Lipstick on a Pig: When a Great Template Just Isn’t Paying Off
While it’s important for your site or blog to look as good as possible (and with today’s templates, it’s easier to achieve this than ever before), there are limits to what great aesthetics can do for the success of your web thing. If your blog or web experience, whatever is, just isn’t performing at the level you think it should, one of three things is probably wrong. If you are committed to the success of your endeavour, it’s time to be realistic and put time and energy into these options. Take some honest time to diagnose the problem, and then do everything you can to make it right.
You Haven’t Worked Long/Hard Enough
This is a big one. Malcolm Gladwell said you need 10,000 hours to become great at a thing. If you are still working to break into the 4-digits club, chances are you have not devoted enough time or energy into the thing you are doing. You may be talented. You may have a great perspective. But unless you produce quality work consistently, you won’t be able to achieve the results you want. Work for a few hours every day, and keep this up for 6 months. Then check back in and see how you’re doing.
Your Work Isn’t Good Enough
It may be possible that the work you are producing isn’t good enough to sustain you. This could be for many reasons. Perhaps it’s a problem of aesthetics, as we so often address on this site. Oftentimes, you can’t grow and monetize your site or blog if it looks like crap. Spend time bring up your images and navigational quality to industry standard, or beyond. This may not be the problem though. If the content pieces which you publish simply aren’t good enough to make yourself stand out in a deep sea of similar blog types, you won’t differentiate yourself to the point where you can actually make money in a meaningful way. Or perhaps you aren’t producing work often enough to keep people interested. Look honestly at these possibilities and make changes so that you can alter things for the better.
You Have Bad Press Online
There are plenty of online reputation management defenders who can help you when people say bad things about you online, warranted or not. There is a certain kind of online hater-ness which you should expect, but if it is too loud or too common it can drown out your possibility of making your business work. In most cases it’s not worth it to defend yourself directly in these circumstances. Many people in your shoes have appeared shrill and paranoid when they fight the haters one by one. But by hiring someone else to make this stuff disappear, you won’t hurt your brand at all.
There are plenty of ways to make online content work. If yours isn’t working, spend some time with the above issues. If you do the hard work which is necessary for even a few weeks, you’ll probably start to see results you can bank on.
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