Not Just for Newbies: 47 Common Mistakes Bloggers Make

Since I am still looking to change my theme and improve my blog overall, I thought I should focus on mistakes to avoid, apart from just looking for a new theme.

So I started to look around for telltale signs that show a blogger is new to blogosphere. A lot of these mistakes can really work against all the efforts one puts in a blog without even realizing that that is why bounce rates go up and visitors just seem to ignore what you yourself believe is “the best blog on earth”.

Who the hell am I to come up with a list of newbie mistakes?

I will be the first one to admit that I am guilty of making (or having made) the following mistakes. But eventhough this blog is new, I consider myself to be an intelligent person capable of learning from my own mistakes and mistakes I see other people making.

I am using this blog in order to become a better blogger and in order to do so I have to look with a critical eye, not just at my blog but also at the ones around me. Some highly successful, some quite the contrary. There is a lot to learn from looking around with your eyes wide open especially if you are willing to step out off your own safety zone.

So here is a list of mistakes I have seen around me or committed myself.

1. Starting your blog on a free platform. Been there, done that. So I can completely understand why so many people choose to start off without spending some money on their blog. If you are at all serious about blogging, and I am not referring to making money with it, but if you just remotely like blogging and all it comes along, do yourself a favour and spend some money on your own domain and hosting. You will find that in time it will pay off, offering more possibilities and less chance you will one day find your blog deleted. Just ask any blogger using their own domain about this and they will tell you the same!
2. Buying your own domain but then uploading it in the default wordpress folder. Make sure your blog is on the main domain and not on yourdomain.com/wordpress unless you want to create a blog to support your existing business, by putting it in a blog folder (yourbusiness.com/blog).
3. Keeping the default template. You should at least put some effort in making your blogtheme stand out from the rest so your returning visitors will recognize which blog they landed on. And it really makes you look like a lazy bastard!
4. Not updating the blogroll the way it came when you downloaded the blogging platform. At least spend the minute it takes to delete it in order to add links you support in the future.
5. Not deleting the default first post and comment. Do you really think the “hello world” post will make for a great first impression?
6. Make your blog look like it never survived the seventies. Even if you can’t design your own theme or can’t afford to have a custom design, there are thousands of good-looking free templates available which will make your blog look like you know what you are doing.
7. Confuse the hell out of your readers by changing your theme too frequently. There is nothing wrong with changing your theme once in a while but if you change it continuously over a short period of time, you are just showing off all flaws and mistakes you are committing in the process.
8. Not changing the default permalink, making your blog title look like www.domainname.com/?=191 (if you ever get to making that many posts).
9. Making your posts hard or even impossible to read. Make sure your visitor can actually read what you are writing. So unless you have a really good reason to use that dark background with small unreadable fonts, just don’t.
10. Sending your posts of in the world in one huge block of packed together words. This should be a no-brainer really, but make sure your posts are easy digestible. Break your post up in small bites; use lists if needed, white spaces and headlines. Make it a real treat for the eye and easily scanable for your visitor.
11. Using background music. This is a very effective way to have your visitor close their browser and never come back to your blog. If you really feel you should share your all-time favourite song, give your visitor the option to start listening themselves.
12. Using audio ads. You might think this is a neat way to earn an extra buck but you can be sure you will end up with no traffic at all.
13. Use advertisement blocks within your post instead of an appealing picture that will illustrate what the post is about and capture the attention of your reader.
14. Overcrowding your blog with ads, banners and text links. It is not only a real pain for the eye, it will send out the message to your visitor that you are only looking to make a buck off of them.
15. Using oversized pictures that take forever to load. Your visitor might just not have the time and patience to wait 5 minutes to see it. And unless you want to share your 342 holiday pictures with your family, don’t make your blog look like a picture album without any content.
16. Flash and blink your visitor away. Keep the use of flashy, blinking and moving things to an absolute minimum if you want your reader to hang around and read comfortably.
17. Not adding an About page and a way to contact you. Think about what signal that sends to your reader, you want them to read your stuff but prefer to hide who you are? People are curious, if they like what you are writing, they will want to know who is doing that writing.
18. Forgetting to create a sitemap for the search engines. While you are at it, you might as well think about creating a sitemap for your visitors!
19. Not using an inside link structure. Make sure you refer to posts you have already written a while back, use a plug-in to offer related post to your reader, make it easy for them to find popular posts on your blog.
20. Not analysing your statistics. Next time you look at your stats, have a closer look at how people found your site through search engines, you might be surprised!
21. Making it hard to leave comments on your posts. People don’t like having to sign up in order to leave a comment and will just move on.
22. Not installing a spam filter. And if it is installed, not making sure to check what has been filtered occasionally.
23. Under using plugins. Plugins are a great way to improve your blog, interaction with your visitors, usability etc and are set up and working in a breeze. Here is a list of 17 plugins you should check out.
24. Not responding at all to the comments people have left. If you do decide to admit comments on your blog, it sends out a positive signal to respond when somebody has taken the time to reply.
25. Going out to create backlinks by spamming other blogs with “great post” comments filled with urls to your blog. There is nothing more annoying for a blogger to feel like their blog is used for nothing more than self-promotion.
26. Not linking out enough. You can’t expect nor make others link to your blog if you don’t show your willingness to send some link juice their way first.
27. Not delivering what you promise. Don’t make your readers think they can expect something next time they visit and find it is just not there.
28. Losing the focus. Starting out blogging about a certain subject and then changing it or starting to blog about a zillion other things.
29. Worse even, admitting you have no clue about what you are doing. People don’t like reading about failure. They will only return if they feel that what is offered is of any value to them.
30. Copying another blogger. There is a lot to learn from reading other blogs, but completely copying what they are doing will not be appreciated. Make your blog your own, finding your own style.
31. Blogging about nothing in particular. Internet users are after information and want to read something interesting and entertaining, they don’t want to waste their time!
32. Not proofreading your posts. Don’t just write and hit the publish button. Read and reread your post before publishing it, run it through a grammar and spelling check. The language most used online is English, but if your English really sucks, you better write in your native language or find a way to improve your English fast. By the way, that last bit also goes for English natives… if I am able to pick up on a huge amount of silly mistakes I will just think you are a lazy bastard for not proofreading!
33. Not correcting mistakes. If at any time you find mistakes in your already published your posts, make sure you edit them. If you see the mistake, you can bet your reader will too.
34. Blogging about something you have no knowledge of. This will show through your posts and make your texts worthless and boring. Besides, if you choose to blog about something you have absolutely no passion for, your blog will end up in the 1-month blog cemetery.
35. Making your titles absolutely suck. A title should give your reader a basic idea of what the post is about and capture their attention straight away. Using a lousy title will make sure your post won’t be read at all.
36. Forgetting the purpose of blogging. You are writing for others to read, and even though there is a certain level of therapeutic value in writing, if your blog is about computer skills or car parts your readers won’t want to know about your latest break-up.
37. Not using bloggers ethic. If you are after to get the attention of a big shot blogger, make sure you do it in a positive and constructive way rather than just attacking them and making you look like an ass.
38. Not making your posts stand out. Writing in a complicated or dry way will make you lose the attention of your readers. Same goes for writing just for the sake of meeting your deadline of the one-post-per-day “rule”
39. Promoting your blog too soon. Make sure you have at least some interesting content before putting a lot of effort in creating links to your site in order to capture the attention of the first visitors to your blog.
40. Relying only on entrecard to get traffic for your blog. Even though entrecard is a great system in order to get your blog going and out into the world, you must use other ways to build up traffic.
41. Forgetting to enter in blog carnivals. Blog carnivals are a not only great way to get your traffic going but you can also submit older posts to get them out of the dust.
42. Not using the signature feature in forums. If you are an active member in a forum, there is no reason why you should not put your blog into your signature. After all, you are proud enough of your blog to share it with your forum companions, right?
43. Making it hard to subscribe to your blog. Put your subscription form about the main fold and offer a full feed or the possibility to choose between partial or full feed. Stephen Cronin made a nice plugin to offer the choice, but I haven´t yet started using it myself.
44. Showing your stats too soon. People tend to think twice to sign up for your reader if only 5 or 6 other readers have signed up before them. And really, there is nothing to brag about if your sitemeter only shows 89 visitors! So instead of posting your RSS count too soon, focus on writing good articles first.
45. Not posting consistently. There is a lot to be said for posting daily. There is a lot to be said for posting only every other day or even for posting thrice daily. Find what best works for you and stick to it. If you are a new blogger with only 1 unique visitor daily this might not really be important, but once your audience is starting to build up, they will be expecting something off of you.
46. Overusing the category feature. Creating a new category will make you stand out like a newbie, apart from creating confusing. Think about it, would you really like to sift through 76 categories on a blog in order to find what you like to read?
47. Making it impossible for your reader to find information they came looking for. Make sure you blog it is easy to navigate your blog.

Everybody has his or her own pet peeves so I am sure this list is far from complete, so before I am off in order to correct some of the above mistakes I am still guilty of:

What are the mistakes you would like to add to this list?