The Ultimate To-do List Every New Blogger Must Have
How’s that sound?
I ran across Carl Ocab’s post on how some bloggers don’t really have any goals in their blogging lifestyle. I posted a comment there saying that everything in our life must have some goals in one way or another. What do you say to a golf player, who’s been hitting his golf ball for hours without knowing where the green is? Or to a football(player) who’s been kicking the ball since kick off without knowing which one is his team’s goal and which one is the opponent’s. It is that simple. You’ve got to have a direction, a purpose. Just like in life, you’ve got to have a purpose of life, so does blogging. You’ve got to have a set of goals you want to achieve daily, weekly, monthly or annually. Otherwise, don’t do it at all. You’ll just be wasting your time
And so I’ve compiled this (I called it the ultimate) to-do list that every new blogger must have in order to succeed in his/her blogging career. I’ve also included some suggestions for the goal in every section, to get you an overview of what is supposed to be accomplished. There are also some recommendations on how often do you need to do each item in the list. The one that I don’t put anything, I leave it to you to decide depending on your style and needs.
I divided this to-do list into 2 categories, internal and external. The internal to-do list contains things you need to do with regard to your blog i.e. design, optimization etc. The external to-do list on the other hand concerns about things you need to do, not directly on your blog but more on the elements around it, such as promotion, social networking etc.
So, here it goes.
INTERNAL
1. Reassess the design of the blog (Goal : maximum usability, pleasing, attractive, simple)
- Check and remove any deadlinks
- Check for errors in alignment and font size of the text
- Check for errors in button placement
- Consider adding graphics
- Consider changing template (I don’t recommend changing the template too often)
- Consider adding/removing items from the sidebar(s)
- Consider adding/removing plugins
- Consider changing the theme color
2. Managing comments (Goal : Attract more visitors, increase traffic, build friendship)
- Check for any comments waiting for moderation (frequency : daily)
- Check comments flagged as spam (frequency: daily)
- Reply to comments (if possible each of them) (frequency: daily)
- Acknowledge top commentators by displaying their names on the sidebar (use the plugin by Nate Sanden)
- Consider plugins specifically related to increasing comments (try and look at JohnTP’s top 5 plugins to increase comments) (frequency: depends on your taste and needs)
3. Manage subscription (Goal : Increase traffic, build up community)
- Offer different options such as full feed RSS, subscribe via email etc (frequency : one-off)
- Use feedburner (or other tools) to keep track of your feed subscribers
- Design/position the subscribe button so that it is clearly visible and easy to access
- Consider displaying the number of subscribers to your blog.
- Offer to subscribe at the end of each post
- Offer to subscribe at the beginning of the latest post for new visitors (you can use the plugin What Would Seth Godin Do)
4. Manage social network (Goal: Increase traffic, expand network)
- Consider adding widgets from social networking sites such as technorati, mybloglog, blogcatalog, bumpzee etc
- Consider adding widgets from social bookmarking sites such as plugim, digg, stumbleupon etc
- Position the bookmark widgets in such a way that makes it easy for the reader to bookmark (or plug/digg/bump etc) your article
5. Manage ads (Goal: Maximize profits, minimize distraction, maximize usability)
- Experiment with different ad size and position (with AdSense etc) (frequency: once a fortnight/month)
- Remove ads that are too distracting and those that drive readers away from reading your articles (frequency: depends on feedback from visitors and effectiveness of the ads)
- Consider different source of monetizing your blog (frequency: most probably after 3 months minimum)
6. Produce Quality Contents (Goal: Increase traffic, gain trust, attract visitors)
- Note down any idea on a piece of paper or your notepad (frequency: daily)
- Set a frequency of posting your articles (daily, once every 2 days etc) but keep it frequent and consistent
- Pick your optimum time to write quality articles and work with full concentration during those time.
- Set 30 minutes-1 hour reading other blogs and your RSS readers to give you some new and unique ideas on what to write about. (frequency : daily)
- START WRITING AND PUBLISH YOUR ARTICLES! (frequency: daily/once every 2 days)
———————————————-
EXTERNAL
1. Connect with visitors (Goal: Increase traffic, expand network)
- Go to their blogs/websites and leave constructive comments. You can reach them via their comments on your blog or via their avatars (like the one I have from mybloglog) (frequency: daily)
- Give them a big thank you for visiting your blog. Appreciate their visits (frequency: Normally done for first time visitors)
- Add them to your friends’ list in your social networking sites
2. Promote your blog (Goal: Increase traffic, more exposure)
- Write quality articles in social networking/bookmarking sites eg. technorati WTF (frequency: twice or more per week)
- Participate actively in forums with your signature displaying your site’s URL (frequency: daily)
- Promote your blog/articles in your social networking sites (frequency: almost everyday)
- Ask your friends to promote your blog in their social networking sites as well (frequency: Until they become bored)
- Promote your blog in your IM status (YM, MSN, AOL etc) and among your IM friends (frequency: daily)
- Find and add new friends with the same interests as yours in your social networking sites (frequency: daily or once every 2 days)
3. Track your progress (Goal: Assessment, better traffic, better income)
- Check your ads earning and check their pattern. Change (or keep) your ads setting accordingly (frequency: daily)
- Check the number of your subscribers. Note any significant increase or decrease in the number. A decrease would mean more effort should be done to promote your blog and to persuade your visitors to subscribe. It might also mean your contents are not appealing enough. Reassess. (frequency: daily)
- Check traffic to your site (I use Google Analytics). Note the patterns. Act accordingly i.e. if the number is low, more effort to increase traffic is needed etc (you should get the point by now). (frequency: daily)
That’s it. There might be some areas that I missed out, but generally this is what I did and would continue doing until I reach my goals and targets. And of course, this is just a general guideline that you can print out or copy and suit to your style and goals. I would welcome any suggestions or opinions to make this list better in terms of its practicality and effectiveness. Till then, keep on producing good stuff, and don’t forget - start writing down your to-do list for a better blogging practice.
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
Comments
Wow, you summarized everything down to one ;). Thanks for that
Listen to readers and write what they want - Yup that’s true. I’ve covered that in my previous post.
I’d like to add to that - be yourself. Sometimes people are so obsessed with satisfying everybody, they end up being someone else which the audience can sometimes see through it. The risk of that is, we might not enjoy being someone else as time goes by.
I would balance between the two. Try to write what the readers want AND at the same time still be myself 
talking about business blog, what if every blogger write a business blog? what will happen? is there any good or bad?
On promoting your site you should activiely pratcipate in writing projects and conversations that go on, on other people’s blog. This is a great list and can really help someone that is just starting out. I just wish their was a blueprint for adding plugins to your site if you do not a have any clue of how to code.
True. It’s all about building network of friends and rapport, and gaining people’s trust
Anyway, feel free to add in anything in the list that you think would be beneficial to those who just started out
Hi! I really like your articles about how to make money with blogs and I think you should keep writing about these things. Good luck!
I think I’m the person you are talking about! The reason people don’t know what to talk, is not because they really don’t know. They have too many things to write, but it also have covered too many difference topics and issues in the discussion. That’s why I also thinking how to improve my blog. Hope your guy can give me some suggestion here.
Actually there is only one thing you should do - listen to readers and write what they want - or if it is business blog - write to sell - that’s it!