105+ Actionable Blogging Tips for New Bloggers

If you are a new blogger, you can easily get overwhelmed by all the things you need to do. Sometimes, you don’t even have an idea of the things you need to do. You end up making many avoidable mistakes that either delay success or lead to failure.

In this post, I will go through over 105 blogging tips that will take you through all the important things you need to know to be successful in blogging as a beginner.

Some of the things I will cover include tips on:

• Avoiding some of the pitfalls of blogging.
• Making sure your blog is technically sound.
• Creating content.
• Monetizing your blog.
• Getting visitors.

These are the tips that I have learned through my successes and failures in 5+ years of blogging. This is everything I wish I could tell myself when I started blogging.

So, without wasting time, here are the things you need to do to make your blog successful.

1. Define Your Blogging Goals

Before you start your blog, you need to be clear about what you want your blog to accomplish. There are many reasons why people start blogs, for example:

• To make money online.
• To promote a business.
• To share hobbies and interests.
• To create an outlet for self-expression.
• To build a brand.

Your goals will determine how you go about your blogging. Also, when things get tough, you can return to these goals to renew your motivation.

You can check out my article on the amazing benefits of blogging for inspiration.

2. Find Out What People Are Interested In

You can’t write about anything and expect people to read your blog. To get visitors to your blog, you need to write about what people are interested in.

Luckily, there are many different ways to find out what people want.

• Use a keyword tool (like KWFinder) to see which searches have a high traffic volume on Google.
• Use Google autosuggest to find out what people are searching for in Google.
• Use Google Trends to see which topics are generating interest.
• Use social media and user sites like Quora and Reddit to see which topics people love to comment on.

3. Play to Your Strengths

When starting a blog, you need every advantage you can get. You need to identify any advantages you have and make use of them in your blogging journey. For example:

• If you have previous experience or credentials in the health industry, you will have an advantage when starting a health blog.
• If you have unique skills that are in high demand (such as coding), you can teach these to others through your blog.
• If you have connections in an industry, you can leverage them to get unique perspectives you can share with your readers.

4. Understand Your Target Audience

You need to understand your audience so that you can serve them better. It is easy to have misconceptions about your audience and what they want. To better understand your audience, you need to find out:

• Who visits your site? Use Google Analytics to get information on gender, age, and location.
• What problems are they facing? You can survey your audience or read the comments they leave on your posts.
• What products and services do they need? You can test this by promoting affiliate products to see what people are willing to buy.

5. Check Out How Much Competition Is Out There

As a new blogger, it will be hard to get visitors if you go into a niche or target topics that are too competitive. These niches and topics often have established players that are difficult to dislodge from the top 10 rankings.

You can check how competitive a niche is by using a keyword tool like KW Finder. Keywords dominated by websites with Domain Authorities (DA) of over 70 are too competitive.

If a niche is too competitive, you can look for a less competitive niche or less competitive sub-niches within that niche.

6. Follow Your Passion, Interest, and Curiosity

Write about topics you are interested in or understand well. You can also write about what you would like to learn (and provide a beginner’s perspective).

This will make it easy for you to write detailed and original content that will help you stand out from competitors.

However, there is a caveat when blogging about your passions. As a beginner, you should avoid niches that are:

• Too competitive or saturated.
• YMYL.
• Too niche (very few people interested).

It will take too much effort and time to succeed in such niches.

7. Create Content Consistently

Content volume is crucial to determining your blog’s traffic and income. The higher the number of high-quality, SEO-optimized posts you have, the more likely you are to be successful.

Here is an example showing a blog with 50 posts versus 350 posts (assuming 200 visitors per blog post and RPM of $50).

• 50 posts= 50* 200 visitors= 10,000 visitors. Potential earnings= $200 a month.
• 350 posts= 350*200 visitors= 70,000 visitors. Potential earnings = $ 1,400 a month.

For more on how to calculate how much you can earn from blogging, see how to calculate blog earnings.

8. Develop a Writing Habit

To create content consistently, you need to turn writing into a habit. If you wait for inspiration to strike for you to write, you will end up with very few blog posts.

The best way to make writing a habit is to write every day. If you have a job, you can carve out one or two hours for writing before you go to work or after you come back.

Also, it helps to set a target for how many blog posts you need to write every week. Most professional bloggers aim for 2-3 blog posts a week.

9. Create Content Fast

To achieve success in blogging faster, you need to write blog posts fast. The idea is to build up a blog with a huge number of high-quality blog posts as quickly as you can.

You can write blog posts fast by:

• Getting into a niche you understand so that you don’t have to spend so much time on research.
• Blogging daily. The more you write, the better you get at writing.
• Learning to type fast. You can double your word count by doubling your speed.

10. Leverage AI

Leveraging AI can be a great way to create content quickly and consistently, especially if you have a job or are juggling other responsibilities.

AI writing tools such as Writesonic are a great way to churn out articles. These leverage the latest Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology, such as GPT5, and can write blog posts better than most humans in minutes.

You can use AI writers to:

• Come up with first drafts of articles.
• Come up with content ideas and topics to write about.
• Create SEO-optimized titles based on AIDA principles.

A caveat with AI articles is that you must edit them in your own voice so that they pass AI article detectors.

11. Be Patient

When you first start blogging, it is normal to assume that success will come quickly. However, blogging is a long-term game.

When you look at top bloggers, you realize that it can take 2 to 3 years before you see significant results from your blogging efforts. The first 4-6 months will be particularly difficult because you will probably see very few results despite your best efforts.

This means that you have to adopt a long-term view and trust in the process. If you consistently produce high-quality SEO-optimized content over a long enough period, you will be successful.

12. Be Flexible

The blogging landscape is constantly changing. You have to deal with Google algorithm change, affiliate commission cuts, and new technologies such as AI writers.

You therefore need to be flexible to adapt to changes. Don’t be afraid to pivot to take advantage of new opportunities, especially if what you are doing is not working out.

When you face a challenge, rather than giving up, see how you can turn it into an opportunity. Try new niches, monetization strategies, and traffic generation tactics.

13. Use the 80/20 Rule

The 80/20 rule (Pareto Principle) states that about 20% of the things you do will give you 80% of the results. For example, in blogging:

• 20% of the posts will bring 80% of the traffic.
• 20% of the tasks will bring 80% of the income.
• 20% of your products will bring in 80% of your revenue.

You can save yourself a lot of time by identifying the 20% that works and putting more effort here. Go hard on what works. The rest you can automate, outsource, or ignore.

14. Focus On One Thing at a Time

If you focus on many things at the same time, it will take you longer to be successful. Also, you might get burnt out very quickly.

Once you find a blogging niche that works for you, grow your blog until it is successful before you think of starting another blog.

Avoid falling prey to the shiny object syndrome where you jump from one cool idea to another. Until you have 100 articles on your blog, forget about video, social media, or any other thing unrelated to producing good quality SEO articles.

15. Scale Your Blog

Once your blog has gained traction and you are generating a decent income, then it is time to scale and diversify into other activities.

You can do this by:

• Ramping up the writing of posts. You can re-invest your earnings to hire additional writers so that you can write posts faster.
• Starting additional blogs. This will protect you if one blog gets hit by an algorithm update.
• Creating other types of content such as social media and video content. This will help build your brand and reduce your reliance on Google traffic.

16. Avoid Perfectionism

Perfectionism is a trap that can slow down your progress in blogging. You have to strike the delicate balance between quantity and quality.

It is heartbreaking to spend one month writing the perfect post only for it to get zero visitors because it cannot rank on Google.

It is better to get posts out quickly and then come back and optimize those that start to rank.

17. Be Careful With YMYL Topics

YMYL stands for Your Money or Your Life. These are topics that can have a significant impact on important aspects of your life such as health, finance, and law. You don’t want, for example, to get medical advice from someone with no experience in medicine.

For such topics, Google wants to rank blogs or websites that have authority and are trusted to provide the right information. As a new blogger, it can be difficult to compete in YMYL niches.

As you gain experience in blogging and your blog gains authority, you can then think of tackling these topics.

18. Take Quick Action

Failing to take action can slow down your progress in blogging. You may know exactly what you need to do, but you either take action too slowly or keep putting things off. Here are some reasons why you procrastinate.

• Perfectionism. You will write very few posts if you try to write the perfect post every time.
• Fear. Worrying that you will fail can paralyze you. It is better to fail fast and learn.
• Endless research. If you fear failing, you will compensate by spending too much time doing research.

19. Choose the Right Blogging Platform

Some blogging platforms lure you with a free plan that is limited in features and you have to upgrade to expensive plans to access more features. They also have a lot of control and can shut your blog down at any time.

To avoid this, I would suggest going with a platform like WordPress (WordPress.org not WordPress.com) because:

• Over 40% of websites online use it.
• It is free and open-source, so you truly own your blog.
• You can customize your blog with thousands of themes and plugins.
• There are plenty of tutorials available.

Starting a blog using WordPress is simple. Check out my quickstart guide which will take you through the entire process.

20. Choose the Right Web Hosting Provider

An bad web hosting provider can mess you up big time. For example, your blog will be slow or offline most of the time. Also, if they have lax security procedures, your blog can easily get hacked, and you may lose all your work.

To save yourself from pain and difficulties, you need to ensure that:

• You check review sites like Trustpilot and Hostadvice to see how users rate them.
• The company offers enough resources for your blog (i.e. storage, RAM, inodes, and bandwidth).
• The company has strong security procedures (e.g. firewalls, backups, recovery).

My favorite web hosting provider is ChemiCloud. They have a 5-star rating on both Trustpilot and Hostadvice and are known for their excellent customer service. See my guide on starting a blog on ChemiCloud.

21. Choose a Good Domain Name

It is important to have a custom domain name as it can help with branding and may even give an SEO boost. A good domain name should be:

• Easy to remember. Avoid names with special characters or misspellings.
• Related to your niche or product. This helps your readers to quickly understand what your site is about.
• Unique. Avoid names that infringe on other blog’s trademark rights.

You can get a custom domain from a domain registrar like Namesilo or your hosting. See more in my quick-start guide to starting a blog.

22. Get a Custom Email Address

In addition to a custom domain, you need to get a custom email address. A custom email address will have your domain as an extension, for example, matt@hobbyslave.com.

A custom email address is important because:

• It reduces the chances of your emails going to spam.
• It looks professional and therefore can improve your chances of accessing opportunities (for example, being accepted into affiliate programs).
• It helps to build your brand.

You can use a service like Zoho to get a business email affordably.

23. Choose a Good WordPress Theme

A WordPress theme helps you to design your blog and make it attractive. When choosing a theme, ensure that:

• It is lightweight and fast. If your theme is bloated, it could slow down your site.
• It is optimized for mobile. People accessing your blog on a smartphone should do so without any problems.
• It has good navigation. This will help people to move around your site easily.

I would suggest using a theme like GeneratePress. It is a highly-rated theme that is lightweight and fast. You can design almost anything with it (e.g. online shops, membership sites, or course platforms).

24. Ensure Your Blog Is Mobile Friendly

Roughly 56% of people access the internet on mobile phones. If your site is not mobile-friendly, you could be losing out on a lot of traffic.

You can check if your blog or particular blog posts are mobile-friendly by using the Google Search Console. You can also use Google Pagespeed Insights to help you identify performance issues on mobile.

You can make your blog mobile-friendly by:

• Installing a good theme.
• Compressing your images and correctly sizing them.
• Avoiding popups.

25. Do Regular Backups

Having backups of your site can be a lifesaver if you get hacked or a WordPress update messes up your site. If you have no backups, you risk losing years of work.

You should always have backups of your blog or website even if your web hosting company does regular backups for you. This is because:

• If you stop paying for your hosting, your provider will delete your blog plus your backups.
• Some companies only back up a small portion of your website.
• Some companies don’t do off-server backups. If the server is corrupted, your backups will also be corrupted.

You can use a free plugin like WPvivid to create off-server backups.

26. Have an SSL Certificate

An SSL encrypts your visitors’ data so that it is not visible to a hacker. When you install an SSL certificate, your web address changes from “HTTP” to “HTTPS”.

These days, browsers and search engines will avoid sending visitors to your website if you have not installed an SSL certificate.This is really bad for SEO.

You can install a free SSL certificate using Let’s Encrypt SSL. See my blogging quick-start guide to see how you can quickly install an SSL certificate.

27. Create a Strong Password

Many new sites get hacked because they lack a strong password and bots can easily crack their weak passwords.

Here are some tips for creating a strong password that is hard to guess.

• Make it at least 12 characters long.
• Mix up capital letters, symbols, and numbers.
• Avoid common names like “password” and “admin”.

If you don’t want to go through the hassle of memorizing multiple passwords, you can use a password manager like 1Password to generate and manage strong passwords.

28. Use Who.is Protection

When you sign up for a domain name and hosting, you are required to give your personal information like email, physical address, and phone number. Whois protection keeps this information from being displayed publicly on directories.

You can have Whois protection as an extra when buying hosting. It will add a few dollars to the cost of hosting but it is worth it.

If you don’t get Whois protection, you will keep getting spam in your mailbox or email address. You may even get spam calls.

29. Protect Your Online Privacy

You need to protect your privacy especially if you are blogging about controversial topics like politics. Here are some ways you can protect your privacy as a blogger.

• Avoid oversharing personal information. Do not share information like your children’s photos, home addresses, and private phone numbers.
• Avoid using your home address because people can track you to your home. You can use a virtual business address from a service like iPostal.
• Enable Who.is protection when signing up for your domain name to keep your details out of the public Who.is database.

30. Don’t Have Too Many Plugins

WordPress plugins are great for expanding the functionality of your blog. As useful as they are, having too many plugins can slow down your site and introduce security vulnerabilities.

You therefore need to keep your plugins to a minimum. Some important plugins you will need include:

• A design plugin.
• A speed optimization plugin.
• A security plugin.
• A backup plugin.

See my list of the most important plugins for a new blog.

31. Regularly Update Your Themes and Plugins

Malware bots exploit vulnerabilities in out-of-date plugins and themes, using them as backdoors to your blog. If you are using WordPress, you should ensure that the following are up-to-date:

• The WordPress Core.
• WordPress theme and Plugins.
• PHP Version.

Before you do any updating of your themes or plugins, back up your site because some updates might cause themes or plugins to stop working. With a backup, you can easily revert to your previous site as you figure out what caused your site to break.

32. Create the Best Content

To outrank your competitors, you have to create the best post. There are many things you can do to improve the quality of your blog post, but here are some quick things you can try.

• Present accurate information that will be useful to the visitor. Cross-check your facts before you post.
• Cover the subject adequately. Aim to present all the information the visitor may need without being fluffy.
• Have up-to-date information. Update any posts that have outdated information.

33. Make Your Content Relevant

Your content should be relevant to people’s needs and wants. You can demonstrate to your visitors that your content is relevant by:

• Sticking to the topic at hand. Don’t stray too far from what your visitors came for.
• Providing the answer to their problems as soon as possible. Don’t hide the solution behind fluffy content.
• Making it easy for them to find what they need by letting the main ideas stand out. You can do this, for example, by sticking to one idea per sub-heading.

34. Make Your Content Easy to Read

If your content is difficult to read, people will hit the back button and look for something easier to read. You can make your content easy to read by:

• Using grammar and a writing style that others can understand. Write as if you are talking to a friend. A typical eighth-grader (13-14 years old) should easily read your writing.
• Simplifying complex topics and terms. If you are an expert at something, don’t assume that everyone can understand what you are saying.
• Use the right fonts and colors. Avoid using fonts that are too small or too big. Also, avoid using color combinations that make it hard to read the text (e.g. blue text on a red background).

35. Have a Table of Contents

Having a table of contents helps your visitors to navigate your site which increases the chances that they will read your posts

It can also have some SEO benefits because Google can choose to display some of your sub-headings as snippets.

If you have a WordPress blog, your theme can allow you to easily add a table of contents. If your theme does not that that function, you can install a table of contents plugin from the WordPress repository.

36. Craft a Good Introduction

A good introduction can hook your visitors and keep them around to read the rest of your post. This is great for SEO and increasing conversions. A good introduction should:

• Make it clear that you have what they need. You can do this by telling your visitors what to expect.
• Be short and to the point. You don’t want to scare your visitors with a long and rambling introduction.
• Invoke curiosity. Make them look forward to discovering something new in your post.

37. Format Your Post for Skimming

According to a survey by HubSpot, 73% of readers will skim through your blog articles. People are busy and they want to quickly find what they are looking for. The last thing they want to see is a wall of text.

Format your post for skimming so that people can skip to sections that are most relevant to them. You can do this by:

• Using headings and sub-headings.
• Using bullet points and numbered lists.
• Using images.
• Using short paragraphs.

38. Fix Grammar Mistakes

According to a survey of British web users found that 74% of them pay attention to spelling and grammar on a website and 59% would avoid doing business with a company with grammar mistakes.

Bad grammar can make your blog look amateurish and unprofessional. Before you publish your post, fix your grammar mistakes. You can do this by:

• Use an AI editor like Grammarly.
• Getting someone else to read your post.
• Reading the post aloud.

39. Use Images in Your Posts

Having the right images can elevate your posts to another level. Images help to:

• Summarize important ideas visually.
• Highlight the main ideas.
• To rank higher on Google.
• Break the flow of text making your posts easier to read.

If you are not a good designer, you can use a tool like Visme to create beautiful images. They have a huge library of templates and copyright-free images that you can use to create infographics, graphs, logos, featured images, and many more.

40. Be Engaging

For you to make an impact with your blog, you need your visitors to read your posts. The more engaged your visitors are, the higher your conversion rates and the more money you will be able to make.

You can be engaging by:

• Telling stories. You can share your personal experience or those of people you know.
• Being authentic. Let your authentic voice break through your writing.
• Avoiding the temptation to be pretentious or look intelligent. Stick to a conversational tone.

41. Craft Clickable Headlines

Good headlines will increase your click-through-rate on the search results and this will help you climb up the rankings. Also, people will share your article on social media and other places.

To craft great titles, you should:

• Match the title to the user’s search intent so that they know that you have the exact information they need.
• Arouse curiosity and trigger a desire to know more about the topic.
• Optimize for SEO so that it can easily be found by search engines.

42. Differentiate Yourself From Your Competitors

As competition in blogging continues to increase, you need to find a way to stand out from your competitors. This is especially important in this age of AI writers where all posts can start to look the same.

You can differentiate yourself from your competitors by:

• Writing in your own voice and style.
• Creating original content such as research and statistics.
• Building a brand through your design, logo, graphics, and other visuals.

43. Optimize Your Website for Speed

A slow website will chase away your visitors. Google estimates that half (53%) of your visitors will leave if your site takes longer than 3 seconds to load.

It makes no sense for you to work hard to acquire visitors only to lose half of them because of a slow site.

You can use a plugin like WP Rocket to speed up your site.With over 3 million users, it is one of the best website optimization plugins.

44. Reduce the Size of Your Images

If your blog is too slow, then large images could be responsible. This is especially true if your web hosting package has a low bandwidth allocation.

Ideally, your image size should be less than 100kB so that if you happen to have 10 images on your blog post, your web page will be a little over 1MB in size.

You can use Google Pagespeed Insights to see whether images are contributing to your slow speeds. If images are the culprit, use Photoshop or GIMP to reduce the size. Alternatively, you can use a WordPress plugin like Imagify to do it automatically.

45. Use a Content Delivery Network (CDN)

A CDN service will increase the speed of your blog by caching your blog’s content on cloud servers around the world. For example, if your web hosting company is located in the US but you have many visitors from Europe, the CDN provider will automatically serve cached content from their servers in Europe.

This makes your blog very fast but it also has other advantages including blocking hacker bots and preventing DDoS attacks on your blog. You can have a CDN on your blog for free using a service like Cloudflare. There are also affordable CDN services like Bunny CDN.

46. Master SEO

Google refers roughly 67% of traffic to websites and this makes it the biggest referrer of traffic to blogs and websites. Therefore, if you want to get reliable traffic, you should learn all you can about SEO (Search Engine Optimization).

Some of the common SEO strategies include:

• Conducting keyword research to find out what people are searching for.
• Ensuring that your blog loads fast and is mobile-friendly.
• Writing articles that meet your visitors’ search intent.

47. Do Your Keyword Research

You need to do keyword research to find out which keywords you can realistically rank for in Google. Keywords are the words and phrases people type into Google when searching for information (for example: “How to ride a bike”).

You can use a keyword tool like KW Finder to help you with this. A keyword tool will show you:

• Traffic volume. This shows how many people are searching for that keyword.
• Difficulty score. This shows how competitive a keyword is. If a keyword has a high difficulty score, ranking for that keyword on a search engine like Google will be difficult.
• Keyword ideas. The tool will show you additional keywords that are related to the keyword you are targeting.

48. Understand Search Intent

You should try and figure out what the visitor wants when they type a particular keyword into Google. This will help you to give them exactly what they want. There are usually for types of search intents:

• Informational. Here, someone is looking for information, e.g. “How to fix a broken tap”.
• Commercial. Here, someone is doing research before buying, e.g. ” Best boots for hiking”.
• Navigational. Here, someone wants to visit a specific website, e.g. “Facebook login”
• Transactional. Here, someone is ready to buy, e.g. “Sony A560 Camera”.

As a blogger, you will deal mostly with informational and commercial keywords.

49. Avoid Writing Articles on Zero-Click Searches

A zero-click search is a search on Google or any other search engine that does not result in a click to a website from the SERPs.

For example, if you type ‘how many teeth does a human have’, you will get the answer at the top of the page and you don’t have to go to any of the websites on the SERPs.

Other topics that can result in zero-click searches include topics related to weather, calories, conversions, and celebrities.

Currently, about 50% of search queries are estimated to be zero-click searches.

50. Spy On Your Competitors

You can spy on your competitors to see what is working well for them and what isn’t. This means that you can replicate their success without repeating their mistakes. You can do this by:

• Using a keyword tool like KW Finder to see which of their content is doing well.
• Checking their sitemap to see what kind of posts they write.
• Checking their monetization strategy (such as the products they are selling or promoting).

51. Avoid Black Hat SEO Tactics

Black hat SEO tactics are practices that try to manipulate or trick search engines into sending traffic to websites, often in violation of the search engine’s terms of service. Examples of black hat SEO include:

• Buying backlinks from link farms.
• Stuffing keywords into your post.
• Creating PBN networks.
• Spam commenting.

Most black hat SEO tactics no longer work and they are likely to get you penalized by Google. Unless you know what you are doing, stay away from black hat tactics. Instead, learn proper ways of doing SEO.

52. Optimize for Featured Snippets

Featured snippets are short pieces of content that appear at the top of the search results and quickly answer a searcher’s question. If your post is featured as a snippet, you can get a good amount of visitors.

You can optimize for featured snippets by:

• Going for a keyword or search query that you have a chance to rank for in the top 10 results.
• Target different types of snippets (paragraphs, lists, or tables).
• Giving a concise answer to a searcher’s question in your blog post.

53. Build E-E-A-T

E-E-A-T is a Google acronym that stands for Experience–Expertise-Authoritativeness-Trustworthiness.

It is a way that Google uses to determine that you are a reliable source of information. This is especially important in YMYL(Your Money or Your Life) niches like health and finance.

Some of the things you can do to build E-E-A-T include:

• Demonstrating that you are an expert in your field. You can also hire experts to do the writing for you. If you have relevant qualifications, you can list them on your ‘ About’ page.

• Writing content related to your expertise. For example, if you have a cooking blog, blog posts that you write about tech will not do well because Google will not consider you an expert in the subject.
• Getting backlinks from more established blogs in your niche. Backlinks are like a vote of confidence in your blog. This shows that your articles are considered an authoritative source of information by others.

54. Have a Contact Page

Create a contact page to allow people to get in touch with you and give you feedback about your blog. This can also help to build trust with your audience which is great for E-E-A-T.

If you have a good WordPress theme, you will have an option for creating a contact form. If your theme does not allow you to do this, use a WordPress plugin like WP Forms or Contact Form 7.

55. Build Topical Authority

Topical authority is a measure of your expertise in a particular topic or niche. The advantage of building topical authority is that you can quickly rank for difficult keywords even without building backlinks.

You can build topical authority by:

• Publishing a lot of high-quality blog posts on a particular topic or niche.
• Create content silos that are interlinked.
• Getting backlinks from publications that are relevant to your niche.
• Get featured in publications, news outlets, and podcasts on topics related to your niche.

56. Pay Attention to Keyword Placement

Although Google is getting better at figuring out what your post is about without keywords, it is still important to have your keywords in the right places.

Some of the areas you should have your keywords include the title, URL, opening paragraph, and sub-headings.

Be careful not to stuff keywords in your post, Google can penalize you for this.

57. Create Link Magnets

Getting backlinks to your blog is important for SEO. It shows that people view your site as a trusted source of information. If you want to get these backlinks, you need to create link magnets. Examples of link magnets include:

• Definitive guides. Write the best guide for a particular topic, for example, “ A definitive guide to SEO”.
• Statistics. People like to quote statistics and if they get the statistics from you, they will link back to you.
• Infographics. If someone uses your infographic on their post, they are likely to link back.

58. Incorporate Tools Into Your Blog

Useful tools can be great link magnets and have the potential to generate a lot of traffic. For example, Neil Patel has acquired tools like Ubersuggest and Answer the Public and they bring a ton of links to his blog.

Some of the tools you can incorporate in your blog include:

• Calculators such as BMI, Calorie, or Financial calculators.
• SEO tools such as keyword volume and difficulty tools
• Name generators such as baby, or business name generators.

59. Protect Yourself Against Google Algorithm Change

A Google algorithm update can see you lose your traffic by 50%, sometimes more than 70%. This can be a disaster if you rely fully on your blog for income.

Here are some ways you can avoid getting hit hard by Google algorithm updates.

• Avoid black-hat tactics like buying links, PBNs, and keyword stuffing.
• Avoid spinning or plagiarizing other people’s content.
• Ensure that the technical aspects of your blog are sound (e.g. SSL, Speed, security).

60. Add External Links

Whenever you quote data, statistics, or information from another source, you should link to the original source so that your audience in case your audience wants to verify the information for themselves.

Linking to trustworthy and high-quality external sources can also show Google that you have taken the time to research the best and most current information. This can lead to some SEO benefits.

61. Internal Links

Besides linking externally, you should also create internal links to useful information within your blog that you think your audience might like.

Internal links can boost the Page Authority (PA) of the articles you have linked to by passing link juice. Interlinking relevant articles also helps Google to find new articles within your site and indicates that you have built topical authority in your niche.

62. Don’t Change Your Permalinks Unnecessarily

A permalink is the full URL for a page or post on your blog, for example, https://hobbyslave.com/blogging-tips/.

Visitors and search engines like Google use these permalinks to find content on your blog. When you change a permalink, it can result in a 404 error which is not good for SEO. When creating your URL, put some thought into it so that you don’t have to change it later.

If you change it, ensure you create a redirect to the new page using a plugin like Rankmath.

63. Monitor for Broken Links

A broken link is a link that points to a page or resource that does not exist. These links could be pointing to other posts on your site, affiliate products, or your products page. Broken links can have an impact on SEO and lead to lost revenues.

You can use keyword tools like Semrush or Ahrefs to find these broken links on your site. Alternatively, you can for free WordPress plugins. If you are using an affiliate plugin like Thirsty Affiliates, it will inform you if you have broken affiliate links.

64. Use an SEO Plugin

An SEO plugin like Rank Math will help you to fix SEO-related issues on your site.

Some of the things Rank Math can help you to do include:

• It can show you broken links within your site.
• If you have issues getting indexed on Google, they have an instant Indexing tool that speeds up the process.
• You can create a schema. This is especially important if you have a site that requires extra metadata (for example, a recipe blog).

65. Do An SEO Audit

You should periodically do an SEO audit on your site. An SEO audit evaluates how well your blog is optimized for attracting search engine traffic. Some of the things you can evaluate in an audit are:

• The number of posts indexed
• Your backlinks profile
• Broken links
• Technical SEO factors (speed, sitemaps, robots.txt)

You can use tools like Google Search Console and KWFinder for your audit.

66. Use Your Blog as a Hub

Remember, you are a guest on all your other platforms online and if they decide to shut you down, you will be in a lot of trouble. Your blog is the only property you own.

To protect yourself, all your accounts online should link back to your blog, for example:

• Your social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, or Pinterest).
• Your products (such as books) that you are selling on other platforms (such as Amazon).
• Your videos on YouTube. You can also embed your videos into your posts using a plugin like Presto Player.

Convert the visitors you get from these sites into your email list subscribers.

67. Build a Community

Your blog can serve as a place where people who share common interests can congregate. Building a community has several advantages for example:

• You can promote your posts to your community members.
• You can sell products and services to your members.
• Your members can promote your blog to their friends.

You can build a community using a WordPress plugin like Memberpress to create a forum where people can interact.

68. Build An Email List

Building your email list is one of the most important things you can do. It will help protect you against:

• Huge income drops due to Google algorithm updates. If you don’t have an email list of people who buy your products and services, a 70% drop in traffic can wipe you out.
• Losing visitors. Over 60% of your blog visitors will not return so you need to sign them up to your list so that you can promote your posts and products.
• Being banned on other platforms. For example, if your YouTube channel is shut down, you lose all your income, subscribers, and brand that you have built over many years.

You can use a service like Systeme.io. You can get started for free and send unlimited emails to up to 2,000 contacts.

69. Create a Lead Magnet

Getting people to sign up for your email list can be difficult unless you offer your visitors something valuable in exchange for their email addresses. This is a lead magnet.

A lead magnet can be a free e-book, PDF, tool, or course. Think of something that your audience may find to be valuable.

70. Leverage Video

Videos have become a popular way of consuming content now that the cost of smartphones and data has come down.

For some types of blog posts and niches, having videos is a must. For example, if you want to show people how to pitch a tent, people will prefer to watch a video rather than read about it.

You can start a YouTube or TikTok channel and then use the videos to drive traffic to your blog. The other advantage is that you can monetize those videos with premium ad networks.

71. Engage with People in Your Niche

You can contact other bloggers, journalists, and businesses to seek avenues for collaboration, for example, you can:

• Write guest blog posts.
• Get interviewed on podcasts.
• Help out reporters on HARO.
• Answer questions on forums, Facebook groups, or Q&A sites.

Being featured in more established blogs or publications can help to build your brand. It can also help with SEO because you can get powerful backlinks.

72. Leverage Social Media

Social media can be a mixed bag when it comes to bringing traffic to your site. Many social media sites (such as Facebook or Instagram) try to keep people within their platform for as long as possible.

It will take some experimentation to find which social media channels will work for you. Currently, a lot of bloggers are having good results with Pinterest.

Besides bringing in traffic, social media can be great for building your brand.

73. Write On Other Sites

You can promote your blog by writing articles on other sites that have a high domain authority. Some publications will let you guest post on their sites but you have to demonstrate that you can write high-quality blog posts.

Alternatively, you can write on sites like Medium, Quora, or Reddit. These sites have a large user base and a high Domain Authority (DA), meaning that your posts are likely to rank.

74. Investigate the Monetization Prospects

If you want to make a living from your blog, you need to investigate ways that you can make money from your blog.

You can do this by:

• Studying how other blogs in your niche are making money.
• Looking at blog income reports (if they are available).
• Asking for advice from other bloggers (for example, in blogger groups).

Top bloggers like to get into niches with opportunities to create high-ticket items (like premium courses) or where they can participate in high-ticket affiliate programs.

75. Diversify Your Income Sources

Diversifying your income sources can help you make money faster and you are protected if one source of income disappears.

You can make money from blogging in a variety of ways, for example:

• Making money from ads through Google Adsense or a premium ad network.
• Selling digital products such as ebooks, software, photos, or posters.
• Sell subscriptions, courses, or membership products using a service like Payhip.
• Selling services such as design, tutoring, marketing, and SEO.

76. Sell Products and Services

Creating a product or service that you can sell through your website is a great way to monetize your blog, especially if you have few visitors.

Examples of products you can sell include e-books, songs, patterns, photos, artwork, and designs. You can also sell a course. In fact, top bloggers often have high-ticket courses (costing $1,000+) as part of their monetization strategy.

You can use a service like Payhip to sell digital products, courses, and services. They are affordable and have a free tier where they charge you only when you make a sale.

77. Leverage Affiliate Marketing

You can make good money by recommending products you trust or enjoy using. Companies with an affiliate program will pay you a small commission if you recommend paying customers.

Some popular companies that have affiliate programs include Amazon, Walmart, and eBay. Most big companies have affiliate programs so check their websites.

Look for affiliate programs with high commissions (such as hosting), recurring commissions, or high conversion (such as Amazon associates).

78. Increase Your Display Ads Income

Display ads are usually the easiest way to monetize your blog. Most people use Google Adsense to monetize with display ads but the earnings can be low.

If you want to increase your ad income, you should apply to join a premium ad network like Ezoic, Mediavine, or Ad Thrive/Raptive, which pays more and offers customer support.

Premium ad networks often have traffic requirements such as 50k visitors for Mediavine, and 100k visitors for Ad Thrive. Ezoic recently dropped their traffic requirements, therefore, as a beginner, this might be a good option for you.

79. Avoid Having Too Many Ads

Although ads are an easy way to make money from your blog, too many ads can slow down your blog and lead to a bad user experience for your visitors.

This is bad for SEO and can lead to a drop in traffic. To avoid this:

• Reduce the number of ads you have.
• If your blog is still small, consider waiting before you put ads to give a chance for your traffic to grow.
• Join a premium ad network. They have better ad rates so you don’t have to plaster your blog with ads.

80. Vet The Products You Promote

You should vet the products and services you promote so that you don’t end up promoting scams, or sketchy products and services.

You can get into trouble for promoting scams but also, you defeat the whole purpose of blogging, which is to help your audience solve their problems.

Before you promote a product or service, test it yourself or check for user reviews on sites like Amazon or Trustpilot.

81. Focus on Increasing Conversions

When you increase conversions in your blog, you can make more money with fewer visitors.

Some of the things you can do to increase conversions include:

• Have one clear call to action. Your visitors can get distracted if there are many things they need to do.
• Learn copywriting skills. This will help you write sales copy that will convert.
• Optimize your design. Design your buttons, images, text, and colors to maximize conversions.

82. Create Original Content

Creating original content can help you stand out from your competitors. It is also a great way to attract links to your blog.

You can create original content by:

• Conducting original research, for example by surveying your audience or testing review products.
• Taking your own images. You can use your smartphone to take unique images for your blog posts.
• Talking or collaborating with industry experts. These can provide a unique view of your niche.

83. Back Up Claims with Data

If you can’t do your own research, you can quote studies that have been conducted by others to back up your claims.

Using data to back up claims has several advantages:

• It gives more weight to your opinions.
• You can increase the conversion rate because people will have more faith in your claims.
• People are more likely to link to and share your article which helps with SEO.

84. Create a Variety of Blog Post Types

Create a variety of blog posts to match a variety of user intents and expectations. Some of the types of posts you can write include:

• How-to posts
• List posts (Listicles)
• Review posts
• Comparison posts
• Pillar posts

The key is to keep experimenting so that you can find a format that your audience will love.

85. Write Evergreen Posts

Evergreen posts are those posts that remain relevant for a long time. Advice on topics like relationships, finance, food, or hobbies rarely changes, On the other hand, topics like politics, current events, and tech products can get out of date quickly.

If you are a small blogger, you can significantly reduce the amount of work you need to do by focusing on evergreen posts. You can write a post once and keep getting traffic for years to come as long as you keep updating it regularly.

86. Focus On a Specific Niche

When you have a new blog, you need to focus your effort on a specific niche or sub-niche. Preferably, you should have interest or experience in the niche. There are several advantages to this:

• You can create content faster.
• You can build topical authority and show Google that you are an expert in that niche.
• You can serve your audience better because you understand them.

87. Write Longer Posts

A study by Backlinko found that the average word count of a Google Top 10 result is 1,447 words. Generally, longer posts tend to do well. However, your post needs to be comprehensive enough to cover the topic at hand.

For each post you write, check how many words your competitors have written. Keep in mind that blogs with a high Domain Authority (DA) can have very short posts and still rank because of their authority.

88. Get Experts to Write for You

If you are working on a post that you are not an expert in, you can get experts to write or review your post and have them as co-authors. This is especially important if you are in a YMYL niche where you need to demonstrate experience and authority.

Some experts would be willing to write for you in exchange for a backlink to their business. For others, you will need to pay them a negotiated fee.

89. Write Down Post Ideas

Whenever you come up with a good idea for your post, you should write it down somewhere so that you don’t forget it. This will make it easier to quickly write posts because you will have a list of post ideas ready to go.

You can get these ideas as you:

• Read other blog posts
• Watch YouTube
• Do your brainstorming sessions.

90. Re-purpose Your Content

Once you have a good number of posts on your site, you should think of how you can re-purpose them into other forms of content. This can have SEO benefits and can also help to boost your brand.

You can re-purpose your blog posts into:

• Social media content on Twitter or Facebook.
• Guest posts for other sites.
• Video content.

91. Remove Poor Content

If a big part of your blog contains poorly written content, this can make your blog seem spammy and low quality. You should update or remove content that:

• Is poorly written content because you outsourced to poor writers.
• You wrote when you had little blogging experience.
• Is written by AI without any customization. These can be detected by AI detectors.

92. Create Time for Blogging

You need to set aside 1-3 hours to work on your blog. However, it can be difficult to find time for blogging especially if you have other responsibilities.

You can use the following tips to make time.

• Track how you use your time and eliminate activities that don’t add value (such as watching TV).
• Wake up earlier or sleep later than you usually do.
• Batch your tasks. For example, you can do all your keyword research in one go.

93. Work Productively

Once you have created time for blogging, you need to use that time efficiently. Here are some tricks you can use to be more productive.

• Focus on the most important tasks first (following the 80/20 rule).
• Schedule your blogging when you are most energetic.
• Avoid wasting time on non-essential tasks (such as scrolling social media).
• Schedule time (1-3 hours) for deep work.

94. Create a Blog Post Template

If you want to create blog posts quickly, you need to have a template that you can use to quickly produce posts. This can serve as an example when outsourcing the writing to others.

The template will include a title format, an outline, an introduction format, and a conclusion format.

You can create a template from your most successful posts. Alternatively, you can use an AI tool like Writesonic to help you create one.

95. Outsource Mundane Tasks

You should outsource work that is difficult or boring for you. This can free up your time so that you can work on the most important blogging tasks.

There are some great platforms such as Fiverr, where you can get an expert for almost any blogging task. On Fiverr, you can get services for as low as $5.

Some of the tasks you can outsource on a platform like Fiverr include writing articles, making logos, removing malware, editing posts, and creating infographics.

96. Survey Your Readers

Your readers can be a huge resource for ideas that will make your blog better. You can tap into these ideas by surveying your readers.

Some of the questions you can ask in your surveys include:

• Which pressing problems are they facing?
• What kind of posts would they like to see more of?
• What kinds of products and services do they want?

You can create a simple survey form using a plugin like WP Forms.

97. Monitor Your Comment Section

The comment section of your blog can be a great source of ideas. Unfortunately, people don’t comment much on blog posts anymore. Most of the comments you are likely to get will be spam comments.

To prevent your comment section from becoming a spammer’s paradise, you should manage your comment section. You can use plugins like Aksimet or Antispam Bee for this.

If you find managing the comment section to be a hassle, then you should disable comments on your blog.

98. Don’t Be Afraid to Ask for Help

If you get stuck with any aspect of blogging, there are plenty of people who can help you online.

Here are some places you can seek help.

• Facebook groups and forums that talk about blogging.
• Courses that have large communities. You can interact with or learn from other students and teachers.
• Hire people to help you on sites like Fiverr, Freelancer, or Upwork.

99. Learn All You Can About Blogging

Success in blogging requires that you embrace constant learning. Blogging is always changing and there will be new things to learn all the time.

A caveat about learning is that you should not wait to learn everything before you start. This will only lead to paralysis by analysis.

Experience is the best teacher so spend 80% of your time doing and 20% learning.

100. Take Courses

Courses are a great way to learn because they condense the wisdom and knowledge of others. This allows you to avoid their mistakes and shortcut your way to success.

There are plenty of free and paid courses that you can take to help you with complicated things like SEO, web security, blog optimization, copywriting, and marketing.

A great blogging course you can try is Project 24 (by Income School). Alternatively, you can look for cheap courses on Udemy or free ones on YouTube.

Check out my free blogging course to get you started.

101. Leverage Data

A big part of learning about blogging is experimentation. You try something and then wait to see how it works. You need data to gauge the success or failure of anything you do.

At a minimum, you should be looking at the following data:

• Traffic. This includes visits, pageviews, and engagement. Use Google Analytics.
• Queries and keywords you are ranking for. Use KW Finder and Google Search Console.
• Trends. Look at emerging trends in your niche that you can tap. Use Google Trends.

102. Leverage Blogging Tools

There are a variety of blogging tools that can help you become a better blogger. Some of the tools you should consider investing in include:

• A keyword research tool such as KWFinder. This helps you to find easy keywords that you can rank for.
• Email marketing tools such as Systeme.io. This helps you collect and build an email list.
• AI writers such as Writesonic. This helps you to craft headlines, make outlines, and write blog posts fast.
• Affiliate link tools such as Thirsty Affiliates. This helps you to easily manage your affiliate links.

103. Respect Copyrights and Trademarks

Copyright and trademark laws help protect the intellectual properties of individuals or companies including written work, images, and music.

To avoid breaking these laws:

• Don’t have a blog name that is too similar to a trademarked name.
• Only use images that you have permission to use. You can use Creative Commons images or images purchased from a stock image vendor.
• Don’t copy other people’s content. If you are outsourcing your work, run it through a plagiarism checker like Grammarly or Copyscape.

104. Create Your Legal Pages

Legal pages help you to avoid breaking various laws related to privacy, advertising, and use of your website. Ad and affiliate networks also look at these pages before they accept you into their programs.

The main legal pages you should have are:

• Affiliate Disclosure page. The FTC’s endorsement laws require you to declare if you are receiving a commission for promoting a product.
• Privacy policy page. Privacy laws such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) require you to explain which type of data you collect and how it will be used.
• Terms and conditions page. This specifies various conditions regarding the use of your blog(e.g. age limit).

105. Treat Your Blog as an Investment

A blog is an asset just like real estate or stocks. The great thing about having a blog as an investment is:

• It is cheap to start. Unlike other expensive investments, you can start a blog for less than $60
• It grows in value as long as you keep increasing the monthly income.
• You can easily sell it in marketplaces like Motion Invest or Flippa. You can often sell your blog for 30-40 times the monthly income.

As you build your blog, build it in a way that will make it easy to sell.

106. Reinvest In Your Blog

As soon as you start making income from your blog, you should re-invest your profits into growing the blog. Some of the areas you can invest in include:

• Getting additional writers to help you write content faster.
• Blogging tools like AI writers, grammar checkers, and email marketing tools.
• Improving the technical aspects of your blog, for example, better hosting and theme.

107. Take Care of Your Mental Health

Blogging, especially in the early days, can be a roller coaster of emotions. You are likely to fail several times before you make it and this can take a toll on your mental health.

To deal with this you need to:

• Join groups where you can interact with other bloggers who are going through the same things.
• Take breaks whenever you start to feel overwhelmed.
• Keep your eye on the prize. Hope will carry you through difficult times.

Wrapping Up

I know that this huge list can seem intimidating, but success in blogging can come down to doing many small things the right way. You can think of this list as a kind of checklist of all the things you need to be successful.

Keep in mind that you don’t have to do them all at once. Blogging is a long journey where you keep making small improvements over time. But it helps to know where you are falling short and that is why I wrote this post.

Hopefully, you have found some value and I wish you well in your blogging journey.

Further Reading

You may also like the following articles:

• How to start a blog (A Quick Start Guide)
• Blogging Crash Course for Beginners
• How to Calculate Blog Earnings
• The Highest earning bloggers (with proof of income)
• The Amazing Benefits of Blogging