Today I will share some of the most common mistakes new bloggers make and how to avoid them as a new blogger.
I know building a blog for the first time can be an exciting and rewarding experience, but at the same time it can also be daunting.
As a blogger myself, I know how challenging it can be to create content, build an audience, and grow your blog.
Unfortunately, many new bloggers make a lot of mistakes that can hinder their success. So we will delve into the most common mistakes new bloggers make and see how to avoid them.
Certainly there are many mistakes both new, seasoned and regular bloggers make. Starting from the process of building a blog, creating content, promoting it, building audience and all of these, there are many places where we do it and wise that we had done it the other way.
Unfortunately, many of us where not told all of these at the beginning, but it’s not the end, neither is it too late to learn from our mistakes and take the necessary steps in correcting ourselves.
The problem is not making the mistake itself but not willing to learn from it and move on. So here are the top most common mistakes new bloggers make and how to avoid it.
Most common mistakes new bloggers make
The first mistake new bloggers make is…
1 Not going self-hosted.
One of the biggest mistakes new bloggers make is not going self-hosted.
Free hosted blogging platforms like WordPress.com,ÂSquareSpace, Wix, and Blogger can seem like the right option when you’re first starting out, especially as many of them offer a free “starter plan” of some sort.
However, going self-hosted gives you more control over your blog and allows you to customize it to your liking. It also gives you access to more tools and plugins that can help you grow your blog.
Most a times new bloggers find more reasons to use free hosted platforms but in the long run they will come to understand that, most of the reasons that make them go for free hosting was their disadvantage.
They usually come to realize that free hosting is not helping matters. There are so many limitations and drawbacks.
No matter the type of free hosting you choose you will be tight with a lot of policies and limited customizarion, no branding, limited SEO options, no or limited customer support.
Before you know you will start thinking of migrating your website to another CMS.
Don’t make this mistake and at the end be a victim of migrating your website.
Actually, migrating a blog with few contents is not that difficult but if you are a kind who have a lot of content in your blog you will be confused.
Another mistake new bloggers make is
2 Using free subdomain
Yes! Choosing free subdomain is one of the biggest mistakes you can make ever.
I have also tried this myself at the beginning of my blogging journey. But I realize that there are a lot of disadvantage with these free sub domains. You are lucky you are finding this the easier way, we learned by experience with a lot of prices.
No branding, no growth, no backlinks and nothing-nothing. The nothings a too many.
If not all but most bloggers love to see their blog ranking on SERPs. The happiness is not just the organic traffic but the feeling that you have arrived. There is a lot of feeling that, ahh! At last.
The process of making this work is building your SEO, and one of the most challenging thing to do is buildings backlinks.
No body actually is willing to link to a free subdomain. Do you know what that means? You are not serious. You are potentially just a spammer.
Another disadvantage for you is that you are building your domain authority in the wrong way. Why would you love to build a domain that you do not completely own? And to top it up with the blog you are using for free and do not own it?
The baddest experience is when you want to migrate. Some may be saying why am I always talking about migration?
The reason I always talk about migrating is because the chances of doing that is higher in the future. The wish and need to migrate your blog to self Hosted will keep growing day by day as your blog keep growing and your are always hit will limitations.
Then you will realise if you do not migrate willingly, you will do it by force. Yes! When you now thing you need to build branding, add more customization, have control over your blog, monetise it, make it bigger, make it professional, and lots of that. Then you will believe you actually need self hosted.
Then your subdomain will now kill you. How do you think about that😱😱😱🤔🤔🤔. Funny? You are actually not dying but it’s killing you any how.
It could be easier migrating a blog that has the domain.com URL than domain.blogspot.com for instance, when you do not own the blogspot.com domain.
So there will be a lot of redirections and broken links. You will learn that you have build authority the wrong way.
Another problem with free subdomain is you cannot move them anywhere. Since you can not update DNS.
You actually must run from free subdomaind. That is why I dedicated a post about why you need a custom domain ASAP.
The third mistake new bloggers make is
3 Choosing the Wrong Niche
Another mistake new beginner bloggers make is choosing the wrong niche. When I first started blogging, I made the mistake of choosing a niche that I was passionate about but didn’t have a lot of interest from readers.
This resulted in low traffic and engagement on my blog.
To avoid this mistake, it’s important to research your niche thoroughly before starting your blog.
Look for niches that have a large audience and are growing in popularity. You can use tools like Google Trends or BuzzSumo to find out what topics are trending in your niche.
Another mistake new bloggers make is choosing a niche that is too broad. Yes! This is a big mistake you may be making.
While it may seem like a good idea to appeal to a wider audience, it can actually work against you.
When your niche is too broad, it’s difficult to stand out from the competition and establish yourself as an authority in your field.
Instead, try to find a niche that is specific enough to appeal to a targeted audience but still has room for growth.
This will make it easier for you to create content that resonates with your readers and establish yourself as an expert in your niche.
Listen, don’t be afraid to pivot your niche if you find that it’s not working out.
It’s better to make a change early on than to continue down a path that’s not leading to success.
Keep an eye on your blog’s analytics and listen to feedback from your readers to determine if a change is necessary.
To avoid this mistake, research your niche thoroughly, find a specific niche that has room for growth, and be willing to pivot if necessary.
The four most common mistake you could make as a blogger is the
4 Lack of Consistency
One of the biggest mistakes new bloggers make is a lack of consistency.
When I first started blogging, I didn’t have a clear plan or schedule for posting. I would write a post when I had time, which meant that sometimes I would go weeks without publishing anything new.
This made it difficult to build an audience because readers didn’t know when to expect new content.
To avoid this mistake, I recommend creating a content calendar.
This can be as simple as a spreadsheet or as complex as a dedicated tool like CoSchedule or Trello. The important thing is to have a plan for what you will publish and when.
This will help you stay on track and ensure that your readers know when to expect new content.
Another way to ensure consistency is to batch your content creation. This means setting aside a block of time to write multiple posts at once.
For example, you might spend a Saturday morning writing three blog posts. This allows you to build up a backlog of content that you can publish over time, even if you don’t have time to write new posts every week.
Actually, repurpose your content is very important.
This means taking an old blog post and updating it with new information or turning it into a different format, such as a video or podcast episode.
This allows you to get more mileage out of your content and ensures that your readers always have something new to engage with.
Consistency is key to building a successful blog. By creating a content calendar, batching your content creation, and repurposing old content, you can ensure that you always have something new to share with your readers.
Another most common mistake new bloggers make is
5 Thinking blogging is free.
If you are just entering into the blogging career you may thing actually that blogging is free but it isn’t.
We mostly get this mentality on social media and forums. I was once told that too, that one of the easiest way to make money online for free is blogging.
But that is not true. Blogging needs money. You need to touch your pocket. You need to invest a lot of resources, your time, money, energy, knowledge, etc.
But truly there are no but personal requirements for starting a blog.
Starting a blog with the mentality of “free things” is one of the reasons why many bloggers end up in free hosted platforms and subdomains.
No! Don’t get me wrong. Not all the people do that but some of them.
In short blogging is not free! You need to invest not only your personal resources but your money too.
You need to buy hosting, purchase a domain, install premium plugins, build backlinks, use website checker and monitoring tools, and lots more.
As a blogger the worst mistake you will ever made is
6 Given up
Since many think blogging is free and easy they end up quitting when they learn the difficulties and the competitions on the way.
Some are not really interested in the blogging itself but probably they are just impressed with others side of stories. Have you ever read those kind of stories yourself?
Like for instance someone may post “how I earn $2000 dollars as a part time blogger”, and the reader will be like wow! And think he also need to make the same money too.
This is one of the most common mistakes new bloggers make which I have seen.
You see, you actually need a strong motive to back you up when starting your first blog. A motive that will keep you going and pushing away the challenges on the way.
You might have been lied but blogging is not easy. Most of does success stories are as a results of many days, months and years of working and don’t thing you will get it simple either.
To top it up the blogger may say he made it by just using the right CMS, buying hosting and domain, creating content, promoting, monetizing and making money.
In blogging there are a lot of does than what is just mentioned. Every step is a job on it’s own.
If you are told the truth, Blogging usually take time. Although the results actually varies from one another but it involves among others hard working, doing the right thing, consistency, learning from your mistakes and adjusting, patience and time.
So don’t be carried away by the success and forget the process, but let the success motivate you and follow the process.
Conclusion
The most common mistakes new bloggers make are actually avoidable if only such person is fortunate enough to know it early.
Not using self hosting, using free subdomain, choosing the niche, inconsistency, believing that blogging is free and not given it enough time are the mistakes you actually make as a new blogger.
Additionally, playing or ignoring the legal aspect of blogging is what I find some people also doing and which is very dangerous. It very important to protect your website and business with the legal documents needed. Not just any document created by some unknown persons like the free templates but the one made by a lawyer which will give you the guarantee and the reliability you needed. Lets learn how to create a lawyer approved legal documentsÂhere.
Do you have another idea? Or want to suggest more most common mistakes new bloggers make? Don’t forget to comment and share this post to more people who need to read it. Lets meet in the next post.
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