5 Blogging Mistakes I Keep Doing And Haven’t Fixed Yet
August 14, 2007
Do you know what mistakes you often make on your blog or in life? Do you do anything to correct them? If yes, then do you
fall back into old habits after a while again?
I tend to do that. I realise that I’m making a mistake, I correct it, but then sometime I fall back into the old habit again. To rub salt into my blog-wounds, display my stupidity and show my ignorance, I’ve created this list of 5 blogging mistakes I keep doing and haven’t fixed yet.
- I “impulse-blog”, meaning I suddenly get an idea and I write a post about it. Several pro-bloggers, including Maki from doshdosh.com and Darren Rowse from Problogger.net, suggest that you plan ahead and write a week’s worth of blog posts in one day. I wish I did that, but I’m not. Sometimes a post topic just pops in my head and I sit down and write about it as quickly as possible. Then I have other days, like yesterday, where I didn’t write a thing. Now if I followed Darren’s great advice I wouldn’t have to “stress” over not having any new posts for my loyal readers.
- My posts doesn’t contain enough keywords. When I write posts for Connected Internet, I make sure that each post contain so many keyword, that I’m sometimes sick of writing “Xbox360″ or “FIFA 08″, but those cursed Adsense ads need keywords, unless I want ads for X-ray equipment or scissors (typing these words might already have screwed this up).
- I keep changing the theme on my blog. Regular readers might experiencing a new theme when reading one post and another when reading the next. I’m still trying to find the ideal theme.
- I don’t analyse my traffic, keywords or statistics. I have the Google Analytics script installed on all my blogs, but I rarely go there and analyse the data. I know, I should be analysing my bounce rate and optimise my blog accordingly. It’s important to measure how many people arrive at your site and then leave again without viewing any extra pages.
- I very rarely write posts that contains hot keywords. I never write posts about “Paris Hilton”, “Britney Spears”, “Hawaii Earthquake”, “Brian Crush Adams”, “Hurricane Flossie” or similar hot keywords. I tried it once in my “Moving To Another Domain” post. I had a picture of David and Victoria Beckham (Becks and Posh) <—– keywords, because the post is about moving and they had just moved to the US. Pretty clever huh?!
I guess I could point out more mistakes, but then I’d only make another one: “I make my lists too long”. Writing this post has helped me realise what I need to focus on in order to become a full-time blogger. It is crucial to exploit the various tools and services offered to you in order to succeed as a blogger. My vacation starts on Friday, I’ll spend some of it to see what it’s like to be a full-time blogger. I have to dig into my blog’s statistics and learn to tweak it.
It’s never funny to focus on the things you do wrong, but I learn from them, so right after I’ve written this post, I’ll write one for tomorrow, that will explain the right things I do, when it comes to blogging.
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practice makes you perfect. It took me more than a year to get a hang of how to blog, right from the design to content. Just keep trying.
Planning it all like that does seem to take away the spontaneity that a blog should be all about though, doesn’t it? Great post!
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[...] 5 Blogging Mistakes I Keep Doing And Haven’t Fixed Yet by Dennis Bjørn Petersen [...]
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I don’t think there’s anything wrong with “impulse blogging.” In fact, it’s great because you’re harnessing that energy of a great idea. The point is to try and even it out by not posting two or three days in a row and then nothing for a week. If you just posted something, and you got another great idea 12 hours later, save the post. (Or, if you’re using WordPress, you can change the timestamp to a day or so in the future, so that it automatically posts.) If you haven’t blogged in a while, send the post through immediately. Impulse blogger is better than not blogging at all
I actually do quite a bit of impulse blogging - just because I don’t want to lose that inspiration and energy… I know I probably should just type it out and go back and rework them, but oh, well. Like the others have said, it’s better to blog than to not blog at all!
I think a mixture of both is the most optimal. Sometimes you can’t write and other times you can write one post after the other.
There should be room for both impulse and “arranged” blogging. My plan is to have at least one post every day, but I’ve found out that writing on four blogs sure takes it time
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Nice post. I always forget about keywords, hot or cold.
[...] 5 Blogging Mistakes I Keep Doing And Haven’t Fixed Yet by Dennis Bjørn Petersen [...]
I’m feeling neglectful as well - I simply don’t write nearly enough Britney Spears or Paris Hilton posts. It’s shameful, really.
[...] 5 Blogging Mistakes I Keep Doing And Haven’t Fixed Yet by Dennis Bjørn Petersen [...]
I agree with Jordan, I don’t find any problem with
impulse blogging.
And regarding keywords and hot key words, I feel too many keywords
stuffed in the post also looks bad to the reader. Just concentrate on the content of the post and keywords should come automatically…
Gosh! This whole list is what i’m exactly doing for my blog
Hello nice blog! !!
pen
It’s my new page.about shoes.
[...] of keywords. Lack of appropriate keywords in the title and first paragraph, and lack of variations and synonyms in the [...]
i’ve just started my site/blog and i tired planning and writing content in advance but for that you need time, and that is a commodity in rarity, hopefully after exams ill write a fair bit in advance and with summer extend this, but then again impulse posts are better as you can’t see the future…well not yet
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