Starting Over: A Recipe for Blogging Success

As some of you know, we recently had a baby. Have you seen her? She's so dang cute!

Our Lucy girl

However, she threw our "normal" routine out the window for the last several months. But it was time to start getting back to a routine and getting to something like a "normal", like losing the pregnancy weight. I started WeightWatchers, I'm paying attention to what I'm eating, and I get out and move more--and I'm back down to my pre-pregnancy weight. Woot! 

I've also wanted to start blogging regularly again, so I jumped at the opportunity that Alt Summit and Blogalicious offered to collaborate with another blogger. I was paired with Maria, a fashion/tech/music blogger over at Aesthetic Elevation and we immediately hit it off--she is one cool lady boss!

 

As we chatted, we discovered we were both in the same place--starting over on our blogs and wanting to build up our readership--so we decided to write a "recipe" for each other, a recipe to jump-start our writing, gain readers, and have a meaningful blog.

I thought I'd apply the same recipe for success that I've had losing weight to blogging, so here are my tips for Maria (and for me): 

1. Be consistent. Like with a diet where you have to be consistently making good choices about what you eat and consistently getting out and moving your body, blogging success comes when you consistently write and consistently post. People can't read what you're not writing.
2. Be predictable. I eat a piece of toast, an egg, some fruit, and soy milk pretty much every morning now, because it's good, fills my belly, and I don't have to think about it. People like predictability and in order to keep readers coming back, you need to let them know that you're going to post about tech and fashion on Monday, what people were wearing on Wednesday, and a round-up post on Friday. Even if it is only once a week, they'll know what to expect.
3. Get moving. I've found that my writing is much more interesting and enriched when we're out and about living life, experiencing new things, and meeting people. 
4. Get social. I have the hardest time getting to the gym by myself. However, when I know I'm meeting my friend for Zumba, you better believe I'm there and I'm on time. Same thing with blogging, I've found when I support others and what they're doing on their blogs, they support me and motivate me to be creative. Hence, this post and Maria!
5. Remember, slow and steady wins the race. It's taken me a while to drop the weight, but I knew if I did some crazy fad diet, I'd gain the weight back. Same thing with blogging, starting over and gaining a following may be slow and steady, but you'll have loyal readers.

So we're back! I'll be posting about our family, cooking, travel, and entertaining at www.reddparty.com. Sign up in the right sidebar to receive posts in your email.

At Muir Woods National Monument in California

And Maria will be posting about tech and music in the fashion world at http://aestheticelevation.com/. Go visit her and say hi!

This post is brought to you by the awesome project CoLAB and the folks at at Latina Bloggers Connect, Alt Summit, and Blogalicious.