How To Set Blog Goals For The New Year

If you’re a blogger, have you thought about what goals you want to achieve for your blog in 2013?  I used to roll my eyes at this question and not give it much thought other than “just keep blogging” and maybe “increase my traffic”.   For me, setting blog goals was always difficult because I couldn’t ever pinpoint exactly what I wanted from doing this.  I thought I had to have some lofty goal to aspire to that would probably never be achieved because, truth be told, I felt like those goals were what I was supposed to want from blogging, not what I really wanted.  I figured if I was to be successful, I had to do _____ and ______, even if those things felt really foreign to me.  When I thought about the amazing opportunities I enjoyed through my blog in 2012, I realized that if I wanted to keep improving on that, I had to have a road map leading me somewhere.  After giving this way more thought than I probably should have, I finally figured out how to discover what I wanted from my blog for the new year.

YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG

Since I couldn’t figure out in detail what I wanted, I flipped my way of thinking.  I asked myself instead what did I not want to happen with my blog in 2013.  This brought forth a ton of ideas.  It’s pretty obvious that we do the things we do in life to avoid the things we don’t want to happen.  This way of thinking helped me tremendously with setting some solid goals that I feel comfortable I will see some growth with.  My goals for 2013 probably aren’t anymore different or original than most bloggers, but I’m writing them down here for me to refer back to throughout the year and possibly help anyone who reads this get some starting points for their own goals.

IN 2013 I WANT…

1.  Balance In Posts- I feel like the majority of my posts this year were for product reviews and advertorials.  This is completely ok to do, but I want to create more personal content, like sharing ideas, recipes, and things I’m interested in.  There’s a happy medium somewhere and I intend to find it.

2.  Improve my photography skills for blogging- I have no aspirations to learn how to be a fabulous photographer and start a side business doing it.  I just want to learn to take the best pictures I can for my own satisfaction to be used on my blog.

3.  Earnings- One aspect of my blog I really enjoy is getting paid to do what I love to do.  I have set a goal for a specific amount of money I would like to earn this year from my blog.  I’m keeping this number private, but I know what it is, and it’s not too big or too small an amount to shoot for.  I also want to be able to save as much of this money as possible to put towards some other personal/family goals.

4.  Flexibility-  I want to make wise choices about the work I accept to do on my blog.  As bloggers, we’ve all been told to “know our worth” and not to accept anything less than (fill in a dollar amount here) for our work.  I also believe my work is worth being paid for, but I’m not going to hold myself to a rigid amount that I will accept for my work.  If it’s work I am proud to do, within reason as far as what’s expected of me, and a dollar amount in earnings I am comfortable with, I will take the work.  At the same time, I know my limitations better now as far as the time I have to dedicate to doing campaigns and reviews.  I will have to be more mindful about what I accept to take on.

5.  Authenticity- Somewhere along the way, I feel like I’ve lost my “voice” as far as blogging.  When I first started blogging, this came so easily.  I don’t know at what point this started slipping away, so I really want to work on this.

I have to admit that laying this all out here feels pretty strange because setting goals for my blog is a new thing for me, but I would love to hear from those of you that have also set your own blog goals.  Feel free to link up in the comments.