How My Blog Traffic Exploded Overnight

Are you a blogger struggling to get traffic to your site? So was I.

Pretty recently, in fact.

On April 26th, my blog had ten visitors. TEN! The next day, April 27th, I had 952! When I say my traffic exploded overnight, I mean it!

That doesn’t mean I did one day of work. Far from it! I have been blogging seriously since October and not made much money. But I knew that I was writing good quality content that was useful and could really help people, so I decided to hang in there.

(If you’re still trying to figure out if blogging is right for you, check out this post: Should You Start a Blog?)

This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. You can read my full disclaimer here.

How I Got Started Blogging

Last summer, I decided to make blogging my full-time gig. I had tried networking marketing, transcription, and one-on-one coaching and–while those are all great opportunities– they just weren’t 100% fitting for my personality or lifestyle right now.

After making a bunch of mistakes as a newbie blogger (you can read about those in this post: 5 Mistakes I Made as a New Blogger), in October I finally got my blog set up in the right place. It took some, but I finally got it set up exactly as I wanted.

Now I just had to figure out how to get people to visit my site, which I found out, was easier said than done.

What I Did Right

If I could rewind back to October, I would still invest in the first course I did, Becoming a Blogger.

Becoming a Blogger provided me with a great foundation to build on. The course teaches everything you need to know about building a profitable blog, including how to land sponsored posts, how to optimize your posts for search engines, and even simply how to write a blog post that people want to read!

You can start this course today even if you don’t have a blog set up. It’ll help you get started right and avoid some of the mistakes that I made in the beginning.

What I Tried

After I understood the foundations of blogging, I was ready to move on to marketing my blog. After all, you can have amazing content with links in all the right places, but if you’ve got no traffic, it does you no good.

I tried a bunch of different marketing methods, including Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest.

On Facebook, I was in blogging community groups exchanging comments, pins, and shares on content. Then I was posting on my personal page and business page, plus running a private group.

On Instagram, I was building two pages, participating in several “pods,” and torturing myself to take IG-worthy photos (which is definitely NOT my strength).

I was also slooooooowly building an email list and Facebook group. I would share new posts with my list and in my group, as well as provide them with other value.

As far as Pinterest, I was creating pins and scheduling them via Tailwind (because I kept reading that scheduling was the way to go). I only did this once a week, which I thought was nice.

So, to summarize, I was spending lots of time in a bunch of different places, and just a little bit of time on Pinterest. I thought I had it all figured out, but I was still only driving minimal amounts of traffic to my site.

Then, I finally found something that made all the difference.

What I Wish I Would’ve Done Sooner

In April, I signed up for Pinteresting Strategies.

Pinteresting Strategies is a course by Carly from Mommy on Purpose. There are a lot of Pinterest courses out there, but as I was researching, this particular course kept coming up with amazing reviews.

I was hesitant because, frankly, I was sick of spending money on a blog that hadn’t made me much money yet. But finally, I decided to go for it.

The tips I learned in this course helped me to 10x my blog traffic overnight!

I went from 1000-1500 monthly page views to over 30,000 in the past 30 days (the analytics image below is a few days old).

Of course, there is some fluctuation in my traffic, but since implementing Carly’s Pinteresting Strategies, I’ve had at least 250 views every day and most days I have around 1000 sessions.

The price of the course (as of the time I’m writing this) is $47. This is one of the lowest prices I’ve seen for a Pinterest course. I made that money back in ad revenue alone within the first month. Of course, results will vary, but this was my honest experience. For me, the course was worth every penny of my $47 investment.

Pinterest Tips to Start Using Now

If you’re working on Pinterest already but not seeing the results you want, here are some helpful tips you can use right now to uplevel your Pinterest game:

-Your pins should be EASY to read (no script fonts) with appealing images.

-Make your pin irresistibly clickable

-Experiment with different templates, don’t be committed to one right from the beginning (I made some TERRIBLE pins at the beginning. If I’d committed to one style, I would still be struggling)

-Use keywords in your board names, pin titles, and pin descriptions

You will find these tips plus SO MUCH MORE in Pinteresting Strategies.

If you aren’t getting the traffic you feel like you deserve, you MUST try Carly’s strategies. They are game-changing! Whether you’re a Pinterest newbie or already using Pinterest to market your blog, this course is for you.

Consider these facts about Pinterest:

Traffic that you get from Pinterest is FREE. I was spending tons of time on Facebook and Instagram trying to build a following and even though I was somewhat successful, my success wasn’t translating into views on my blog.

Why is that?

Because Facebook and Instagram don’t want to encourage people to visit other sites. They want to keep their users on THEIR sites (don’t we all?) so they make it difficult to see posts that direct users other places unless of course, it’s a PAID ad.

For example, my Facebook business page has around 6500 “likes.” But every time I post on my page, I’m lucky if 200 people see it. I’ve paid for ads on Facebook too, but the return was just not worth it.

On Pinterest, I can drive traffic to my site with a smaller following (I started with 150 followers) and see much better results without spending a dime.

The Struggle to Get Blog Traffic is Real

The hard part is knowing how to do the Pinterest thing well.

I hated trying to figure Pinterest out on my own. Many days my husband would come home from work and ask how my day was and I’d answer, “I’m in Pinterest hell.” I just couldn’t figure it out!

But now that I learned Carly’s strategy, Pinterest is SO MUCH FUN! I spend most of my time these days writing and manually pinning.

I still send out emails to my list and post in my Facebook group, but I spend much less time marketing in other places. It simply isn’t worth my time when Pinterest has been so much more successful.

Trust me, if you aren’t getting the traffic you want (even if you feel like you understand Pinterest pretty well), invest in Pinteresting Strategies.

I’m willing to bet that you’ll wish you did it sooner.