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What it Means When Your New Blog Isn’t Getting Any Comments

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As someone who has been blogging for over 9 years now, I’ve seen a LOT of people – including some of my closest friends – start blogs and then give up on them after just a few weeks or months of blogging.

At first, when I see people stop blogging, and I ask them why they stopped they usually tell me it’s just temporary because they had something come up in their life and they’re just too busy to blog.

Pretty soon, however, their temporary absence from blogging turns into a permanent one and they never come back to it.

Months and in some cases years later I sometimes get the real truth as to why they stopped blogging.

They reveal to me that the real reason they stopped blogging is because they weren’t getting any traffic to their blog, nobody was reading, and nobody was leaving comments.

Usually when I probe a bit more and ask them how they knew that nobody was reading and that they weren’t getting any traffic they say “Well, because I wasn’t getting any comments!”

Have you ever thought that yourself?

Have you ever written and published a blog post that you thought was a phenomenal post, only to later find out that NOBODY left any comments…not even ONE single person?

Did it frustrate you and make you feel like you wanted to quit blogging?

I know I used to feel this way, especially when I was first getting started.

In this post I’m going to offer you a solution that will stop that frustration dead in it’s tracks.

The insight and advice I’m about to give you may very well save your blogging career.

Are you ready?  Here it is…

DO NOT expect any comments on your Blog at all.

Zero.

Zilch.

Nothing.

Here’s the truth…

WAY too many new bloggers spend their first year blogging riding the “Blog Comments Roller-Coaster!”

What’s the “Blog Comments Roller Coaster?”

Basically, what most new bloggers do is they write a blog post and they publish it and then they sit there WAITING to see if someone leaves a comment on their blog post.

And they interpret what happens next as follow…

If someone leaves a positive comment on their blog post, they think to themselves “YES!  I’m awesome.  I’m a great blogger.  I love blogging.  This is awesome…WOOOT!”

If nobody leaves a comment on their blog post, they think to themselves “OH NO!  Why isn’t anyone commenting?  Did my blog post suck?  I bet it sucked.  Maybe I’m not good at this… Maybe I should just give up.”

And if someone leaves a negative comment on their blog post, they usually think “OH NO!  Someone hated my blog post.  I *KNEW* I sucked at this!  I just want to crawl up under a rock.  I’m quitting blogging.”

What keeps most new bloggers going is the ADDICTION to the hope that they’ll get a positive comment on their blog post so that they can feel good about themselves and their confidence can go up.

And what knocks most bloggers out of the game is when a long enough period of time passes when they haven’t receive any comments on their latest posts or the comments they have received are negative.

Listen, I’m here to tell you that COMMENTS are a TERRIBLE way to measure the value of your blog posts!

In fact, I wouldn’t even be opposed to the idea of telling new bloggers to completely turn off blog comments on their blog for the first year because I think it would mean that more bloggers would actually pay attention to the RIGHT metrics they should be measuring instead of comments.

Comments are a useless measure for new blogs…

…why?

Well, firstly because of the flawed idea that if someone doesn’t leave a comment on your blog it must mean that they didn’t like your post or they didn’t find it valuable.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

You know what the truth is?  The truth is that 99.99% of the people who will visit your site and get value from it will NOT leave a comment.

Why not?

Because that is just how we are wired!

Let me give you an example.  I went to a restaurant for lunch today and on my bill it said “If you enjoyed your service today or would like to leave feedback please fill out our survey.”

I ate my lunch.  I enjoyed the food.   It was delicious.  The service was great as well.  I got my bill, and I saw the request to leave a comment…

… did I leave a comment?  NOPE!

In fact, 99% of the time when I’m out and about at stores and restaurants and constantly being asked to leave comments and take surveys I ignore them.

So does everyone else.

We’re just too busy to take the time to stop what we’re doing with our lives to leave comments.

VERY few people leave comments.

Once in a while I’ll fill out a survey, but more than 99% of the time I never do.

That doesn’t mean that I didn’t enjoy the service or the food or the product etc.

It just means I was too busy to leave a comment.

Your readers are BUSY TOO!

Don’t expect ANY comments.

Now, you might get some comments, but what I’m saying is that you shouldn’t expect any.

It doesn’t mean your blog post sucks.

It doesn’t mean you didn’t provide value.

It doesn’t mean anything about you or your blog post at all.

All it means is that the people who read your posts didn’t have time or the desire to leave a comment – and that’s okay!

A number of years ago I learned this lesson in person.

I was at an event in Chicago and I met someone there who thanked me for having a positive impact on her life through my Blog posts.

This person had been reading my blog for YEARS but never left any comments.

She loved my blog, and my posts and continued to read them and some of my posts had a very positive impact on her life, but she never left a single comment.

In fact until that moment when I met her in person, and she told me she has been a long timer reader of my blog, I didn’t even know she read my blog.

I’ve had hundreds of thousands of people across hundreds of different countries around the world visit and read my blog posts over the years, and you know what?

Only a very, very, very tiny fraction of one percent ever leave a comment.

That’s NORMAL!

Stop expecting to receive comments on your new blog!!!

Having that misguided expectation will kill your motivation to blog.

So why do so many people expect comments on their blogs?

Well, I think there are a few different reason for this.

First of all, most people who have never blogged before, have nothing to compare blogging to.

Most new bloggers struggle to understand blogging as a communication medium because it has to be treated differently from many other forms of communication.

For example, blogging is totally different from emailing your friends.

If you write an email to your friends and you send it to them, what happens next?  You expect an answer, right??!

If they don’t answer, what happens? You get upset!  You might phone them and ask them “What the heck…I emailed you…why are you ignoring me?”

Blogging is NOT like emailing your friends.  You can’t treat it the same way.

The vast majority of people who will read your blog posts will read them, enjoy them, and then say NOTHING back.  That is just how it is.

Blogging is NOT like texting your friends.  You can’t treat it the same way either.

If you text someone a message, what do you expect?  You expect them to reply, right???!

You’re not going to get that with Blogging!  So stop expecting it to work that way.

But what about posting stuff on Facebook?  That’s the same as blogging, right?

NO!

When you post a picture of your newborn son on Facebook – and all of your friends and family see it – OF COURSE they’re going to click the LIKE button and leave comments.

That’s to be expected.

On Facebook, most of the time you’re sharing important status updates from your personal life with people who are your personal friends and family.  The likely-hood that they’re going to leave a comment is very high!

But blogging is different from Facebook.

Stop expecting it to be the same thing.

As a successful blogger, 99.9999% of your traffic will come from complete strangers…

… people you have never met and will most likely never meet – BUT you may completely transform their lives with your content!

Of course that’s only if you stick with blogging and don’t give up, and of course that is NOT going to happen if you base your blogging self esteem on how many comments your blog posts are getting.

“But Paul, what about the successful bloggers who are getting comments!???”

Yeah, some successful bloggers get lots of comments on their blogs, but that is because they are getting MILLIONS of visitors on their sites.

And even then, if you follow them for a while you’ll notice that even for them, it’s the same 5 or 10 or 20 people who leave comments every time.

From MILLIONS of people who read their content and benefit from it – only about 5-20 people represent the majority of the comments that they get.

That is just how it is.

And that’s okay.

You don’t need people to comment on your blog posts in order for those blog posts to be valuable to people.

In fact some of your best blog posts might never get any comments.

And that’s okay…

… because you can reach every blogging goal you can dream of without worrying about how many comments you get at all.

… you can provide a tonne of value and have a massive positive impact on the planet even if your blog never gets a single comment!

Of course if you DO get comments, that’s cool too… but don’t allow that metric to be the deciding factor for you as to whether you think your content is helping people or not.

So what metrics CAN you track?

Personally, I would recommend tracking your total visitors per week or month, and your average visitor length of stay.

Google Analytics tracks all that for you automatically. Set it up on your Blog.

For example, if you get 2,000 visitors to your blog this month and they stay on average for 1.5 minutes each, that’s over 3,000 minutes or 50 HOURS worth of attention your readership has given your blog.

That is a huge milestone.

Imagine having an auditorium full of 2,000 people and you go up on stage and give a short, inspirational 1.5 minute speech to the audience who claps for you.

Wouldn’t that be awesome?  And what if they all got value from your speech, but none of them left any comments.  They just applied what you taught and changed their lives.

Well, having 2,000 visitors to your blog is almost the same thing.  You’re helping 2,000 people with your content!

If you get 10 visitors, then that’s awesome too.

If you get 100,000 visitors, then that’s awesome too.

Tracking visitors and working on growing your visitors matters…

Comments don’t matter!

Don’t give up and rob this planet of a chance to hear your story, and learn from your wisdom just because at some point in your blogging career you created the limiting belief that comments are the indicator of a successful blog.

They’re not.  You can have an ultra successful blog and have very little to no comments at all… especially when you’re first starting out.

And you know what the funny thing is?

Once you stop chasing the thrill of getting a comment and just start blogging regardless how many people are commenting on your posts… guess what happens?

You start getting way more comments – LOL.

That’s just how it works.

By the way… if you found this blog post valuable… leave a comment!

Even though I know that 99.9% of you won’t. 🙂

And that’s okay too.

 

Blog Income Report – April 2015

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Now that April has zoomed by so quickly, it’s time again for my official Blog Income Report blog post again.

This month I started putting a lot more time, energy and resources into getting my health and fitness plan in motion, but that didn’t stop me from cranking out yet another 30 blog posts in 30 days.

Blog Content Report – April 2015

Here is a recap of all the blog posts I wrote this month:

 

As in the previous months, I once again participated in the 21 Day Blogging Challenge put on by Empower Network, which is available to all bloggers regardless whether they are a part of Empower Network or not.

The 21 Day Blogging Challenge is a great way to build the habit of daily blogging.  I highly recommend it to anyone just starting out or for existing bloggers who are ready to take things to the next level.

Blog Traffic Report – April 2015

In this fourth month of running this new blog, here are some of my stats for the month of April 2015:

  • Total Users: 1,760
  • Total Sessions: 2,230
  • Total Pageviews: 3,261
  • Avg Session Duration: 1 minute 04 seconds

Although these stats show a decline in my numbers as compared to March, I know one of the major reasons for this is because I have not been emailing out all of my Blog posts to my email list every day.

I’ve been experimenting with emailing my list less often versus emailing every day to find out what is the best emailing frequency that people like.

Now let’s take a look at where my traffic has been coming from.

Blog Traffic Sources Report – April 2015

As you can see from the charts above, my blog traffic distribution changed this month due to the less frequent emailing of my list.

  • Direct Traffic – 898 sessions – 40.3%
  • Social Traffic – 330 sessions – 14.8%
  • Referral Traffic – 525 sessions – 23.5%
  • Organic Search Traffic – 471 sessions – 21.1%

Now for the fun part. 🙂

Blog Income Report – April 2015

Okay, so let’s get to the actual blog income report part of this post.

Before I start talking numbers though, just a quick income disclaimer.  My results are not typical, not guaranteed in any way, and you should check out my income disclaimer if that sort of thing floats your boat.

Okay, now that we got that out of the way, here are my stats:

Total Gross Income – $3,094.32

Total Expenses – $879.81

Net Income: $2,214.31

Alright, so let’s dive into what has been happening this month.

Affiliate Income

My affiliate income this month jumped up to $479, which is exciting as affiliate income is my favorite type of income due to the fact that it can have a passive component to it.

If you’d like to learn how to build up your affiliate income, check out my previous income reports where I’ve covered this topic in more detail, and also check out this video here.

Mentoring / Consulting Income

My mentoring and consulting income was the same as last month and continues to be my highest income stream right now from my Blog.

What most Bloggers don’t realize is that one of the BIGGEST benefits to starting a Blog is that it can help you get consulting / coaching / mentoring clients.

In my opinion EVERYONE should have a Blog regardless what type of business you’re in.

Check out my post on Who Should Blog and Why for a detailed list of people who would benefit most from a Blog.

Now, let’s briefly touch on my expenses for this month.

Expenses

As you can see from my report above, my expenses for this month have actually dropped while my income has gone up!

This is because a lot of the initial expenses I had for getting my Blog started are ONE TIME initial expenses.

As an entrepreneur you may have to invest in your business, especially in the beginning.

You don’t need to overspend on useless crap, but investing into your business strategically, such as buying training courses or getting mentored by the top people in the industry is a great way to get your business growing faster.

I meet so many young entrepreneurs who haven’t learned this lesson yet, and they’re so afraid to invest any money into their business.

They want everything for free and they have this entitlement mentality that just leads them to failure.

Don’t be afraid to invest in yourself and your business.

You will most likely never find a better investment that pays higher dividends long term than investing in yourself.

My Blogging Goals for April

Here were some of my main goals for April:

  • Participate in my 4th 21 Day Blogging Challenge – Check!
  • Continue on with daily blogging – Check!
  • Test different email frequency for my audience – Check!
  • Research and test out free traffic strategies – Check!
  • Record 10 “Driving With Paul” Episodes – Check!
  • Increase my Blogging business profits – Check!
  • Grow my Empower Network Team and Income – Check!
  • Launch my “Manifesting Body Diet and Fitness Plan” and Start Blogging About It – Check!

Summary

To summarize, my blogging income has continued to grow pretty steadily each month and with some of my initial one-time expenses out of the way, my net profit from my Blog is starting to go up which is exciting.

Some of you may also remember that back in January I wrote a post declaring my intention to build up my blog business income up to the point where I can get a Free Car from Blogging.

Obviously I’ve now blown past that goal, and I can afford a new car with my Blog, so I’ll be writing an update Blog post sharing my intentions with that very soon.

Keep an eye out for that. 🙂

Final Words

One of the reasons I decided to put together these monthly income reports is because I want to inspire others – LIKE PERHAPS YOU! – to consider starting a Blog today and using it to build your own brand, and to start making some extra income from it.

One of my personal goals is to teach / mentor and help 108 people to make a full-time six-figure income working from home as Bloggers and Internet marketers.

If you’d like to learn more about getting started with making money online, click here to learn more.

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Crazy Tank Shenanigans Help Raise a Million for Charity

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I came across this video today and thought it was a brilliant example of how a celebrity like Arnold Schwarzenegger can use his brand to raise money for charity in a fun, exciting and unique way.

Basically Arnold held a contest last year where people who donated had a chance to win a trip to meet him and to do fun and crazy stunts with his TANK!

Yes, you read that right… a TANK!

Check out the video here:

As you can see in the video, Arnold is back at it again – except this time the lucky winner will not be crushing things with Arnold’s tank, but instead blowing things up with Arnold!

I think the whole concept and idea and the execution behind this project is an awesome example of the power of properly utilizing branding, online marketing, social media and good-ol-fashioned FUN to do something worthwhile for a good cause.

It all starts with developing a brand for yourself, and in my opinion one of the best ways to establish yourself as a brand and to build an audience is through blogging.

Once you establish your brand, there are so many positive things you can do with it – just like Arnold did – simply thinking outside the box a little bit.

 

I Don’t Know What To Blog About

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Sometimes people say to me “Hey Paul, I really don’t know what to Blog about anymore… I’ve run out of things to say.”

If you’ve started a Blog and at some point reached that point where you just don’t know what else to write about or what else to create YouTube videos about, let me tell you why this is a good thing!

Have you ever heard of the saying that in order to learn something new, you must first empty your cup?

Well, whenever you write a Blog post, you’re essentially sharing your opinion on a specific topic for the world to read.

When you do that, it has the effect of releasing that information from your cluttered mind – kind of like getting something off your chest.

Once you write your Blog post and publish it, that information no longer has to take up space in your mind.

You’ve put your ideas, opinions and concepts on “paper” and now your mind can move onto other things.

Being in this place of having an “empty mind” and not knowing what else to possibly write about should be celebrated, not seen as failure.

It means you’ve essentially finally said what you’ve wanted to say, and you’ve cleared your mind.

So what do we do next?

How to Create More Things to Blog About

Once you’ve reached this point where you’ve written about all the things you can think of writing about, your mind (cup) has been emptied a bit.

What you now have to do is start filling that cup back up!

Read a new book, re-kindle your love for a hobby you once had, research something new, start learning a new skill of some sort…

… there are just a few ways that you can start to fill your cup again.

Get around other people who are succeeding in areas that you’ve wanted to succeed, and learn something new!

As you start filling your cup again, it will give you new things to think about and new things to Blog about.

Take my recent decision to lose weight and get fit.

As soon as I made that decision, I started reading books, taking courses, researching and even consulting with personal trainers on the topic of health and fitness.

As I’m learning more about this topic, it’s giving me new Blog content to write about, and ideas for the types of videos I can shoot.

This is the beauty of Blogging – it forces you to go out there and to LIVE life and to LEARN new things to that you have something to Blog about on a regular basis!

A very successful person once told me that he has been journaling in his journal every single day for decades, and the most common objections people tell him when he recommends daily journaling is that people say that they don’t have anything to write about.

His answer to that objection was simply this… he said “Look, if you spend a 24 hour period of time on this planet, and during that time throughout the entire day you have NOTHING interesting happen to you, and you LEARN NOTHING new, and you have NO NEW THOUGHTS, and you EXPERIENCE NOTHING that would be worth writing about in your journal, then you seriously need to re-evaluate your life because you’re either living a very small life far beyond your capabilities OR you’re going through your days completely unaware of what’s happening in your life because you’re not paying attention.  In either case you may want to make some changes.  To live a day on this planet without having anything interesting to write about in your journal is a total waste.”

I first heard this about 20 years ago and I’ve been journaling on an almost daily basis ever since and I have to say that it has been very transformational.

Journaling on a regular basis led me to also love Blogging on a regular basis.

And both journaling and Blogging have really helped me in my life by making me aware – every single day – that I’ve got to do SOMETHING with my life each day… something worth Blogging about or Journaling about, otherwise I’m wasting my life!

So if you’re feeling totally stuck and you don’t know what to Blog about – firstly, I recommend celebrating the fact that you’ve probably emptied your cup and de-cluttered a lot of the noise that has been swimming around in your head.

Secondly, it’s time to now start making some changes in your life by learning something new, or taking on a new project, or re-connecting with some projects you started in the past.

It’s time to LEARN and DO new things and then to Blog about them!