Few things annoy me. Ok, I lied. Many things annoy me like people who try to talk to me while I’m on the phone or how the internet ruins the plots for my favorite shows with spoilers.  You know what annoys me the most? When smart creative business owners make decisions that are damaging to their brands online. Running a business is challenging, competition is fierce and things online are noisy so we don’t have the luxury of making silly mistakes. To be successful online you have to bring your A- game every single time no matter what stage of business you’re in.

If you want to grow your brand, it’s time to stop doing these 4 things immediately:

Stop writing blog posts for the sake of writing blog posts.

If you don’t have something valuable, thoughtful or a lesson to share you’re better off not publishing anything. People make judgments on your expertise simply by the content that you share and the things you write. Don’t ruin that by posting less than stellar content. Trust me it’s noticeable.

What to do instead: Get strategic about what you post. Create an editorial calendar that uses monthly themes or products you’re launching as the basis of the blog posts that you’re writing. Before you decide to publish any post ask yourself, “How am I helping my reader with this post?” If you can’t answer confidently then don’t publish it.

Stop watering down your brand.

The desire to make money online can sometimes cause us to do questionable things, like accepting product reviews for things unrelated to our blog, working with people that aren’t a good fit or creating products just because they follow the latest trend. Each time you do that you water down your brand and skew its messaging a bit.

You need to draw a firm line in the sand and decide what you are willing to do and not do with your brand. If you want to do product reviews then only work with companies that are in alignment with yours and that provide products your readers might actually use. The same logic applies to collaborations. You don’t work with someone just because they offer. Take the time to think about whether or not the collaboration builds up your brand because poorly matched partnerships can be damaging. Make sensible choices that support brand growth.

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What to do instead: Get clear about your brand values. What does your brand stand for? Who does your brand represent? What does your brand value? Once you’ve decided don’t compromise on that, especially not for money.

Stop neglecting your email list.

Many creative business owners still don’t understand why list building is an important ongoing process so I want to break it down simply. Without a continuous stream of interested subscribers joining your list monthly, you will burn through your list with just one product launch. Think about it. Every time you send a message to your list you have unsubscribers, inactive subscribers and people who have changed their email address. If you tried to sell to a stagnant list you would find that your sales dry up quickly. This is why getting people on your list and keeping them happy is critically important.

List building is not an optional activity. It should be a key part of your monthly strategy.

What to do instead: Make a monthly list building goal. How many people do you want to add to your list? Then, make a list of strategies to try, including content upgrades, community challenges, guest posts, etc. Put it on your schedule and make time to execute those strategies.

Stop thinking that you need to create new products all the time and start promoting what you already have.

This is a biggy. One of the main reasons that you aren’t selling more is because you haven’t maximized your opportunities to promote your offers. Instead, you slapped up one blog post or sent a single email announcing a new product and believed that was enough to have the sales rolling in. If your previous product announcement produced less than 10 sales (unless you only intended to sell 10), it’s time to put together a better plan.

You don’t need to be in constant product creation mode. Learn to do a better job of promoting the products and services that you’ve already sunk time into. Don’t shy away from promoting your awesome product because you feel it may annoy a few followers. Anyone that is annoyed about you selling something you put so much time into was never going to buy anyway.

What to do instead: Make a relaunch plan to generate buzz about a previously offered product or service. Map out both written and visual content as well as multiple social shares.