Here Are Some of the Most Crippling Mistakes Bloggers Made in 2014 (and How to Correct Them!)
If blogging was easy, then everybody would be doing it. Unfortunately, lots of people are doing it.
As of writing, there are around 214 million Tumblr blogs in existence and 42.6 million posts published every month on WordPress that are viewed 409 million times. And that’s not considering the statistics of other blogging platforms!
While blogging is a fun activity for those who simply wish to write and publish stuff, blogging as a profession is serious business. Bloggers have the responsibility of not only sharing ideas and engaging with their audience, but also driving more leads and sales to their online business.
Therefore, if you’re not making enough with your blog, then you’re most likely doing it wrong. Considering that there are lots of bloggers now than ever before (and that number will only increase in the coming years), you need to cut through the noise by kicking the bad habits you’ve been making with your blog and let your voice be heard.
Below are some of the mistakes that you may have committed with your blog this year and ways on how to correct them.
Went with a cheap hosting service
While the hosting service you choose may not have any bearing now since you’re still building up your content and readership, it will have its consequences once your blog picks up traffic. Choosing a shady web hosting provider may help you cut down on costs, but it will give you massive headaches if your blog keeps returning error messages to visitors due to the hosting’s inability to bear the stream of traffic coming down your blog. Imagine how much of potential leads and clients you’re missing out because your blog has been unavailable!
Fix:
Make sure to choose an affordable and reliable web hosting that will maintain quality performance regardless of the amount of blog traffic.Aside from the usual suspects, you can try out Hostt, a website that offers free premium web hosting. All you need to do is create an account, manage your domain, and publish your website! In order to use Hostt, however, you will need to register the domain from their site.
Failed to create a content strategy
Upon building a blog, you may have an idea on how to write the posts and promote them for the purpose of driving more visitors. If you have been applying this practice, then you’ll notice low to nonexistent blog traffic ever since.
There’s more to effective content creation than the ones mentioned above. To begin, you must write down your mission statement and business objectives to have a clear idea on what your blog will be about, as well as identify your target audience to ensure that your content specifically caters to that group of readers. From here, you will also need to perform a competitive analysis, set up social media channels and define the purpose of each, and break down your goals into quarters, among countless other tasks.
Fix: To provide you with a much simpler and more comprehensive introduction to developing a content strategy, read this excellent article from QuickSprout.
Creating content that isn’t compelling
Writing a blog post can be deduced to a science. If you’re just hacking away with producing content for your blog without deliberately producing a highly engaging blog post that presents helpful information to your target readers in a clear manner, then you’re hurting your chances of captivating your audience and convince them to become a client, if not a brand follower.
Fix: Darren Rowse at Problogger has published a series of posts about great blog content that everybody should read and take at heart.
Not building relationships with other bloggers
Part of what makes blogging fun is the ability to reach out to other bloggers and make meaningful connections with them. While writing a blog is something that you want to focus on at the moment, that’s fine. However, you should definitely squeeze in time building relationships with bloggers to achieve more with your blog.
Fix: Head on to MyBlogU and start brainstorming with fellow bloggers for content ideas, getting your opinions cited on other blogs with a link back to your blog, and looking for sites where you can get your high-quality posts published to tap on the readership of other bloggers. Create an account and visit the site regularly to find opportunities that you can capitalize on.
Not measuring your blog performance
There’s no reason why you shouldn’t have installed Google Analytics to your blog, as it will provide you with comprehensive data on how your blog is faring in terms of metrics you’re targeting for your blog. However, what’s worse that not having Google Analytics installed is not doing anything with the data you’re getting, using this valuable website tracker!
Fix: From beginners to advanced users of Google Analytics, this nifty guide by KISSmetrics should help you not only understand which metric to target for with your blog, but also how you can use the data to further improve your blog’s performance. Also, don’t forget to set goal value to ramp up your blog’s revenue and online presence.
More on blogging mistakes:
Blogging Mistakes: Ten Things to Avoid
The First 5 Things You Need to Hear Before You Start Blogging
Freelance writer for hire by day. Heavy sleeper at night. Dreams of non-existent brass rings. Writer by trade. Pro wrestling fan by choice (It's still real to me, damnit!). Family man all the time.