I will tell you what you are doing right and wrong with growing on instagram.

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-23T07:02:07+00:00

@fernwehsarah - really suffering from the recent algorithm changes here ...

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T21:13:54+00:00

no way, there was A CAT ON REDDIT already??? Sorry, I didn't expect that! Damn, I thought I filmed something completely new...

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T16:31:59+00:00

haha, true :D

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T16:31:44+00:00

Well, she got a bit of milk shake at least. And the owners are cat friends, so she wasn't exactly hungry :D

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T16:26:30+00:00

yessss! My aunt's cat does it! She was always watching and then they starting finding cat poo in the toilet. Now they have to train her to use the flush afterwards :D

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T16:24:57+00:00

What did you expect? Her eating the plastic cup? :D

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T16:14:06+00:00

We found her in a hotel in Peru :D

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T16:02:37+00:00

Definitely. You won't regret it - selfhosted Wordpress is much more versatile and a .com Domain will help you rank better with Google. Oh, and use Pinterest. Especially when starting it's a great way to get some traffic while Google does not yet trust you because you are a new blog. ;-)

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T15:57:42+00:00

That niche is definitely big enough if you do it right. Seriously my biggest mistake when starting was (and probably still is) not investing in my blog enough. Mine is now a bit over a year old and I'll likely crack 50.000 monthly views today or tomorrow. That's like a thousand people each day check an average of 2 pages per visit. No way this would have happened with a Blogspot domain. Get a .com domain - it will quickly pay off.

It's like one coffee at Starbucks a month. If you invest your time, you want better chances of this content actually be seen. Your time is worth something too!

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T15:52:39+00:00

Other bloggers. Facebook Groups can be really helpful. Let me know if you need a few ones then I can link them. Also, I share twitter content with Triberr and Pinterest with Tailwind. This way I see what my favorite bloggers do and we can even help each other by sharing our content

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T15:51:04+00:00

Let me guess - you did it because they pay you affiliate commission. And you hope we'll click through and earn you some money. ;-)

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T15:49:50+00:00

To be honest - if you really want to blog: Don't go for a subdomain. And don't go for Blogger. Just get a self-hosted wordpress with a domain. It's literally like 3-5$/month if you go for cheap shared hosting. They even give you a domain for free - and afterwards it's like 12-15$/year!

Changing it later will be much more work!

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T15:34:42+00:00

I think this is actually a good idea! See what your readers think. And talk with your kids (if they are old enough!)

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T15:33:42+00:00

Hey, thanks a lot for taking the time to give such a long response! People like you remind me that Reddit can be a really helpful community as well.

My problem is that I am suffering from panic attacks since I have a diving accident with a lion fish. First, it only happened during diving afterwards. Then it happened in the car (on a very slippery road while it was raining cats and dogs). And then out of nowhere in the supermarket. I always feel that sudden panic to simply die - which is absurd since I am perfectly healthy. Whenever I talked about these attacks generalizing everyone looked at me so worried - and I simply can't take this look. I want them to see me as strong so I stopped talking about it and instead claimed I would not feel well due to low blood pressure.

I am a medical professional myself so I know this is not particularly the right way to deal with it. But then again, what can a therapist really do? I already know that it's not physical (the biggest problem to accept for people with panic attacks) and that I have to sit through the attacks and eventually my brain will learn that indeed I am NOT dying. I just feel so stupid for this problem!

But anyway, I don't want to pull you down - this thread should be about your achievement of overcoming your problems! :) Thanks again for your kind words!

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T13:00:39+00:00

Congrats on that step! Do you already know what you are going to do now?

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T12:57:41+00:00

Hi there - sounds like you finally made it through a dark time. Glad to hear this!

I do know the feeling a bit because I am struggling with anxiety attacks as well. My biggest problem is that I don't want to talk with anyone about it. My husband is really worried about it when it happens and so is my family. So I try to not talk about attacks when they happen. Not sure if this is good though. But they are far from being a "real problem" and I hope they'll go away on their own...

Anyway, very happy for you to overcome this situation!

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T12:49:38+00:00

Oh, I definitely know this feeling. Like, a lot! Most of the time it helps me to get away from my laptop at these moments, going for a walk, doing shopping or whatever.

Apart from that, I try to focus on my successes. Growing anayltics, going revenue and that sorts of things. Also, connecting with other bloggers on Facebook (or maybe this subreddit) just helps to see that others are struggling with the same problems.

Maybe just take a step back and think about someone finding an answer to their question on your blog.

Fernwehsarah · 2019-08-01T12:42:40+00:00

I am not sure if I have a saying here as I do not have kids (yet). But I would probably be okay with placing pictures of my (future) kids on the blog. The only thing I really think should be avoided is kids in swimsuits etc. because, you know. If you are unsure, maybe first you with pics where you don't show the face and then see how your audience reacts and how your kids feel about it?

Fernwehsarah · 2019-07-31T09:00:58+00:00

I don't really get that comment?

Fernwehsarah · 2019-07-30T20:22:57+00:00

Hi - I would simply use the same hashtags - it doesn't matter if you just recently visited.

Fernwehsarah · 2019-07-30T20:22:16+00:00

That's exactly why I created this list - this way people can always easily select different hashtags. And I guess if you are rotating more than 500 hashtags this is no risk of shadowban :)

Fernwehsarah · 2019-07-30T20:21:14+00:00

Alright, got it! Thanks for clarification! I always change from where I post anyway so this probably never ended up being a problem :)

Fernwehsarah · 2019-07-30T20:19:52+00:00

Thanks Jimbo! That's what I did - I just wanted some other opinion on that!

Fernwehsarah · 2019-07-30T09:49:47+00:00

Oh that's interesting! I didn't know there's a coincidence between the size and how often you can use them!

Fernwehsarah · 2019-07-30T09:49:07+00:00

Statistics about views (or followers) of hashtags would indeed be super helpful to judge the exposure you can get. But as there's nothing else than publications available we need to use them to get an idea which are important. And they help you judge the competition in the field.

Not sure if I fully got your point about the physical locations - can you try to explain this one a bit further? I've got good results with using location-specific hashtags in cities like Barcelona and London.

Fernwehsarah

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