20 Blogging Tips For Beginners

Are you thinking about starting your blog but don’t know how to become a popular blogger? Many times it happens that people roll their eyes when you share that you want to try your hands on blogging. People easily judge blogging as a plum job.  

That’s fine- It happens to almost all fresh bloggers. An estimate of about 5 million blog posts is published regularly. If you want your blog to top the list, you need to put in all your efforts and treat your blog as nothing less than a brand.

Most viewers will look for content on a search engine and visit your webpage if it correlates with their topic of interest. But, there is a tough competition amongst bloggers to grab the viewer’s attention, so you must be careful and avoid simple blogging errors to stand out.

So, keep on reading for all the grade 1 bloggers considering speeding up quickly. This article gives you a quick view of the mistakes that beginner bloggers usually make and also some awesome hacks on how to overcome them.

The Best Blogging Tips for Beginners

Here are some very frequent blogging errors (and their quick fix.)

#1 Target Marketing over Mass Marketing

Your blog MUST be niche specific at the start. Design your website’s content so that it caters to a narrow niche of readers before expanding. It’s better to be really good at one thing than mediocre at many things. Why?

From an SEO perspective, Google enjoys promoting articles that are niche-focused, covering every aspect of a specific story or field of study. The latter reason is quite similar. People can understand better who you are and what your website is all about.

How can you find out what your readers want can be conducted thorough keyword research. Once you find out what people really want you’ll have to ask yourself whether the content you’d like to provide is adding any value or experience to your reader’s life? 

Make sure to write about the content around what your viewers are interested in rather than focusing on only you! 

You are blogging because you want to solve problems for your viewers and expand your blogging trade. So, every idea in your post should serve the interest of your readers’ goals. 

#2 Specify what Vibrates with your Viewers

If you desire your blog to run well ( i.e., promote sales, traffic, and leads) it must vibrate with your viewers and attract them to it. One of the major shortcomings is wishful thinking. You might be celebrating your content’s post without understanding which platform works best for your blog. Different social media platforms have different audiences. Your goal should be to cater to your target audience on the right platform.  You should specifically observe your viewers and their likings.

Your personality is the core of all the things that you fabricate. 

Instead, if you picture your authentic personality and genuine pains, obstacles, and goals, they will resonate with you, match your wavelength, and more likely approach you to talk to you! 

Apart from connecting, they would constantly visit your page, increasing their chances of staying on it.

If you are not in your viewers’ shoes and creating content just for content’s sake, then you are wasting your time and energy.

#3 Write as if you are in a TedTalk

I know… I know, I’ve broken rule #3 a dozen times. But this is rather a tip than a must-do activity for all new bloggers. The time span of an average reader is equivalent of a goldfish thanks to video content and an abundance of information. 

For this reason your writing should be flowy. Writing a blog is different from writing a thesis on your answer script. But when a new blogger starts building content, he only has experience with the latter. 

The viewer does not enjoy a stiff style of writing that is too academic or biblical. Rather a flowy and conversational style is appreciated. 

It’s absolutely fine to carry a conversational style. The more informal and welcoming your style is, the more audience will stick with you, resulting in better SEO rankings too.

#4 Demonstrate your Personality Don’t Tell It

It might sound harsh, but it’s true.

When you begin blogging, you feel that everyone will be inherently interested in your articles. With around 8 million articles, blog posts, case studies, journals, research, and reports coming out, there is little room for your own story.

Combined with SEO tactics, you have to infuse your authentic personality in your writing, like adding some jokes, referring to some pop culture, or adding a dash of vivid descriptions.

#5 Provide Your Viewers A GiveAway

One of the biggest objectives of content writing is that it must be useful. You need to keep giving in order to receive. One of my strategies to collect sign-ups is through my free ebooks.

Instead of being vague and conceptual, your audience must be able to walk away with informational and concrete ideas to solve their issues.

Think of it this way. If you’re a fan of a cooking channel, you go back to it for more insights. Same will happen with your blog until your frequent visitor becomes a customer at some point.

#6 Be Consistent

Consistency is key in blogging.

If you think you’ll be blogging once in a while and gathering traffic, then sorry, that’s not happening. I’ve been doing content marketing, blogging, and working as an online entrepreneur for 4 years now. It’s rather easier to lose an audience than build up.

You have to be consistent and regular with your content throughout the weeks. This is why it’s important to select a niche that you’re genuinely interested in researching and sharing more insights on.                                                                          

#7 Be True To What You Say

Authenticity and honesty cannot be camouflaged.

People don’t bother to follow blogs as much as they prefer to follow people. Be authentic to your thoughts and voice out your thoughts to people in an engaging manner. Always remember to be honest with your readers. Eventually, this will guide you to connect with your audience base and fetch recurring traffic in due course.                                      

#8 Prioritize Your Email List

If you are serious about blogging and want your business to grow or are trying to support a cause, then you should prioritize your email list.

Regular engagement with your audience can be only maintained if they get updates on what’s happening to their favorite content creator. Nowadays people get bombarded with emails, so make sure your email marketing campaigns are on point, personal, and add value.

#9 Write Catchy Headlines

I’ve highlighted the importance of SEO and keyword optimization for higher traffic. 

It hardly matters how good your content is; if your headlines are dull, it will take a split second for your audience to choose if they should visit your page. The headline makes it easy for the audience to share your post. 

#10 Don’t Write Too Long Articles

What do I mean by too long articles? Normally topics that go further than 2000 words will not be read. I would rather take a topic and break it down into different parts than cram an entire idea into a single post. In fact, I’d rather focus on short paragraphs, visuals, and infographics to maintain your audience’s attention.

#11 Avoid Grammatical Errors

Grammatical errors are forgivable to a certain extent. 

I make mistakes… others do the same. But a multitude of errors will not only keep your readers looking away but also search engines consider grammar as one of the signals for search engine ranking.

To avoid this issue, I would recommend a free chrome extension like Grammarly.

#12 Don’t Copy From Others

Plagiarized work will more often lead to a penalty and harm your entire website. That is not to say that you are not allowed to take thoughts, quotes, or ideas from other writers. But taking long paragraphs or snippets from other authors without a source is content creator theft. 

#13 Ask Opinions from your Readers

Your targeted audience must not feel like they are reading an article written by a robot. Try finding ways to engage and converse with your readers. Ask for their opinions and comments to deliver the best pieces.

As a WordPress user, I always welcome comments, even if it’s about my horrible grammar or dumb ideas. Any feedback is good in my opinion and only helps. Be aware though that many people will shower your comments with ads and promos. Make sure that you use an anti-spam plugin or extension to filter out all the spammy comments.

#14 Learn about SEO

I’ve talked about “Making a living Blogging” where I’ve highlighted the importance of SEO. If unfamiliar, SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is an internet metric and optimization method that helps increase the outreach of your blog’s visibility on the internet through rankings. This results in the gathering of your traffic. As search engines are frequently the largest source of website traffic, this can be extremely important for your webpage.

I would advise to learn as much about SEO as possible if you want your hard work to be found on the internet.

#15 Share It On Social Media Sites

Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest are some exquisite platforms to share your blog and generate traffic. It would make it much more convenient for you to advertise it to friends and family at the start and ask them to share your content to give your blog a boost. 

#16 Design Your Blog’s UI

Remember that your blog’s design should be clear and with simple navigation for your users. Your homepage should explain who you are and what your blog covers in a few sentences.

Content always plays a vital role. But it’s the looks and ease of use that leave the biggest impression on someone and reduces bounce rate. 

#17 Bookmarking It On Social Bookmarking Sites

Bookmarking sites can bring in traffic, so don’t forget to bookmark your posts. Faster indexing is an advantage of bookmarking, especially on bookmarking sites such as Reddit, Flipboard, and Pocket.

#18 Plan Out Your Monetization Policy and Make Money

Let’s face some facts. We all want our work to turn into a goldmine. No? Whatever your answer is, monetizing a blog can be a huge motivator.

Chalk out a monetization strategy even before you launch your blog. I’ve already shared a few tips on some weird ways to make money. But even bloggers can use some common tips that many websites have already shared:

• Subscriptions
• Advertising
• Affiliate Marketing
• Sponsored content
• Adsense
• Affiliate Marketing
• Freelancing for other content creators

#19 Find A Schedule That Works For You

Most bloggers start their website as a side project while going to school, university, or working from 9 to 5. Scheduling your blog’s frequency for consistency is important to help it grow over time.

You should publish your content at the time that suits you best. I use Buffer.com for frequent social media shares and my blogs are usually written in a bulk over the weekend where they can be shared periodically throughout the month. This way I don’t have to worry about inconsistency when I’m on a break.

#20 Guest Blogging

Once your blog is up and running, but readers are not coming in despite writing a dozen different content, you can write for others. Is it worth your time?

Absolutely!

You need to find sites that resonate with your niche, reach out to them and provide them with your expertise. Make sure that the sites you’re publishing for will link back to you for added SEO value and provide an author bio for reference.

Wrapping It Up

Blogging is an iterative process. Don’t expect to be a pro right away. None of the Blogging Wizards were a pro right from the beginning. So take your time and work consistently to improve your skills.