You want to learn how to become a successful blogger, but aren’t sure how to do it – right? Wondering what the habits of top bloggers are that you can adopt to achieve your goals?
We all started our blog with goals in mind. But the journey to achieving those goals requires some essential habits and qualities that we need to learn and adopt.
For many new and intermediate bloggers finding blogging success may seem like a mystery.
Face it, you’ve probably wondered “When will my blog traffic grow?” or “When will I finally start making money with my blog?”.
How do you adopt all of these blogging habits? All at once? Or over time?
Because we know how difficult it is to keep to a resolution, let alone build good habits.
So we’ll look into the habits of highly successful bloggers and how you can start adding them to your blogging routines and activities.
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How To Become A Successful Blogger With 15 Habits Of Top Bloggers
Over the past few years, I’ve spent many hours reading the blogs of many top bloggers. I’ve assessed how they make money, and read their blogging and business tips.
This list of 15 habits of successful bloggers is based on these observations.
You may be subconsciously already adopting some of these habits. Now it’s time to do it consciously.
So, let’s learn how to become a successful blogger by emulating some of their good habits.
1. Know Their Audience & Regularly Interact With It
One of the smartest things a blogger can do is to research their audience.
A blog can’t grow if you’re not producing content that appeals to your audience.
Figuring out your audience’s pain points and interests helps you create a consistent blog content plan, as well as online courses, digital products and services that will help them.
By interacting with your audience you’ll fine-tune all of the above.
How do top bloggers do this?
- Creating and actively participating in their own communities: Facebook groups, pages, Instagram, email newsletters, memberships
- Asking engaging questions in captions, posts and emails
- Running surveys
When you ask the right questions, you get insights into what your audience needs.
| RELATED: 5 Genius Ways To Grow A Facebook Group
2. Have Realistic SMART Goals
Another of the top 15 habits of top bloggers is to set goals and work at achieving them.
SMART goals are those that are: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound.
I always take the last few months of the year to start planning and setting my blog goals for the upcoming year. This helps me keep on track of my accomplishments and work on areas where I’m lagging.
In the header, I included the word “realistic” as this is extremely important for success and also mental health.
I’ve seen new bloggers set unrealistic expectations for themselves, thinking they could leave a full-time job within a year of starting a blog.
Building a strong blog foundation takes time.
Successful bloggers focus on mini-goals and objectives, making it easier to achieve their big goals.
3. They’re Consistent, Organized And Patient
Want to learn how to become a successful blogger? Start getting consistent with your blogging activities!
To become a successful blogger you’re going to need to be consistent, organized and very patient.
Sometimes it can take a few years of hard work, building a robust blog and business, before things take off.
The key factors that make this happen are:
- Consistency: regularly blogging or working on your blog to grow it
- Organization: to help you be consistent, working productively and faster at achieving your goals
- Patience: understanding that it takes time to market and promote your blog, while also growing it
Being organized and consistent means using daily, weekly, monthly and quarterly “to-do” lists.
And patience is really something that we need to keep in check every day.
For example, I know that sometimes even despite the best plans, I may not get to publish a new blog post that week. I just have to patiently wait until the following week to publish and promote it.
4. Open To Trying New Things And Taking Risks
One of the most valuable habits of successful bloggers is their openness to experimenting with new things and taking risks.
It can be anything from a new blogging tool, or trying a strategy they’ve learned in a course – successful bloggers take risks.
So what if it doesn’t work out? But maybe it will… and their blog continues to grow.
For example, I decided to invest in a premium caching plugin for my blogs: WP Rocket.
Caching was a complete mystery to me.
However, by using WP Rocket, I learned the basics of technical optimization.
My blog started loading faster leading to a better site visitor experience. My posts started ranking in Google searches!
Win-win!
PRO TIP: Stop sabotaging yourself with negativity! If you think your blog won’t make money, it’s because you aren’t trying new strategies. Flops will happen, but if you keep trying you’ll find your success.
| RELATED: Grow Your Blog By Starting A Facebook Group
5. Learn Something New Every Day
Do you want to know how to become a successful blogger?
Read and learn something new every day.
Whether it’s a new skill, blog tool, trend or industry news, learning gives you the power to move your blog forward.
Smart bloggers:
- Read competitors’ content
- Subscribe to email newsletters from respected industry leaders and blog/business tool companies
- Monitor industry news on social networks: Twitter, Instagram
- Participate in special membership groups where information is shared daily
- Listen to industry-related podcasts
PRO TIP: Reserve 15 minutes a day to do some reading and learning! That’s all it takes.
6. Try New Blog Tools And Platforms
Tied to learning something new is trying new platforms.
If your audience is all of a sudden using TikTok, it’s time to start using it.
When a new way to monetize your blog pops up, it makes sense to look into it.
Successful bloggers make a point of trying out new blog tools, social media and ways to monetize.
Sometimes things work, and sometimes they don’t. But the point is that they’re experimenting and trying out new things to further their blog and business growth.
Learn how to make extra cash online each month to help fund new tools, platforms and systems to grow your blog.
7. Promote Themselves & Their Blog
One of the most important habits of highly successful bloggers is the daily promotion of their blog AND themselves.
Successful bloggers boost their productivity by using social media schedulers such as Later or Tailwind to promote their content. Another smart tool for boosting older blog posts is SmarterQueue.
Scheduling once a week or sometimes even a month in advance can free up time for other activities.
While it’s important to promote your blog content, it’s also necessary to focus on personal branding.
People are naturally attracted to people who are perceived as credible experts that help solve problems.
If you’re hiding behind your blog content, you’re failing to make people aware of you!
Personal branding boosts opportunities for lucrative income streams such as coaching, consulting and other freelance services.
8. Avoid Imposter Syndrome
Stop comparing yourself to other bloggers!
If you want to become a successful blogger you’re going to have to tamp down on imposter syndrome.
This is when you feel like you’re not good enough compared to others in your niche.
How do you avoid it?
- Realize that every top blogger has probably felt the same at some point
- Remember that everybody has their own blogging journey
- Celebrate your successes and wins: you’ll feel more confident in yourself
- Don’t dwell on mistakes or errors – learn from them and move on
Top bloggers are at the top because they believed in themselves. It’s time you start doing this too!
9. Take A Break When Needed
A top habit of successful bloggers is knowing when to take a break… and actually taking it!
When you’re starting to feel burned out, it’s time to take a break.
Or when you’re dealing with writer’s block – yup… time to take a break.
And when your personal life is busy, please take a break. Family and friends are a priority over your blog. Remember, they can be your greatest supporters. Don’t ignore them when they need your support!
So, one of the best habits bloggers should start making is remembering to take a break.
Read up on ways to practice self-care as a busy blogger or entrepreneur, and find some work-life balance.
| RELATED: Why It’s OK To Take A Blogging Break
10. Get Support When Needed
We’re going to delve into the topic of support a bit more.
As I just mentioned above, be there for family and friends as they can be your greatest supporters.
But they may not know you need support when you do need it. It could be anything from help with kids because you need to focus on a blogging project. Or perhaps it helps with feedback.
Highly successful bloggers also look outside their family and friends for support. For example, working with a blogging coach or a business coach may help them overcome challenges.
What kind of help do the top bloggers seek? Anything from virtual assistants to SEO experts, to bookkeepers.
Don’t be afraid to hire people to help you when you can’t handle something yourself.
| RELATED: How To Balance Motherhood With Blogging And Entrepreneurship
11. Work Independently
Top bloggers all have the ability to start their own businesses. They are comfortable being their own boss.
Working independently, without instruction and without the safety net of a boss is a habit that you can build with a blog.
Consider this: when you start thinking of your blog as a business, you’re the boss!
Blogging can be solitary work, and some love this. Successful bloggers learn how to hold themselves accountable and motivated.
One very good habit for independent work is to stick to a regular schedule. If you’re blogging full time set your “working hours”.
For example, some blog from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Others will blog only in the morning and do other things in the afternoon.
| RELATED: How To Get Important Things Done Before 9 AM
12. Blogging-As-A-Business Mindset
Another important habit top bloggers have is to think of blogging as a business – not a hobby.
What does this mean? Specifically for bloggers?
It means:
- Believing you’re worthy of making money
- Seeking opportunities for making money blogging
- Thinking positively about selling
- Knowing that investing in your blog smartly will result in a greater income later
Once you start changing how you think about money in general, and specifically with your blog, you’re bound to see greater successes.
| RELATED: Tips For Using Business Etiquette To Get Ahead With Your Blog Or Solopreneur Biz Faster
13. Network And Build Relationships Regularly
Blogging can be very solitary work.
This blogging habit is one that you’ll want to adopt sooner than later because it can quickly grow your blog.
Building a network of bloggers and experts in your niche or similar niches creates collaboration opportunities.
They can help introduce you to a bigger audience, and support you when you launch something new.
How can you do this?
Set yourself the goal of reaching out to somebody new each month. Before you do so, follow them on social media, and comment on their social media and blog content in a natural way.
It’s best when they are at the same level as you in terms of followers.
Be sincere, and don’t pitch immediately. There are so many who use Instagram to pitch for business deals, and not for networking.
Don’t get a cold shoulder by reaching out in a way that comes across as if you were trying to sell something.
| RELATED: How To Build A Network Of Blogging Friends That’ll Help You Grow
14. The Best Bloggers Are OK With Failing
This is one of the toughest habits of top bloggers: the ability to get past failure.
We all fail. Nobody is perfect – even that successful blogger who seems to have their business thriving has had a failure in the past.
The difference is how they dealt with their failure.
Successful bloggers learn from mistakes and then work on rising to the challenge. They have a can-do attitude.
The next time you work on something and it doesn’t work out as you expected don’t give up!
| RELATED: When To Quit Blogging And Key Reasons To Keep Going
15. Analyze And Adapt To Become A Top Blogger
The habit of dealing with failure in a positive way is tied to this good blogging habit: analyzing and adapting.
To become a successful blogger you much take the time to analyze what worked and what didn’t… and adapting.
One of the things many top bloggers do is update their older content, focusing especially on SEO. This keeps their blog up-to-date and thriving.
For example, every month I look at an older blog post and update it to keep it relevant with the best information. This inevitably helps boost my organic traffic.
Being productive and moving forward is the only way to go!
| RELATED: 5 Ways To Be A More Productive Solopreneur
Start Building Habits For Successful Blogging
Now that you’ve got the secrets of how to become a successful blogger, let’s go over that list once more.
The top habits of successful bloggers are:
- They know their audience and regularly interact with it
- Blogging goals are realistic and SMART
- They’re consistent, organized and patient
- Always trying new things and taking risks
- They learn something new every day
- Try new blog tools and platforms
- They promote their blog as well as themselves
- They don’t compare themselves to others and avoid imposter syndrome
- Breaks are taken when needed
- They get support when needed
- They’re able to work independently with an entrepreneurial spirit
- Have a “blogging as a business” mindset
- Focus on networking and building relationships with other bloggers
- They’re OK with failing
- They analyze programs and adapt them as needed to succeed
Start with a few of these habits – focus on building them over a period of a couple of months. Some will be easier to keep than others.
I’m still working on all of these as well!
If you need some help with keeping your blog post ideas organized here’s my free Airtable template to help you!
QUESTION: What are the habits of successful bloggers that you’re going to tackle first?
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Thanks for this amazing tips on blogging.
Consistency and self promotion are definitely my weak areas. I will continue to work on them!
Once you get these mastered, you’ll see the difference! Glad you like the post.
Thanks for this piece of information, I have bookmark this web page❤
You’re welcome!
As a new blogger, this article is so helpful! Happy to see that I’m already following some of these tips 🙂