Blog promotion goal setting

[Buddy]

I understand that I'm not talking to novices. Each one of us has been into blogging and know the basics. We are trying to cross promote one another here and achieve a win-win balance. We will team up into small groups <10 and work as a team to grow our individual blogs. A pre-requisite to participate in this is that each one of us need to have a blog and we are clear on basics of blogging.

At this stage, I want to mention that we are not trying to sell anything to each other. (You are welcome to write a post about your product in the intro section). This will leave us focused on our goal of promoting our blogs on the web.

Before we get started, I want to ask you one question. What is your blogging goal?

If you answered that you have set goals and are pretty sure about it, then ignore this post. Let me know if I missed something.

If you don't have set goals yet....this IS the first step. List down your long-term & short-term goals. Long-term goals for a period of 6-12 months. And short term goals that you will have to achieve in a month.
(Note: Your goals must be achievable, small, next step goals). We want reasons to celebrate frequently ;).


Goal Setting

Present Site Statistics as on Dt: __________ :

* Google page rank _____________
* Alexa Traffic Ranking _________________
* Google backlinks ________________
* Alexa backlinks _______________
* Yahoo backlinks ________________
* Number of Incoming links ___________

Present Traffic Statistics as on Dt: ____________ :

* RSS Feeds Subscribers __________________
* Number of site visitors ____________________
* Number of page-views ___________________
* Average daily visitors ____________________
* Average daily page-views __________________
* Opt-in list members __________________
* Numner of Guest posts _____________
* Number of Pingbacks ______________
* Comments _______________________
* Twitter following ____________
* Ezine article score _____________

Site goals for the month of ______________:

* Increase google page rank to _____________
* Decreasing alexa traffic ranking below _________________
* Increase google backlinks to ________________
* Increase alexa backlinks to _______________
* Increase yahoo backlinks ________________
* Increase number of Incoming links ___________


Traffic goals for the month of _______________:

* Increase RSS Feeds Subscribers to ______
* Increase site visitors to ___________
* Increase number of page-views to ____________
* Average daily visitors to ______________
* Average daily page-views ___________
* Increase opt-in subscribers to ______________
* Increase number of pingbacks to ______________
* Increase comments to ____________
* Increase voluntary twitter following to _____________
* Improve ezine article score to ___________

Cross blog promotion goals:

Join a team of _________ members
Participate in __________ number of cross blog conversations
Request for ___________ guest posts

Goal Of The Month:
_______________________________________________________

Additionally, Create a giveaway product (white paper, podcast, vodcast, script, software, ebook, cheat sheet or even PLR material ... ) that is relevant to your blogs content.


If you wish, you can print this and stick it in your workspace. Works as a "constant reinforcement" technique.

I use LinkBuzz for instant statistics about page visits, google PR, alexa ranking and backlinks.
1) What software/progrma are you using?
2) Did I miss something in the goals?

[Sandy Morgan]

I'm afraid I am a novice when it comes to blogging so hope to gain a lot by being part of Buddy Bloggers!

[Bill]

I've looked through my statistics from last month and set some new goals for October. Inspired by Debra's mention of the spreadsheet, I've created a spreadsheet to allow me to track my goals on an ongoing basis.

The raw truth is available for all to see here: Blogging Goals

I'm actually amazed at how well I did, meeting all but two of my targets. However, the two that I failed to meet are two that I consider most important, number of incoming links and the elusive bounce rate. I have to say I don't fully understand the difference between backlinks and inlinks and why these vary wildly between different sources.

I've got quite a busy month during October so am unlikely to be blogging as much as I'd like, but I have set out a number of improvements I'd like to make in order to improve my ranking.

- Adding "related posts" to the bottom of each entry
- Add keywords and description to each of the pages in my blog

Long term I am looking at separating out my current blog into two (or more) more focused blogs. This is a big decision and needs some thought, but the idea at the moment is to split them into Chinese & English blogs.

Anyone else working on specific goals for the month of October?

[Bill]

It's coming to the end of September and it must be about time to review our goals for last month and look to set new ones for October. I'll publish my thoughts on how I performed against my goals as soon as I get a chance to sit down and run through the statistics.

Just a quick reminder to everyone else who is setting monthly goals.

[Debra Legg]

Great list! I flopped it over into a spreadsheet, too, because I wanted to automate some math and an Excel file is easier for me to keep track of than paper.

First thing's first, though. I have to re-do my whole site in Wordpress so I can even get some decent analytics. And I have to do it without destroying my links. I don't even know if that's do-able. Wish me luck!

[Buddy]

Great to hear about your goals Bill and very impressed with your goals, (though i'm not supposed to peek).

Wish you good luck in achieving your goals.

[Bill]

I think this is a great idea at least to get me (and others) thinking about what exactly it is we want to achieve by blogging. For me the short answer is quite simply, I don't know. I started my first blog right when Blogger was launched. It began as a mindless diary with no thought put into it whatsoever. Despite the fact that I cringe when looking back over older posts I've kept the archives online as they chart the progression of my blog.

Not so long ago I had a bit of a re-think and a re-design. Rather than set a goal for my blog I decided to identify 4 or 5 clear categories I was likely to blog about:

- Photography - I like to share my photos
- Chinese - I'm trying to learn Mandarin Chinese
- Thoughts - For articles & longer blog posts
- Daily Adventures - Occasionally I do something worth mentioning (marriage proposal, etc.)

So, in an exercise of brutal honesty, I've gathered up some statistics about my blog and set a few goals for the month of September. You'll notice the statistics are slightly different to those identified above, mainly because I couldn't work out how to obtain some of the values. I've also added a few (Bounce Rate in particular) which I consider to be a good measure of my blogging success.

Statistics & Goals: http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dd47g32z_43dcrmrpcp

Other Goals Include:
1) Identify clear goals for my blog
2) Write three significant articles (as opposed to short posts)
3) Present my brief biography in Chinese and English
4) Track feed subscribers
5) Review my goals at the end of september

Useful Info
Blog Platform: Wordpress
Statistics: Google Analytics