I recently had a blogger sidle up to me at a conference and ask me to share ‘the secret’ technique that would allow see their blog grow to its potential.
While the blogger was asking with tongue planted firmly in his cheek (he understood that there was no single thing that would transform his blog) I do sometimes wonder if some bloggers are looking for ‘the secret’.
The reality is that looking for a single technique to make your blog grow to its potential is as crazy as looking for a single technique to make your child grow to its potential.
Actually I like the analogy of children growing to their potential… lets go down that path for a moment.
I have 3 boys. They’re 2, 5 and 7.
They started small (of course). Here’s our 2 year old a few minutes after he was born.
He was little (although like all Rowses had a quite large head for his age).
I look back on that photo today and can barely believe that the 2 year old that runs around our house talking up a storm is the same person that I saw born just a couple of years ago.
I look at my 7 year old and am even more amazed at who he’s become already! He has grown so much – physically, emotionally, socially and so much more.
But how did he grow to become the 7 year old he is today?
The reality is that while it seems just yesterday that he was born, his growth has been little by little thing – every day since.
He certainly has had growth spurts where he’s shot up at a faster rate over a month than other months but he’s grown gradually and as a result of consistent feeding, exercise, sleep and nurturing.
As parents we can’t identify a single thing that has resulted in him reaching the point he’s at – it’s a result of small consistent and regular actions over time.
The same is true with your blog.
There’s nothing you can do that will suddenly make your blog reach its potential.
It will grow as you regularly add content, as you regularly look after the readers you have and grow community, as you regularly participate in places off your blog to find new readers and as you regularly nurture it by keeping its design and technical side up to date and working.
You will probably go through growth spurts where you see bursts of activity that results in growth in one way or another – but its what happens between the growth spurts that is just as important.
The key to success in blogging (and in many areas of life) is small but regular and consistent actions over a long period of time.
