6 Cardinal Sins A Blogger Should Never Commit

Today it seems that just about everyone is a blogger. If you’re ready to enter the wide world of blogging, it’s important to think through your approach carefully. You might have fun, but you won’t find real success unless you work hard and steer clear of these major don’ts.

Posting Unfocused Content

Image via Flickr by Paper Cat

Your blog needs to have a purpose. It’s fine for you to enjoy diverse interests, but posting about your love of pig figurines, contemporary ballet, and homemade sushi all on the same blog will spell disaster. You don’t get more readers by appealing to different audiences. You just get more confused readers. Pick a specific niche and stick with it so you can target loyal fans of that one topic.

If you don’t target a specific niche you’re pretty much talking to the whole world when there are countless others talking to the same world. What this means is that you are losing out on the chance to appeal or reach to a small group of people who are looking for the information you provide. By targeting a specific niche you are ensuring that your information reaches a specific group of people faster, and this results in the probability of more traffic to your blog site.

Getting Offended Too Easily

Image via Flickr by Creative Donkey

When you enter a public forum, you naturally open yourself up to criticism and critique. The edgier and more opinionated you are, the more likely it is that you’ll spark some controversy. Don’t let negative comments bring you down. If there’s something productive that you can from them, do what you can with the advice. If the comments serve no real purpose other than to tear you down, throw them away and forget about it. So it’s good to carry with you a reasonable amount of thick skin if you don’t want to run away from the blogging scene at the same speed by which you came in.

Giving Up Too Soon

Image via Flickr by photosteve101

Bloggers don’t become rich or famous overnight. It takes a lot of time and dedication to become really successful with your blog. Don’t expect to wake up the morning after your fist post with thousands of dollars in your Google Ads account. Keep plugging away at it and the rest will come in time. If you’re serious about blogging, your notebook will become a trusty friend that stays at your side every day, ever-ready for the next strike of inspiration and another well-worded post. As with all good things in life, the monetary gains from blogging could take some time to come, but when they do, they might open out a host of financial possibilities for you.

Using Poor Spelling and Grammar

Image via Flickr by Cubosh

Always spell check, grammar check, and reread your posts – twice. Nothing will turn readers off more than a poorly written blog. Many readers will click away at the first haphazardly constructed sentence or spelling error. If you’re sharing a fact-filled post, accuracy is even more important. No one will trust home remedies from a blogger who doesn’t know the facts and does not know how to convey those facts to the readers without error. Oftentimes, the quality of a site is gauged by the reader on a quick scan, and if factual, grammatical and spelling errors catch their eye, rest assured they are not coming back to your site.

[Don’t Miss: Things To Do After Writing Your Post]

[Further Readings: Read My friend Sue’s Grammar Lesson]

Updating Your Posts Erratically

Image via Flickr by photosteve101

Successful bloggers update often. You can’t post for five or six days in a row and let the blog stagnate for months while expecting your traffic to increase. Repeat customers are important if you want to have a successful blog. If someone comes back two or three times to the same top post, they’re going to stop coming back, period.

Stealing Content from Others 

Image via Flickr by sfslim

Photos, videos, and articles on the internet are not free for all. If you want to quote another source, do so in a clear and respectful way. Link back to the original source. Provider proper attribution for photos and videos. Never copy and paste work from another writer, or lazily reword here and there to make someone else’s work your own.

Being a great blogger takes time and dedication. The rewards will come, but you must stay smart about how you manage your blog and yourself to get them.

___________________________________________________________
This article is written by Shaun Chatman, who is a well published author on many authority sites. He lives in Dunedin, FL, and spends his free time playing with his kids or his notebook.
___________________________________________________________