No matter how much time and effort you put into learning about blogging, there is always something you’ll miss.
Here are the things I wish knew about and I would have done differently.
1. Hosting
I wish I switched to Agathon shortly after I got accepted to Mediavine.
I was scared off my Agathon’s high prices – especially since at that time their site wasn’t very clear so I had no idea how much I’d actually be paying.
However, as I learned a couple months later after switching to Trellis, a faster site means higher RPMs.
So, I took a look again a number of months later because I felt my hosting could actually be faster…
It turned out I’d be paying $80 a month, which isn’t a little bit, but the switch raised my RPM’s by almost 25%.
My RPM from video ads was up almost 60%.
So it more than paid for itself.
I honestly wonder how high the percentage would have raised if I had moved directly from BlueHost to Agathon instead of from Lyrical Host.
2. WordPress Theme
I wish I would have switched to Trellis sooner.
While I was a part of the beta testing, I was offered to join at least a month or two earlier.
At first I was really excited to be accepted but then I started to think about losing my design.
I ended up actually holding off off because it was recommended to me to wait for Create Indexes because of how I built my homepage for SEO.
Create Inexes was supposed to come out any time and I contacted them weekly for an update.
I ended up giving up and switching to Trellis without them.
I’m glad I did because Create Indexes didn’t open to beta testers until many months later.
What I didn’t know while I waited was that using Trellis increased your RPMs.
That is when I learned that the faster your site is, the more money you can make.
If I had switched when I was originally offered I would have made thousands more than did.
3. Podcast
I’m a big believer in using podcasts as a way to learn.
I got into listening to them when I wanted to start a blog and came across Food Blogger Pro.
Then I started listening to Smart Passive Income too.
And then I found others and I listened to those as well.
I wish I would have given The Theory of Content a try when I first came across them.
To be honest this is a case of judging a book by it’s cover.
I saw the silly thumbnail for the podcast and thought it probably wasn’t serious…
So I set it aside for later and forgot about it.
I happened to hear about it two years later and gave it a try.
It totally changed my understanding of SEO and my content strategy.
I’m glad I started listening to it before starting my second blog though because I did implement it then.
4. Mobile First
I wish I would have known about Mediavine‘s YouTube channel before I joined.
If I had, I would have known about having mobile friendly paragraphs.
This would have not only made me a lot more money from ads, but also would have saved me lots of time.
When I joined Mediavine I had less than 100 recipes and it would have been much easier a job.
They did tell me to make shorter paragraphs when I moved so I did.
But it wasn’t until I saw this Go for Teal video almost a year later.
By then, I had to go back and fix almost 200 posts.
5. Video
I wish I would have started making video sooner.
Mediavine was always telling us in their educational content to make video.
What I don’t remember knowing until after I already had a few videos up was that ads on videos have much higher RPMs.
So, if I would have done it sooner I would have made a lot more money.
So, when I started my second site, video was a part of the game plan very early on.
6. Pinterest Strategy
My Pinterest Marketing Strategy wasn’t bad…
I did what ever I learned from either Pinterest or Pinterest experts to do.
However, I had no idea how many times a day to pin or that it makes a difference.
It was only when Pinterest came out and said you should pin 25 times a day did my traffic (and income) started booming.
Also, I did know that Pinterest links are follow links until I saw the thousands of links I had from Pinterest in Google Search Console.
I wish I knew that too.
7. Gutenberg
I’m glad I switched to Gutenberg when it was first impelemtned.
It was a shock to the system at first because I was rushing to get a post up and now I had to work with a whole new system but I got used to it quickly.
What I really liked about it were the reusable blocks because I answer a lot of the same FAQs in my posts on my food blog.
However, I wish I noticed sooner that they added in the group option.
Before that I was hardly able to take advantage of the the reusable blocks.
In general I spent dozens if not hundreds of hours a year going back and fixing every paragraph.
If I knew about the reusable blocks sooner I would have saved many hours for sure.
8. Create Cards by Mediavine
One thing I think made a big difference for my food blog was switching to Create Card (which can be used for many types of blogs).
Their review system is very simple and really helped my recipes rank higher.
This in turn helped my both my blog and income grow.