5 Ways to Get Past Failure and Move Forward: Starting a New Blog or Business when Your First One Failed

People are the best resource, and Margaret is at the top of my entrepreneurial resource list.

Margaret Bourne is a blog coach, blogger, content creator and experienced PR and marketing professional helping aspiring bloggers grow and transform their blogs into successful online businesses. Its why I asked her to write about how to get past failure and move forward with a new business. Whether you are just starting out and feel the need to pivot or are contemplating a completely new endeavor, her insight is valuable.

And she is a go-to for me as a friend, peer, and mentor! This collaboration is one of many for us. You can often find her inside my Facebook group, and her SEO book, coaching and courses are repeatedly recommended by me- in fact I am an affiliate for her now!

Note: As a blogger, I use affiliate links sometimes! I may receive commission from purchases I share, but it does not change your price.

Look here to find these valuable tools, also referenced in detail in Margaret’s article below.

Whether it’s starting a business or a blog, online entrepreneurs often find themselves facing failure the first time around.

How do you get past mistakes and move forward with a new business or blog?

Fear of failure once again may be the biggest culprit.

Here’s the thing - we all fail at something at some point in our lives.

I remember my swimming lessons: I was awful at treading water and swimming in deep water. To this day, I’m not a fan of the deep end of the pool.

So how do you get past your fears and your sense of failure, to start a fresh new blog or a new business?

I’ll share five tips that work very well metaphorically, “Pulling up your bootstraps, and getting down to business” again!

Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

How To Get Past Failure and Move Forward: Five Simple Tips

The first thing to do to get past failure and move forward is to admit to yourself: “I failed.”

The second thing is to not beat yourself up over it! These tips work for bloggers as well as anybody who’s started an online business that didn’t grow traffic or make money.

How do you start a business after failing? You want to do it want to do it right. So it’s time to reflect and do some planning!

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

1 Mindset: Rising To The Challenge

If you’re like me, you’re somebody who says “Scr*w it! I’ll do it better next time,” and starts planning, you’re going to be fine.

However, I suspect you’re reading this post because you’re not like this. So here’s the secret to getting past failure and moving on to success: it’s all in how you approach it mentally.

This is the biggest obstacle for many people!

A quote from Frank Herbert’s “Dune” illustrates this very well:

“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer.”

If you want to try launching a business or blog again, you’ve got to stop thinking it will possibly fail.

No! It will not fail, because this time you know the mistakes you’ve made in the past. You have a desire to succeed. And you’re going to overcome those obstacles, no matter what.

Ultimately, I’m telling you to give yourself one big pep talk.

Photo by Caroline Veronez on Unsplash

2 Analyze What Went Wrong

I mentioned above that you know the mistakes you’ve made. One of the other key ways to get past failure and move forward again is to figure out where things went wrong.

This will take a little bit of time. If you’re Catholic, you know that before confession you need to analyze your sins. Well, it’s a similar approach with this process.

Instead of saying “Mea Culpa,” you’ll be asking yourself:

● What were the skills that I lacked that affected my success?
● What were the key tools/elements I was missing?
● Did I have the right plan and strategy in place? Or was it missing altogether?
● Emotionally, how did my failed business/blog make me feel when I worked on it?
● Were they people I should have been leveraging to help support me?
● Did I have a budget to support my goals?

The list is not exhaustive, but a good starting point. To truly understand what caused your failure, you’ll need to set aside some time for introspection.

TIP: Set aside some quiet time to think things through, without distractions.

RELATED: Take time for self-care! You can get some great ideas and products here.

Photo by Marko Kovic on Unsplash

3 Develop An Action Plan

It may be that the reason why you failed in the first place was that you didn’t have an action plan!

Many of my blog coaching clients come to me with a jumble of emotions and fears: they are afraid of failure, yet they want to try again. They have an idea but they don’t know how to get started. As well, they don’t know how to organize their thoughts into a plan.

Here’s how you can get started on that action plan! Think of it like a business plan or a marketing plan.

● What is the big problem that I’m going to help solve?
● Who is my key consumer/audience? What is keeping them up at night? Do your research!
● What is my business/blog’s mission statement (a short one paragraph that answers the first two questions - e.g. “Helping busy working parents with home organization tips

● What are my key objectives? Always start your response with “To…” to make it easier to figure this out. Use the SMART method to set your goals.

● What strategies will you use to reach those goals? Strategies are broad, i.e., leverage my professional network, or position myself as a niche expert.
● What tactics will you use for each strategy? These are the granular actions, such as “Reach out to five of my professional contacts each week to XYZ” or “Post to Instagram and engage with followers to grow my online presence.”

When you want to start a business after failing, having a plan in place will make a huge world of difference.

Once you have this all down in a document, you’re set. This is your big plan! Plans will change, so you can revisit throughout the year and adjust your strategies and tactics.

RELATED: Click here for Daphne’s video interview with Margaret about goal-setting.

Image by Yakup Ipek from Pixabay

4 Determine The Blog/Business Tools And Resources You Need

Another key way to get past failure and move forward is to admit that maybe you didn’t invest in your success the last time around.

What were you lacking last time that you need this time to achieve your goals? Was it an online tool to streamline your activities and speed things up? Or a professional tool that helps you reach broader audiences?

For example, many new bloggers love the free tools out there, and while many are great, they do have their limitations. You can be successful with them, however at the expense of your time and energy.

Draw up a list of the top five things you know would have helped you last time around and you know can propel you to success faster this time around.

They can be things such as:

● Quality website (self-hosted, or a top-notch platform with extra features you need)
● Sales funnel/course creation platforms
● Design tools such as Canva

● Templates - such as my template collection for everything from Pinterest to social media templates (Bonus - buy once and get access to new ones as I add them!)

● Courses & ebooks (for example, a course for bloggers to boost traffic, an ebook on SEO to ensure you’re optimizing your site/blog to get found in search engine results).

● A coach that can help provide you with tips, strategies and keep you accountable! For example, I work as a blog coach with clients who need help with starting and growing their blogs.

Figure out your needs and plan a budget! Successful business owners know when to invest to grow their business.

RELATED: Daphne recommends Groove for hosting websites and blogs as well as for sales funnels and other entrepreneurial technology needs.

Image by Monoar Rahman Rony from Pixabay

5 Determine The Support And Network You’ll Need For Success

Getting past failure and moving forward with a new business or blog sometimes means you’ll need help from others.

It’s not weak to seek help! Some of the best tips and knowledge I’ve gained is from others.

Facebook groups are some of the best resources. Daphne’s group is fantastic for anybody taking the big leap from working for somebody to working for yourself. My blogging group - The Blog It Better Society - is for those starting a blog and learning how to grow it.

You may find that you’ll find people in these groups that go beyond your group relationships. Daphne and I have become online friends, helping each other out whenever we can to boost our businesses. We also bounce ideas off of each other!

RELATED: Read the Free At 50 blog post about people as a resource here.

Image by GuHyeok Jeong from Pixabay

Starting Something New Should Be Exciting Not Scary

Once again, I go back to the key point that your mindset is the first place to start when you’re ready to begin again.

Letting go of your feelings of inadequacy, and inability to succeed will be your best move as you work to get past your fear of starting a new business or blog.

My final point is a pep talk: you can do it! Look at how many successful entrepreneurs failed time and time again until they achieved success.

Rise to the challenge. Know that you can do it. If there’s a will, there’s a way!

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