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Lack in patience and confidence.
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Trying to write on a subject you don’t understand, or that you don’t enjoy.
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Not knowing that there is a difference between a blog and a website.
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Trying to use blogs to sell something instead of using them for credibility and trust!
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Spending too much time thinking about the design and Search Engine Optimization, SEO.
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Having too much clutter on the sidebar. This causes too much distraction.
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Putting too much money towards the advertising of the blog and not the writing of the blog.
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Thinking that you are going to start off with a ton of traffic.
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Assuming you know everything about blogs and stop learning about them.
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Anticipating that people will visit your blog without promoting it.
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Not thinking about your long-term goals of the blog, and focusing too much on the short-term ones.
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Not analyzing the traffic to your blog to find out what is working and what isn’t.
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Forcing people to comment on the blog or to link to it.
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Not including a top ten posts, archives, and recent posts.
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Lacking in organization of the content of the blog by context.
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Having no plan to go by.
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Not having the need to learn.
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Not learning from previously done mistakes.
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Thinking that you will make passive money from blogging.
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Not having enough social interaction and making your blog run solo.
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Trying to target a very small market niche.
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Not using English to target an international market.
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Underestimating blogging by not giving it enough credit.
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Failing to maintain the quality of your blog by controlling spasms.
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Having too much irrelevant traffic to your blog.
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The inability to handle incoming traffic.
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Having links that do not work- broken links.
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Not including a blogroll.
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Having a lack of originality.
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Lacking in regularity.
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Writing on irregular posting.
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Having a lack of dedication to your blog.
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Fearing to go against others.
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Not choosing the right blogging platform.
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Blogs that are made for advertising only.
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Having annoying ads.
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Trying to blog to get rich.
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Lacking in defined keywords to target in your post.
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Not understanding the news and RSS readers.
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Having too many blogs to keep up with.
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Wanting to get everything with less than 100 posts.
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Having too many keywords in your post.
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Content writing with no research behind it.
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Writing for search engines and not in a natural way.
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Duplicating the contents from other blogs or within your blog.
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Not using titles effectively.
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Failure to use keywords at important places like subheadings, text links, headings, and bullets.
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Using generic headings & subheadings. Not getting to the point.
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Having a lack of facts and evidence.
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Textual content is lacking or not there.
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Trying to turn one post into several subjects. Showing people that you are uncategorized and can not stay on topic.
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Writing about topics that are not helping the reader.
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Having to posts and not mentioning them.
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You have a blog with a lot of plug-ins.
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Posts that come across as boring and not informative.
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Having no links to other blogs with relevant information.
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Prompting with poor or bad content.
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Including a lot of duplicated content.
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Lacking in useful content that people want.
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Not having the ability to stay on topic.
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When you do not proofread or spell check your post.
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Having too many words in your URL.
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Forgetting to add an ‘about page’ to tell people who you are.
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Trying too hard to impress people with big words.
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Having paragraphs that are not formatted properly so that they are easy to scan.
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Being a very annoying blogger by spamming people.
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Using blog posts that are too long.
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Having no niche to market to.
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Choosing a niche that has a big drop in the market place.
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Other blogs that are competing for your niche, that you can not keep up with.
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Using a niche that there is no demand for.
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Skipping the basics of good SEO.
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Opting to go with SEO methods that search engines recommend not using (called black hat SEO).
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Trying to promote your blog before it’s done.
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Using a different domain name for a blog that’s already up and running.
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Running a blog that costs too much.
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Wanting it all in just a few months.
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Not including RSS feeds.
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Failure to give an easy way to subscribe to your feed.
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The ill use of animations and images.
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Choosing a bad looking template for your blog.
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Aimless writing with no attention to promotion or to design.
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Colors that make your text hard to read, or making your text too small.
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Not allowing people to use social bookmarking or to subscribe by email.
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Having no option to leave comments or a way to get in touch with you.
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Choosing to not be linkable.
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Not having next, previous pagination.
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Trying to buy visits or traffic to your site.
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Not using offline promotions.
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Ignoring comments and emails about your blog.
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Leaving no meaningful comments on other blogs.
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Having no link back from your comments to your blog.
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Not commenting on other blogs in your same niche.
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Having no network of friends. Lacking in a network of bloggers.
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Not being indexed in the search engines.
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The lack of links from other blogs and relevant sites.
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Your blog does not have enough links from variety of sources leading to it.
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Not using blog directories like pingomatic and technorati.
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Having links to bad neighborhoods and blogs.
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Forgetting to follow the tips we just talked about!
Archive for the ‘All’ Category
Top 100 Reasons Why Blogs Fail – Blogging Mistakes
Friday, December 12th, 2008
Top 100 Blogging Tips for Bloggers – Bloggers Guide
Saturday, November 15th, 2008
The scope of the business is international and I currently deal mostlywith the international clients, but many people from Pakistan ask about the SEO and the blogs by various means, such as social networking sites, emails, web enquiries and telephone calls. It just becomes difficult for me to explain them everything. For this purpose I have complied my blogging tips over here. Contrary to my previous blogs, I have tried to keep it general and have tried to avoid the jargon this time.
Keywords and Writing
- Unlike other web content, a blog is more social, personal and informal. Use a casual tone while writing. You can earn money by blogging with the help of adsense and affiliate marketing.
- Don’t write blogs on just about anything. Choose your niche carefully; preferably something that really interests you.
- Before writing, do some research and find the right keywords to use in the blog. This can be done by thinking of words people are most likely to use while looking for your blog and by using some keyword research tool.
- Choose keywords that are less competitive and target the long tail keywords.
- Create attractive blogs by customizing the look of the blog while feeling templates.
- Make sure that the content of the blog is of great quality; it is the quality of the blog content that makes a successful blog.
- Don’t just write content; do some research to find the right content for the blog.
- Write your blog in such a way that it will become the main source of information you are writing about.
- Don’t place all your blog posts on a single post; just a few.
- Make sure you spell check your post and proofread it before submission.
- Titles play an important part in the blog post so create catchy titles while using keywords over there.
- If you have long posts, use sub headings – use keywords in subheadings.
- Wherever possible, add some italic and bulleted text containing your keywords.
- Stem your keywords. Use singular, plural, past forms, etc.
- Make use of synonyms and don’t spam your blog with one and the same keyword.
- Your URL also has to be keyword rich.
- The more posts you have on the blog, the higher is the chance of getting found on search engines through targeted traffic.
- When writing blogs, make it a point to add sources and references for matter.
- Blogs become user friendly and easy to navigate by building an index on the blog.
- Link to other similar blog posts on the internet.
- Use and add tags carefully in the blog post.
- Moderate all the comments you get.
- Promote the writing of comments, and answer all comments you receive instantaneously.
- It is better to have a long blog divided into divisions.
- Include an ‘about us’ page on the blog for newcomers to learn more about you and what your blog boasts of.
- Write for the readers not for the search engines i.e. Do not do keyword stuffing.
- Interlink the blogs within the contents.
- Make your top posts prominent.
- Write blogs with a positive note, and not how negative something may be.
- Give a first hand narration of what you know or have experienced.
- Instead of repeating points, find and add new angles to a discussion.
- Be the first person to write on the topic you have chosen.
- Never duplicate content; you can be jailed for this.
- Write about one subject per post.
- It is better to write on evergreen topics which will remain fresh and in demand even after a few years’ time.
- When writing for a blog, write on topics that people will want to read and share.
- Make it a point to add keywords to the start, middle and end of each page.
- Make sure you cover topics and FAQs thoroughly in your niche.
- The blog design is important; so make it easily readable with the right background colors and placement of text.
- Color for the blog should be chosen carefully.
- Avoid using fancy and small fonts on the blog as they are difficult to read.
- All white spaces or spacing between elements of the blog have to be removed.
- Place some emphasis on the blog design not for SEO purposes but to attract the attention of visitors and have them returning for more.
- This does not mean you need an elaborate blog design; something simple is sufficient.
- Blogs have to be updated regularly, with a minimum of 5 blogs per week, if not 7. This content helps generate traffic and thus income for you.
- Your blog should be easy to subscribe perhaps through RSS, mobile subscription and emails. People should also be able to digg your posts.
- Your blog should make it easy for people to contact you when required.
- All the categories of your blog should be well organized.
- Don’t place too many ads on the blog.
- Use the help of research, surveys and polls to make your blog more interesting. It also improves the quality of your blog.
- All important contents of the blog should be placed ‘above the fold’.
- Make it a point to add images to the blog, and to optimize them.
- Ad visuals in the form of blockquotes, videos, charts, graphs and photos are important for a blog.
- Work at integrating these ad visuals into the blog and not at bombarding visitors with the ads.
- Speed in downloading is important in blogs, so maintain a low page size.
- Choose and create a decent logo for your blog, and display it with your posts.
- This logo should link to the home page.
- The functionality of the blog is enhanced with plugins. In the process, it also saves time.
- When archiving a blog, you have to archive it according to topic and not go by date.
Promotion / SEO
- Make sure you optimize and distribute a press release announcing the start of your blog.
- Use the help of blog directories to promote your blog.
- Forums and other similar blogs can be used to promote your blog by participating, and by commenting in them.
- Online communities are effective in promoting a blog.
- Participating in social networking sites like facebook, orkut and myspace are effective in promoting your blog.
- Simultaneously, your blog URL has to be included in social media profiles.
- Work at researching and commenting on various industries related to your blog.
- Article marketing is a great tool for promotion of the blog.
- Use www.pingomatic.com to send out notices and pings.
- Online blog communities are great for blog promotion. You could also create your own community to promote the blog.
- Dig and stumble upon are feasible options for promoting the blog.
- Let others know about the updates on your blog by using Twitter and Jaiku micro-blogging.
- Make your own videos and post them on youtube, podcast and Vlog directories.
- Every time you post a new blog, remember to post and thus make a network
- You can attract new visitors to your site by participating and getting involved in a community.
- Inform others about your blog; and don’t feel shy to say you have a blog.
- Include you blog URL in all your email signatures.
- Never attempt Black Hat SEO techniques as these are unethical SEO techniques.
- Like all businesses, you have to work at first building your visitor base to your blog, and then at earning money online.
- Keywords have to be used in linking texts.
- This keyword linking text can also be used to get and exchange links from relevant sites with high PR.
- Your signature should have a link to your blog so that the posts you make to forums, outgoing mails, etc work at promoting your blog.
- Blogs should run with a good link building campaign.
- Work to give links to other blogs from your blog. People tend to find out who links to them and in exchange, will also link back to your blog.
- With all this linking, it is important that you check your statistics and analytics on a regular basis and make the required changes in your blog.
- Look at other blogs for ideas- www.bloglines.com and www.technorati.com are great sites to visit to get ideas from other blogs.
- Meet and interview famous and interesting bloggers.
- Though SEO may be time consuming, it gives long lasting effects and is better than the quick social bookmarking where results are not long lasting.
- Blogs have to be submitted to major search engines.
- Blogs have to be submitted to blogging directories using keywords for links.
- Work at becoming an expert in your trade and also a specialist in your topic.
- Make an account in stumble upon where you have to stumble good stuff and make new accomplices.
- Work at growing, and sustaining your audience.
- Be careful of ongoing discussions on your blog.
- Make it a point to keep track of visitors, with the help of some analytic software.
- Don’t concentrate on short term benefits of your blog- work at increasing your readership base.
- Be as helpful as possible, whenever possible.
- Keep some time solely for your blog.
- Be patient as blogging is more like running a marathon, and not a 100m sprint.
- Learn and make improvements from previous mistakes.
- Though the going may be tough, perseverance succeeds.
Market Research on the Internet
Saturday, July 5th, 2008Doing some kind of market research is the best and in fact the only way to get to know your consumers, what they want and need from the internet, from their businesses and from you.
As a business on the internet today, you know that services are competitive and you need to deliver a product or a service that is high enough in quality that it can sell itself.
If you don’t, the other company is going to do that rather than you.
Creating your business, or making your company’s services when you haven’t done the right research is a design for disaster, because you’re going to end up creating products or services that are not cost effective, wasting money and time, as well as your valuable people resources and offering something that isn’t really needed or wanted on the internet.
Market research is going to help you to know your internet customer better, to analyze what they really want from you and to give you valuable insight into the things they want from the companies they deal with.
One of the largest frustrations with people trying to do business online is that it is difficult to discern the next new trend, what their customers require from them and how to deliver that in a cost and time effective way.
Market research on the internet will help to alleviate that frustration and to make you and your company more effective in delivering a quality service for your clients, if you simply take the time to research a little more about what they really do need to make them more effective as a business.
Some of the strengths that the internet offers when used for market research that can help you with doing great market research online and getting your customers the information and services they want in a timely way are;
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The information is cheap or free and it is plentiful.
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Many of the subjects that you are going to be seeking online are quite well covered and there is great background information.
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The information that you need is speedily acquired, it’s fast to get to. Its not like the old days when we had to wait several days or weeks to have it delivered to us. Market research on the internet is nearly instant.
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The range of geopolitical information is quite broad in its scope, and is rapidly increasing in its coverage, internationally.
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With so many new companies opening brand new web sites for their own companies, the range and depth of information available to us is increasing all the time.
Market research is imperative, and makes a difference in the quality and effect of the service that you offer to your clients. Doing good market research only makes sense if you are trying to discern what kind of things your clients expect from you and how to offer them a service they will be pleased to pay for.
You have the option of making good use of the information that the internet affords you, to make sure that you provide a good service to the companies that you work for, simply by taking advantage of the vast array of information that is available to you here, on the information super highways of the internet.
 Since we primarily market on the internet now, it makes sense that we obtain the information we need from the very place where we will ply our trade.
Don’t neglect this most important aspect of business.
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Article Marketing
Friday, June 6th, 2008What can online article marketing really do for you? It not only has the ability to get enough targeted traffic to your website but it will help you to build your brand. At the end of the day, it is all about product or service visibility and brand awareness. Only when your product or service has the required visibility, will it transform into a brand and bring in the moolah!
Article marketing is considered to be one of the most promising aspects of online marketing as well as SEO. There are several vehicles of online brand awareness but none of them are as cost effective as well as more powerful than article marketing.
Article marketing can be defined as a branch of advertising where businesses find keywords and use them in short articles that are related to the services or products offered by them or their industry on the whole. Once the articles have been written, they are made available for distribution as well as publication in the online marketplace.
Benefits of Article Marketing
Article marketing definitely has its own set of benefits especially for a start-up or small business. Some of the benefits that you can derive include:
1. Credibility: This is the first and foremost. If your business doesn’t get the required credibility then that will be the end. What article marketing can do is help increase your credibility. For eg: If you have a blog or a website that presents information regarding loans then you can always use numbers and statistics within your articles and yes the topic should have some credibility too. The more factual, relevant and to the point your article is, the higher will be your credibility.
2. Link popularity: This is one of the important aspects of search engines optimization and goes a long way to drive targeted traffic to your website. Providing links of your website as well as other websites related to the same industry will attract more clicks to your website as well as the article submission directories. For example: If you post your article on www.ezine.com with the link of your business and if your article is of high standard then you can expect a high rate of visitors to your website.
3. Search Engine Ranking: Sprinkling your articles with the highly rated keywords and adding a resource box at the end with your link or URL will ensure that internet user click on the links. The higher the number of clicks, the faster you will climb up the PageRank of some of the top search engines like Google, Yahoo, etc.
There are no immediate drawbacks of article marketing except the fact that if your article is not of high standard then you might not be able to get as many visitors. Secondly if you donot submit your article in the top directories that have high PageRank then it will be a lost cause. The crux of the matter is that article marketing is the cheapest way to get noticed and can boost your overall internet visibility as well as Page Rank.
Search Engine Optimization, SEO Vs. Pay Per Click, PPC (SEM)
Thursday, June 5th, 2008The war is on! Yes! The hottest war over the internet is not between businesses but between two options of online marketing: SEO and PPC. According to a research, almost 85% of internet visitors start their product or service or information search using some of the top search engine like Google, Yahoo!, and MSN. All internet users while looking for relevant information type a word that is more commonly known as the keyword and it helps search engines to bring up result pages that have natural organic listings as well as pay per click (PPC) advertisements.
SEO Vs PPC
SEO and PPC are two different sides of the same coin and are an integral part of major Search Engines and can increase your overall brand visibility. Â According to a research, 60% of search engine visibility will depend on effective SEO vis-a -vis PPC. The average states that almost 70% of all clicks received from various search engines take place through SEO. The fact of the matter is that SEO clicks are able to convert 25% more than PPC clicks according to BusinessWeek. A Marketing Sherpa study has shown that most organic referrals are able to convert at 4.2% vis-a -vis 3.6% for PPC.
SEO
Let us look at what are the different benefits of using SEO:
1.Most of the listings through SEO campaigns have a definite psychological advantage vis-Ã -vis sponsored links.
2.SEO is a long-term investment
3.It has recorded some of the highest conversion rates as well as best ROI
4. SEO can increase your PageRank
5. Brands get top positions so searchers trust more on organic search results.
6. If you are planning to go with SEO on long-term then it will be cheaper vis-Ã -vis Pay Per Click.
7. SEO can get you or your business almost 30 times the traffic as compared to sponsored links for the same cost.
Some of the drawbacks of SEO include:
1. SEO takes more time to fall into place and provide good returns as compared to PPC
2. You will not be guaranteed of Top Rank on Search engines always
3. Determine the actual value of a high organic ranking is difficult
PPC
Now let us take a look at the various benefits of PPC:
1. Pay-per-click is a great option for a business looking for immediate exposure.
2.PPC campaigns work well with a bidding model i.e: you select the keyword and bid on it. The advertisement of the highest bidder will reflect at the top.
3.In PPC, you will have to pay only if a user clicks on your advertisement.
4.It is a good platform for testing the effectiveness of a new product
5. It is easy to measure the effectiveness of PPC
Some of the drawbacks of PPC include:
1.It is expensive on a long-term basis. Popular keywords can cost around $10 per click
2.The targeted traffic to your website will stop the moment you stop paying
3. You will need to manage your PPC campaign and keep a tab on the clicks vis-Ã -vis conversions
The crux of the matter is that you need to use SEO and PPC both if you want to keep ahead of the race.
See also: Top 10 Benefits of SEO for Businesses ; Top 10 Benefits of Social Media for Business ; SEO and Social Media Marketing Integration ; What is an SEO Specialist; SEO Specialist’s Website
