4 Dumbest Mistakes To Avoid When Starting A New Blog

The truth need to be told… though it hurts, but it’s the only way to help you stay off the radar!

Am I speaking parables? Hell no… I am talking about those dumbest mistakes which you can make when launching or starting your new blog.

Before now I have talked about 3 Writing Prompts to Follow Before Launching a New Blog and I was able to straighten things up for you.

Today my major concern is helping you realize those mistakes which you can make (without knowing) out of excitement during the period of your blog launch.

Believe me the period of blog launch is usually a time when you get busier and focused because you are trying to catch up or making sure your blog gets the life it requires.

However, after doing all these, you still find yourself in the middle of nowhere…yes in the middle of nowhere!

Starting a Blog is usually easy but what comes next is BIG…

The truth is this, many blogs are launched every day and also many die every day. Remember it doesn’t hurt to start a blog; it gets easier starting a blog and then gets tougher maintaining it. This is where the tough guys stay on top of their games while the slippery ones get grounded!

Recommended Reading: 7 Basic Things To Do in Your First Week of Blogging

Like I said earlier, my major concern today is helping you realize those dumbest mistakes which you can make that kills your blog instantly during the period of your blog launch.

Let’s see these Dumbest Mistakes…

Dumb Mistake #1: Being Over Ambitious for Readership

Now being excited for a new thing you have done is not really a bad idea but being over ambitious is what kills your blog instantly. Did you get that? The operative word I used here is “kills your blog instantly”.

Over ambition can lead you into doing so many wrong things without knowing them. It can make you start to source for shortcuts to success, you will begin to read those promising but self killing blog posts on how to get 1000 to 5000 readers in your first week of blogging. So many things you can actually do wrong…

Recommended Reading: 4 Smart Ways to Get Subscribers for Your Blog

It’s a natural thing to try to make people to subscribe and become your readers, but doing it ambitiously or doing it in a way that it becomes obvious to these people that you are forcing them to subscribe is where you make a mistake.

The following practices can become of you due to over ambition:

Before ever someone reads your post, there is a pop up email subscription form to cause distraction

• At the beginning of your post, there is an email subscription form with a persuading write up for readers to subscribe
• In the middle of the post, there is another one
• At the end of the post there is also an email subscription form…

Now I didn’t mention the one you added on the sidebar and footer section of your blog, I can keep counting or listing these things for you…

Now if I may ask you this simple question, isn’t all these practices persuading? That’s what being over ambitious can make you do.

What then should I do?

Allow things to flow naturally the way they are meant to be and with time you will get to see the changes you seek.

There is no magic to gaining 1000 to 5000 readers over night; it takes only a time to get there. Adding an email subscription form on your posts is a healthy practice which I strongly recommend you do, but there are few places where you can add them such as the top most part of your blog sidebar and, immediately below your post body. If you noticed, these are the practices I have implemented on my blog.

Dumb Mistake #2: Sitting All Day Long Redesigning Your Blog

This is a very common mistake which every newbie or beginner would make. Believe me even the newest person that launched a blog today wants the design of his blog to look like that of Darren Rowse, John Chow, Ms. Ileane, Ana Hoffman, Kiesha Easley and so on…

But one thing which you fail to know is that these blogs have long been in business, and probably have resources bigger than what you have.

While having a beautiful blog design is a good practice and a must do, it becomes a mistake when you put it above your business of writing. I made this mistake few years back when I was blogging on Google’s free Blogspot “Blogger”.

As a newbie, I had so many blogs I looked up to and always want my blog design to look like that of these blogs, and this single passion led me into browsing for templates every now and then looking for the best design. While I was doing all these, little did I know that I was wasting the precious time which I should have invested in writing good content and promoting my new blog on looking for the best design.

Recommended Reading: 25 Ways to Build a Better Blog – A Call to Action

The same is applicable to browsing for WordPress themes and uploading them every now and then. When you do this, one thing is certain… you are confusing the few readers you have managed to gain.

Readers feel very bad and discouraged when they visit and see an entire look of what they are used to seeing, especially when it’s done every now and then.

What’s the best practice for me then?

Before starting a blog, make it a task to do all the necessary shopping you need. If you have blogs you look up to, visit these blogs, spend time on them and study them to know what is unique among them. Then come up with a choice of which WordPress theme to use on your new blog.

A better way to get started is by using a premium WordPress themes (aff) which are usually optimized for SEO and with a catchy look. If you have money, feel free to get a designer to tweak the theme for you.

However, if you are using the WordPress premium theme built on the Genesis Framework (aff), you don’t need to worry for any design because everything you need is already there for you.

Dumb Mistake #3: Thinking SEO is the Master Key to Starting a blog

What’s preached throughout the web today is nothing but SEO and how to rank well on Google. Now I am not saying this is bad, but for a new blog like your own it becomes a mistake reading such articles.

Remember I talked about being over ambitious? It can also be applied to matters concerning the ranking of your blog on Google and other search engines.

If there is one thing which most web masters are yet to know, it’s how Google uses its algorithm to decide how blogs rank. This is the simple reason why most SEO experts preach that keyword practice is only one of the secondary parameters for deciding a blog ranking, the primary parameter or one of the most important factors according to these experts is the number of legitimate links coming from the authority blogs in your niche to your blog.

So you can actually optimize your blog with keywords with high performing results and still get ignored by Google.

Recommended Reading: Understanding The Basis Of Keyword Strategy Using Google Adwords Keyword Tool

What’s the best practice for me then?

I will suggest what I did when I started new on Daily Tips Diary. I started by writing some good content and then went ahead to identify with some of the authority blogs in my niche by writing a well researched guest posts for them. See a List of Guest Posts I have written so far.

Write a guest post to solve a problem of the readers of these authority blogs and keep doing so without losing focus and then give time a chance to do its work.

Writing a guest post which can easily be accepted especially as a newbie whose name is not yet popular is not that easy, but I will encourage you to give it a shot, I did it and it worked for me.

There is no gambling in this, once you are able to do it right you will notice some good SEO changes on your blog.

Dumb Mistake #4: Embracing the saying ‘Content is King”

I am sure you must have come across those articles that preaches that content is king for a better blog? Actually content is king and you should aspire to always write good and quality content for your blog.

However, writing a quality content is not just enough for your blog to rank or do well on Google. There are other things which you must do to add up to that saying.

The truth is that you may have the best and well written content on the web and still not get noticed by the millions of readers that storm Google each day.

I can equally go further to say you have been writing a quality and killer content which no one has ever given attention or clicked on…

Recommended Reading: 6 Writing Tips To Help You Write Your Most Popular Blog Post

Remember you are new in the business of blogging and so need people to know you exist, and so spending most of your time writing that quality content without looking beyond the walls will only keep you stagnant at a place.

What then is the best practice for me?

I have already talked about guest blogging on authority blogs in your niche, apart from that you can make yourself known to your targeted audience by dropping valuable comments on posts made on those authority blogs, answering the questions which you know their answers well and joining every other discussion that may arise in future.

Another thing you can do is to take note of the trend of questions that are asked on these blogs, go back to your comfort zone and then research and come up with their solutions in a blog post.

One thing is certain, when your name becomes familiar in those blogs, with your valuable comments and contributions shown on these blogs, some of the readers will be touched to give you a surprising visit one day…

What other Dumbest Mistakes do you think newbies make when starting a blog?

These are just a few of the dumbest mistakes which a newbie can make when starting a blog. I am sure there are other handful of mistakes which are not here…

I would like to hear from you, you might actually be a party to helping someone new in blogging to stay off the radar!