping my blog growing.

When it comes to blogging for the long term, persistence and grit are must-haves.

Making changes where needed and not staying comfortable at status quo are vital to moving ahead and making your blog successful quicker.

Moving into success, my next post on day 5. Payoff, I will share a few tips in how to measure payoff or progress.

Hugs and love ya,

I have been sharing pictures on all these 5 days of blogging from my Forever Blog Planner that I use and look at this one today. Be sure to grab the free printable from Day 1. Purpose.

Also, check out iBlog Pro, Proud to be a Co-Author

Purpose, Plan, Performance, Persistence and Payoff.

5 Days of Homeschool Blogging Basics.

Day 3 Performance.

Homeschool blogging basics Day 1 gave you focus or purpose. Days 2 and 2 1/2, I broke down a 3 part plan and today, on Day 3. performance, I will be sharing some sweet things for what is commonly called the back end that nobody sees, but which keeps the front end looking smokin’ hot.

Stacking Up Stats

Though I whine a bit about it, I promise I’m starting to like the techie things. They gel well with my personality that likes to read the details.

I warn you though, some things to understanding the back side can be years trying to figure out and shorter explanations will just do.

Though I love the free jet pack plugin for a lot of other things, it is not the standard for analytics.

You will want to install Google Analytics right away on your site so that you can start tracking page views, visitors and traffic that is being referred to you.

This can be done by a free plugin. Look at Google Analytics by Yoast.

I didn’t install my google analytics code until about 2 months after I started and if I hadn’t I wouldn’t have known that I was getting right at 75K page views within the first few months.

I will tell you why I give you my starting stats on Day 5. Payoff. For now, be sure to install the superior standard of measuring analytics, which is Google.

If you really want to get adventuresome, my friend Kathy over at Cornerstone Confessions did a beautiful job on a post laying out google terms for when you are digging around your analytics and want to understand it in more detail. It’s worth the time to read if you want to be spurred ahead in your expertise.

One thing I want to mention here because I feel like it goes more with performance is to be sure your website is mobile responsive.  That means that nowadays with more people using smaller devices, you want your website to be able to be viewed optimally across a number of devices. Mobile responsiveness is the term to describe that your blog design can be changed to fit the device. This is important to know because Google ranks your site by being mobile responsive.

Now on to plugins. The best way to show you what plugins you may want is for me to share the ones I use.

Keep in mind, everybody has a different purpose when they download plugins and be careful about overloading your back end with too many plugins because they can slow your website down and that is a huge turnoff for potential followers.

Powerful Packing Plugins

Look at my list of plugins and their function in alphabetical order.

Askimet – One of the most basic and best plugins because it checks comments for spam.
Comment Reply Notification – It took me a year to find this one, but it’s important to me to engage with my audience. So when they take the time to comment, I always take the time to reply BUT they won’t know unless they get notified by this nifty plugin.
Comment Luv – Reward your readers by automatically placing a link to their last blog post at the end of their comment.
Genesis – Featured Widget, Slider, Simple Hooks. These are all plugins that my theme Genesis needs to show the slider on the front page and allows me to place ads on my site. I will explain a bit  about Genesis on Day 4. Persistence.
Scroll Trigger Boxes. I use to have Icegram, which I list below and still love it but have not had time to investigate if Icegram works well with mobile phones and tablets. So I am using scroll trigger boxes to capture new followers. It is free too.
Icegram. There are many free plugins that allow pop ups. I chose this one because I liked it and because I could set the time to pop up for about 20 seconds, which is just the right amount of time for your follower to engage with your content. Don’t set your popup for the second a potential follower lands on your page. They can’t make a decision if they want to follow until they have a chance to look around at your amazing content. Look for popups that can be dealyed so followers have a chance to peek at your goodies.
Jetpack. This is an amazing plugin with all kinds of features that can be “activated” or left dormant and it is a new blogger’s best friend. When I first started up, I used their social sharing buttons because they were easy to configure until I figured out what social sharing bar I wanted.  Too, it’s easier with Jetpack to see how popular posts and pages are doing and I use their contact form to add to my pages. Two other features are worthy of mention. You can use the email feature, which allows you to post on your blog if you are away or not near it or don’t have time to get to the computer. One other free feature is that it allows followers to subscribe to your blog and you don’t have to make a decision right away on a meatier service to have blog followers sign up. All in all it has about 27 features that are very friendly to the new blogger. I also use their publicize function so that when posts are published, it automatically shares to some of my social media.
Pinterest Pin It Button for Images – This allows a pin it button to hoover over your images. Now it does allows you some advance coding and I made my pink button that hoovers on my images to match my site and coded in language, but you don’t have to do that and that is beyond the basics. Update: And as quick as that, something can change. Pinterest Pin It button messed up my images after a while. My technical guy advised I use Frizzly plugin for pinterest buttons.
Related Posts by Zumanga – Again there are numerous free plugins that keep followers on your site by linking content within your site. I loved the look of this one and chose it because I could arrange it like I wanted to. Guess what? Jetpack does this too and it’s called related posts.
UberMenu3 – This plugin is not free and you will see that sometimes you just want something specifically and it’s worth paying for it. Of course, it is better to have a budget to pay for this. I love organization and I kept getting emails about my followers not being able to find certain unit studies or lapbook, so I chose this plugin with a fly out menu. Bam, you see all my unit studies in order and at one time. I love this plugin because organization is important to me
Ultimate Social Deaux – Too,this plugin is not free because the money I have made, I have put back into updating my site and keeping it fresh looking. I was wanting a social sharing plugin that was more flexibility and chose this one. Again, though using the free social sharing with Jetpack works great for beginners and you don’t have to spend a dime on them.
VaultPress – This is a VERY important plugin because I pay to backup my content. I don’t want to have any nightmare stories now or in the future and am doing my best in avoiding getting up one day and all my content being gone. Back it up. It’s important.
WooCommerce – This is a plugin for a store if you are thinking about having one now or in the future.
WP-Optimize – This is one of those babies that keeps your back end clean and cleans up trash posts and otherwise optimizes your content so it keeps running streamlined.
Yoast -This is the easiest SEO plugin I have used and it has kept me on my toes checking my posts to maximize them for SEO.

TIP: SEO Equals Organic (or natural searches, not paid) Results

Moving on to search engine optimization, look at this snippet from my back end as I explain in simple terms what is SEO and how I use the plugin.

Before I understood how to make my posts show up in searches, I had done quite a bit of blogging.

The green is for posts that I have optimized or used an excellent keyword to show up in searches and I figured out using Yoast, which makes it all easy.

As you can see, when I started to learn, I  have  some posts that have yellow on them that I am updating too with what I know now about matching keywords in my title and in my blog post and putting them in the description.

Too, you will notice that I have 86 more posts still to go to find the correct word to put in.

Look at how this plugin works, which is why you don’t have to know so much about SEO, just fill in the information in the box at the bottom of each post and make sure you get the green light before you publish.

Look at this box that comes from my back end on this series.

At the top of the box, you will see what is shown up in google searches or the snippet preview. So it’s important to put key words there that are associated with your topic so people will find you when researching for those terms.

Then I had a focus keyword, which is homeschool blogging.

The SEO title is what shows up in the searches and the meta description is what is explained under the SEO title and helps others who are searching to read a “preview” for your post.

Notice how all the parts were “answered” in green showing my posts is set for optimum seo. This plugin  is just the tip of the iceberg so to speak in understanding SEO.

Though this plugin helps to be sure that your posts are primed for searching, the key to understanding SEO is to understand key words people are searching on google. It’s good to have your posts “green” or the green light on your posts, you want to start understanding what key words people are searching for.

This is enough for a basics course, but I wanted to give you something to chew when you get ready to dive into deeper topics.

Too, I had mentioned in Day 1. Purpose about shortened links. There has been much back/forth about having shorter URLS, but my research has shown that key in perma (permanent) link is to be sure your link to your blog or post has key words.

Looking back, I wished I had left off the date on my posts and I still can if I use a redirect, but that part hasn’t really affected the growth of my blog.

It’s just something I wished I would have done differently in the beginning. Look here at the picture of my back end for setting the permalink when you set up your blog.

Go to SETTINGS > PERMALINKS

You have a choice now of keeping your permalink short by choosing the option for POST NAME and not the one I have done with the date.

Too, another advantage over not choosing the date is that nobody really can tell when you blog and your posts don’t become dated and it goes hand in hand with evergreen content on your blog.

Phew, did you get all of that?

Now on to day 4. Persistence because that is when you need to re-evaluate, sharpen your vision again and persist in doing what you started off doing! I will be sharing more nuggets of experience.

Hugs and love ya,

I love my blog planner that I created uniquely like my 7 Step Homeschool Planner where you build it step by step. I have been sharing different pictures on each of these days and you can read more about my Forever Blog Planner here.

Also, check out iBlog Pro, Proud to be a Co-Author