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I can hardly believe that 6 months have already past on this blogging journey of mine.
It quite honestly feels like just yesterday that I nervously purchased my hosting and spent days figuring how to use my theme….oh the good ol’ days.
Each and every day provides a new learning curve, and I am loving every single minute of it. I would dare say I love it a lot more than I thought I would. The community of women that I have met on this journey have each inspired me and encouraged me over and over again. I love doing this virtual life with them.
Related: How To Start A Self-Hosted WordPress Site
As much as I have grown to love blogging, there are a few vital lessons that I have learned in these last 6 months that I hope can be a help to you today, wherever you find yourself in your blogging journey.
12 Lessons I Learned In My First 6 Months Of Blogging
12 Lessons I Learned In My First 6 Months Of Blogging Click To TweetLesson #1: Believe In Yourself
If you were to come up to me and tell me that you were wanting to start a blog but didn’t know if it would be right for you or if you could ever make money from blogging, the first thing I would probably tell you is to believe in yourself. If you do not believe in yourself, you have already set yourself up to fail!
You cannot convince people to follow your brand, care about what you say or “buy into you” if you do not first believe in yourself. If you think you cannot, then you definitely will not. Your only limit is yourself. You got this!
Lesson #2: Don’t be afraid to invest in your blog
It honestly surprises me how many people are afraid to invest in their websites. I am a big believer in starting off on the right foot and setting one’s self up for success from the very beginning. And a lot of times, this requires a bit of an investment.
Investment can look like a number of different things: money, time, emotions.
Maybe you need to take a course of some sort to teach you how to properly monetize or how to create an engaging pin. Perhaps you will need to spend a good chunk of time each week writing content and promoting your blog. You may need to buy hosting, a theme, and a few plugins. But let me be the first to say that making these investments pay off in the long wrong and make the process a lot more simple.
Lesson #3: Treat your blog like a business
This may evoke the question “How do I treat my blog like a business?” Here are few ways you can do that!
- Create a business plan. Before I began my blog in January, I took a great amount of time to sit down and write out a business plan for my blog. This helped me determine my niche, my desired audience, my monetary goals, and so much more. Writing out a business plan gave me a great way to measure goals and keep myself accountable. I personally used this business plan from ByRegina and I loved it:)
- Work a set amount of hours and keep track of your time. My personal goal is 30 hours a week, and I quite honestly go over that a lot. I always feel like there is something more that I can be doing and improving. However, I use a time card app on my phone to log my time each day, and I love it. Doing this makes it really easy to keep track of my time!
- Log your income/expenses. Logging my income and expenses has helped me see where I am spending the most money each month and where I am earning the most money each month. Having this knowledge to compare month to month gives me the ability to create a budget for things like marketing and courses that I would like to take.
- Log your stats. Logging your stats is such an important thing to do each month. This allows me to make sure I am meeting my goals and it also offers encouragement when I feel a little bit discouraged. Logging my stats gives me a way of looking back and seeing how far I have come.
Lesson #4: Making money takes time
Yes, yes, yes. Making money takes time. In this post, 10 Things I Learned In My First Month Of Blogging, one of the things I shared is that it is never to early to monetize. And that is true. But blogging is not a way to get rich quick. It takes a lot of time, effort, and dedication to really see it pay off. Do I believe it’s worth it? Absolutely. But getting to where you want to be takes times.
Lesson #5: Post consistently
This has been my #1 ways of increasing traffic on my blog; posting consistently. Giving your readers new and quality posts to read increases engagement which in turn increases your page views.
Lesson #6: Stay organized
I cannot express how important this is!
Who here has trouble being organized…even though they would like to consider themselves an organized person? Yeah, this girl right here. I try really hard, but if I don’t have an actual system, everything just falls apart. Let me introduce you to this lovely planner.
This lovely business planner from Restored 316 Designs has everything you need to track your progress, your growth, and your sales. Plus, it’s super cute…which is a place. I mean, lets face it. There is nothing worse than a dull, uninspiring planner. If you need help becoming organized, I cannot recommend this one enough!
Lesson #7: Sort Out Your Share Buttons
Let’s just say, I have had a love hate relationship with social share buttons.
At one point, I had three different plugins in order to do all the different things I wanted to do. This included click to tweet, pin it hover buttons, a particular pin to be chosen when someone hits the pin it button, and more. Having so many plugins made me feel unorganized and frustrated. They each looked different, weren’t that easy to find, and failed to add to my brand.
One night, I was just done with my social share buttons. In frustration, I tried every single free social share button I could find, but none were able to do what I wanted. So, I took to the internet. After doing some research and reading what felt like a million “the best social share buttons for your blog” posts, I finally settled on Social Warfare.
*hallelujah chorus*
Y’all. Social Warfare has been an absolute dream come true. This plugin does everything. EVERYTHING. It is easily the best $29 investment I have made in my blog and easily my favorite plugin. I love the way it looks on my posts. I love all the different options it has. It is a lite plugin that doesn’t “weigh down” your site.
In my humble opinion, it is so worth it. If you want to learn more about this life changing & earth shattering plugin, you can do so here or by clicking the picture below!
Related: 5 Reasons You Should Be Using Social Warfare
Lesson #8: Don’t be afraid to make changes
As your blog grows and develops, you may find that you need to make a few changes. Maybe you will have to get a new theme, change your branding colors, redo some of your graphics, or rethink your audience. This is totally normal. As your brand grows and becomes more refined, don’t be afraid of the change. Embrace it and keep moving forward!
Lesson #9: Connect with other bloggers
I told you earlier that the #1 way I have grown my traffic is by posting consistently. Well, the second best way I have grown my traffic is by connecting with other bloggers. There are so many blogging Facebook groups, Pinterest group boards, TailWind Trips, Instagram Pods, Twitter Lists, etc. These different kind of groups give you a great platform to share your content, connect with likeminded people and grow your brand.
If you are a Christian woman trying to impact the world through the ministry of blogging, I created a Facebook group just for you. You can request to join here! I would love to have you!
Lesson #10: Focus on one project at a time
This was really hard for me…especially in the first few months. There always seems to be a list of never-ending tasks to do, and I have a tendency to want to tackle them all at the same time. If you are anything like me in this area, make yourself pause and remind yourself to just work on one thing at a time.
Working on one thing and doing it well is better than doing 100 things just okay. When I’m trying to handle a whole bunch of different projects at once, I become overwhelmed and end up making a lot of mistakes. Don’t do this to yourself like I did! It’s not worth it.
Lesson #11: Be authentic
Remaining authentic to myself was also, quite honestly, a bit hard at first. When I saw others making more money from their blogs or generating more traffic, my immediate thoughts were “maybe I should change my audience or my mission? Maybe I should write about something else?”
But any time I tried to write about other things, it felt so unnatural. I love talking about Jesus and what He has done in my life. I love encouraging others with the Gospel and pointing them back to Jesus whether through posts on faith or resources for their blogs.
These topics specifically are where I come alive and what I am passionate about. To write about other things that are not in my niche, not geared toward my target audience, and not written from my heart just for the sake of numbers totally sucks the life out of what I am trying to write.
And if I think it’s lifeless and irrelevant, so will my readers.
Lesson #12: Blogging is a ministry
This is so important. Blogging is a ministry. I totally underestimated the reach and impact one could have from a virtual platform. If you are discouraged about your blog, please remember that your words have the power to touch someone’s life, impact what they think, and point them to Jesus. What you write is not in vain. God is using you and your blog, even if you cannot see it right now.
So there you have it.
Those are 12 of the most important lessons I have learned in my first 6 months of blogging. I hope the lessons I learned can be an encouragement and a help to you!
For a complete list of blogging resources found on and supported by Cassidy’s Heart, click here! 
What lessons have you learned during your blogging journey? Let me know in the comments below!
