Building a solid reader-base is without doubt something every blogger is striving for. That is the first step to actually converting your visitors and making them part of your brand.
In blogging making money is not a direct result from traffic. Everyone who’s been writing and publishing for more than a couple of months knows that there is more to it.
You need to go through several stages to transform first-time visitors into people, who enjoy reading your posts and come back for more.
Unfortunately that doesn’t always come as easy as we think. There are a lot of underwater stones that can easily turn our blogging boat upside down.
In the following paragraphs I’m going to identify them so that you have a clearer map for where you are headed:
1. Quality Content without a Strategy
Everyone’s talking about quality content. For many it is the key to success. Quality content alone however won’t get you the visitors and it won’t get you the buyers.
Thorough articles offering practical information are the backbone. There are no guarantees nonetheless. For content to work, you need a strong network.
As a matter of fact, the right relationships can give you torrents of traffic even with average posts. There are more than one or two blogs that are popular without bringing much to the table.
Social media success is crucial. Before even thinking about writing a post make sure you have a marketing strategy in place. With that missing, you are wasting time and effort.
Related Post: Your Blog Quality Content and Its Role
2. Being Inconsistent with Providing Fresh Content
Unfortunately due to lack of time I was publishing new posts in a random manner here on Reviewz‘n’Tips for some time. All of this was translating into random results as well.
To make it clear, publishing an article once a week is just not enough. Traffic fluctuations, not many new subscribers, and not a lot of new likes were just some of the problems I ran into.
All in all posting frequently and consistently without taking long breaks for no reason is a good starting point. Blogging breaks are for only when they are needed!
Related Post: 4 Bad Blogging Habits You Must Avoid
3. Not Thinking About How Readers Can Connect
That one really puts me off. It is quite an unpleasant feeling to land on a newly discovered blog with promising content and not to have an easy way to connect.
Providing a Twitter button is the least you can do. If you have the skills you can create one from scratch. What I recommend is to go to twitter (here is a link) and extract a simple piece of code to put on your blog.
I would strongly advice you to include at least four buttons (RSS, Twitter, Google+ and Facebook) preferably above the fold, so that visitors can find them with ease.
As you can see I have them in the top right side of this blog. That way people can connect in a matter of seconds.
Related Post: 10 Smart Steps to Building Trust and Getting Readers to Take Action
4. Your Call to Actions are Nowhere to be Seen
In blogging a call to action is a message that has the purpose of getting visitors to take a desired action. In my blog I have call to actions, for example, for asking people to share my content, to connect with me and also to check out my About page.
Most popular locations for call to actions include the area below your blog posts or anywhere above the fold. Obviously the idea with such placing is to get as many eyeballs on your message as possible.
So why you need them? When people take action, they get involved. That is what you want – engagement. When that happens, you can easily move on, create a discussion and turn a visitor into a loyal reader.
5. You Never Actually Share Personal Experiences
When writing, do you ever provide examples from what you have actually tried and tested? Do you ever happen to say “I did that, the result was this and here is the proof”?
You really need to have a way of showing that you know what you are talking about. Wherever possible and especially if you are writing and providing information about numbers and statistics, try to back up your statements. Giving visual clue and talking from first person adds up to your credibility.
If your articles seem like you are teaching people something you read about five minutes ago, you can’t expect to get a lot of engagement or interaction. Don’t just write on a topic, because you think it will be well-accepted. It might be, but only if you are able to prove that you do more than CTRL+C, followed by CTRL+V.
Now It’s Your Turn
The above is just a small part of the things you need to avoid if you really want to get people listening.
What are your thoughts on the topic?
What else can you add to the list?
As always, I’m looking forward to hearing your thoughts!
The post 5 Mistakes to Avoid if You Want to Build a Loyal Readership first appeared on Reviewz'n'Tips.
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