When you blog is growing, analytics wise or in quality you can feel great. It's the best feeling in the world seeing your blog grow and grow but what happens when your blog isn't growing and developing at your desired rate. It can be really hard to deal with falling or stagnating blog traffic. It can make you completely disinterested in blogging or even to the point where you hate your blog. It can be hard to sit and watch all those around you grow their blogs, but you seem stuck at the same point.

What I want you to know is that it's completely okay for you to feel like your blog is not growing and increasing as you would wish. It happens to all of us. It happens to me all the time. Although it can be hard to deal with there are ways you can cope with it. There's no quick fix that will help your blog pick up again. Most of the time your blog is doing fine, it's just your personal perception of your blog that can make you feel deflated and disheartened as you compare your blog to those around you.

Although these tips may be able to help you out and help boost your morale when it comes to blogging, it's important to remember that you are not a failure if one of your posts doesn't get as many views as others or if your Twitter analytics aren't as high as they were last month. There is always something you can learn from these periods of deflation. In addition to the fact, you should always be blogging for yourself and not other people. I hope you find this post of use. 

ACCEPTANCE 

This may sound a weird point to include, but before you can deal with falling blog traffic, you need to accept it. You can't deal with it until you accept the fact your blog is not doing as well as you would like. It can be easy to deny its happening because you don't want to feel like a failure. I have news for you; you are not a failure. You are anything but. Acceptance may sound really easy, but it can be a bit challenging. 

If I feel like my blog is slumping and not doing as well as I like, one of the best ways to accept this fact is to either refer back to goals you have written for your blog ( I bet a lot of you have goals posts back on your blog from January which you haven't looked at since publishing them) if this the case, dig it out, have a read and compare how you're doing with your goals. I bet you're not doing as bad as you thought. If you didn't have any goals, it's now time to write some. Write out what you realistically want to achieve in relation to your blog and how you are going to achieve them. Your goals should also have some type of time span whether that be by the end of the year or at the end of the month. Once you have focused on your goals, you will realise that you are not doing as badly as you may have thought. 

TAKE A BREAK 

If you are not feeling like blogging, it's probably worthwhile taking a break. If your not feeling 100% committed to your blog or passionate about the content you are producing, it really does show. I personally believe, it's much better to take a break then uploading a post every month explaining where you have been each time. If you are not feeling it, don't do it! Taking a break does not make you a failure. Sometimes getting away from your blog and finding some time to be inspired is just what you need to help you find your feet again. 

I know a lot of people are scared to take a break because they worry that they will lose all their followers. Trust me this is not going to happen. Everyone appreciates that we all need a break from time to time, we are human after all, not robots. As I mentioned before, it's not what you're actually doing with your blog; it's your perception of your blog in comparison with others that can lead you to believe your blog traffic is falling. A break can really help you feel more inspired about your blog and give you that extra boost you need. Breaks don't have to be months long either; they can be as long or as short as you feel necessary. 

MIND MAPS 

I love a good mind map. Trust me; I love a good mind map. I used to do them all the time for revision; they are such an easy and visual way to brainstorm ideas. Now I know you don't want anything to remind you of revision especially if you just finished your exams but it's not just revision they are useful for, they can be an excellent way to get your thoughts and ideas down on paper for your blog. If you are feeling like your blog traffic is falling or stagnating and you want to change the direction of your blog, sitting down and making a mindmap is a great way of getting yourself organised and back into blogging. 

If you are taking a break from your blog, creating a mindmap would be a perfect thing to do during this time. When I make a mind map I like to use branches to around four main categories, then further branches to subcategories. Ideas for these branches could include; ideas for posts, categories you want to cover, a new posting schedule, etc. I did this a few months back when I wanted to start covering more diverse topics on my blog, and it really helped. Mindmap are basically one big dump of ideas which although directly might not help boost your blog traffic they will help you understand it and know where to take your blog in the future, which in turn may help boost your morale, getting you back in the swing of things. 

PROMOTE OLD POSTS

This is the main practical tip actually to help boost your blog traffic not just your perception of your blog or morale. One of the best things I find to drive traffic to old posts is promoting them. During the summer months when I upload almost every day it can be hard to do this but during the rest of the year, I do try my hardest to promote older posts on Twitter. Because social media moves so fast these days it can be really hard to keep up with your feed, this means it is likely that people may miss your posts, and we don't want that. Also, my social media following is growing all the time; new followers may be interested in posts you have done in the past, so it's a good idea to keep sharing those old posts.

If you know, you did a post about festivals, and it's approaching the festival season, promote that post more. As its relevant to the season or an upcoming event, more people are likely to click on it and boom more blog traffic! Also by promoting old posts that are relevant to the time of year etc. Someone may click on it and while on your blog find more posts they want to read and as if by magic, more blog traffic. It's really as simple as that. My preferred way of scheduling tweets is via Hootsuite.

I hope you found this post handy and will be able to put these tips to good use. However, if there is one thing I want you to take from this post is that falling or stagnating blog traffic does not mean that you are a failure or your blog is worthless. Sometimes falling blog traffic can be a warning light to let you know you probably need some time off and to take a break.

How do you deal with falling blog traffic? Do you use any of these methods or something else not mentioned? I would love to know in the comments below!

Thank you for reading X