Let's be honest: writing is hard. And while it may seem like a skill that comes naturally to some people, the reality is that many of us need to work harder than others to write effectively and get results from our content.
To help you avoid common mistakes in your writing and publishing, below are five common blogging mistakes that I've seen over and over again on my own blog (lesson learned) as well as with other bloggers who are trying (and sometimes failing) at their own blogging.
Not Knowing Who Your Audience Is
The first step to creating content that resonates with your target audience is knowing who they are. You need to know what they want from you and how they talk, as well as where they hang out online.
The more time you spend getting to know them, the easier it'll be for you to write blog posts that will resonate with them—and get the results you want.
Not Planning Your Content Ahead Of Time
Planning is essential to success.
Planning will help you to be more efficient and organized, allowing for a better workflow that results in more productivity and ultimately more content published on your blog! It will help ensure that all of your posts are consistent with one another rather than having random gaps in between each post or being disorganized because there was no planning involved at all (which tends to happen when writers just jump into writing without thinking about what they're doing).
Using Too Much Keyword Stuffing
In the world of search engine optimization (SEO), keywords are what help your website get found by people who are looking for it. If you're a blogger who wants to attract more readers and build your brand, then using keywords effectively is of utmost importance.
However, there's a fine line between using keywords effectively and stuffing them into every sentence on your blog post or website page like so much filler material in an attempt to game the search engines.
Keyword stuffing is when someone tries too hard to use specific words or phrases over and over again in order that their content ranks highly in Google searches for those terms. The problem with keyword stuffing is that rather than making visitors want more information about those topics—or anything else related—it will instead turn them away before they even realize what happened!
Not Using An SEO Strategy
SEO stands for "search engine optimization." It's the process of getting your website to appear on the first page of Google, Bing, and other search engines when people look up certain keywords or phrases. If you want more traffic from organic search (people who come to your site through a search engine), then SEO is an important part of your marketing strategy.
When done correctly (don't keyword stuff), an SEO strategy will help you attract visitors who are interested in what you have to say because they found it through a keyword search on Google or another major search engine. This means that these visitors are highly targeted—they're interested in what you're offering! They may become customers, subscribers, or even referrers who send business your way.
The good news is that there are many ways to get started with SEO if this all sounds new:
Read up on how-to guides like this one from Moz (https://moz.com/learn/seo). The Moz Academy also has plenty of free courses worth checking out (https://moz.com/academy). For paid courses specifically designed for beginners, check out Udemy ($10 per course) or Skillshare ($12/month access). You'll also find helpful books like "SEO 2016" by Andrew Shotland and Rand Fishkin at Amazon ($20).
Of course, you could also check our SEO blog.
Not Optimizing The Site For Speed Or Mobile Readership.
I'll start with one of the most important factors: speed.
When you're writing, it's easy to focus on what you're writing, but it's also important to think about how people will read your blog posts. If they have to wait for them to load, they probably won't stick around long enough for your brilliant words of wisdom or witty anecdotes about cats in hats (which I assume is what all bloggers write about).
So what can you do? You could use a content delivery network (CDN), which will help speed up page loads by distributing files across multiple servers located all over the world so that readers get them from the closest location possible—and thus faster! You can also optimize images and minify CSS and JavaScript code by using tools like Smushit or WP Rocket if those things are important parts of your site design process.
In short, blogging doesn't have to be quite so hard if you plan well, have clear goals, utilize SEO, and know who you're writing for. With these tips, you'll be well on your way to unlocking blogging success and generating amazing blogs. And if you'd rather have someone do the writing for you, we're always here to help!
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