If the process to qualify for Yakezie membership hasn’t gone as quickly as you’d hoped, take heart. I’ve got to be one of the slowest Yakezie challengers to reach the elusive Alexa 200,000 mark. I joined Yakezie on January 7, 2011, and my lifestyle blog Happy Simple Living finally crossed the Alexa finish line on December 1, 2013 – two years and eleven months later. For those of you who aren’t there yet, allow my tortoise-like example to encourage you to hang in there and keep plugging away.

Do you fret because you can’t blog as consistently as you’d like? Let’s join hands and commiserate. Some months, like during my blog’s annual January Money Diet, I posted every day for 31 days straight. Other months I could only post a few times because of work deadlines. Sometimes I could interact with other bloggers a lot and I felt like I was really being a good Yakezie community member, and other times it was all I could do to manage my own blogging activities.

Fortunately, Yakezie is more about a spirit of helpfulness and giving back rather than a strict set of rules and regulations. No matter where I was in my roller coaster journey, I always felt supported and welcomed here.  One thing that spurred me on is the community of bloggers on the Yakezie forums. Whenever I needed an answer, a dash of inspiration or simply a moment to be with other like-minded bloggers, the forums provided a welcome respite—and a lot of invaluable help.

Like many of us, I like to hang out in the Bloggers’ Lair. (By the way, the dictionary defines ‘lair’ as “secret retreat or base of operations.” Don’t you think that’s a cool description?) Reading about others’ accomplishments, deciphering technical jargon, getting recommendations and advice, and lurking around reading others’ posts has been so helpful.

Here are some of the tips I’ve learned from the generous lair-folk (should we call ourselves Lair Loungers?) in the forums since I first joined Yakezie wayyyy back in 2011. Read More