Measuring the Success of Your Blog Through Content, Social Media, and Analytics

Measuring the Success of Your Blog Through Content, Social Media, and Analytics#14ntcnpblogs 

Emily Weinberg

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How do you measure success on your blog?

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Basic Ways to Measure Success

• How many hits to blog• How many people talk about blog on social media• How many people subscribe to blog• How many comments

As an organization, you can measure success by how many entries you post. Your goal could be to write one post a week and if you meet that goal, then you were successful.

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These are good things to look at. But you need to dig deeper into your blog to measure your success. You need to look at specific entries, not just your blog as a whole.

You should look at your content strategy, analytics data, and promotion strategy.

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Content

PromotionAnalytics

You need blog content to look at analytics

You need blog content to promote

You can find out if your promotion strategy is working by looking at analytics

Content + Analytics + Promotion Cycle

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Content

Content is what makes your blog a success, without content you will not have a successful blog

You need to update your blog regularly (at least once or twice a month) and post content that your readers might be interested in.

How often are you posting content to your blog?

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Analytics – Existing Content

How many of you look at web analytics for your blog?

Looking at your web analytics is an important step to measure the success of your blog. It helps you figure out what content people are interested in and where they are learning about your blog.

The easiest way to record your data is to create a spreadsheet in Excel. It does not have to be recorded daily. You should try to update it weekly or every other week.

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Analytics Data to Track

1) Number of times your blog has been viewed

This will give you an overall picture of the success of your blog. You should see this number increase as your blog grows.

2) Number of times each blog entry has been viewed

This will let you know what content is being viewed the most and the least.

3) Referring sites

This will let you know where people are learning about your blog and blog entries.

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Things to Look for in Analytics

• You might notice that you suddenly get lots of visitors to your blog or to a particular blog post. This can happen if it was linked on a website or shared on social media. It could also be a result of your promotion in e-mail or on social media. Check your referring links to see where this traffic is coming from.

• You should be looking at your referring links to see who likes your blog or blog entries.

• Look at the number of times each blog entry was viewed. You can sort the data in the spreadsheet from most views to least views. Your most viewed entries will tell you what content is working well and your least viewed entries will tell you what is not working as well. The entries that have lots of views are the topics or format of content your readers want to read. You should post similar content in future entries. Your least viewed entries will tell you what you should write less about on your blog.

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Analytics – Blog Entries

A blog entry can be a success or not a success based on 3 things – the topic, promotion strategy, and title of entry.

1) Topic

You should be looking at your most viewed entries and seeing if there is a particular topic that is getting the most views. You should do the same for least amount of views.

2) Promotion

An entry might have lots of views because you promoted that entry more. Maybe it was linked on many websites or shared more on social media. You might have forgotten to share the post on social media and that is why it had less views. You should be looking at the most viewed entries and see if it had to do with the promotion strategy.

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Analytics – Blog Entries

3) Title

The title of your blog post could also have an impact on your most viewed entries and least viewed entries. You should look at the titles for your most viewed entries.

It is proven that certain words in titles will drive more traffic to a post. For example, titles with numbers get lots of views.

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Content Ideas from Website Analytics

You can get content ideas for your blog from your website content. Look at the analytics for your website and see what is getting the most views.

Has anyone looked at their website content or website analytics for blog content ideas?

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Web Analytics Questions

For those of you that look at your blog’s analytics:

• How often do you analyze your data?

• What data do you track?

• Has web analytics helped your blog?

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Promotion

Blogs can be a success based on how you promote them. You have to promote your content in order to get people to read it.

Ways to promote:

1. Website

Make sure you have a link to your blog on your organization’s website. Your website visitors should easily see the link so they know you have a blog.

2. E- News

Highlight blog entries in your e-news.

3. Social Media

Post links to your blog entries on social media sites (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn)

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Promotion – EDF Example

• Article promoting new blog• Explains what will be posted

on the blog• Graphic that promotes blog

http://blogs.edf.org/energyexchange/2013/05/29/edf-releases-new-blog-for-all-our-expert-voices

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Promotion Questions

Do you promote your blog entries on….• Facebook? • Twitter?• LinkedIn?• Pinterest?

Share examples of how you promote your blog entries on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pintrerest.

For Pinterest you can create a board called “from the blog” or “our blog” and pin blog images to that board. Remember to keep the board updated.

Do you promote your blog or blog entries on your website? Share examples.

Do you promote your blog or blog entries in your e-news? Share examples.

Are there any other ways you are promoting your blog?

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Ways to Measure Success of Blog on Social Media

Lots of nonprofits share their blog entries on social media.

You can measure the success on social media by looking at the following data:

Facebook – track shares, likes, comments

Twitter – track tweets, retweets, favorites

LinkedIn – track shares, likes, comments

Pinterest – track pins, repins, likes, comments

How many of you measure these? Share your experiences.

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Ways to Measure Success of Blog on Social Media

Look at your post promoting your blog entry on social media sites. Does it have lots of likes, shares or comments?

If yes - Your fans are either interested in this topic, enjoyed the blog entry, or both. Post similar content on your blog.

If no – Your fans are not interested in this topic or post, or did not see the post. Most likely they are not interested in the topic.

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Content Ideas From Social Media

1. Look at the content you share on social media. Content that has the most comments, shares, and likes means your supporters are interested in this type of content. Use this information to help you with blog topics. Write a blog entry about it.

Has anyone done this? Share examples.

2. Ask your supporters what they are interested in learning about. Then write a blog entry about it.

Has anyone done this? Share examples.

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NWF Facebook Case Study

Blog Entry - http://blog.nwf.org/2013/10/were-not-mountain-lion-about-these-facts

Facebook Question Post

Blog Post

Facebook Post With Blog Post Link

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Blog Content Ideas

• Stories from volunteers, donors, clients, and supporters• Weekly Post Themes• Roundups• Advertise e-mail lists and social media sites• Ways to Volunteer• Ways to Donate • How donations are being used• Share articles that mention your organization• News related to your mission• Summarize a report• Stories from the field

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Roundups

Sections

• what is happening with NWF this week• NWF taking action• NWF in the news NWF News Roundup

http://blog.nwf.org

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Roundups

http://blog.savesfbay.org/category/weekly-roundup

Weekly Roundups – links to news articles affecting San Francisco Bay

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Roundups

Highlights from member blogs

This is a great idea for organizations with members or chapters

http://givingforum.wordpress.com

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Weekly Post Themes –Photo of the Week

http://treeswaterpeople.wordpress.com/category/photo-of-the-week

Photos include nature and people

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Weekly Post Themes –Photo of the Week

http://cbf.typepad.com/chesapeake_bay_foundation/photo-of-the-week

Variety of photos of the bay

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Weekly Post Themes – Photo of the Week

http://wilderness.org/blog

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Do any of you post roundups on your blog?

What type of links do you include in roundups?

Do any of you post a photo of the week?

Any other weekly themes?

Roundups & Weekly Post Themes Questions

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Promote Social Media & E-Mail List

http://bergenvolunteers.blogspot.com/2013/09/are-you-on-list.html

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How to Donate Posts

http://www.cheerfulgivers.org/2009/12/online-donation-opportunities

This an old post so the links do not work. This is still a great example to share.

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Lessons Learned Post

http://www.donorschoose.org/blog/2012/12/06/5-lessons-learned-from-blogging

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End of Year PostsMany nonprofit blogs have a post at the end of a year with links to their top posts of the year on their blogs. They get this information by looking at which posts get the most page views in their web analytics.

They also write posts about their accomplishments in the past year.

I started including these in my roundups a few years ago on the Nonprofit Blog Exchange linking to these posts. The trend started in 2011 and has grown since then. I did a special roundup for 2012 and 2013 for end of year posts.

Organizations that do a great job with these posts:

• The Humane Society (they do a bunch of end of year posts)• First Book - They posted an infographic about their accomplishments in 2012• ASPCA

Do any of you write end of year posts with accomplishments of the year or top posts of the year? Share examples.

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Blog Action Day Posts

Many nonprofit bloggers write posts for Blog Action Day. (blogactionday.org) It is a day where bloggers write about an issue. It has been held since 2007 and it is in October.

I write a special roundup for these posts on The Nonprofit Blog Exchange. You can read my special roundups for the following years and topics:

• poverty for 2008 • climate change for 2009• water for 2010

How many of you have participated?

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Blog Action Day Posts

The theme for 2012 was “The Power of We”. I wrote about this on my blog, Emily’s World, in my post “The Power of Nonprofit Bloggers”.

Think about the power your blog has for your organization.

http://eweinb04.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-power-of-nonprofit-bloggers.html

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Posts Related to NewsUse news and trending topics to write a post.

The Alliance to Save Energy posted entries with a football theme.

For the playoffs, an entry was posted about “The NFL's 5 Most Energy-Efficient Stadiums”. http://www.ase.org/blog/here-are-nfls-5-most-energy-efficient-stadiums

For the Superbowl, they posted “Energy Efficiency Super Bowl Showdown: Seattle Vs. Denver”.http://www.ase.org/blog/energy-efficiency-super-bowl-showdown-seattle-vs-denver

Do any of you use the news or trending topics to write entries? Share examples.

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Guest Blog Post From Supporter

Milk+ Bookies had a celebrity supporter write a guest post for their blog. Ariel Winter from Modern Family wrote a post in May 2013. It is a great example of what a supporter of an organization should write about.

The post mentioned the following:

• Her involvement with the organization• Why books have been a big part of her life• Explains what the organization does and her connection to the

organization• Encourages others to get involved and mentions ways to get involved

http://www.milkandbookies.org/blog/ariel-winter-special-guest-blog-post

Have any of you posted guest posts from supporters of your organization? Share examples.

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Blogging Planner & Checklist

You can keep track of your blog post ideas and what you need to do for each blog post through a planner or checklist.

You can find some examples by searching the Internet for “blog post planner” or “blog post checklist” that you can print to use.

This will help you keep track of where you have promoted the entry. For example, you can make a checklist with boxes for Twitter and Facebook. As you promote the post on those sites, you can checkmark it.

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Editorial Calendar

One way of planning your blog content is by using a calendar. This is helpful to note events, campaigns, holidays, and other important events.

If you know your organization is having an event, you could plan to write about the event after it takes place.

Holidays and awareness days are also good to include in a calendar. For April, you could plan to write a post about Earth Day.

A resource to learn more about different holidays and awareness days (months and weeks) is Kivi’s Nonprofit Writing Prompts. Each month she sends an e-mail with ideas you can write about. Sign up for this great resource at http://www.nonprofitmarketingguide.com/resources/articles/monthly-writing-prompts

Do any of you use an editorial calendar for your blog? How has it helped your blog?

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Topic Buckets

Another way of coming up with content ideas is by topic buckets. Topic buckets are topics you can write about each week. You should come up with 2-3 topics a week.

Two general topics nonprofits could have are

1) News (about the organization or related to mission)

2) Events and Campaigns

You can also be more specific in your topics. If your blog has categories or tags you can look at those for ideas.

This gives you two blog entries you can write each week.

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Questions

Is it helpful to see what other nonprofits are writing about on their blog?

What topics do you write about?

How do you get ideas for content?

Is there a blog post that you think was really a success? How do you know it was a success?

How has blogging helped your organization?

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Any Questions?

Any additional questions, comments, or blog examples can be e-mailed to me.

Add your questions to http://bit.ly/npblogquestions

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Resources

Add your blog to the 14NTC Blog List http://bit.ly/14ntcnpblogslist

Nonprofit Blogging Articleshttp://bit.ly/npbloggingresources

Blogging Articleshttp://bit.ly/blogginglinks

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Stay ConnectedThis is just the beginning of our discussion on nonprofit blogs. Let’s stay connected.

Emily Weinberg

eaw1924@aol.com

http://nonprofitblogexchange.wordpress.com

http://eweinb04.blogspot.com

http://www.linkedin.com/in/emilyweinberg

http://www.pinterest.com/emilyweinberg

Continue discussion in NTEN’s Blogging Group

http://bit.ly/npblogscop