Let me guess.

Right about now you’re looking back and wondering where the hell 2014 went.

Seriously, how can twelve whole months disappear so damn quickly?

Regardless, it was an interesting year for us bloggers.

In January, Matt Cutts announced the death of guest blogging (although it still seems to be in rude health almost a year later).

In the summer, Google killed off  its Authorship project, which sucked if you wanted more recognition for your content. (But, hey, at least you didn’t write a 15,343 word guide on the topic.)

It was also the year that blogging platform Medium gained some serious momentum (though you know you still need your own blog, right?)

And a brand new social network called Ello created a lot of buzz in a short space of time and then faded into the background almost as rapidly.

But as another blogging year approaches, it’s important to celebrate the highlights of the one about to pass.

So let’s get started.
More

Admit it. You’re sceptical.

Is great content really the answer to all your blogging woes?

Maybe you’ve heard the mantra once too often, but you can’t help wondering…

Even if you do work your ass off on a post, will it get the recognition it truly deserves?

The blogosphere is so crowded and noisy, even the good stuff gets lost.

So is it even worth the effort to try?

Well, here’s the disappointing truth…

You’re right.

Until you reach a certain level of internet “fame”, the quality of your content doesn’t count for much. You’re like an artist hanging work in a gallery nobody visits.

Quite simply, your blog isn’t big enough – yet. You don’t have the right connections – yet.

And until you’ve spent longer on the blogging treadmill, and earned your blogger’s dues, the most likely result of creating great content is the feeling of disappointment when it’s completely ignored.

It’s not fair. But then nobody said it would be.

That’s why you need an unfair advantage. You need powerful friends…
More

You’re impatient to become a better writer.

So naturally you love writing tips.

You eagerly devour each new one, hoping to give your writing brain a small but valuable upgrade.

But in practice, new tips appear so regularly that you struggle to keep up.

You don’t know which tips to try and which to ignore, and each new practice is quickly replaced by the next.

One week you’re trying to use more emotion in your writing. The next, fewer adjectives. After that, it’s all about empathy.

You end up switching tactics so often that you can’t tell which tips are working and which are simply wasting your time.

Surely there’s an answer? A solution must exist that lies somewhere between trying everything and ignoring everything.
More

You dream of connecting with a powerfully engaged audience.

Readers who are excited by what you write – and show it.

But so far, the reaction to your content has been underwhelming.

And you start to wonder:

Is your writing having an impact at all?

You’re not alone. Most bloggers struggle to get a reaction from their audiences.

Because the disturbing truth is that most blog readers are barely conscious.

After all, when did you last hear someone say:

“Man, I’m so pumped right now I could sit down and read a blog post.”

Never, right?

Readers are seeking someone to snap them out of their stupor.

And if your blog can’t do that, they’ll simply sleepwalk to the next.
More

Want to know the secret to a popular blog?

Drumroll please…

Popular posts.

Simple, huh? 🙂

So simple as to be, well let’s be honest, completely useless.

Because if you knew the secret to writing consistently popular posts, you’d already have a popular blog. Right?

But instead, you approach each new idea with a gnawing trepidation.

You quietly hope that this might be the post that finally rockets you to Internet fame, but it’s all you can do to suppress the creeping fear that people will completely ignore it – or even ridicule it.

The problem is that nobody – not even the A-List Bloggers – knows how a post will be received until they click publish. And even the top dogs understand that they are just one underwhelming post away from a raft of unsubscribes and a flurry of premature – but strangely prophetic – rumors of a fall from grace.

But there is a way to give your next blog post (and the one after that and the one after that) the best chance of being your most popular to date.
More