68. What If No One Reads My Blog?

Stephanie: [00:00:00] It is every blogger's worst nightmare. Pouring time, money, and a lot of effort into a blog only for it to be a ghost town. What if no one reads your blog posts? Let's talk about it.

Welcome back to the podcast. I hope you've made it through back to school season and are enjoying the beginning of fall. At our house,

we've been enjoying what my teenager dubs fall vibes since September 1st. As soon as the calendar turned over to September, she had everything decked out with cocoa, fall decor, and lots of Gilmore girls. Since Halloween is rapidly approaching and we're entering spooky season, I thought it would be fun for us to tackle some scary things

on the podcast. We are going to be talking about three common fears that I see in the blogging community. And today we are going to start with the worry that no one is [00:01:00] actually going to read your blog. So first in this episode, we're going to talk about why this is actually a very valid concern in 2025.

Next, I'll give you some reassurance if this is truly something that is worrying you. And then we'll wrap it up with an important perspective change that should put this fear to rest once and for all. With the rise of AI, and then Google algorithm changes, and an ever evolving Pinterest climate, I think that new bloggers in particular are completely justified in their concerns about traffic, and frankly, even existing bloggers are justified in their traffic concerns.

Let's start with the elephant in the room, AI. Now it is true that the rise of chatbots has definitely changed the way that people search for information online. You've likely noticed that when you search on Google, the [00:02:00] AI overviews are at the top of the results page for most queries. The AI overview is basically a summary of the most helpful information to answer that question, and when I was collecting listener questions during the podcast birthday celebration

I had more than one person ask me a question related to these AI overviews and how they impact search. After all, if people are just going to read a chat bot summary of information, rather than visit a website, what's the point of writing a blog post? Then there's the issue of Google. Their algorithm is always shifting, and I can totally understand when new and existing bloggers decide that it's just not worth it to focus on SEO. Because as soon as you feel like you get the hang of one set of current best practices, it seems like everything shifts and then you're pushed back into the cobweb filled corners of search results, never to see the light of [00:03:00] day.

And then finally, the evolution of Pinterest makes it feel like seeing real traffic from this platform is just a thing of the past. Search results are cluttered, competition is high, and it feels like you're churning out pins for potentially zero traffic. Now, I know this is all a bit of a downer, but I wanted to take a moment to recognize the fact that I totally understand the fear that you're going to be blogging to an empty room, so to speak.

So let's take a deep breath for a second before I give you some reassurance. If you're afraid that you'll have zero traffic to your blog forever, I need you to remember three things. First, remember that every website starts with zero traffic. Every blogger starts by writing to an empty room. I remember when my website first went live, I would constantly check my real time analytics to see if I could catch someone live on my website [00:04:00] because the prospect of that was so exciting to me and also a little bit nerve wracking.

But ultimately it just felt like an eternity waiting for real live people to come and visit my website, but they did. The second thing I want you to remember is that traffic will always have ups and downs, but you'll be rewarded by weathering the storm. Now, I'm not a well-versed investor or anything, but blog traffic has always reminded me of the stock market.

Now, I'm not talking about flashy day trading and all of that. I'm talking about that slow growth where you invest a little bit here and there, trusting that your investment will grow over time and will be a significant nest egg someday. Yes, there are going to be bad years and you'll see losses on your annual statement, but if you just stay the course, you can expect a fairly predictable return on your investment.

This is true of blogging. You might not see the direct [00:05:00] post to purchase user experience right away. You know the one where they come onto your blog, they read a post, they love the product that you're soft selling in that post, and they purchase it. That might not be what you see right away, but you are going to see other benefits of blogging consistently.

You'll have a bank of long form content to repurpose into social media posts, YouTube scripts, or email marketing. You are creating a library of binge-worthy posts for your website visitors to read when they do end up finding you. You'll also have somewhere to refer your audience when they ask a question related to one of your products.

Oh, you'd like to see how I organized those centers? Check out this blog post for some pictures and some descriptions. So yes, pushing through your fears and continuing to add content to your website can help you reap rewards for years to come. And this is true whether you're a brand new [00:06:00] blogger or you're seasoned blogger experiencing a traffic slump.

The third thing I want you to remember is that the demand for helpful human written content is only going to go up as people get more frustrated with AI. Now, yes, I'm sure AI is going to become more sophisticated and accurate, and it's going to become a bigger part of day-to-day life, but I don't think AI will ever replace our desire for human connection.

People want to see inside your classroom. They want to hear your thoughts and experiences. They don't just want a summary from a chat bot, and it's not just your human website visitors that are looking for that kind of content, the algorithms want it too. With the flood of generic AI generated content on the internet,

google and Pinterest are actively trying to find ways to reward websites that lead with human experience and [00:07:00] helpful content. So keep being you. Keep writing helpful content from your own brain and your own experience, and people will find you. There's one more thing that can help you finally put this fear to rest.

I think there's an important perspective shift that can help you stop feeling so afraid of getting no traffic as a new blogger or losing all of your traffic as an existing blogger. And so here's the mindset shift. Instead of worrying about getting everyone to read your posts, focus on finding the right people to read your posts, because it really only takes a small amount of the right kind of traffic to completely transform your business.

You don't have to have a website that gets 1 million visits per month in order for your blog to have a significant impact on your income. So keep writing the type of content that will attract your ideal audience. Keep being helpful and thorough in your blog [00:08:00] content. Market, your posts on Pinterest, social media, and in your email newsletters.

The right traffic will come in time. It might not be all the traffic, but it will be the right traffic. To sum it all up, I'm feeling the pull to remind you that blogging is the crockpot of traffic. If you've ever used a crockpot slow cooker before, you know that you get all of your ingredients in there, you put the lid on top, and then you kind of wonder when you're gonna start to see some action, and it usually takes a while.

Your ingredients will just sit there, perfectly as you left them, for a long time before things start to boil and cook. But the thing is, we know that about Crockpots, we know that it takes a little bit for it to get going, so we leave the lid on because we don't wanna let the heat escape. We double check that we've plugged it in and that we've turned the knob to the correct setting.

And then we trust that we'll have a tasty home cooked meal [00:09:00] when we get home. And so I'm sharing this to remind you to take care of the blogging best practices as you create your bank of content on your website. But then trust that you will reap the benefits of your consistent efforts. Don't be afraid of blogging to an empty room forever.

I am always happy to be a cheerleader for teacher bloggers like you. My dms are always open. If you're looking for someone to share your excitement for your latest blog post, just send me the link to your post, and I would love to give it a read. You can find me on Instagram at Stephanie Royer Solutions.