13 Blogging Mistakes to Avoid Now To Be Successful

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Imagine if you knew the blogging mistakes to avoid from the get-go. Imagine if you could just start your blog and magically be making money a month later. How amazing would that be?

The thing is, the chances of that happening are extremely low. I’m not saying it can’t happen, but chances are it won’t.

Don’t let that discourage you though. Be thankful you have people like me writing about all the blogging mistakes to avoid so you have a chance to start your blog without making them too.

I’m sharing this information because one, I made all these mistakes myself. I wasted my time and gave myself double the work because I had to go back and redo everything I had done wrong.

The second thing is, I don’t want this to happen to you. I only wish I had seen an article like this when I first started out.

I did everything wrong for the first two years. I became so discouraged that I gave up and ignored my blog completely. It’s not until now that I’m trying to fix everything I did wrong and let me tell you, it’s definitely a challenge.

Blogging Mistakes to Avoid

Please take note of all the following blogging mistakes to avoid so you don’t go through the headache of trying to fix it later like me.

Don’t Waste Your Time Trying to Design the “Perfect” Blog

Most of the time, new bloggers waste their time where they shouldn’t be… designing their blog. Yes, you want it to have the proper functionality but you shouldn’t make that your main focus.

Your design will come in time. You will constantly be tweaking the look and always be trying to improve it. But remember, if you don’t have the traffic, what’s the purpose of wasting all your time designing it?

Of all the blogging mistakes to avoid, this is one of the hardest for people to not to make.

Make Sure You Have a Self-Hosted Blog and That You Own Your Domain

I understand that putting money out for your blog when you have nothing coming in can be hard. You might wonder why you would pay when you can get a website for free. The answer to that is easy.

If you don’t self-host, you don’t own your blog. The free-hosted sites can remove you without warning, wiping out all your hard work.

Also, the opportunity to monetize your blog will be almost impossible. The chances of you finding paid sponsorships or affiliate programs willing to accept you will be slim.

Considering the blogging mistakes to avoid, this one is a no-brainer. There are some cheap hosts that will make do for a beginning blogger. You can always switch later as your traffic begins to pick up and your needs change.

Keep it Simple

There is a lot going on in the beginning, especially when you’re trying to learn everything all at once. Don’t focus too much on one thing.

Focus on creating amazing content and the rest can be worked on over time.

Make Sure You’re Publishing Great Content From the Get-Go

There is a list of things you want to focus on when writing your content. Can you answer yes to all of the following questions:

• Are you answering questions?
• Are you solving people’s problems?
• Is it easy to read?
• Are you making sure you have no grammatical mistakes?
• Is it meaningful?

This is the checklist to go by when writing. If you don’t keep this in mind, you won’t be creating content that is going to drive traffic to your website.

Refer to these questions every time you decide to write new content. This is one of the easiest blogging mistakes to avoid as long as you answer yes to those questions.

Make Sure You’re Writing About Something You Enjoy

This is a must. If you aren’t writing about something you’re passionate about, you won’t enjoy writing your blog. You will constantly struggle to find new content because you are bored with what you are doing.

Furthermore, your readers will notice. Your audience gets a sense of who you are through your writing. They will not follow someone who isn’t passionate about what they are doing.

Enjoy what you write because your readers will know if you don’t.

Make Sure There Are People Who Want to Read What You Are Writing

To follow up with the previous section, you have to keep something else in mind. Yes, you may be writing about something you enjoy but, do you have an audience?

If you don’t have an interested audience, how will you make money? You won’t be driving the necessary traffic to your blog in order to monetize it. For the majority of us, that’s the whole point.

Do your research and make sure you’ll have the necessary amount of readers. There’s one way I’d suggest doing this. Get on Facebook and search for groups related to your niche.

If you can find groups of say 10K or more, you might be okay. I’m not guaranteeing that though. I’m simply providing a suggestion of ways to see if you could possibly have an interested audience.

This is one of the blogging mistakes to avoid that people often struggle with. They want to write what they want but the audience just isn’t there.

Try to Narrow Down Your Niche Instead of Being Too Broad

Keep in mind, if you choose something popular, it will be hard for you to rank and stand out from the other blogs. This a lot of times is at the top of the list of blogging mistakes to avoid.

Let’s use a lifestyle blog for example. There are thousands of them if not more. They tend to focus on a large range of topics including, beauty, fashion, travel, food, etc.

Instead of trying to be a replica of that, what if you focus on one of those niches?

Let’s pretend you pick fashion. There is still a huge audience and plenty of content to be written about. That could include seasonal trends, trends based on different age groups, trends from around the world, and so on.

Again, it’s just an example but you will have a more targeted audience this way. There are people who are looking for just this information and will continue to return to your blog versus the blogs that are broader with their content.

Focus On Getting Organic Traffic

Organic traffic is key to your success. It means you are doing something right. You’re drawing in your audience based on what your posting on your blog and your social media.

You’re building the trust of your audience at the same time too. They are beginning to figure out who you are and that’s exactly what you want. When they start to return to your blog, it’s because they trust you. When they trust you, they buy from you.

Of all the blogging mistakes to avoid, this should definitely be towards the top of the list.

Link Building

Blogging mistakes to avoid include link building. There’re a few factors to consider when it comes to this. If done correctly, it can drastically improve your ranking in search engines.

Internal and External

Internal links are a great way to keep people engaged with your content and keep them on your blog longer. They may be reading one article and reach a point that links to another one of your articles that might go into more depth on whatever they just read.

External links include linking two separate domains. You need to be very careful when it comes to this. It will definitely help you rank higher if linked from the right sites. You don’t want external links coming from just anywhere though.

I think it’s best to always reach out to a website you’d like to link to and get their permission. I personally think it’s just good practice. If there is an agreeance, they might reciprocate the link. But make sure they are relevant and the website you want to be associated with.

Quality Over Quantity

This is in reference to external links. You don’t want to get links to your website from just anywhere. Receiving fewer quality links will have a much more positive effect on your website than a bunch of low-quality links.

Gaining a bunch of links from low-quality and spammy sites can actually have a negative effect on your website and your ranking in search engines such as Google.

Also, make sure you never buy link-backs to your site. This is a great way to make yourself disappear off all search engines. That could be a disaster if no one is able to find you online.

Offer to Guest Post on More Popular Blogs

This is a great way to start gaining links to your blog. You are a nobody in the beginning so offer to write a post for somebody else’s website.

If they agree, they usually will then let you link back to your own blog. Just make sure you’re bringing quality content to the table or no one will ever let you guest post on their site.

Build Your Email List From the Beginning

This is one of the biggest blogging mistakes to avoid. Doing this will allow you to do email marketing. This is going to get you a much higher click-through rate than your social media accounts will.

If you can get people to sign up, that means they are already invested in you. They want more from you. They are giving you access to their personal inbox. Utilizing this email list is crucial. It’s a great way to convert your audience into clients and customers.

If you want a more in-depth understanding of the importance of having an email list, check out Why Every Blogger Needs an Email List.

SEO

Considering all the blogging mistakes to avoid, this tops the list. This will make or break your existence on any search engine. Making sure you have this taken care of is extremely important.

There are a lot of factors that go into how Google ranks websites. Learn them. Implement them. Always stay on top of them.

This subject can be very in-depth so I’d suggest you do your research. You’re going to want to do everything possible to maximize your chances of being found on the web.

To Sum Up

I understand that I threw a lot of information at you but know these are all the blogging mistakes to avoid. The mistakes I made. Not only me but many, many bloggers before you.

You might still make a few of these mistakes, but at least you are aware of the things that cause most bloggers to fail. If not fail, be delayed in driving traffic to their blog and monetizing it.

Take this information and use it to your advantage.

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