What I did in 2015 to grow my blog

2015 really was a successful year for me. As far as blogging goes, it was incredible. Much better than my first year, but hopefully not as successful as 2016 will be! In the last year I found an increase in followers, page views, social media followers, and engaged readers. I'm sure this was all a result of my different strategies implemented last year. This is what I did. What really worked and helped me as well as my blog:

I told people at school - once I started to become proud of my blog, I was of course, more open to talking about it. I wanted people to know, and I wanted them to tell people about it as well. Once I started to get the word out around school, my readers, Instagram followers, and Twitter followers grew! My teachers also somehow got word of my blogging side, and would stop me in the hall to tell me about a small grammatical error or a picture they liked... Ect.

I really got into scheduling tweets - it shouldn't surprise anyone that the way I got more views in 2015 on my blog posts, was by utilizing social media. I didn't really realize before about July 2015 just how much of a help Twitter could be. I scheduled tweets through Hootsuite and Tweetdeck, and would share new posts & old posts all throughout the day at random times

I posted on Instagram daily - I'm not really sure how this helped my blog grow... If I had to guess I would say it was probably me always promoting my posts, sharing photos from a post, or just posting something semi artsy that a follower would want to check out this blog that I was always talking about. Whatever it was... It worked!

Constantly commenting - I did this a lot last Summer. Every morning before really starting my day, I would go through my bloglovin' feed as well as the select blogs I had posts delivered to my inbox for. As I read each post, I would try my best to leave a meaningful comment along with a link back to my own blog. Even if no one clicked on it, I was still getting my name out there! The same goes for Instagram.. I would comment on at least 5 posts each time I checked Instagram. Even the simplest of cat heart eye emojis and direct people back to your account. Also on Twitter, I replied to every #replytweet, question, ect. 

Hosting linkups - I co-hosted a crap ton of successful linkups with some amazing gals (all y'all know who you are ;)) it's always fun when you get to interact with other bloggers around the Internet to collaborate under one topic! The best part of linkups is sharing other people's posts... Sometimes they'll shout your post out in return which is always nice too! 

Participating in linkups - Not only did I co-host a lot of linkups, I participated in a bunch too. They are amazing opportunities to connect, build relationships, gain inspiration, as well as share some creative posts of your own! 

I told random people about my blog - It's really fun to be 15 and be able to have a formal, business like introduction when meeting adults and strangers. I love it! When I met people while I was helping at the flood relief center and we had some downtime for lunch... I found myself talking about it. While visiting craft fairs and Christmas bazaars I gained new Instagram followers. My mom's friends follow me on Instagram and Twitter. Casual things like that... You just can't be scared to throw it out there! It's actually really cool that you're a blogger, so be proud of that and tell people! 

Hosting Twitter chats - Twitter chats were somewhat scary to me at first. I felt intimidated. Honestly, it was probably because of my age and lack of experience compared to other bloggers (the comparison trap sucks to fall into). My first one was honestly probably the wrong type of chat for me... It was more for the entrepreneurial type, which is something I am not - in my defense, it was advertised completely wrong! The next one I tried was fun, but I couldn't exactly answer all the questions. I felt my answers were "unpopular" (I'm a very honest person) so I decided to keep looking for another more fitting chat. When I couldn't find one, I immediately brainstormed ideas and did a bit of research. Shortly after, Jamie and Nicole and I teamed up to host #bloggerblab (which was insanely successful) and there's also #galpalchat which is a heck-a-lot of fun too! 

Completely being myself - there is no one else out there on the internet that is 100% like me. I can promise you that. I can also promise that there is no one else with the same voice, intentions, ideas, ect. As me. Which keeps my content interesting - at least that's what I've been told. I set myself apart from the basic blog in my "niche" (wow I hate that word) and it worked to my benefit.

I hope this helped you, fellow bloggers, in your strategy planning for 2016. Please share with me your tried and true strategies and what has helped you achieve success!