How Responding To Blog Comments Improve Blog Performance

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When it comes to responding to the comments of the readers, bloggers often give it less priority over other things. When your blog post receives a large number of comments, you find it even more difficult to respond to the comments. After responding to the initial comments, you often make the mistakes of leaving rest of the comments unattended.

Bloggers often find it difficult to respond to the comments of their readers due to their busy schedule. They do not consider responding to blog comments a core function of blogging.

Some bloggers believe that responding to comments gives a low return on investment. However, in reality responding to blog comments is one of the most effective strategies to improve the performance of a blog.

Not replying to the comments of your readers can cost you dearly. There are many disadvantages of not responding to the comments of the audience. For example, it can negatively impact your blog traffic, revenue and even ranking of your blog.

Moreover, it impacts the opinion of your audience about your blog. Some of your readers might not comment on your blog again if you fail to respond to them.

Why is it important to respond to the comments of your blog readers? There are several advantages of responding to the comments of your blog readers. Let’s check out the benefits of responding to the blog comments.

Top 10 benefits of repling to blog comments

1. Responding to blog comments results in more comments:

    The more you respond to the comments of your blog readers, the more comments you receive in your post. Higher the number of quality comments/response, more readers will come back to read the comments. Quality comments give fuel to the discussion which in turn helps you get more comments.

2. It improves the amount of time a reader spend on your blog: 

    The amount of time your audience spends on your blog post is directly propositional to the number of comments on your post. In other words, if you have large numbers of quality comments in your post, your readers will spend more time in reading your post.

3. It improves the ranking of your page in Google searches: 

    It has been found that the posts that receive a large number of comments rank higher in Google searches. There are two reasons behind it. First, a large number of comments indicate the popularity of the post which in turn helps Google rank post higher in the search results. 

    Second, when you respond to the comments of your readers it leads to the creation of more content resulting in an increase in the content of the blog. Google search engines rank those posts higher in the search results that have more content. Why? Because more content means more keywords which in turn helps search engines to rank the post higher in the search results.

4. It leads to enhanced audience engagement 

    When you respond to the comments of the bloggers, it enables you to understand the problems or opinion of your audience. Your audience is most likely to show a high level of engagement if you reply to their comments. 

5. It leads to improved blog traffic: 

     When you respond to the comments of the readers it improves the blog traffic in five ways:

•  When you respond to the comments of your reader they visit your blog post once again to read your response which in turn increases page views.
•  Responding to the comments of the readers  helps you connect with your audience which in turn results in more sharing on social media platforms.
•  A large number of comments in the post create curiosity among the readers to read the post which in turn further increases page views.
• Sometimes the blog comments become more interesting and informative than the actual post itself which further improves page views
•  A large number of comments improve the ranking of the page resulting in more generic traffic.

6. Responding to blog comments helps you improve your blog content 

    There is a big difference between reading the comments of your blog readers and responding to their comments. When you actually respond to the comments of your blog readers it leads to discussion which in turn helps you improve the blog content. Once you have a better understanding of the problems of your audience it helps you create content complying with the needs of your targeted audience.

7. Responding to blog comments leads to increase in revenue 

    Always remember, the readers who are serious about their business are more likely to comment on your blog. They might be looking for the answer of some of the questions related to the topic or simply want to thank you for valuable information. When you respond to their questions or simply appreciate their comments they are most likely to purchase your products or services in the near future.

In other words, the numbers of readers who comment on your blog are most likely to be your potential customers. By responding to their comments, you establish a relationship that could generate results in the long terms in the form of improved sales.

8. It helps your gain loyalty of the audience: 

    When you respond to the comments of your readers you build a long-term relationship with them. Readers are more likely to read your blog time and again if you respond to their comments.

9. Sometimes it leads to a healthy discussion: 

    The comment section of your blog is a place that not only provides the readers to raise questions but also the blog author to clarify his stand on the topic. Sometimes a topic leads to healthy discussion which in turn helps all the party to gain in-depth knowledge of the phenomenon. In other words, it helps in knowledge creation.

10. It helps you build your brand 

    Responding to the comments of the readers helps you build your brand image. It provides you the opportunity to identify your targeted audience and build a relationship with them through enhanced interaction. 

    Responding to the readers' comments is the core function of the blogging business. It serves the function of public relation which in turn helps you build your brand image.

There is no doubt responding to the comments of the readers positively impacts the performance of your blog. It creates a chain reaction which in turn facilitates blog traffic, blog ranking, knowledge creation, and customer satisfaction. You can significantly improve the performance of your blog by simply responding to the comments of your blog readers.

Have you ever realized any of the above mentioned beneifits of replying to blog comment? If yes, please do share with us. Do you find this post helpful? Please feel free to post your comments and share it with others. Look forward to hearing from you. 

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11 Blogging Practices That Audience Hates

What are the blogging practices that have the potential to take a toll on your future growth? In this article, I have summarized 11 blogging practices that audience hates. As a blogger, you must not indulge in these blogging practices. If you want to become a successful blogger you must adopt only best blogging practices. 

Sometimes success makes you blind. You begin to ignore the people who helped you achieve the success you have been enjoying today. For bloggers, their audiences are their great supporters. If you are unknowing ignoring your audience or knowingly fooling them, it’s high time you reevaluate your blogging approach. 

If you want to continue to enjoy your success, you need to avoid some blogging mistakes that most of the bloggers are unknowingly or may be knowingly making.

Let’s check out the 11 blogging practices that bloggers must never follow.

Best blogging practices to keep you audience happy

1. Do not promise what you cannot deliver: Audience hates false promises

There is a new trend that has emerged in the recent past year. Bloggers are increasingly adopting tempting ways to attract their audience to subscribe to their blog or website. For example, many bloggers promise you a free eBook on marketing that you will find nowhere else. However, in reality, these books contain the same old stuff that you find on the internet.

Similarly, there are some bloggers who promise you to deliver something that can help you earn hundreds of dollars on the social media sites if you subscribe to their blog. However, in reality, these things are same old crap that is useless and time wasting. So never promise something that you cannot deliver. Such practices can adversely impact your reputation.

Moreover, some bloggers write their marketing pitch in such a manner as if the product is free of cost. However, in reality, when you submit your information you get to know that it’s a paid service. Get out of this blogging practice. Always remember, it hardly takes a few seconds to unsubscribe.

There is no doubt creating email list is extremely important for creating a successful blog. However, bloggers must not do it at the cost of putting their reputation at risk. There are several bloggers who advise using tempting offers to make audience subscribe to your blog. However, in reality, this strategy doesn't last long. Always remember, audience hates false promises

2. Do not ignore the comments of your blog readers: Audience hates nonresponsive blogs

Readers hate it when they do not get any response on their queries or comments. You would have noticed that several successful bloggers hardly respond to their readers’ comments. 

If you look in the comment section of the successful blogs, you will find that only some of  readers get the response on their comments.

On the other hand, there are many bloggers who take out time to respond to their readers no matter how successful they are. Some of the successful bloggers do it at an amazing speed. For example, Neil Patel is one such blogger. According to Neil Patel, he has responded to over 50,000 comments so far. He spends more than 26 hours per month to respond to the comments of his readers. 

Interestingly, for him, this approach has resulted in increased traffic, enhanced customers’ loyalty, social sharing and significant improvement in sales.

Personally, I have come across several successful bloggers who responded to my comments within a couple of hours. A majority of these bloggers are either award winning bloggers or hold top positions in blogging business.

On the other hand, I have also come across many other successful bloggers who hardly care to respond. I am sure, like me, most of you would have stopped commenting on websites or blogs where your comments do not get noticed.

In the coming years, your blogging strategy including the customer care strategy will determine your success or failure in the blogging business. Always remember, blogging business is rapidly evolving and your inability to respond to the queries of the audience will surely result in blog failure. 

You can significantly improve your blog performance by responding to the blog comments. Responding to the blog comments is considered as one of the best blogging practices.

3. Don’t be unthankful to your followers: Audience does not like ungrateful bloggers

There are many bloggers who never take out time to thank their followers. This is especially true on social media platforms like Twitter. You are mistaken if you think that followers do not care about these things. 

Not thanking your followers gives the impression that you hardly care about your followers. It shows that you are too busy with your money making ideas and hardly have time to respond to your followers. 

Personally, I feel more attached to the bloggers who take out time to respond to their followers. And I am sure most of you might be having the same opinion. It hardly takes few seconds to send a thank you note to the followers. It is considered as a good business practice.

I understand it is not possible for highly successful bloggers to respond or send a thank you note to each and every follower especially on social media platforms likes twitter. However, research shows that higher the response rate, higher will be the traffic flow.

Followers are more likely to stay loyal to you if you appreciate them for becoming your follower. Respond to their queries and guide them to become a successful blogger. Always remember, the audience do not like ungrateful bloggers.

4. Do not outsource your core functions to outside providers:  Audience hates static blog

Outsourcing the core function of your blog to the outside providers can adversely impact the performance of your blog. In fact, this practice starts the beginning of the end. You are the best judge of you blog. You know what is best for your audience.

The audience hates it when you use your blog as a tool to only display your content and fail to connect with your audience. In fact, the loyalty of the audience is for the creator of the content rather than the blog itself. Your audience is more likely to show a high level of loyalty if you create your content yourself and connect with your audience.  

A majority of the audience shows their loyalty to the blog owner rather than the blog itself. This is why Google recommends displaying your profile in your blog. All the successful bloggers have been doing it. It is considered as a good blogging practice as it helps your audience connect with you.

You cannot expect from external service providers to create something that your audience loves. Occasionally, there is no harm in asking external service providers to write something unique and useful for your blog. However, depending on others to consistently provide content for your blog is a bad blogging practice. Gradually you will fail to connect with your audience.

Content creation is the core function in the blogging business. You can depend on external service providers for noncore functions. However, core functions must always be performed by the blogger.

If you find it hard to put across your ideas effectively you can occasionally hire someone to write articles for you. However, the basic research must always be done by the blogger. After all, external service providers are not going to respond to the queries of the readers. Audience hates  nonresponsive blogs.

Therefore, it is important that you should play an active role in the core functions of your blog.

5. Do not ignore investing in your business: audience hates inconvenience

Most of the bloggers make the mistake of not investing in their blog. They keep whatever they earn from their blog for their personal expenses. This is a bad business practice.

Once your blog begins to show signs of growth, it requires investment. You cannot expect to make a lot of money from you blog unless you invest a small part of your income in enhancing the value of your blog. If you have successfully monetized your blog, you must invest in the promotion of your blog. 

You can invest in branding, marketing, advertising, look of your blog, and customer care activities. For example, if you are too busy with content creation, you can hire experienced staff that can respond to the readers' queries. Or, you can simply install auto responders to send at least a thank you note to your followers. According to Hubspot, Gartner research has predicted that by 2020, customers will conduct their 85% of the relationship without talking to the human.

Readers are most likely to stay loyal to you if they can access your blog easily on different social media platforms. Digital audiences need the convenience of access. Providing conveneince of access to the audience is also one of the best blogging practices to engage your audience.

By investing in your business, you can significantly enhance your presence across several social media platforms. Always remember, the audience loves to access information from reliable and convenient sources. Audience hates inconvenience in accessing the information they need.

6. Do not stop following your followers: Audience hates self-centered bloggers

Most of the successful bloggers think that they do not need to follow their followers. If you become their follower, they mistakenly believe that you need them more than they do. If you do not follow your followers sooner or later you will lose them to your competitors.

There is no harm in following back people who follow you. There are two advantages of following your followers. First you will get to know about your real audience. Second, it will help you in successful monetization.

Following your followers simply shows that you care about your followers and value their opinion. At the same time, it shows that you are open to learning from your followers.

Always remember, following your followers is a great sign of success on social media platforms. Knowledge is available everywhere, your audience can anytime access knowledge from various other sources. A majority of successful bloggers follows at least 50% of their followers. 

For example, successful blogger  Jeff Bullas currently have more than 386 thousand twitter followers but at the same time, he follows 238 thousand twitter users. Similarly, award-winning entrepreneur, Sayed Balkhi is currently following more than 20 thousand followers.  Your audience is most likely to show a high level of loyalty if you follow them back. 

7.  Do not play tricks on your readers: Audience hates bloggers who play tricks on them

Audience hates it when someone try to fool them. Some bloggers try to be too smart with their audience. For example, some bloggers follow you with the sole intention of making you follow them back. They play a trick on you. Once you follow them you will notice after a week or two that they have unfollowed you.

However, this blogging practice generates counterproductive results in the long run. Get out of this blogging habit. Don’t follow someone you think is not your ideal audience. Follow them like they way you want them to follow you. If your followers are contributing to your success, it is your responsibility to contribute to their success.

You are mistaken if you believe your followers are never going to find out who unfollows them. Always remember, there are many apps available in the market such as, Crowdfire and Unfollower that enables bloggers to keep track of their followers. 

8. Do not avoid reading blogs of your followers: Audience hates  noncooperation

Your followers are your great supporters and they expect you to support  them the way they support you. One-sided support kills the spirit of better collaboration and networking. Allowing or even encouraging your audience for guest posting or creating a guest post for your audience are some of the methods of enhanced cooperation and networking.

To understand the problems of your audience, you must read the blog of your followers. Commenting on their blog will be much more beneficial than your imagination. It will help you in two ways. First, your followers will feel more attached to you. Secondly, you will be able to understand the problems of your audience. Moreover, you might be able to get some new ideas by reading the blog of your followers. 

9. Do not force your audience to buy your products: Audience hates forced selling

The audience hates it when you force them to buy your products or services. Displaying your own products or affiliate products in the blog does not bother audience. They hate it when your adds frequently interrupt their reading. 

Unlike other businesses, in the blogging business your audiences are not only your targeted customers but also your competitors. There are several readers who read your blog to learn something new rather than actually buying your products. These followers are equally important for you as they help you maintain high page ranking in google searches.

10. Do not stop learning from your followers: Audience hates egoistic bloggers

The audience hates egoistic bloggers. Underestimating the knowledge and blogging capabilities of your followers is one of the biggest mistakes that some of the bloggers make. 

Some of the bloggers think they are not going to learn something valuable from their followers. They use followers for improving their blog ranking and to sell their products or services to them. They are preoccupied with their own self-interest and fail to learn from their followers.

Never underestimate the competition in the business of blogging. Even your followers have the potential to become your competitors in the near future. Therefore, building a good relationship with your followers will help you to strength your position in the blogging market.

A majority of the bloggers do it unknowingly as they follow industry trends. However, it is highly recommended that you should read the blog of your followers as much as possible and comment whenever you get time. It will not undermine your knowledge or success. In fact, it will enhance your image in your followers’ circle.

11. Do not stick to old ideas: Audience hates outdated information

Audience hates outdated ideas. Always be ready to learn to unlearn. The things that were once a source of great competitive advantage in the industry might no longer be relevant in changed blogging market scenario. For example, short articles were very effective a couple of years ago. However, today, long articles are increasing gaining popularity and getting more page views.

Therefore, it is imperative on the part of bloggers to learn to unlearn. Get out of your old blogging habits or strategies that are no longer relevant in today’s environment. This will help you to adapt to new environment. 

The success of the bloggers in today's blogging environment will depend on their ability to create and market content complying with the convenience, needs and expectations of the targeted audience. 

By adopting the above mentioned best blogging practices you can significantly improve audience satisfaction resulting in higher audience engagement and loyality.

Do you think an effective strategy to improve audience satisfaction can help you achieve better audience engagement? Is there any relationship between comment response rate and blog traffic. Please feel free to share your opinion with us. If you liked this article, please share it too. 

Is Guest Posting a Right Thing For Bloggers

In the recent years, guest posting has emerged as one of the most effective methods of increasing blog traffic and creating quality back links. Bloggers are increasingly writing articles exclusively for leading blogs to drive traffic to their blogs.

There are hundreds and thousands of bloggers who consider guest blogging an effective method of building a reputation. On the contrary, there are several bloggers who are against the idea of guest blogging. There are many benefits of guest posting. However, bloggers must also keep in mind the disadvantages associated with guest blogging.

As a blogger, you might be having several questions related to guest blogging. You might like to know is it worth guest posting. When should you start guest blogging? Is guest blogging a wise thing to do? Let’s examine in this article whether guest blogging a bane or boon.

In this article, I have summarized the pros and cons of guest posting. Moreover, I have also highlighted the precautions that bloggers must take while guest posting. After examining the pros and cons of guest blogging, I am sure bloggers will be able to make a rational decision.

Let’s check out the advantages and disadvantages of guest blogging.

Guest Posting Advantages

1.    It helps create Backlinks: the first advantage of guest posting is that it enables you to create valuable backlinks. I am sure as a blogger you understand how important it is to create valuable backlinks to improve your blog’s page ranking.

2.    Helps improve page rank: quality backlinks are one of the best sources of achieving higher page rank. Guest posting helps bloggers gain better page ranking in Google page rank as well as Alexa page rank. Google measures the quality of a blog on the basis of the valuable and high worth backlinks. It is not feasible for Google to read each and every blog to determine the quality of a blog.

3.    Helps Increase blog traffic: Guest posting in reputed websites helps you drive traffic to your website. It has been found that quality guest post creates curiosity among the readers to check out the blog of the guest blogger. Consequently, you experience a significant increase in blog traffic. When you show up in reputed websites more readers will be interested in getting to know about you.

4.    Helps Build Networks: guest blogging not only benefits the blogger but also the blog owner where you post your article. So it creates a win-win situation for both the parties resulting in better networking. Moreover, you come across several other bloggers who might be interested in joining hands with you for better blogging.

5.    Helps Build reputation: guest blogging significantly helps bloggers to build a reputation in the business of blogging. Guest blogging not only provides you recognition but also helps you gain the loyalty of the audience. When you create content for reputed websites your audience will trust you more.

6.    Generates new ideas: writing guest post enables you to interact with a large number of readers via different mediums of communication. When you receive several comments on your post you get to know about your audience and their problems. At the same time, it helps you create better post complying with the needs of your targeted audience.

7.    Boosts self-confidence: more than anything else, guest posting significantly improves your self-confidence. If you are able to post your article on leading sites such as Huffington post, Problogger, Dailyblogtips, YoungPrePro, WritingForward,  or any other reputed website or blog, you will experience significant improvement in your self-confidence.

Guest Posting Disadvantages

1.    Backlinks may backfire: if you are guest blogging for low worth blogs or low-quality websites, it can adversely impact the ranking of your page. Always remember, only high-quality backlinks help you improve the page rank of your blog. Google is working out ways to keep in check spammy practices that bloggers use for backlinks.

2.    Generates short term benefits: guest posting provides you short term advantages. The long-term success of your blog depends on your ability to consistently write high-quality content for your own blog. You cannot depend on guest posting to drive traffic to your blog time and again.

3.    May result in a decline in traffic: if you are using all of your high-quality article for guest blogging, it will decline the quality of your blog. Your audience might not find your blog worth reading. As a result, they might get drifted to other blogs. Gaining loyalty of your audience is extremely important for you as a blogger. Your subscribers trust you. You must not break their trust by focusing your attention on guest blogging. 

4.    Loss of high-quality posts: if you consistently write for high ranking websites as a guest blogger, it means you are hardly contributing to your own blog. Reputed website do not accept low-quality posts. Therefore, you will be forced to part away with high-quality posts that otherwise you could have used in your blog.

Always remember your targeted audience in limited in numbers. They will either read your content on your blog or others blog where you post your content. So use your discretion while posting your content.

Guest posting suggestions/precautions

Do not write guest posts for low-rank web sites: writing a guest post for low-quality blogs cannot help you get quality links. Therefore, makes sure you do guest blogging for high ranking blogs or websites.

Save extremely high-quality articles for your own blog: do not part away with a high-quality post that you can use in your blog to enhance the value of your blog. Writing guest posts once in a while will not harm your blog. However, if you will keep posting the high-quality article on someone else blog, it can adversely impact the quality of your blog.

Do not ignore your existing audience: makes sure you do not ignore your existing audience in an attempt to attract more audience from other’s blog. There is no use attracting more readers if you fail to retain your existing ones. There is no doubt guest blogging provides you an opportunity to drive traffic to your blog, but your existing readers must be equally important to you.

Beginner bloggers must not fall into the trap of guest blogging: As a beginner blogger, you must not do guest posting. You must focus on creating quality content for your own blog. If you are good enough to create high-quality content, Google can divert a significant amount of traffic to your blog. Do not worry about traffic, focus on content.

Conclusion

Guest blogging is good as long as you are able to post your content in high worth blogs. It’s no use posting your content to a blog with little reputation. Low-quality blogs or websites cannot add any value to your blog.

There is no doubt guest blogging can help you improve your blog’s page ranking. However, it is equally true that you cannot depend on guest blogging for long term benefits. Guest blogging can help you create valuable back links but for sustainable advantages of guest blogging, you will need a quality blog. 

Guest blogging can help you drive traffic to your blog, but it cannot support you in retaining your audience. Thus, if you want to take full advantage of guest blogging first create a high-quality blog that can help you attract and retain your audience. Use guest blogging for branding, networking and exposure rather than backlinks.

If you liked this article, please feel free to share your opinion on guest blogging with us. If you have experienced the benefits of guest blogging, please share with us to help others use guest blogging to their advantage.

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How Far Are You From Success: Check Out

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We all put in hard work to achieve success in our life. We feel happy when people call us a successful person. When we are labeled as a successful individual we feel motivated and take more interest in our work, family, and social life. 

On the contrary, when success eludes despite our best efforts we feel irritated, sad and depressed. Gradually people begin to tag us as a loser. As a result, we begin to lose interest in our work.  The family seems a burden and we begin to avoid social gatherings.

Thus, success plays an important role in making our life happy. And to achieve it we all work day and night. However, why is it so that success comes earlier to some people whereas, it keeps eluding others? What makes some people successful while others fail to realize their dreams despite hard work and strong desire? In this article, I am going the reveal the secret of success.

However, I want to remind you that success is relative. We all have our own measurements of determining our success. For some, a peaceful happy life is a success irrespective of the material wealth they have acquired. For others, it could be academic achievements, career growth or a profitable business. 

In this article, I have associated success with the achievement of your real purpose. We all live for a purpose. Purpose gives us a reason to live. It motivates us and make us work towards our goal. And we all want to achieve that purpose.It could be becoming a successful writer, entrepreneur, blogger, teacher or simply a social worker. The article contains some tips that can help you achieve success. 

I have analyzed the issue from the perspective of a blogger. Bloggers can use these tips to create a plan of action. However, it is equally true in all fields of work.

I have identified some of the factors that enable some of the people to enjoy success earlier than others. I will bring this discussion to a logical conclusion so that it can help us all to achieve success. Let’s start with some questions to measure how successful you are at present.

Before I take this discussion further, please answer the following questions in Yes, No or somewhat Yes.

Please make sure to answer all the questions genuinely. It will help you to measure your current level of success or the distance that you have covered so far to reach your real goal.

1.   Have you clearly outlined what exactly you want to achieve in your life?

2.     Have you created a plan of action to achieve your main goal?

3.    Have you fixed a deadline for each and every task that will help you move closer to your main goal?

4.      Do you love your work?

5.     Do you try to learn not only from your own mistakes but also from others' mistakes?

6.     Are you hard working?

7.    Do you have all the right skills to achieve your main goal in life?

8.    Do you take responsibility for your failures?

9.    Do you complete your work on time?

10.  Are you satisfied with the progress you have made so far to achieve your main goal?

The marking criteria has been explained below: 

                     No=0

                     Somewhat Yes=5

                     Yes=10

The level of success you have achieved so far can be gauged by your answers. I have assigned 10% weight age to each of these questions to determine the current level of success of an individual. 

For instance, if you have answered all the questions in NO it means your level of success is 0%. If you have answered 5 of 10 questions in Yes your level of success is 50%. You can give yourself 5 marks if you answer is somewhat yes. 

So if you have answered five question in Yes and 5 questions in somewhat yes it means your level of success is 75%. 

In other words, this measurement will help you to get a clear picture of how far you are from your real goal. If you have answered all of these questions in yes it means you are a successful person.

Let’s examine all of these questions one by one to understand their importance in achieving success.

1.      Have you clearly outlined what exactly you want to achieve in your life?

If you have answered this question in NO it means you have no idea what exactly you want to achieve in your life. You do not know where you want to go. And if you have no idea where you want to go then creating a guide map to reach there is out of the question. 

Therefore, the first thing that you must do is it to identify your main goal in your life. For example, if you want to be a successful blogger you need to identify why you want to do so. Once you will have a clear idea you can think of creating a strategy to achieve it. 

2.      Have you created a plan of action to achieve you main goal?

If the answer of your first question is NO then it is unlikely that you would have created a plan of action. However, if you have a clear idea of what you want to achieve in your life you must create a roadmap for it. By roadmap I mean to create a plan of action. The things that you will have to do to realized your dream. A road map will tell you whether you are moving in the right direction or not.

If you work randomly on a project, you will have no idea what progress you have made so far and how long it will take you to reach your main goal.

3.      Have you fixed a deadline for each and every task that will help you move closer to your main goal?

Once you have created a plan of action you will be required to divide the task into small chunks. It will help you to easily complete each task. For instance, if your aim is to create 100 posts for your blog within a year then you will have to make sure that you write at least two posts in a week. 

The calculation is quite simple. There are 52 weeks in a year. If you write 2 articles in a week, you will be able to write 104 articles in a year. Even if you fail to write 4 articles due to unavoidable circumstances you will still be able to achieve your target. So set your target keeping in view your personal and professional commitments.

If you fix a deadline for each post then it is unlikely you will fail to achieve your target. You can further subdivide the tasks. For example, if you plan to write at least 500 words every day you will not miss posting your article on time.

4.      Do you love your work?

If you love your work you will find your work easier. On the contrary, if you are doing something that you don’t like then you are unlikely to get success in that field. 

Most of the office workers find their work boring. They do it just for the sake of money so that they can meet their monthly expenses. Most of the people are helpless as it is the only option for them.

However, always remember where there is a will there is a way. Stop blaming your circumstances for pursuing what you are currently doing. Either love what you do or find out a way to do what you love.  

I am not saying you to leave your job. What I mean to say is that either you develop an interest in your job or you must create a strategy to do what interest you most. 

For example, if you want to start something of your own then start saving for it. Fix a deadline for it. If you want to become a full-time blogger set a deadline to quit your job. Circumstances won’t change itself you will have to make efforts to make it happen.

5.      Do you try to learn not only from your mistakes but also from others' mistakes?

Life is too short to learn from your own mistakes. Learn from others mistake. Every day we make several mistakes and I am sure most of you learn something from it.  

Trial and error route to success is a long journey. It is tiring and sometimes deviate us from our real goal. If you take this route, it might take you more that the usual time to achieve what you want to achieve.

I am not advising you to take a short cut to success. There is no short cut to success. I am just suggesting you to avoid the mistakes that you possibly can. Learn from the failures of others. It will help you avoid the mistakes others have made in their journey to success. 

Always remember the people who have created a name for themselves in the books of history have learned something from the mistakes of others.

6.      Are you hard working?

I know most of the people are hard working. I am sure most of you would have answered it in affirmative. We all know that there is no substitute for hard work. However, hard work alone cannot ensure your success. At the same time, you must learn how to work smart.

Creating a road map, setting deadlines for work and planning your day activities in advance, learning from the failures of others are all part of working smart. Many of you must be working hard then why is it so that success is still eluding you. The reason is that you have not developed a strategy to achieve your goals.

Many of us spend our whole life working hard for others, but the real success is achieved by the people who we work for. Why? The reason is that employers build a strategy to ensure the success of a business. 

They employ different tools of business management to analyze the internal and external environment. They analyze their strengths and weaknesses. They leverage on their strengths and work out ways to minimize their weaknesses. They lay off the incompetent workers and recruit the competent ones. They leverage on the presented opportunities and avoid the threats.

If you are working hard, you need to ensure that you also take all these things into account. Forsake your weaknesses and learn new skills that can help you in your mission.

7.      Do you have all the right skills to achieve your main goal in life?

We cannot expect to achieve success unless we have the right skills. Skills do not include just the technical knowledge to complete a task or writing an informative post for your blog. It also includes the interpersonal skills, the right attitude, and the ability to manage things, decision making, and making the best use of the things around you. 

For example, if you are a blogger you must know how to create an effective article, how to promote your blog and how to optimize it for search engines. Writing a great post alone wouldn’t help you to achieve the kind of success you are aiming for. 

Similarly, if you are an entrepreneur you cannot create a successful organization solely on the basis of capital and human resource. You will also need the right strategy to ensure the profitability of the company.

8.      Do you take responsibility for your failures?

Blaming others for your failure shows that you have lost your way to success. Your are getting impatient and need to reevaluate your strategy. 

When success eludes we begin to blame others for our failure. You would have noticed the most successful people in the word are those who take responsibility for their failures. They do not blame others for their failure. 

The happiest persons in the world are often the most successful ones. The reason is that they always make sure to keep their team happy and never blame team members for the failure of a project. They share their success and failures equally. So stop blaming others for your failure.

9.      Do you complete your work on time?

Procrastination is the biggest hurdle in your way to success. Procrastination leads to accumulation of pending work which in turn affects the quality of work. In other words, it not only makes you work harder but also negatively impacts the quality of work. 

Procrastination is in human nature. We all postpone things till it begins to hurt us. If you really want to overcome the problem of procrastination you must accept it first and create a plan to avoid it. Setting a deadline for work is the best method to overcome the problem of procrastination. Divide each of your work in small parts. Fix time limit to complete a task.

If you really want to procrastinate something, procrastinate bad habits. Adopt good habits that can take you nearer to your goal. Habits can make or destroy us. Therefore, develop good habits. Always remember first we make our habits then our habits make us.

10.    Are you satisfied with the progress you have made so far to achieve your main goal?

If you look at all the above questions you will find that all of them are interrelated. One leads to other and creates a chain reaction. If you have answered first 9 questions in affirmative, you are most likely to give the answer of the last question in affirmative. 

Satisfaction comes when you set a purpose for your life and create a plan of action to achieve it with fixed deadlines. Love for work keeps you interested in your work resulting in higher satisfaction. You are most likely to work harder if you love your work.

Satisfaction comes when you complete a job within the framed time limit. Satisfaction comes when your work is recognized by others. If you fail to complete small tasks on time you cannot expect to achieve your main goal within the set time limits resulting in frustration, irritation, and depression. If you are not satisfied with your progress so far it means you need to address the first 9 questions.

It’s never too late to start something new. You already have covered a long way to success. The only thing that you need to do is to manage things effectively. Working in a haphazard manner would not generate the desired results. Unplanned work drains your energy, kills your time, makes you work harder, delays results and never lets you meet your beloved success.

Do you think you have learned something from this article? Please feel free to share your level of success or opinion with us. Your opinion and suggestions will help me to further improve the quality of the content.

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