Most people agree that when it comes to blogging for profit, the first year is usually the hardest. Not only is the learning curve pretty steep when it comes to things such as SEO and marketing, it’s also pretty rare for first year bloggers to really be raking in the cash.
This usually leads to a year full of challenges but without very much reward. Should you want to keep those challenges to a minimum while maximizing your rewards, here are eight common mistakes that are well worth trying to avoid.
Expecting To Pay the Bills
If you’ve just started a new blog, you probably aren’t going to want to hear this but very few bloggers make much money during their first year.
You can expect to make some money of course, but expecting to make any kind of serious income is likely to lead to nothing but disappointment. Making a serious income from a blog requires some serious traffic and traffic numbers take time to grow.
Taking Insulting Comments Personally
Experienced bloggers don’t sweat what people say in comments but for those new to blogging, a negative comment can be rather discouraging.
It’s important not to take criticism from strangers seriously. After all, you have no idea who they are or what their motives are. Unfortunately, this also means that you shouldn’t place too much stock in positive comments either.
Thinking SEO is a Gimmick
There’s nothing wrong with wanting your content to speak for itself. Content is after all significantly more important than SEO.
But if you choose to ignore SEO completely, you will be fighting an uphill battle from day one. You don’t need to be an expert and you certainly don’t need to hire an expert. All you need is the basics of on and off page SEO. They are both easy to learn and easy to apply.
Changing Themes Every Month
When you start a new blog, it’s only natural to want to tinker with it a little bit. But many bloggers go a little further than this and end up making major design changes on an apparently weekly basis.
You need to choose a design and stick to it. If you keep changing things, you are going to keep confusing your regular readers and doing so can easily lead to you losing them.
Comparing Yourself to the Big Boys
If you really want to demotivate yourself as a blogger, you should constantly compare yourself to the big boys in your niche.
You should check their traffic statistics, listen to what they say they are earning and obsess over their superior SERP. On the other hand, you could just focus on your own progress and accept the folly of comparing yourself to people who have been online a lot longer than you.
Breaking Your Promises
There’s nothing wrong with being ambitious but when it comes to making promises, you need to be sure that you can keep them.
Many first year bloggers have big plans and while there is nothing wrong with this, when those plans are shared and they fail to come into fruition, you tend to look either stupid, dishonest or both. Therefore you should always aim to both under promise and over deliver.
Being Overly Controversial
It would be difficult to even spend a few hours researching how to become a successful blogger without reading about the power of controversy when it comes to getting noticed.
While there is nothing wrong with utilizing controversy in this fashion, it’s very easy to overdo it and many first year bloggers tend to do exactly that. It’s important to remember that controversy can not only get you noticed, it can also destroy the reputation of your blog.
Quitting
Finally, the biggest mistake that you can make in your first year of blogging is to give up.
Most bloggers start out with unrealistic expectations about just how fast they can create a successful blog. And when that lack of realism becomes apparent, the urge to permanently throw in the towel can be incredibly strong. It’s important to stick with it however, as giving up too early is the only mistake on this list that you cannot actually recover from.
Robin Cole had his visit to Orlando Florida colocation data center recently, for his research project. From the research conducted,he inferred the common mistakes made by most bloggers in their first year and has listed some great ideas to avoid the same.
Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net
This is definitely what most of us new bloggers do. I definitely did and will try to change it from now on 🙂 Thank you once again Sanjeev.
This is a nice share. The pointer presented in the post are very true. I really appreciate the hint of sarcasm that you have usedNo while explaining each and every pointer. It is very important on the part of the new blogger to understand that every new thing takes its own sweet time to give fruits. Miracles don’t happen in reality. Patience is the key here.
These are excellent points. I believe you ‘have been there and done that’. I am facing a hard time in my blogging experience too. I especially get very low when someone leaves awful comments. Your post sure helped a great deal. thanks!
Blogging is not a short term revenue rewarding thing, The new bloggers should understand this. The most important thing it commands is ‘patience’. But I would also say, you learn with every mistake you make and it helps you become a better person. Making mistakes is a part of every business. Thanks for this informative share.
That is an awesome post. You have really layed out your points in great detail. Very easy to follow with good content. We should take get hold of this post, read and impliment the points outlined.
I would say the biggest mistake that a blogger would be expecting great traffic and revenue in the first year. This is the year when 90% of the bloggers quit blogging, those who keep on working have a great future!
yes, assuming that we can compete with the people who has spend 10-15 years online is not good…everybody takes time to setup income stream and we should give time to it…
It’s dangerous for upstart bloggers to think that they can earn loads on their first year. People tend to think that they’re going to earn so much that they can pretty much buy anything they want now. And when they find out the hard way that it’s not that simple, they feel downhearted and sometimes end up quitting blog posting all together.
absolutely, first step in online business is building trust, once it is there you can think of money….Initial time should be spend in earning trust rather than money…
I have to admit, I experienced all of these things on my first year and I thought I was going to completely stop when all I got were very insulting comments. I really thought I was going to get a lot of money with it immediately and when I didn’t, I got even more discouraged. I still blog and I’m doing a lot better now. 🙂
It becomes better once we cross the initial hurdle and start understanding real progress with respect to ourselves.
The first few months or years of blogging are going to be full with mistakes, if we don’t pay close attention. But i think it’s important to make mistakes so that we know where or how things can go wrong. In any case, we should learn from our mistakes and never repeat them.
Thanks for this share!
Hi Faissal, I agree, its better to make mistakes and learn from them….nothing teaches better then experience itself….
Giving up is the one that gets most people, at the start you’re happy, after the first week you have doubt and by the end of the month you’ve quit.
We need to keep strong and consistent.
Yes, at least initial few months when there is hardly any income and traffic…it gets better with time….
Nice article. I started blogging 6 months back and i faced same mistakes which you have listed, Still i am facing the two mistakes 1. Comparing Yourself to the Big Boys 2. Taking Insulting Comments Personally. I will try to rectify my mistakes. Thanks for the detailed article.
Hi Sai, I think its very common to compare ourself with the big boys..we all want to be there…
I have also face this and I feel it is good to an extent as it keeps an check on progress, but pushing for rapid growth can sometime lead to a downfall so we need to be careful.
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