7 Practical Ways to Blog Through the “Summer Slump”

Like the post? Share it!

As the weather gets warmer, bloggers get anxious expecting the typical “summer blog traffic slump”. Well, while you might not be making your biggest sales in the summer months, there are still some ways in which you could blog your way through the tedious summer slump.

Are you curious to find out the 7 ways you can improve your blog and make it thrive, surviving the little traffic and sales of the summer months? Then, let’s get started!

1. OPTIMIZE OLD POSTS

The first tweak you could make to your blog to fight the summer slump is optimizing older posts.

Even if you followed a bullet-proof SEO strategy from the beginning, blogging has a constant learning curve. (Seriously, every day I find out something new thanks to FB groups!)

For this reason, it might be good – now and then – to go back to old posts and see how you can further improve them. Some examples of ways to best optimize old posts are:

• Check keywords’ score
• Target new keywords, if necessary
• Refresh the content
• Check the links
• Add new links, if possible
• Optimize images
• Upload new graphics
• Spot any typos or mistakes
• Update the post with a new date

As you can see, the list of tweaks you could make is pretty long and time-consuming.

That’s why you can take advantage of the traffic slump during the summer and best optimize older content.

Google loves new content! Making sure that every post is optimized and updated will make you score higher in the rankings.

In that way, when people come back from vacation and become more active online, they’ll only stump across your best content!

2. RE-PURPOSE OLD CONTENT

Another great blogging task you could do over the summer is repurposing old content.

Since you’re already going over your older posts to optimize, you can kill two birds with one stone and generate new creative ideas for the old content!

Are there new social media you weren’t previously using, but now are?

Or, did your graphics’ style change over time?

Are you creatively stuck and just need some inspiration for future blog posts?

Re-purposing old content is your solution to all those problems!

For every blog post that you go over, you could:

• Create new Pins
• Make a video out of it for Youtube
• Create a TikTok
• Elaborate on a new Pinterest Idea on the topic
• Generate new blog post ideas linked to the post

Especially if you’re uninspired or have little time to work on your blog over the summer, one of the best ways to make your blog survive the traffic slump is by getting inspired by yourself.

Look at all the amazing ideas you’ve already generated, and use them in your favor!

Save time and creative energy by repurposing your old blog posts.

3. BLOG MAKEOVER

Over time, your taste in things changes.

Maybe you started your blog when you were only 18 years old and the excessive, childish style doesn’t suit you anymore.

Or maybe, throughout your years of blogging, you decided to niche down and the theme you once chose doesn’t fit your type of content.

Maybe, you just need to revamp your blog style because it doesn’t excite you anymore.

Whatever your prerogative is, now and then, doing a blog makeover is a must!

So why not take advantage of the traffic slump to change your blog style over the summer months? (No one is reading it anyways, so no one will notice it!)

Here are a few things you could change to give your blog a complete makeover:

• Change your theme
• Use a new color palette
• Change your fonts
• Switch old Pins for new ones
• Refresh your “About Me” page
• Update your social media accounts
• And…don’t forget to share your makeover with your readers!

Especially if you’re changing your domain name, or brand colors, or logo…make sure you inform your readers about all the changes!

By doing so, your readers won’t panic when they won’t recognize you anymore – and also, they will feel involved in the process. They see you evolve, as they evolve with you 🙂

4. BLOG AUDIT

Another great way to use the summer traffic slump to your advantage is to conduct a blog audit.

I mean, when was the last time that you did so? (And, if you’ve never done it – it’s never too late!)

If you don’t know what a blog audit is, SemRush couldn’t have explained it better in this post.

Anyways, if you’re not into the technical and more specific details of it, and are ok with knowing the basic and essential steps to conduct an audit for your blog – I’m glad to help you out!

These are the steps you should take when conducting a blog audit:

• Define your end goal
• Define your parameters:
  • The number of pageviews?
  • Ranking on SERPs?
  • The number of shares?
  • Likes and comments?
  • The number of readers turned into subscribers to your newsletter?
• Assess the performance of your content based on the chosen parameters
  • What posts did perform well?
  • What posts didn’t perform well?
  • Can you notice a pattern for both cases?
• Improve old content based on the insights you gained
• Develop a proven strategy for new content

For example, let’s analyze a real-life scenario:

• Goal -> Increase the number of email subscribers
• Parameter -> Number of new subscribers per blog post
• Single posts -> Which one(s) resulted in the highest conversion rate? -> 3 blog posts determined the conversion of 75% of current email subscribers
• Analysis -> Is there a particular strategy or pattern used in the most well-performing posts? -> All 3 blog posts had the same opt-in form
• Old posts -> Integrate the given strategy -> Find ways to naturally incorporate the golden opt-in form in previous posts, when possible
• New posts -> Develop a plan to integrate the given strategy in every post -> Elaborate on a strategy to integrate the stated opt-in form in most of your future posts OR create a similar opt-in form)\

Looking back at what worked – and what didn’t – is a great way to shorten your path to success in your blogging journey!

(PS. Make sure to not be making one of these “7 Blogging Mistakes All Bloggers Make” that could be preventing your blog from success!)

5. MAKE A PLAN FOR FALL

Another best way to take advantage of the summer slump in your blog traffic is to use the extra time to create a perfect plan for the Fall.

While in the summer your blog might suffer from a pitfall in traffic, generally – as people go back to their routines -, the Fall is a great high-traffic and high-conversion period of the year.

Kids are going back to school, so parents have more time to surf online for quick dinner recipes or ways to become better parents.

Adults are logging in back to work, so they might want to waste some time at the office by surfing how they can change their lives.

Students who go back to college might be looking for the best morning routine or money-making side hustles they could start.

If you don’t want to let them find you unprepared, then using the summer months to create a solid plan for your Fall blog posts is essential!

6. FOCUS ON NETWORKING

One way to boost your blog traffic to avoid the summer slump is by focusing on networking!

Nurture your relationships with fellow bloggers and make sure to support each other, especially if you feel stuck in your blogging journey.

Some of the best networking strategies are:

• Being very active on Facebook Groups and participating in daily threads
• Reaching out to bloggers that are ahead of the game
• Finding collaboration opportunities
• Accepting guest blogging offers by other bloggers
• Offering to write a guest post on somebody else’s blog
• Interacting a lot on other social media platforms (Instagram, TikTok, etc)
• Answering questions in Quora

Find ways to generate even the smallest amount of traffic to your blog by using any of the strategies mentioned above. (And, if you have other tips, please feel free to share them in a comment!)

7. CREATE A LEAD MAGNET

Finally, the last thing you could do to deal with the summer slump is to create a great lead magnet for your blog!

If you want to boost your conversion of newsletter subscribers, then you need to make sure that new readers that stumble upon your blog have a reason to stick around!

No one wants to give his or her email address to receive a lot of spam in return, or to receive unuseful emails that pile up in the (already) cluttered inbox.

Offering something of high value is the perfect way to start building a trust-worthy relationship with your readers.

Find what their biggest pain points are, and then give them a solution!

If you’re stuck and don’t know what freebie to create, you might consider:

• Asking Facebook groups
• Doing a poll on Instagram Stories
• Simply talking to people (and carefully listening to what they have to say!)
• Creating a detailed persona of your typical reader
• Looking inwards -> What is something you wish you got helped in?

To know what’s meaningful to your readers, you must first have a clear picture of who your typical reader is. That’s why describing your “user persona” is one of the first steps I make you do in the FREE Workbook “The Perfect Blogging Plan: Get Ready to Launch Your Blog!”.

---

As a blogger, there’s nothing you can do to prevent your blog traffic to fall into a slump during the summer months. But, what you can surely do is use those months to your advantage to further improve your blog and get ready for a great comeback in the Fall!

Keep your motivation and hopes high – you’ve got this!

What are you going to do for your blog to make it survive (and thrive) through the summer slump? Share your thoughts in a comment!

Like the post? Share it!