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One Year Blogging Anniversary

kaylaannauthor

I received my official notice from WordPress yesterday that I have been blogging on WordPress for over a year now!

I can’t believe that it has been a year already! I feel like it was only months ago that I started to consider blogging and then when I first posted by blog post, I thought, this would never work. That first month was so rough and so uncertain, but now, a year out, it was so worth it!

I have posted over 250 blog posts! I have gained 1,800 followers! And more importantly, I have found an incredible writing/blogging community here on WordPress that is irreplaceable! The friendships I have formed here have encouraged my growth as a writer and I am so glad for that decision I made a year ago to embark on this journey.

Published by kaylaannauthor

43 thoughts on “One Year Blogging Anniversary”

  2. Pingback: One Year Blogging Anniversary — KaylaAnn | Ups and Downs of Family History V2.0

  6. Impressive!

    I’m nearly 3 months into my journey, with almost 300 followers, and 88 posts. I feel like I’m engaging my audience at a comfortable pace, but your numbers show me there’s room for improvement.

    Out of curiosity, do you comment a lot? Is there one or more actions you took that helped boost your followers?

    Any information you’re willing to share is greatly appreciated. I’ve been able to build thousands of followers on Twitter, but still trying to solve the WordPress puzzle.

    Thank you.
    Brian

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    1. Hey Brian, and thank you!
      300 in 3 months is a great pace! There’s always room for improvement for you, for me, even for the person who reaches 5,000 followers in the first year. We can always work to better ourselves.

      I am really big on reciprocal relationships. I do my best to comment (although sometimes it gets difficult). Ideally, I comment on at least two different blog posts (from different bloggers a day). Even more ideally, I check out the work of those who have liked or commented on my stuff. If they’ve taken the time to check me out, I try to run over to their blog and check them out.

      WordPress is definitely a community and I’ve grown, I think, mainly through engaging that community through real relationships, reciprocal visiting, liking, reading, and commenting, blog parties, and contests.

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      1. Last night, after thinking about this conversation, I decided to run a test. I searched on a few different categories that closely resemble my site, like “Free Verse”, then visited numerous sites, commented, and followed the sites I really liked. I had a lot of time, so I probably visited and commented at least 100 sites. When I started, I was at 292 followers. I woke up this morning with 308, a net gain of 16 followers. I’m also on track for my most visitors, views, likes, and comments. I say all that to say this, for anyone reading the comments, if your site isn’t getting the traffic you want, taking time to visit a like-minded audience really works, versus the “Field of Dreams” scenario (build-it-and-they-will-come). 🙂

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        1. Your findings do not surprise me at all. We get what we put out on WordPress. Also, I love that you said “I followed the sites I really liked” because authenticity is so key. Some people think that if they go around and follow every single site that pops up on their reader, that everyone will turn around and do the same. But that’s just not how it works. We should only follow sites we are genuinely interested in because more than likely, if you’re a writer and you’re following a mommy-and-me blog (without being a mommy) that mommy probably won’t be interested in your blog. It’s not about reaching the most people, but about reaching the right people who (like you said) “closely resemble our own sites.”

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          1. Funny, I actually follow a mom site, but in my defense, I have my kids as a single dad for about 4 months a year. Those mom sites offer a lot of great advice! I learned how to braid my daughter’s hair from a blog. hehe 🙂 — completely agree with everything you said. 🙂

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            1. Oh I totally get what you mean! I follow a handful of non-writing sites like beauty or lifestyle or travel just because I like the writing style or find the blogger fun to read! There’s always that exception to the “rule.” 😅

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