My third month officially blogging at kaijumaddy.com is in the books! While I feel like I did less work on my blog in August, I think it was a very successful month. I’m starting to see steady and sustainable increases in traffic which I think is thanks in part to the Pinterest strategy I’ve been following. In July, I was disappointed to see that my traffic was basically half of what I had seen in June, but I stuck with it and I’m glad I did. Let’s dig in!

 

August 2018 Blog Stats

Number of Posts: 12

• Posts Published: 11
• Freebies Written: 1

 

Pageviews: 4,070

 

July 2018 Pageviews: 2,508

June 2018 Pageviews: 5,051

 

Most Viewed Posts:

• 14 Free Friendship Bracelet Patterns
• 16 Planner Inspiration Pages
• 11 Free Crochet Patterns for Summer
• 11 Crochet Along Projects
• Bullet Journal Ideas: Astrology Chart

 

Top Traffic Sources:

• Pinterest. Like I said above, Pinterest started bringing in traffic at a more steady rate, and I think it’s in part to using Tailwind to schedule out my own content and repinning relevant external pins. I’m noticing a theme in my most popular pins and it might shape the direction that my blog will focus on — crafts. I received 677 clicks on this pin alone for my friendship bracelet pattern post.
• (direct) / (none). I talked about this one in my last blog report, and it’s a little hard to nail down where this traffic came from exactly. Mobile apps, messenger links, etc. all can attribute to this.
• Facebook. I’ve basically all but stopped using blog-focused Facebook groups to share my post in hopes to get traffic, but I do add my posts to any relevant niche-topic group pages if it makes sense to do so. I also share my kaijumaddy Facebook posts onto my personal page if I think it’s something my friends would be interested in.

 

Income: $30.65

• Affiliates: $26.21
  • Grammarly. I wrote about Grammarly in my post about 7 Essential Tools for New Bloggers, and as an activation bonus, I got $25!
  • Amazon Affiliates. Wow wow wow, $1.21 in the bag!
• Ads: $4.44
  • Google. Just strollin’ along! Not really including banners in any new posts, except in the friendship bracelets blog.

 

July 2018 Income: $29.48

June 2018 Income: $3.47

 

Social Follower Counts: 

As for marketing my blog, Pinterest is the main channel I use to promote. So far, that’s working well for me! I’d like to increase my Facebook traffic this next month, though, and try to get new likes to my page.

• Facebook: 46 (+2 from July 1st)
• Pinterest: 3,487 (+124 from July 1st)
• Instagram: 1,136 (+18 from July 1st)

 

Big Wins: 

• I wrote a freebie! This project took me a whole weekend — between writing the printable, creating the page, setting up the mailing list, and adding this download as a free gift for signing up, I learned a lot.
• My Pinterest presence remained strong — I went from 399K monthly average views last month to 538K in August. Thanks to the lessons I learned in Pinteresting Strategies and Tailwind, Pinterest stayed a mostly set-it-and-forget-it platform and traffic earner.
• Just that I saw my traffic increase from last month – I was pretty proud that I didn’t give up after a not-so-wonderful July.

 

August Goals: 

Well, I missed most of them, but that is ok! I spent A LOT of time working on my opt-in freebie near the end of the month, and after that, I kind of took it easy blog-wise for a bit.

• MISSED: Break 8,000 page views.
  • Halfway there!
• MISSED: Earn $130/enough to buy a computer desk at IKEA.
  • Not quite…
• MISSED: Write 15 posts.
  • I did 11 + Freebie!
  • I don’t feel too awful about this one — my opt-in freebie post included 1. the freebie excel sheet itself, 2. an 11-page instruction guide, 3. the freebie page on my blog, 4. email copy for those who signed up for the page. I still wrote a lot for my blog!
• HIT: Create an email list and plan strategy for it.
  • YAAY! I started my email list AND created my opt-in!
• MISSED: Use the Yoast SEO plugin to beef up the SEO on all live blog posts.
  • Nope.
• HIT/MISS: Audit my Pinterest group board list to cull poor performing ones, as well as join at least 10 new, high-quality ones.
  • I’ve been going through and removing myself from lower quality boards, and I joined a few more, but not 10.
• MISSED: Write individual posts for Pinteresting Strategies, How to Make an Affiliate Sale in 24 Hours, and Breaking the One Percent’s The Perfect Pin.
  • Nope!
• MISSED: Start general Pinterest refresh: create covers for boards, separate out board topics that are too general, and absorb smaller, less updated boards into another one that is appropriate.
  • Again, nope.

 

September 2018 Goals: 

• Publish 10 posts.
• Break 8,000 page views.
• Earn $130/enough to buy a computer desk at IKEA.
• Continue planning email strategy / get 20 total sign-ups for my list.
  • Start brainstorming second freebie.
• Write individual posts for Pinteresting Strategies, How to Make an Affiliate Sale in 24 Hours, and Breaking the One Percent’s The Perfect Pin.
• Start general Pinterest refresh: create covers for boards, separate out board topics that are too general, and absorb smaller, less updated boards into another one that is appropriate.
• Join 10 niche-related Pinterest group boards.

 

Happy blogging in September! My advice to you and to myself is to only do what makes you happy when blogging – I’d love to turn blogging into a viable career, but at this point, just using it as a creative and professional outlet is making me feel happy and challenged.

 

[Note: this post contains affiliate links.]