What Not To Do When Starting A Blog

What Not To Do When Starting A Blog

I started my blog roughly around 6 months ago. Yes, 6 months is a short time period. But, starting a blog can take so much time. There are so so many things to learn about how to start the blog, writing blog posts, marketing your self and your blog, monetizing your blog, and many many more things! It can be hard to keep up with everything at first.

I am using this blog to earn a little money on the side as a “side hustle” or side job. It can be hard to monetize your blog right at the beginning but I chose to dive right in. I am going to go over the main things I wish I had not done that hindered the growth of my blog in the first few months. Here are the 5 mistakes I made when starting my blog that really made it harder for me to earn an income right at the beginning.

1. What Not To Do: Not Having Enough Content/Blog Posts Before Launch Day

The first thing not to do when starting a blog is not having enough content before launch day. I was so so excited to launch my blog. I had spent days perusing themes to purchase, designing small aspects, writing about me pages, and more. I loved the design aspect of having my own website to do whatever I wanted too with. I think one of the main things I missed when starting my blog was really identifying my audience, my niche, and having enough content (aka blog posts) on my actual launch day.

I also did not have a schedule set up when I would write my next blog post. It was extremely hard to find time to sit down and write a blog post that was full of great content considering I also work a full-time job and have a 2-year-old to tend too once I get off work every day. If I could go back to the beginning I would not let myself launch my blog until I had identified my audience to a TEA. I would also have at least 8-10 blog posts full of fabulous content that are ready to be posted in the drafts that I can easily just log in and post when needed.

This resulted in me having a couple of short blog posts the first month I launched my blog. I eventually lost track of time and the holidays came around and I neglected my blog for a few months. I had hardly any traffic at all. In January, I finally had time to get back to it and realized all the work I had done previously was lost. If you are not marketing your blog consistently then your traffic will fall to nothing. So, I just recently started marketing again with Pinterest and social media. I have seen a great improvement this month in traffic, which I am super excited about! I would suggest that once you start your blog to make sure you have enough blog posts scheduled out that you know you will new content being published on a schedule that your audience can count on.

How To Start:

If you are in need of some blog post inspiration, check out these great posts featuring hundreds of blog post ideas for almost every niche! Each website also offers a ton of information on starting a new blog so I would check that out too. It’s great to gather information from multiple sources because everyone does things a little differently!

Blog Post Ideas

1. Blog Pixie – 100 Easy Blog Post Ideas
2. She Means Blogging – 47 Refreshing Lifestyle Blog Post Ideas
3. Boss Babe Chronicles – 50 Lifestyle Blog Post Ideas
4. Bites To Brand – 55 Blog Post Ideas for New Bloggers
5. The Side Blogger – 10 Powerful Topics Guaranteed to Grow Your Blog

I have also started using a great editing tool, Grammarly. It’s a free program that proofreads and edits your blog posts as you write them. It has saved me so much time! I recommend it 100% to all new bloggers and even experienced bloggers!

2. What Not To Do: Not Knowing Enough About SEO

The second thing not to do when starting a blog is not knowing enough about Search Engine Optimization. When I started my blog I thought I had done plenty of research and knew what I was doing. Obviously, it’s a lot to learn if you are just starting out and almost impossible to research everything! I had no clue what SEO really meant and what I needed to research and apply to my own blog.

SEO is so important for a blogger because it’s how you get people to find you and your blog! It also helps Google rank your blog by what other people are searching for. You have to use the correct keywords to make sure you can get the most visibility from your audience.

How To Start:

Here are a few great posts about SEO and why you need it to grow your blog.

SEO Posts:

1. Leanne Wong – SEO Made Simple 
2. Social Buzz Hive – SEO Strategy for Beginners 
3. Blogging to Build – Keyword Research 

The best plugin for SEO I have found is the Yoast SEO plugin on WordPress. It gives you a rough guideline on how to make sure you are attempting to get the best SEO possible on your post. I use it with every blog post I publish.

3. What Not To Do: Not Knowing Enough About Pinterest/Pinterest Strategies

The third thing not to do when starting a blog is to not know enough about Pinterest and Pinterest strategies. Pinterest is a great tool for bloggers and anyone looking to share information on the web. Pinterest is now considered a search engine platform. If you think about it, we use Pinterest to look for recipes, outfits, etc. and it’s almost like google except filled with images that link to the actual web pages.

Pinterest can be amazing for your new blog. It can bring a huge audience to your blog if you learn the tricks of using Pinterest in a business form and mindset. The first step would be to change your Pinterest over to a business account or open a completely new one. Next, I 100% recommend Tailwind! It’s absolutely amazing! You can upload pins there and set them to automatically post at the best times during the day. You can literally sit down on a Sunday and work about an hour and have all of your pins scheduled for the whole week! It’s really great! And you can start for free to test it out and see how it works for you and your blog. I promise you won’t regret it!

How To Start:

Tailwind – If you use my link to sign-up for Tailwind you automatically get a free month of Tailwind Plus (which can seriously help grow your Pinterest in no time!) This would be my number one recommendation for a new blogger to help advertise their posts and grow their audience. Plus, it can save you tons of time that you can spend on other things for your business. You can read how I grew my Pinterest viewers with Tailwind here: Grow your Pinterest Views By 20,000 in 1 Month

Canva – Canva can help to make those pretty Pinterest graphics bloggers use to advertise their posts. It’s a great tool to have if your not a graphic designer on the side. It can make it extremely easy to make graphics for Pinterest, your blog, and even newsletters, emails, etc. It’s one of my favorite sites to use to really bring a brand and a consistent similar look to my blog.

Pinterest Strategy Ideas:

The next thing you need is a good Pinterest strategy. Advertising your blog posts and growing an audience isn’t the easiest thing to do when first starting out. You can’t write a post and hit publish and just sit back and relax and watch the page views roll in (unless you have a great established audience!). Blogging takes a lot of hard work. A Pinterest strategy is great to have to ensure you are growing your audience consistently!

I started by scouring multiple blog posts about Pinterest Strategies. I ultimately came up with my own after reading through multiple strategies of other successful bloggers. I suggest reading as much as you can about others’ strategies to help you understand what you should be aiming for with your own. I will also be making another post to go more in-depth with Pinterest and different strategies as well as explaining my own that has helped me grow my Pinterest viewers by the thousands. Be on the lookout for that!

Meanwhile, here are some great blog posts about Pinterest strategies for you to check out.

Pinterest Strategies:

1.  Maya Maceka Blog – The Most Powerful Pinterest Strategy for Bloggers 
2.  The Random Passion Project – Bulletproof Pinterest Strategies 
3.  The Yellow Birdhouse – Simple 10 Minute Pinterest Strategy

4. What Not To Do: Not Knowing Monetization Methods

There are many different ways to monetize a blog. I was very confused when I first started this blog. I read about all the different monetization methods but wasn’t really sure what they were and how these things worked. Now, I have a little more experience and can help other new bloggers try to understand the different opportunities that exist.

Affiliate Sales

The first type of monetization I jumped into when starting to monetize my blog was signing up for many different affiliate programs. A lot of programs will allow you to join even with a new blog and some will require a larger audience before accepting you. Either way, there are plenty of affiliate programs you can join as a new blogger. I will admit though, affiliate sales are hard to get with very little traffic (especially in the beginning with a brand new blog and not a lot of following)

The easiest affiliate site I have signed up with so far is ShareASale. I totally recommend you start there. They have tons of different brands they work with so it’s easy to find a brand you like.

Sponsor Posts

There are many different platforms that allow you to get sponsored posts. This is when a brand or business pays you to write a sponsored blog post for them. You usually are reviewing and recommending a service or product. I have not delved into this section of monetizing yet because many programs usually have a minimum amount of page views or followers you must have before you can be approved.

Digital Products/Services

You can also make and sell your own digital products/services. A big one that a lot of bloggers sell is an e-book on a topic that you are an expert in. I have not researched this much yet, but plan to in the future. It can be a great way to make extra money while also teaching your audience something new.

Ad revenue

Google Adsense – You earn revenue by gaining views on your pages or by having your audience click on the advertisements. It can take a long time to see a decent salary with this method so it’s up to you if you’d like to put ads on your blog right at the beginning or wait a little bit until it takes off and you see higher traffic.

There are also other ad programs you can join but I have only used Google Adsense so far. There are some great programs out there once your monthly viewers reach 25,000 views or more. You can easily make hundreds of dollars from ad revenue alone once you have a consistent audience every month.

5. What Not To Do: Not Knowing That This Takes Time (And A Lot Of Patience!)

You can write fabulous posts, have amazing photography, wonderful tips, and tricks, but it takes a while for your blog to be shared and seen by your audience. It can take months for Google to start showing it in a web search. This all takes time.

My word of advice to new bloggers is to really have patience in the first couple of months. I know it can be extremely hard to work and work and work and see nothing come out of it. But, if you write great content and market yourself and your blog well, I know eventually you will find yourself with a great audience and making a great income in no time!

That’s all for now!

I hope these tips helped you understand what not to do when starting a blog for the first time. It can be a lot to learn in the beginning and a lot of mistakes can be made. I hope I helped a few people skip some of the mistakes that I personally made. It can help you make an income much faster and keep you motivated on this blogging journey!

If you also have a blog or in the process of starting one, please let me know if you have any other ideas for me to add to this post of what NOT to do when starting a blog.

You can also check out my other post How to Start a Profitable and Stylish Blog On a Budget and How To Write A Perfect Blog Post Every Time 

Those will give you a little more information on how to start your blog!

Thanks for reading,