When Blog Expansions Backfire: The Risks to Know

There is a time on our blog where we have to start planning for the future. Do you always want your blog to be “just a blog?” Sooner or later, I think that to increase the popularity of your blog and bring more visitors to it, you need to add some additional things to your blog to make it a website.

When you think about it, there are many risks involved in any decision make you on your blog. But when the time comes to adding onto your blog, or expanding it – you have a lot more risk introduced to yourself.

This is part 2 of the 3 part series “When Blog Expansions Backfire on you.” To get yourself introduced with this series, why not read the first part? When Blog Expansion Backfires: The Why.

This post, and the last post are both a preemptive to the final post in the series with solutions to a failed blog expansion. Everything here will mostly be reflecting on common thoughts on the before & after period of a new launch on your blog.

In part one, I briefly touched up on the risks you should know when you want to build onto and add to your blog. There are just so many factors to keep in mind to successfully build up your blog with expansions. I decided to split this post up into two parts; the pre-launch and the after launch.

The Pre-Launch

Pre-launch of something new is such a great period! Everything is wrapping up and you are finally ready to launch your new expansion. But just because you put a lot of work into your new addition to your blog doesn’t mean everything will go over well.

There is a lot to think about in the pre-launch period. These risks of failing with this new expansion should always be running through your head, but I think that the final days/hours of your release is when those negative thoughts come into focus more.

Last Minute Realizations

These are the things that always get me, the last few hours of the pre-launch period where things start becoming real with you and you start coming up with all of these bad scenarios in your head. The ones that get me the most when I am about to launch something off (even a new blog post) are:

• Idea isn’t as great as you thought

Every time I come up with a new idea for my blog, I think it’s genius! A lot of people do, and when it’s almost done, the self-sabotaging begins and the idea doesn’t seem so brilliant anymore!

• Woops! Something is messed up!

When you’re not careful or cautious, things are bound to slip past you. Whenever that one minor slip up is found, we’re more likely to freak out about it than we would have a few days ago when everything was being tested.

• How can I manage this and a blog?

If you add an expansion such as a forum, another blog, or even a link directory, you have to ask yourself how you can possibly manage a blog and built another community! Whatever the expansion you add to your blog is, it will undoubtedly require a lot more time and effort to manage on top of your blog.

But no matter what it is…

No matter what you think, I still say you should launch whatever it is you planned to launch! Blogging is all about experimentation, some things work and others don’t. You will never find out what does and doesn’t work by not trying new things, so continue onwards with expanding your blog and forget all of the bad things that can happen and focus on what good will come out of it.

After the Launch

This is the period, the after launch period, where I feel the most stress is built up. Everything we thought about in the pre-launch period is being put to the test, and it’s just so nerve wracking to think about anything bad that will happen!

There are more realizations you have to face, and even some of the things that you thought about in pre-launch may even come true. Not everything is going to be perfect of course, but there are some things you should worry about regardless of how much time you put into your new expansion.

• Where is this going next?

You should figure out some plans for the future and where you think this new featured you have added to your blog will go. Figure out promotion strategies, where new features can be released, and of course if your new addition to your blog will even be there in a month or two.

• It doesn’t go as you thought it would

Don’t lie to yourself, have you ever done or added something to your blog that you released with high expectations, but didn’t live up to them? Most likely it has happened with an article you wrote. It’s quite discouraging when something doesn’t go your way and may even make you wonder if it’s worth trying it again.

• Does the community want it?

Everything you do on your blog is really for your readers whether you think about it or not. If you add something to your community you don’t think your community needs, was it worth the trouble? This kind of brings me to the next point,

Getting the Absolute Worst Response Ever

What do you consider a failure? If one day you decided to add a forum to your blog, what kind of response would you consider to be the worst?

A lot of people say they hate to get negative responses. That’s common right? We want people to love what we do. But personally, I believe that the absolutely worst response to anything you do on your blog is not having a response at all!

Thing about it, your community likes the new thing you have added to your blog, so they may tell their friends about it. If they hate it, they will probably tell their friends how much they hate what you have done. Both of these are forms of publicity, and any publicity is GOOD publicity.

But what about not getting any response at all? That just hurts, and that leaves a permanent scar in you somewhere so you never forget about this.

Stay tuned for Part 3, the conclusion of this series. That post will be full of great tips and information to kick start your “failed” blog expansion. Expect it later on this week!

Image found from A Syn