ProBlogger: The 9 Conversion Habits of the World’s Most Successful Bloggers

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ProBlogger: The 9 Conversion Habits of the World’s Most Successful Bloggers

The 9 Conversion Habits of the World’s Most Successful Bloggers

Posted: 26 Apr 2017 07:00 AM PDT

This is a guest contribution from John Stevens.

Just how do they do it?

From influencing millions to making millions, the world's most successful bloggers manage to turn visitors into readers, readers into customers, and customers into fans without breaking a sweat.

But is it all accidental, or is there any science behind their success? Are there any habits successful bloggers follow? And if they do, what are they and why do they work?

In this post, I'll give you answers to these questions, and more.

1. They use multiple opt-in boxes

According to research by ExactTarget:

"77% of consumers prefer to receive permission-based marketing communications through email".

With email being such an effective method of conversion, top bloggers make sure they don't leave any stone unturned in order to get visitors' emails.

Using more than one opt-in box increases the chances of users signing up with you. But there is also a fine line before it gets annoying.

For example, Smartblogger keeps it very subtle. Jon Morrow asks for your email on the homepage and a popup when you're about to leave the website.

This treads the fine line between "effective" and "annoying". Since SmartBlogger is a writing-focused blog, the reduced visual clutter also fits its audience and brand image perfectly.

Neil Patel uses multiple opt-in boxes at QuickSprout – on the homepage, sidebar, as a popup and at the end of every blogpost. Some may argue he goes a little overboard but since Neil writes about marketing, his audience is likely forgiving of aggressive marketing tactics.

While you can debate merits and demerits of an aggressive opt-in box strategy, one thing is clear: they work.

Doing it too aggressively in a non-commercial niche might not be the best option, but at the very least, you should have 1-2 opt-in boxes throughout your site.

What you can learn from this:

Use more than one opt-in box on your site. Take advantage of pop-ups and above the fold area (see below) to maximize visibility for your opt-in boxes.

2. They make good use of "above the fold" area

"Above the fold" is the first half of a webpage that is visible without scrolling.

Whatever content you place above the fold is the first thing your visitors will see when they land on that page. If it is irrelevant, there is good chance they will leave the site before exploring further.

As Peep Laja of ConversionXL writes, "Content placed above the fold grabs our 80% of attention".

Plenty of studies back this claim. According to an eye-tracking study by the Jakob Nielsen group, viewer attention drops dramatically beyond the fold.

Top bloggers understand this, which is why they use their above the fold area to introduce themselves to their audience, collect emails and put forth evidence of their success (such as reviews from other sites).

Tim Ferriss' site Four-Hour-Workweek is a great example of this.

There's lots of good stuff happening here.

Let's drill down:

"About" the blog: This single statement – "If you could 10x your per hour output…" – tells readers everything they need to know about the blog.
Social proof/Proof from authority: By showing off quotes from authoritative publications, Tim leverages the principle of authority and social proof to show that his advice is valuable.
Opt-in box: Tim doesn't just throw together an opt-in box; he shows readers exactly what they'll get if they opt-in to this email list.
More proof from authority: Tim adds his NYT and WSJ bestseller tags for good measure to further attest to his expertise.

Also note how Tim uses his own face rather than a generic brand image.

Here's another example from Noah Kagan, founder of OkDork:

Though not as busy as Tim's homepage, it still follows the same principles:

Opt-in box: The opt-in box is easy enough to understand, but also note the headline: 85% of my best business hacks. Why not say "all of my hacks"? Because studies show that users fixate on numbers in headlines, not words.
"About" section: Noah uses the opt-in box section to quickly tell readers about himself and his past successes. Again, this is a form of persuasion through authority.
Social proof: "What others are saying" adds further social proof to Noah's offer.

What you can learn from this:

Two things:

Use the above the fold area to tell readers about yourself and your blog while pushing a lead magnet.
Increase opt-in rates by using social proof and proof from authority via testimonials and quotes.

3. They make it easy to share content

Sharing might sound intuitive to us marketers and bloggers, but your average reader might never share your content unless you make it seamlessly easy to do so.

This is partly due to laziness – your readers don't want to put in the effort to copy-paste URLs or think of tweets.

Partly, this is because your readers don't even know how to share content.

In fact, a recent survey of computer users across 33 rich countries showed that only 5% of the population could do complex computer tasks, while 14% are "below level 1".

Successful bloggers understand this very well. That is why they provide multiple easy options for readers to share content anytime they want.

For example, GrowthEverywhere uses multiple social sharing options on the side bar:

This allows readers to pick their favorite social media channel and share the article with one click.

Another tactic is to use plugins such as Click to tweet to get more shares from Twitter. This takes all the effort out of sharing on Twitter – readers can, well, click to tweet the highlighted text.

Here's how Tim Soulo uses it on BloggerJet:

But simply flooding your posts with share buttons isn't enough. Hick's Law dictates that after a certain point, more choices simply confuses your users and discourages action.

To solve this problem, limit your sharing buttons to your top 2-4 networks. If you don't have a lot of visual content, it doesn't make sense to throw in Pinterest, Instagram and Tumblr sharing buttons.

For example, Neil Patel uses just two social networks – Facebook and Twitter – on Quicksprout.

What you can learn from this:

Give users multiple sharing options but don't flood them with too many choices.
Use plugins such as "Click to Tweet" to make sharing easier.

4. They use overlays to capture additional emails

Email is the foundation of blogging success.

Which is why bloggers keep coming up with innovative ways to capture more and more emails.

One such technique is called 'welcome mats'.

Welcome mat displays a full-screen call to action that shows when visitors land on your website.

For example, this is how the welcome mat looks like when you visit Zac Johnson's site.

As you scroll down, the welcome mat goes up and you are presented with the landing page.

SumoMe takes this a step further and uses custom welcome mats for each blog posts. A post about writing better headlines, for instance, shows this welcome mat:

Another popular overlay is to use a Slide-in CTA. This CTA enters the screen below your sidebar content so it doesn't cover your main content:

Here is how Hubspot uses it:

What you can learn from this

Strategic use of overlays can get you additional conversions. However, make sure that they don't hinder your user-experience. If someone has already signed up for your email list, hide all overlays from them.
Try using post-specific overlays to push content upgrades and highly targeted lead magnets.

5. They use static home pages to funnel additional leads

If you went back in time and visited ProBlogger.net back in 2013, this is what you'd see:

In contrast, ProBlogger's homepage today looks very different.

What changed?

For one, ProBlogger's new homepage doesn't just show the latest posts. Instead, it pushes PB's latest content, directs users to relevant categories ("I need help with…") and also includes a prominent email capture form.

This is a tactic a growing number of bloggers are adopting. Instead of directing users straight to the blog, they direct them to a homepage instead.

Here, they can introduce themselves to their readers, direct them to their best content and capture emails.

For example, here's Videofruit:

This also gives bloggers an opportunity to do some personalization.

For example, on ProBlogger, returning users are greeted with a "Welcome Back!" message while first-time visitors get links to introductory content.

What you can learn from this

Create a homepage instead of directing users straight to your latest blog posts. This gives you an opportunity to do so much more than just make them read your latest content.

6. They use social proof to build trust and authority

As per wikipedia:

"Social proof is a psychological phenomenon where people assume the actions of others in an attempt to reflect correct behaviour for a given situation."

In a nutshell, we look at other's opinions and signals to evaluate our own potential action.

Consider that:

Over 70% of Americans say they look at product reviews before making a purchase.
Nearly 63% of consumers indicate they are more likely to purchase from a site if it has product ratings and reviews.

Top bloggers take advantage of social proof in a number of ways:

By showing testimonials

This is perhaps the most common use of social proof that most (if not all) bloggers use.

According to the research done by Nielsen, "92% people trust a recommendation from a peer and 70% people will trust the recommendation from someone they don't even know".

For example, Copy Blogger shows testimonials from real people on their homepage.

By showing authority endorsement

Brian Dean from Backlinko uses testimonials from the big names in the marketing industry.

This is an example of the principle of authority where you leverage the authority of successful people to make yourself appear more trustworthy.

By showing the number of subscribers

For example, on Problogger's homepage you'll see this:

300,000 bloggers can't be wrong, right? By showing that so many people have joined the community, ProBlogger shows that it is trusted by your peers.

By showing media mentions

This is another example of the principle of authority in practice. By showing that you've been featured in authoritative publications, you increase your own perceived authority as an expert.

For example, consider Growtheverywhere's media mentions:

What you can learn from this:

Social proof can be hard to use if you don't already have it. Showing off your subscriber count when you have just 300 subscribers isn't very comforting.

To get around this problem, try to get featured in prominent publications or get interviewed by other bloggers.

You can then use the logos from these publications or quotes from others about you as social proof.

7. They use a "Start Here" page.

SmartBlogger does it.

SmartPassiveIncome does it.

Even ProBlogger does it.

I'm talking about a "Start Here" page.

As you can imagine, this is the "start" page for your blog, a page that tells readers who you are, what you blog about, and what they should read.

ProBlogger's start here page, for instance, tells Darren's story and shares a list of resources with readers.

Readers will often turn to the "Start Here" page when they land on your site for the first time. While you might have a detailed homepage, it can't tell your story quite as effectively as a compelling "start" page.

It's also a fantastic opportunity to collect emails and increase conversions.

What you can learn from this

Easy: create a start page for your blog. This page should:

Tell the reader who you are
Tell them what your blog is about
Direct them to appropriate resources
Set the tone for the rest of your content.

Once you've created this page, make it the first link in your navigation menu.

8. They make better use of the footer area

The footer area is often overlooked when designing blogs for conversion. We're so fixated on the above the fold area that we completely forget about users who scroll all the way to the bottom (who, ironically, are also among your most engaged users).

The truth is that the footer matters even more than your middle 'body' content.

I'll refer back to Nielsen group's scrolling behavior study:

Notice how attention spikes right at the end of the page?

Successful bloggers understand this, which is why they use their footers to increase engagement and conversions.

For example, ProBlogger directs its readers to different resources on its site:

On Hosting Facts, you'll see a three-column layout (like above) highlighting:

Top-performing content (in terms of revenue/conversions)
"Helpful links" directing users to "best-of" content
Contact us page with email and address
"Social proof" in the form of an established brand (Pingdom's) logo.

You can also use the footer area to show users all your content and product offerings.

On Entrepreneur On Fire, for instance, John Lee Dumas shows all of EOFire's offerings (trainings, podcasts and communities) in the footer of his blog content:

Since anyone who has reached the footer is likely already familiar with your content, directing them to high converting pages is a smart move. This is where you can make some additional conversions.

What you can learn from this

Take a close look at your footer and ask yourself: are you making the best possible use of this screen real estate?

If the answer is no, think of the links you can add here. Your best content (in terms of engagement and/or revenue) should get prime space in the footer, as well as your lead-gen forms, earnings disclaimer, and contact details.

9. They use prominent CTAs

What color CTAs do you use?

I know this might sound like a minor design quibble, but your CTAs have a big impact on your conversion rates.

For example, in one case study, changing the color from green to red increased conversion rates by 21%.

This might not sound a lot, but if you get 100 customers each month for a $100 product, you'll make an extra $2,100 – with no extra work.

In the above example, the red button worked because it contrasted against the green of the logo. The green button, on the other hand, seemed to merge with the text.

Most successful bloggers follow this practice and make their CTAs very prominent.

For example, on Chris Ducker's site, you'll see a green CTA standing out against the orange text.

It's the same on James Clear's homepage – you see a green button standing out against a grey-white background.

There is actually a scientific reason why contrasting colors work so well in CTAs – the Von Restorff effect.

Also called the "isolation effect", this principle states that when confronted with multiple stimuli (in our case, CTAs), the stimuli that stand out the most wins our attention.

What you can learn from this

Since your CTAs lead visitors to subscribe to your newsletter, download your eBooks or buy your courses, it makes sense to optimize it for higher CTR.

Try testing colors that stand out against your site background in your CTAs. The more prominent, the better.

Over to You

Building a high-converting blog isn't a matter of chance; it is deliberately planned. While your content creation and distribution strategy will largely define your success, you can increase conversions dramatically by following the same tactics as the world's best bloggers.

Start off with the 9 habits highlighted above. Once you've used them, share your results with me in the comments below!

John Stevens is the CEO of Hosting Facts, a startup that helps consumers make data-backed decisions when choosing web hosts. He is also a frequent contributor to WebsiteSetup where he helps businesses set up their website.

The post The 9 Conversion Habits of the World’s Most Successful Bloggers appeared first on ProBlogger.

ProBlogger: On-page SEO Tips: Three Things You Can Do Right Now

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ProBlogger: On-page SEO Tips: Three Things You Can Do Right Now

On-page SEO Tips: Three Things You Can Do Right Now

Posted: 25 Apr 2017 07:00 AM PDT

Here's something you should have known by now –

There are a number of aspects of a given web page that influence search engine rankings. And by optimizing these aspects (namely, on-page SEO), you will get higher rankings on search engines.

Some of these factors which comprise on-page optimization include:

writing great content which fills a need, and making it linkable
having a catchy page title with your top keyword in it
creating a URL which accurately reflects the hierarchy of your website
using your image alt text to help search engines understand your content better

These are considered the fundamental factors of on-page SEO optimization, but they are by no means the only things you can do to improve your website’s rankings with search engines.

In this post, I will talk about three on-page optimizations, proven by case studies and SEO experiments, which will create an immediate impact on how well your site gets ranked on search engines – in particularly, Google.

1. Better click-through-rate, better search rankings

SEO is never a pure-science subject in my opinion. However, it has been possible to guesstimate what Google wants, by considering patents it has submitted in recent years, and by experimenting with various factors for their effect on rankings.

One of the known on-page factors, proven by Rand Fishkin's study, is your page click-through-rate on Google search results (I call it Search CTR). Search CTR is a percentage that identifies how often people view your page on search engine, and then actually click on it to see more.

According to Rand's experiment, when Google sees that the CTR for a given page is higher than normal, it assigns it a higher ranking.

From this, it stands to reason that one great way to boost your site rankings would be to improve your CTR on the search results page. Some ways you can go about that include the following approaches:

Optimize your page title for more clicks

There are some very specific things you can do to optimize your title, for example, including the current month or year in your title.

4 out of 5 top search results for "Best Laptop Brands" contain the year in the page title

You can also experiment with Google Adwords or Facebook Advertising to see which version of your title works best and appeals most to your target audience. For instance, titles using the phrase "step-by-step" or "how-to" usually have greater appeal than the mere mention of how to do something in my experience.

One of our top performers this year. This Facebook post (both paid and organic) got 6x better engagement rate compare to our average.

Shorter, more concise titles also lead to better CTR and higher rankings, according to a study conducted by Etsy, and those which performed the best were titles that included only the target search keyword phrase.

Include schema markup on your site

Schema markup gives meaning to your data. It helps search engines to understand your data better and display your data differently on their search results. Hence, more users' attention and (hopefully) clicks.

Put ‘breadcrumbs’ in your blog

Breadcrumbs help users navigate back to the main topic, and to locate themselves in whatever blog they’re reading, and have been explicitly stressed by Google as important to the overall user experience.

Example of Google showing a site's breadcrumb navigation in its search result.

2. Broken links and 404-errors

Broken links and 404 errors signal Google two things –

Your site is poorly maintained.
Google users are more likely to bump into broken pages.

In result, Google assumes your website is simply not being maintained to a high standard, and users would be better served by another site which has high quality content.

In an actual case history of a site clean-up published in Blizzard Press, a comprehensive site improvement was undertaken. The clean-up initiative repaired more than 1,000 broken images, setup more than 100 301-redirects, corrected dozens of broken internal links, and tracked more than 280 keyword phrases for effectiveness.

As a result of the corrections made, the client’s website climbed more than 1,700 places in the search rankings.

On average, each of the 286 keyword phrases being tracked advanced six full places.

Not only was this an astonishing climb for the website, but it all happened within the space of one week!

This should serve as proof positive that timely correction of navigation issues can have an immediate and profound effect on the ranking of your website.

Taking Actions

404 errors and broken links are easily fixed, so such problems should be avoided.

In the case of a wrong URL, simply correct the address. If the target page no longer exists, a 301-redirect can be used to point to a page with similar content. To determine whether or not your site has such errors embedded in its pages, a site-crawling tool such as Screaming Frog SEO Spider or SEM Rush can be used.

3. Get mobile-optimized

In April of 2015, Google rolled out an update which boosted the rankings of mobile-friendly websites. This gave preference to sites having high-quality content for mobile devices, without the need to zoom, scroll, or otherwise re-position their screens for readability. This was of course in deference to the fact that the usage of mobile devices and smartphones were being used so much for web browsing.

Within 18 months, Google was prepared to roll out another update, this one making their primary indexing and evaluation centered on the mobile website’s characteristics rather than the desktop version of the same website. While not ignoring the desktop website, focus was then centered squarely on the kind of user experience provided to owners of mobile devices instead.

It is not at all surprising therefore, that a number of case studies have confirmed the fact that optimized mobile site presentation now has a direct correlation to being ranked higher in search engine results. When my site's (WHSR) new mobile-friendly site design went live on December last year, search traffic surged for more than 20% (in particular, our host review index page – which took us more than three weeks to create such a big mobile-friendly table).

Google Mobile-Friendly Update Study #1

One study conducted by Stone Temple was particularly telling, because it captured rankings information for thousands of websites before and after Google’s update. As might be expected, 46% of sites considered non-mobile friendly slipped down in the rankings, and more than 30% of those which were considered mobile-friendly rose in the rankings. The rise for mobile-friendly sites would have been much more dramatic, except for the fact that many of the sites tracked were already ranked #1 in their specific area of interest.

Google Mobile-Friendly Update Study #2

In a second case study involving retail company Offspring, a major re-design of their website was undertaken to provide users with a responsive website.

Previously the company had no mobile-friendly presentation, and it had become painfully obvious that Offspring was missing out on a huge sector of the consuming public.

After wading through all the expected trials and tribulations of such a massive project, the results were even more impressive than company officials had hoped for.

Within three months of the new mobile-friendly site launch, first-page visibility had increased almost 78%. In addition, the Google site usability score jumped from 60 to 100, the company had a 103% increase in mobile revenue, and there was a 15% increase in their mobile conversion rate.

Take Actions

It’s no exaggeration to say that getting mobile-optimized is not really an option anymore, it’s a requirement. If your site isn’t optimized for mobile traffic, you’re missing out on the largest segment of Internet traffic. To find out just how mobile-friendly your website is, use this handy tool: https://testmysite.thinkwithgoogle.com/.

Sample of Google Mobile Friendly Test.

All you have to do is plug in your site URL, and Google will evaluate everything about your site. Then you’ll be provided with a percentage figure on its mobile friendliness, its mobile speed, and its desktop speed. You will also have the option to request a free report which details how those figures were arrived at, and some recommendations on what you can do to improve your scores.

The post On-page SEO Tips: Three Things You Can Do Right Now appeared first on ProBlogger.

ProBlogger: 190: How to Overcome Failure in 6 Steps

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ProBlogger: 190: How to Overcome Failure in 6 Steps

190: How to Overcome Failure in 6 Steps

Posted: 24 Apr 2017 02:00 AM PDT

How to Move Through Failure in 6 Steps

In today's lesson, I want to talk about failure in business and how to move through it.

I've been asked questions on this topic a number of times in the last few weeks and while it's a topic most of us probably don't want to have to learn about – it's something that we all will need to deal with at one point or another because it's a part of any business story.

We all fail – in fact failure is an essential part of any startup and if you're not having it it could be a sign that what you're doing is not pushing hard enough and that you're spending a lot of time in your comfort zone.

SO in this episode I'm going to give you 6 things that I try to do when facing failure of different sizes. I think they're relevant for the small fails and mistakes that happen to us regularly but am particularly thinking about some of those big ones too!

Further Resources on How to Overcome Failure in 6 Steps

Full Transcript Expand to view full transcript Compress to smaller transcript view

Hi there and welcome to episode 190 of the ProBlogger podcast. My name is Darren Rowse and I'm the blogger behind problogger.com. A blog, podcast, event, job board and a series of ebooks, all designed to help you as a blogger to start a blog, to grow your audience, to create amazing content, and to hopefully make some profit from your blog. Learn more about ProBlogger over at problogger.com.

In today's lesson, I want to talk about failure, failure in business particularly, and how to move through it. I've been asked questions on this topic a number of times over the last few weeks and when I hear the same question more than once, I often pick up my ears and it often turns into a podcast and that's what I want to talk about today.

It's something that I guess most of us don't really want to have to learn about. We don't want to have to learn how to move through failure but it is something that we will all need to deal with a one point or another, both in our personal lives but also as part of a business story and our blogging journey.

We all fail. In fact, I think failure is an essential part of any start up, any business. If you're not having times of failure, if you're not having things where things don't succeed, it's possibly a sign that what you are doing really isn't outside of your comfort zone and perhaps you're not pushing things hard enough.

In this episode, what I want to do is give you six things that I try and do and I emphasize try here because there's a right answer when it comes to failure and there's an actual answer, so most of us swing from the good things through to the unhelpful things. Those are six things that I try to do when I'm facing failure or mistakes of different sizes.

I actually think most of what I'm going to share today is relevant for the small failures we have, those things that just don't go right from day to day but also those bigger things as well. I'm particularly thinking of those because some of the questions I've heard over the last week have been on those bigger failures.

You can find today's show notes with the six points that I'm going to go through as well as some further reading over at problogger.com/podcast/190. Also, check out the Facebook group at problogger.com/group where there's some great discussion going on at the moment. We've seen a lot of new members over the last few weeks. Let's get into today's show.

Like I said in my introduction today, I've had a number of questions on the topic of failure recently. Willie over in the Facebook group asked just a few weeks ago, how would you recover from a massive failure? And then Max also messaged me and gave me permission to share his question. He said, "I've just had a big failing in my blogging business and I feel unable to move on. Do you have any advice?" That's what I want to address today.

What do we do, a lot of these will be applicable to other areas of life too, but particularly in a blogging business, the failures we have can sometimes be very public failures and sometimes the mistakes we make, the things that we say we're going to do don't often work out and there's public consequences on that.

I guess I'm tackling it from that angle as well. Firstly, let me give you what I usually do first. That is to freak out. Usually for me, when I have a failure, when I make a mistake, when something doesn't go right, I usually have some kind of an emotional response. I'm a fairly measured person, you would meet me in person you might not think that I freak out but I do.

I throw as good tantrum as anyone else, I panic as much as anyone else, I think the worst as much as anyone else, and as I was preparing this podcast, I was going to say, "Move past that phase as quickly as you can and get onto the more constructive things." I actually think that it may be important to have that moment of freak out.

Failure takes its toll on us and that is a natural thing. I think it's probably important to get through those feelings and to some extent embrace them and sit with them, and to let them out. I think it's really important to let those feelings out, to not bottle them up. This is going to come out to a lot of what I'm going to talk about today. I think we do need to get those feelings out.

All I would say is as you are having your freak out, as you are having your tantrum, as you are having that panic, try to do it in a safe place that wouldn't have long lasting consequences on you, those around you, and your business. I think it's totally fine to feel the pain, to feel out of control for a moment. That is natural and it's okay to do that so allow yourself to do that. But as you're feeling that, try to move yourself towards the six things that I'm going to talk about next.

Out of that panic, out of that freak out, here's what I would suggest you do. The first one is so important and that is to try. This is hard, all of this is hard, but try to separate your failure away from your identity.

One other the biggest challenges that I think many people face today is that they equate their self-worth with their achievements or their lack of achievements, also, what other people think about them and I think this is a real trap. This is a huge trap.

I want to give you an equation. This is an equation that I see the world suggesting when it comes to our self-worth. The world says self-worth equals what I achieve plus what others think of me. Let me repeat it, self-worth equals what I achieve plus what others think of me. This is a message we hear all the time. We hear it in conversations, we say it in the media, and we say it in marketing. My self worth is all about what I achieve my success, and what others think of me.

So to be worthwhile, I need to achieve a lot, I need to have other people think well of me. This idea creeps out in a lot of what we do. Most of us don't even know that we abide by that equation, but we are constantly looking for success, and we're constantly looking to look good in front of other people. The problem with this equation is that it really sets us up with problems because it's just not realistic.

All of us are going to have times in our personal lives and in our business where we do not achieve, where we fail. It's just human to have failures and so if we equate our self-worth with achieving with success, then we're setting ourselves up for a massive fault. All of us are going to have times in our lives where other people don't think much of us. If we base our self-worth upon our success and what other people perceives of us, then our self-worth is going to have times where we will have very little of it.

That's an unhealthy thing. It's going to only lead to poor self-worth. It's going to lead to a roller coaster ride through your life. I guess one of the big things that I want to get across and this is something that I try and really remind myself in those times of failure is that my self-worth doesn't come from what I achieve and it doesn't come from what other people think of me, it actually comes from something else.

For me, that comes more from my faith. For other people, it will come from something else. But if there's one thing I really want to get across today, as we tackle this topic of failure, is that you are not worthless because of your failure. You're not worthless because of your failure, you are not a failure. What you have done, your business may have had a time of failing but that doesn't mean that you are a failure, don't personalize your failure.

Particularly if it's a business failure which is really not connected to you, it is something that you do. Yes, it's an action that has failed, but it is not you. Don't identify yourself as a failure just because of something that you have done.

Number one, separate your failure out from your identity. Number two, don't face it alone. I'm not sure whether this is a gender thing, whether it's more of a personality thing, but a trap that I've seen many of my friends fall into is that they face their failure alone. They internalize their failure.

One of the best things that I think you can do is to admit your failure and to share with another person, just one other person. That will help so much. Even if that person has no real understanding of your business, by telling them what you are facing, you're doing something very healthy.

To verbalize it and to start a conversation about it actually is a very powerful thing. Name the mistake, name the failure, first, by you alone and internalize it and you will very luckily become overwhelmed by it. It will become bigger than it really is. This is something I've fallen into the trap of, many times.

Even last year, the end of last year, I had a couple of months where revenue wasn't really great for the business. It wasn't particularly anything I had done, it just was a bit of a lean patch and I know many other bloggers went through that. For the first few weeks that I noticed that, I internalized it and I would lie in bed at night thinking that the end of the world was coming and not being able to see anything positive in my business, even though there was lots there.

It was only once I shared that load with Vanessa, and for me, Vanessa, my wife, my partner, is the place that I go to. By simply naming the issue, by putting words to it, it put things back into perspective. I realized, even as I spoke the words of what was going on that there were solutions, that there were ways forward.

The other person may not even know what you are talking about but you, simply verbalizing it to another person, can be a very powerful thing, so tell a friend, share the load. As I said, it's usually for me, talking with Vanessa. Today, she is a blogger and so she does have some understanding of what I'm talking about but even in the early days, back in 2002, 2003, when none of my friends knew what blogging was, when social media didn't even exist, I found simply by verbalizing those things really did help a lot.

In doing so, you're actually going to find that you're not the only person who has failed as well, we all do. Most of the people that you share your failure with will be able to recount some story in their own life where they faced something similar, even if the details are different.

The other thing I would suggest you do though is to also find someone who does understand your business. Talk about it and this might be the second person that you talk to. It maybe that you need to find another blogger, it may be, for a period of time you need to find a business coach or a mentor. Those types of relationships are really important, even if they're not formal business coach type relationships.

There are a few people in my life, if I'm having a tough time in business, I'll pick up the phone, and even though they might be in the different type of business, to me, they understand some of the pressures of what it is that we're going through. Get some professional advice. It doesn't have to be an ongoing thing. It might just be a simple phone call with someone who's been through what you've been through and to draw the wisdom of them.

It might also be something like more of a group type of support, maybe finding a Facebook group like the ProBlogger Facebook group or there are plenty of others online as well to actually have those types of people we can present the failure, the mistake or part of it to that type of group and get that type of advice.

Lastly, I would say is that there are times where you might need to find a therapist. You might need to find a counselor. Perhaps your business failure has rocked your world, your confidence, your personal health, your mental health in some way. There is no shame in actually finding someone to give you support on that emotional level. When you're sick physically you go and see a doctor and when you shaking up emotionally with your mental health, I think it's important to seek help there as well.

That's something that I've done from time to time as well. Sometimes, our business life spills out into our personal lives. Just to encourage you if that is spilling out to actually get some help in that way. Maybe going to speak to a doctor and getting some help in that way as well. No shame at all in that. It's an important part of this journey.

Number one is to not take on that failure in your business into your personal identity. Number two, don't face it alone and number three, is related to not facing it alone and that is to be transparent. It really does relate a little bit to what I've just talked about, you speaking with that friend, or that colleague, or that doctor, and being a little bit vulnerable with another person, it's being transparent about the type of failure that you've had.

Often as you begin to process these failures, you realize there are other people impacted by your failure. This doesn't always happen but in many cases there will be someone else who has been impacted by the mistake that you have made. It maybe that there is a business partner, maybe there is a team member, maybe there is a colleague, maybe even your readers as a blogger have been impacted by your failure, by your mistake.

The temptation when other people are hurt by our failures or impacted by our failures is to save face, it's to hide our failures, and to actually even pretend that it didn't happen or to lie about them, perhaps. But in most cases, this just escalates the problem, and this is really tough. I know it's tough and I'll say it's kind of hesitating but come clean. Admit to your failing to those who are impacted, own your part in it, take responsibility for the mistakes that you have made and attempt to deal with those consequences to find a win-win solution for those who are impacted and to I guess seek forgiveness and to actually right the wrongs that have been done.

This isn't really relevant to all types of failures but in many cases, I'm sure you can realize that those times in your life where you have had a failing, other people are impacted by that. Many times the failing, there's ripple effects that go out from it.

To give you a really quick example, and this is a small failing, I know many of you are probably thinking of bigger things of what I'm about to share with you but this sort of illustrates in my own business a mistake that was made a few years ago, we sent an email, a sales email that was supposed to go to a few hundred people. It was a small segment of our photography blog. A few hundred people was supposed to get this sales email. We actually sent it out to every single person on any of my list including my ProBlogger readers.

I think it was close to 700,000 to 800,000 people who got this email. The email was irrelevant to most people. It was a sales email and it went out. My immediate reaction was to panic, to throw a bit of a tantrum, to run away, to pretend it didn't happen and I was really worried, particularly my ProBlogger readers, that they were going to get this photography sales email.

How was that going to impact? Was it going to impact my credibility? I really hoped that no one would notice but I quickly realized that people were going to notice and so I had to come clean about that mistake as quickly as I could sent an email again to those hundreds of thousands of people, apologizing and owning the mistake that we've made and apologizing for that.

I sent that second email with a lot of fear. I wasn't quite sure how it would be received. Whether people will believe me? I was amazed, instantaneously I started getting emails from readers, messages from readers, saying that they understood it, that they were confused by the first email but they really appreciated me owning the mistake. By no means was there any intention for this to happen. It actually ended up being something that built the brand. I think people were impressed by the way that it was handled and people reflected back that they could relate to the mistake.

In many ways, sending that email, owning that mistake, owning that failure, actually humanized the brand of ProBlogger and Digital Photography School. That's not a big example. I know there are bigger failures. There has been bigger failures in own life but I've seen time and time again, when we own our mistakes, when we own our failures, when we take responsibility for where we have done the wrong thing, that often will be received well from other people. Most people are incredibility generous and gracious and can actually be something that can lead to solutions as well. As you are transparent with people, you will hear back things that can often help you to move forward through that failure. Number three is to be transparent.

Number four is to learn from it. This is something I say to my kids all the time. I say to my kids all the time, making a mistakes are not a bad thing, it's actually making the same mistake repeatedly and not learning from that mistake, that's the issue. That's where I get across with my kids. If you made a mistake, that's totally fine. What are we going to learn from it? How are we going to do things differently next time?

When they make the mistake again, that's when we have tough words. That's where we really need to address it, I guess. Making mistakes is a part of life. It's actually I think a sign of life, that something that you are building momentum, that you are moving forward. Mistakes come when we do that. Failure comes when we do that. Embrace those mistakes, but look for what you can learn through that mistake.

All businesses will have their times of failure, but what you can learn from it, why did the failure happen? Spend some time with that question, what actually happened. Don't just move on to the next thing, what actually happened, what could you have done differently that would provide a different result. What can you learn from that failure, what lessons were there?

Don't run away from the mistake, the failure, embrace it. It's a learning opportunity. If you can find some way to see as a positive and to do it differently next time, that's a very powerful thing. You know that for a fact, if you actually think back to previous failures you've had, you know that those times, sometime they make you who you are today. In hindsight it's really easy to see that but trying try and convince yourself out in the moment as well. What can I learn for this? How I can turn this around?

Number five thing is to keep moving. I do think it's important to sit with the problem, to sit with the foe, to learn from it, to rest perhaps, if you need to recover from it, because sometimes it does take an emotional toll. There are times where I think in business we need to rest, we need to stop, and we need to have a break. Sometimes, after failure, that can be a really good time to do that, to look after ourselves, but I think it's really important to then move on to keep the momentum going in some way.

Right now I'm teaching my five year old to ride a bike. I know a lot of you listening to this podcast, the parents, have had that experience yourself, and he has had his fair share of crashes over the last few weeks. He has scrapes, bruises, and sores on his elbows, on his knees and he even got a little one on his nose at the moment. He has had these crashes and that's part of learning to ride a bike.

He kind of understands that but there are these moments after he has a crash, after he has banged into a fence sort or something, that his natural reaction is to say, "I don't want to do it. I don't want to ride a bike," and to ride off this whole experience. I understand that, I understand that's a natural reaction, I understand the little tantrums that he throws at those point, but I also understand that if he wants to develop this skill, he needs to get back on the bike.

He understands that too in many ways as well and sometimes a little rest is in order, sometimes a little what went wrong is in order so we can learn from the mistake, but most importantly, he gets back on that bike. The same is true in our business, failure can paralyze us. It can stop us in our tracks but it's important to keep moving, get back on the bike.

Identify your next best step, maybe that your next best step is about picking up the pieces and starting again. Maybe it's about evolving what you do, tweaking it, taking the lessons from the mistake and just evolving and tweaking or it may even be that your next best step is to start something new. Drawing out what you've learned, identify something that you need to do to keep you moving and if possible include someone else in that conversation, tell someone about that next best step as well.

The last one I want to share with you is going to annoy some of you. This comes from my personality type which I'm told can be quite annoying at times, but that is to be positive. It's so hard to do it but I always try and look at the bright side. I'm told by Vanessa and her friends that I am eternally an optimist and that can be incredibly annoying, but I am always looking for positive. I think even in those times of incredible failure there are sometimes, there's almost always some sort of a glimmer of something positive in the midst of that.

Sometimes, it does take a little while for this positive glimmer-y little sparks to emerge but when you see them, grab them and move towards those glimmers, focus upon them. It's often the small little sparks that fly in the midst of a failure that can become our next big thing. It can actually be the failing, the mistake that we've made that shapes us and that becomes a part of who we are and how we move forward. It can actually become a part of your brand in many ways. I can think of many people over the years, who actually through failing that they've actually discovered a passion.

They've actually discovered out of their own pain a way that they can help other people who go through a similar things as well. Be very aware that in the midst of the gloominess of failure can actually be the seeds, of something really important. Be on the lookout for those things and on the lookout for those small sparks and to be positive about those sort of thing. Celebrate those little things in small ways in the midst of that pain as well.

I know as I've gone through this, part of me is cringing if I'm honest with you because I know in the midst of failure sometimes you don't want to hear this kind of stuff. Hearing things like find the sparks, it sounds a bit corny, but I really hope that somewhere in the midst of those six things is going to be a way forward for different one of us, who are going through different stages of failure at the moment.

Separate your failure from your identity, don't face it alone, draw other people alongside you to share the stuff that you're going through. Number three, be transparent with the mistake, with the pain. I think that's particularly important in the blogging space because many times when we try and hide the issues, the failings, and the mistakes, these things actually come out later. They can actually come back so be transparent. Number four analyze the failings, analyze the mistake, and work out what you can do to do things differently in future. Number five is to keep moving, keep momentum going, get back on the bike. And lastly, find those glimmers, those sparks of opportunity, those sparks of positivity, and focus upon those things.

I really do hope that somewhere in the midst of those six pieces of advice is something that helps you to move through the inevitable failures that will come your way, the inevitable mistakes that we all do, and that will help you to move through those things into exciting times ahead.

You can find today’s show notes over at problogger.com/podcast/190 where you have the opportunity to not only get a transcript of today's show and find other episodes that relate to the show, but you can also leave a comment. Also, check out the Facebook group problogger.com/group. That will redirect you into that Facebook group.

Lastly, if you're looking for something else to listen to, check out episode 54 of this podcast. It kind of relates. There's some overlap in topic. In episode 54, I gave you three questions to ask yourself when you're facing fear, which is something that I know relates to these times of failure as well. If you want something else, you're feeling fearful at the moment about those sorts of failures that you go through, go and listen to episode 54 as well. It may help you to move through that, that time as well.

Thanks for listening today. I look forward to chatting with you in episode 191 next week on the ProBlogger podcast.

Before I go, I want to give a big shout out and say thank you to Craig Hewitt and the team at Podcast Motor who've been editing all of our podcasts for some time now. Podcast Motor have a great range of services for podcasters at all levels. They can help you to setup your podcast, but also offer a couple of excellent services to help you to edit your shows and get them up with great show notes. Check them out at podcastmotor.com.

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The post 190: How to Overcome Failure in 6 Steps appeared first on ProBlogger Podcast.

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