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DOUBLE Pinterest Repins in Just One Month (no fancy app needed)

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

DOUBLE Pinterest Repins in Just One Month (no fancy app needed - REALLY!) There is one secret tip that works without having to pay for high dollar courses or trying to figure out a fancy algorithm. Click here because you can EASILY do this! @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

When I joined Pinterest I had no idea it would be my number one referrer and still is for many years now. There wasn’t any information or solid tips on how to increase your reach like we have today. In the beginning, finding solutions to how to grow Pinterest to my current 52K followers felt like groping through the unknown. What I’ve learned through it though is to trust my instincts like I’ve done to this point. And I’m giddy because I figured out another secret tip that I can’t wait to share with you. Today, I’m going to tell you how to double pinterest repins in just one month and no you don’t have to buy one more app or take one more high dollar course to learn this secret.

I won’t keep you hanging long, but first you have to see my December stats below to appreciate how stale my repins had become. I’m sure you can relate to my struggle of not only trying to stay ahead of Pinterest but keep up with the other changes on social media.

Too, Pinterest changed to adding Picked for You pins which competes for the pins you want your followers to see. I mean that is why somebody is following you because they want to see your pins right? But that is another thread. The point is there is more competition than ever.

Like most professional bloggers, I started using tailwind and had been using ahalogy when it first came out to schedule my pins. I tried scheduling with both tailwind and ahalogy at the same time and even increased my pins per day but look at the picture below from December.

I just felt like I was spinning my wheels because just scheduling pins alone did not boost my repins.

In December, 2016 I just couldn’t get over the 6K or 7K repins and it was that way for MONTHS. If I took a snippet of each month before December, they would all look similar.

Getting Back to My Roots

So (drum roll please, sorry) instead of following one more fancy algorithm, I simply went back to my roots. I went back to doing what grew my Pinterest fast in the first place which is to pin naturally.

I know it may sound stressful to do one more thing with your limited time when you think you can schedule it. But if you want your repin rate to increase, the key is that you have to still pin organically too.

Especially if Pinterest is your number one referrer, like it is for me, it commands my respect and that means time.

Want to see the results of pinning each week with not really a set schedule? What I mean is that though my pins were scheduled for that week with tailwind and ahalogy like they’ve been for several months before, I didn’t follow a set schedule of pinning naturally. I just pinned.

While I was on my laptop preparing my blog posts or having my morning brew, I pinned one or two pins. In the evening when I’m on, I pinned a few more pins here and there.

Look at the results below. My repin rate went from 76% in December to 177% in January!

And to keep this simple because I always love things explained to me in a not technical Tina fashion, look at how the repin rate went up each week as you can see from my email.

It’s easier to see the growth this way because sometimes the graph is not so user friendly. I started pinning naturally again in January and every week thereafter.

Jan 2  –  6723 repins
Jan 9  –  8330 repins
Jan 16  –  10050 repins
Jan 23  –  11077 repins
Jan 30  –  12760 repins

And February has well over 13k repins as I have continued to pin naturally when I’m on my device.

I just pinned naturally each day. That is the other important key. Be consistent and do it each day. That is really how I grew fast in the beginning by doing something I love and being consistent in sharing high quality content.

If you’re like me, you have tons to do each day as a blogger or social media manager, sot I didn’t repin every pin. My tailwind scheduler did most of the work, but it did not give me the same results as when I pinned along naturally with it.

I hope that tidbit can be a saving grace for you. You don’t have to pin every pin naturally, you just need to pin some of them.

I’ve learned another lesson in managing my own content which is keep doing what I’ve done no matter what fancy scheduler or supposedly scientific research comes along.

Pinterest is about natural engagement. Try it! And see if it doesn’t work. Just remember my pointers, you need to be consistent, still use your favorite scheduler and have fun. Track your repin rate.

Also, check out my other tips about Pinterest on Pinterest Secret – The 3Cs of a Smart Pin. From a Homeschool Mom Who Grew Her Followers to 35K Without Complicated Algorithms and 11 Amazing Tips To Grow Pinterest That You Need to Know NOW.

Hugs and love ya,

Signature T

Don’t forget to follow BOTH of my Pinterest accounts for AWESOME pins.

Visit Tina Robertson’s profile on Pinterest.


Visit Tinas Dynamic Homeschool ‘s profile on Pinterest.

If you love printable planners as much as I do, you’ll love my Forever Blog Planner.

Forever Blog Planner. Detailed pages and organized.

And I’m proud to co-author iBlog Pro.

You’re writing and writing and…writing. You’re not even sure you like writing any more (if you ever did!) You’re putting your life out there, and it feels great. But maybe, just maybe, you’re feeling the pull toward something MORE.

Maybe you’d like your blog to generate enough income to cover its costs. Maybe you have a great idea for a product to offer, but aren’t sure how to bring it to market. Ready to take your blog to the next level with the 2nd book in the iBlog series?

Free Rolling To-Do List (for your Homeschool or Blog Planner)

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

Free Rolling To-Do List (for your Homeschool or Blog Planner) @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool PlusBlogging goals are somewhat like homeschooling goals, but not exactly when it comes to meeting deadlines. As I homeschool, I only have the goals for my children that I want to meet.

As a homeschool blogger I collaborate with others. That means there are some deadlines, goals and tasks that need to be done, which are out of my control.

Also, some of the tasks that I need to do can wait for weeks and months and others need to be addressed quickly. Still other goals or projects require multiple steps that don’t necessarily go on the blog pages I use now for each month.

I know you don’t necessarily follow me because you blog, but I do know that certain times in your homeschool journey you have much to do as well and need a place to dump it.

Flexible Rolling To-Do List

So because I needed this form for my blog and I know you probably could use it too for your homeschool or blog, I am sharing this Rolling To-Do List with you freely instead of adding it to my Forever Blog Planner.

Forever Blog Planner 361 pages. The Ultimate Blog Planner @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus store

The reason I named it a rolling to-do list is because there is no date on it for each month. You just keep adding your to-dos and rolling them over onto the next page while you mark off what you have completed.

I will be placing my rolling to-do list pages at the front of my blog planner for now.

As I complete the tasks, I will check them off or put an arrow if I need to move that task forward to another page.

Like I mentioned, I can check off the list and keep using another page or rewrite a task if I want to onto another page.

It’s a place to dump all that is on your mind.

This rolling list just lets me keep on adding and scrolling through it and it is flexible. I don’t have to decide which month to put a task at the moment. I just simply note it to get it off my mind.

 

I love forms that are flexibility and I’m excited to use it. I hope you can use it as well.

Download the Free Rolling Printable To-Do List Here.

Also look at these other snazzy forms you may like: How to Choose the BEST Homeschool Lesson Planning Pages THIS Year, Homeschool Quarter Planning Form – Free UNIQUE 7 Step Planner and How to Grade a Homeschool Unit Study for an Older Child (& high school assessment).

Hugs and love ya,

Signature T

Don’t forget to follow BOTH of my Pinterest accounts for more AWESOME pins.

Visit Tina Robertson’s profile on Pinterest.


Visit Tinas Dynamic Homeschool ‘s profile on Pinterest.

Add 1004 Blog Subscribers in 26 Days – From Feedblitz to Mad Mimi

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

How to Add 1004 Blog Subscribers in 26 Days @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

You know what is better than analyzing blog stats? Learning how to add 1004 blog subscribers in 26 days with almost no cost, but with a rewarding payoff.

Is a Slow Start Really Necessary?

When I first started my blog (2 1/2 years ago), I looked at several newsletter providers or rather I should say email delivery providers. My top four choices at the time were Mad Mimi, Mail Chimp, Feedblitz and Mail Poet.

I chose feedblitz because sending out blog posts with a rss feed “newsletter type” format was not time consuming.

What do I mean by that? I need to explain first about what it means to be clear about your goal when you begin to blog.

The absolute number one goal is awesome content. Time is needed to find your voice and sharpen your focus. Did I mention that takes time?

Mommyhood alone makes finding the time to prepare a well written newsletter that bubbles with your personality and tips that you are burning to share seem like a super human feat.

Add homeschooling to the mix, and you almost feel defeated. I say almost because attitude is everything and a huge dose of  patience is key.

What I am saying is that when I first started, Feedblitz allowed me to send a newsletter type of post where I could share all my blog posts without having to take time to add them to my newsletter.

Check a few boxes of what I wanted to send in the feedblitz set up, add my header, and click send was the extent of what I wanted to do at the time. I didn’t have to recreate the blog posts like you do in a newsletter format with Mad Mimi.

In Mam Mimi, you add images and some text or all the text and prepare like a newsletter. Feedblitz used the images you already have on your blog and there is very little to no writing that I had to do.

This is important to understand when choosing how to communicate with your followers in the beginning days of blogging.

I needed time to focus on my blog (and homeschool first) and not prepare a newsletter right away. Getting my content to my followers and growing my list were my goals for the first two years. First things first.

See, I don’t believe that delivering a newsletter (content yes) to your followers is the first goal when you are a beginner blogging. You can’t do that and blog stunning content daily.

Oh, you could, but would it be as snazzy? Probably not.

Feedblitz (and yes it has a huge techie learning curve) had more bells and whistles than the other providers and I started off with their free trial period.

Their price scale for paying for subscribers was nice and slow in the beginning. The best part was that  I could pay for a year and get a discount and it locks in the present number of subscribers.

This means that if my subscribers increase and fall into another price bracket before the year is up, I am still paid up and not paying for those extra subscribers.

I could also send newsletters on demand. This means I could communicate with my followers about anything without or without having blogging content.

This allowed me to communicate with my followers in a more personal way when I needed to.

Also, by using feedblitz initially, I could focus on creating products in my shop.

Lesson 1 Learned: When you’re a beginner blogger, use the best email service with the most bells and whistles you can get and not the best newsletter service. You have to focus first on content, your blog goals and product.

However, the time came to move on to the second part of my blogging business goals, which are to increase followers rapidly, make money beyond just paying for blog expenses and sharing tips in my newsletters too.

I don’t want to wait for five years to do that.

Up Your Game

However, being a budget savvy blogger is also important.  I noticed how Feedblitz moves up significantly to a huge price bracket when you reach between 500o to 9,999 followers ,which is where I am right now. And having 5K followers is not near like having 10K followers. That is just too wide of a gap to pay one price.

Enter Mad Mimi.

I went back to the newsletter providers I had researched earlier to compare prices now that my subscribers are knocking on 9K.

Knowing now that I had successfully accomplished a huge techie learning curve with Feedblitz, I was ready for Mad Mimi.

My focus now is on sharing creative homeschooling tips in a newsletter while I add my blogging content that is now overflowing.

Did I mention that Mad Mimi is cheaper as well?

Mad Mimi costs $27.00 for 5,000 subscribers and $42.0o dollars for 10,000 subscribers. Feedblitz cost $75.00 for 5,000 to 9,999. See what I had noticed?

Mad Mimi has a price increase that goes up slowly, as it should, as you build your list instead of such a huge range in followers, which costs more with Feedblitz.

Not only that but Mad Mimi is super easy to use, beautiful and very user friendly for both blogger and follower. It makes sending my blog posts and a time worthy newsletter super simple too.

However, the other significant part of using Mad Mimi is that when I started using Mad Mimi, my subscribers have doubled for the day. I have gone from 20+ subscribers each day to 40+ and I  am working on tripling them now.

The other thing I am using is the free icegram which I brag about a lot. You can use one of their premade popups or create your own graphic, which I did. Mad Mimi and icegram have made for a great partnership with minimal cost.

Feedblitz just recently got web forms that you can create, but before that the web forms were poor quality. Though it didn’t affect my growing significantly, it did not contribute to it either.

Icegram allows me to show my personality and create a warm invitation to follow me.

Lesson 2 Learned: I trusted my gut instead of going with Mad Mimi, Mail Chip or even Mail Poet (which I like too) in the beginning. It’s important to change when you need to and more importantly your newsletter provider should help you grow rapidly. Too, it doesn’t have to cost a lot to grow your followers if you’re willing to stay flexible. And web forms are important and should be inviting and easy to use for both blogger and subscriber.

Now that I have added 1004 subscribers for the last 26 days and growing substantially each day by now using Mad Mimi, I hope these steps will help you to grow just as fast.

Do you have any questions?

Also, be sure to grab the beginner blog tips at my 5 Days of Homeschool Blogging Basics: Purpose, Plan, Performance, Persistence and Payoff.

I know you will love 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.

Forever Blog Planner Preview @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

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Also, check out the must-have book, iBlog Pro, by homeschool bloggers, I am proud to be a co-author.

iBlog Pro by iHomeschool Network

Hugs and love ya,

Tina Signature 2015c

Don’t forget to follow BOTH of my Pinterest accounts for more AWESOME pins.

Visit Tina Robertson’s profile on Pinterest.


Visit Tinas Dynamic Homeschool ‘s profile on Pinterest.

 

How Not to Read my blog

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

 

Tips on How to Not Read Blogs

Blame Kelley for this post. Or, okay, maybe thank her for this. She thinks sharing with you how I organize and cope with the gazillion posts/emails I get each day may help some of you receive more benefit from the blogosphere. I agree.  Also because my blog pace may not be so unhurried from now on because of all I will be sharing, I wanted to pass on a few tips on how to organize and still read all of your favorite blogs without looking for the unsubscribe button.

Before I share a few tips there are some things that are important for readers to understand when they join a blog.

    • Understand that bloggers come in a variety of personalities AND this affects the layout of their blogs. From how they deliver their content to you, to when they do it, to what they blog about gives you a clear picture of their personality. You may say this is a given, but I promise I will give you an example real soon, but you’d be surprised at the people that don’t get this.
    • Personality, experience and background affects the blogger when they speak whether it is in generalities or whether it is very detailed and specific. One guess where I am on this sliding scale? Obviously the longer that a blogger has been doing something and the more experience they have gives them a treasure trove of tidbits to draw from.
    • Some bloggers only worry about numbers — that is the unsubscribe and new follower numbers. Those type of bloggers never make blogging a passionate hobby but only a business. They do not inspire a reader because their time is focused on pleasing folks instead of persuading them. Forget the numbers and foster a relationship with the reader is my mantra.

Tips for organizing and reading blog posts 5.2.2013

    • Maintain a separate email JUST for blog posts. I have an email account that is just for reading blog posts and yep I love it. It is an account that nobody has the email to and is used to receive only  blog posts.  Some readers unsubscribe from a blog claiming “too many updates”, but are they really? Or are they just filling up your personal or main inbox to the point that you can’t enjoy them? Besides your main inbox not being cluttered up, you can read on your own timetable AND read them all in one setting.  It is so nifty to look at a whole page or 20 blog posts at one time for the day and read the ones that interest me. With the abundance of phones, tablets and iPads, having a free email account which is just for blogs makes it very enjoyable for me to check when I am in the mood.
    • Subject lines matter to me a LOT. Not all bloggers feel this way but you should help them along if their subject lines are not specific because it can waste your valuable time. Give them feedback, help them grow and improve as a blogger. I know I value your comments and always welcome them. To show you how much I do not want to waste your time, I use Feed Blitz email dispersal, which is not free, because I want you to get blog posts with a SPECIFIC subject in each blog post. When I see blog posts that say “Here is what So and So had to say today” I cringe because I am forced to open it up before I know what it contains. Having the option to delete the blog post or browse until you find one that interests you is a huge time saving tip.  So read my subject lines as I take much care to be sure you know exactly what I have for you each day. This is the example of what I was talking about when I say “personality comes into layout”.
    • Where is the fire? Take your time reading. If you have a separate email account, then there is no rush to reading your blog emails for the day and it’s a breeze to look at all of them at one time. Look to see if there are any time sensitive posts like a giveaway and read those first, otherwise read on your time table.
    • Understand the blogging cycle. Not all bloggers give specifics on what they blog about, but I do. If a blog failed to give you specifics, the very name of the blog should give you a hint of what is the mainstay or common weave of blogging topics. Not all bloggers have a variety of topics to blog about either, but if they do, most of them follow a sort of cycle. For example: Look at my blogging description: Dynamic 2 Moms Homeschooling Adventures: Our blogging pace is unhurried as we share our free printables first on our blog.  Unit studies,  lapbooks,  notebooking  pages, Free 7 Step Curriculum Planner,  Free Student Planners, Free Home Management Binder,  organizing  tips for homeschool,  homeschool curriculum review and some education for the educator are all things we like to share.  Because I homeschool, mothering and homeschool always comes first above my love for curriculum, home management binders, curriculum planners and anything else I blog about. I feel that my topics are like a blogging cycle and I address each one as I plod along. When I read an email that says “content no longer” it only tells me that the person did not read carefully what I blog about. That is all, it is not a personal affront and my life is blessed by each person that comes here.
    • Personalities Differ. One night, I had a nightmare thinking I blogged about how my toddler {when I had one} did poo for the day and all were to hail him and rejoice. Thankfully I have never done that and feel over sharing about personal things makes for drudgery. Who cares about my toddler’s potty habits besides me and his dad? Okay– maybe grandma.  However, when I do talk about topics I am talkative passionate and tend to be the  “detailed and like to give a lot of information” person.  At times I prefer to send one or more posts at one time instead of each day. Overwhelmed people may think they need to scroll and read all the posts in that long rolling scroll. They do not. Again, bloggers do this so that you have choices. If you are interested, read them all, if not, use the subject line and delete that post. Like I explained above, give yourself time to go through a cycle on a blog by doing your part as a reader by organizing all the content you get.

Every blogger has a style whether it’s general and all over the place or being finely tuned to details. I appreciate both kinds of personalities as the blogosphere needs all of them to round us out. Appreciating that helps to make a better fit for you.

Take your time poring over all the blogs you enjoy, organize them and read them when it’s good for you.  Reading your favorite blogs will be something you eagerly look forward to each day.

Hugs and love ya,