Are you a beginner blogger in 2023, struggling to know the best blogging tips and grow your blog? You’re not alone. Blogging can be intimidating for those just starting out. It takes time to figure out what works and what doesn’t—and that’s before you even start seeing the smallest results!
Fortunately, there are many helpful tips available to guide beginners on their blogging journey.
In this article, we will discuss 15 actionable blogging tips for new bloggers looking to make an impact in 2023. With these simple yet effective tactics, you can take control of your blogging future and avoid the blogging mistakes beginners often make!
1. Choose a Profitable Niche You Like
Choosing a profitable niche is an important step for beginner bloggers. It not only narrows down the subject of your blog, but it also increases your chances of making money from your blog.
By choosing a niche with some earning potential, you can set yourself up for success and maximize your blog’s profit potential. Here are a few tips on how to choose a profitable niche:
Evergreen: Your niche should be evergreen. This means that the niche should still exist in five or more years. If you choose a niche likely to disappear, you will not have enough time to make money before people start losing interest.
Enthusiast: Having enthusiastic people in your niche is amazing. By enthusiastic, I mean people who like to read content in your niche.
Urgent problems: Your blog niche should also have urgent problems. You can make money fast by providing solutions to these problems. You can do this by selling a course, offering a coaching or membership program, or doing affiliate marketing.
Future problems: You cannot make money in the long term if there are no future problems in your niche. Your clients/students should have other problems after you solve the first one.
For example, someone who takes a course on how to start a blog also wants to know how to get traffic, how to make money, and more.
Players with money: Finally, people in your niche should be willing to spend. You will struggle to make money if they prefer to get everything for free.
Your niche must meet these five key points in order to be profitable. I dive deeper into each tip on pages 9-27 of my ebook ‘Blogging With Results.’ I pick a few random niches and use various free tools to check the five points. You’ll see screenshots and images describing each step in depth.
Avoid the big mistake of wasting your time and money on something that will not make you money in return. Download your free copy today!
You Are Just One Successful Blog Away...
... Just 1 Successful Blog Away From Reaching The Financial Freedom You Desire More than Anything Else in Your Life!
By doing your research and carefully selecting a topic with profit potential, you can blog with confidence, knowing that there are opportunities to make money with the right marketing strategy!
2. Target Topics That People Are Searching For
To get traffic to your blog, it is essential that you focus on topics that people are already searching for. This way, when potential readers type a keyword or phrase on search engines like Google, your blog article will appear in the results.
The mistake that many beginners make is to write about themselves. They publish content like ‘The breakfast I make every Monday’ or ‘I am visiting Tokyo next week.’
Nobody is going to type ‘what country is Piaff visiting next week’ on Google. People want to find answers to their questions. So, if you write an article about yourself or your hobbies, nobody is going to read it.
So where do you find content ideas?
You can use free tools like Answer The Public or Ubersuggest to find popular topic ideas related to your niche. Try to write articles covering these topics and you will attract traffic faster.
In addition, you should use SEO practices like optimizing for long-tail keywords and using internal links to boost your search engine rankings.
3. Create a Content Calendar
Speaking of content… One of the best blogging tips I could give you is to create a content calendar.
A mistake that you can make is to write new blog posts wherever you want. If you want to get traffic last, write consistently. But sometimes, you don’t know what to write about.
It could be because you have too many ideas or you don’t have any. That’s when a content calendar comes into play. Creating a content calendar is essential to keep your blog organized and consistent. With a calendar, you can plan ahead and make sure that your content schedule is up to date.
Your content calendar should include topics for each blog post, the estimated date of publication, the author, and any other information relevant to the post.
How and where to create a content calendar?
You can use free project management tools like Asana, ClickUp, or Trello. Check out the image below, for example. I created this calendar sample using Asana.
It has the information necessary to write each blog post. I know the publication date and the steps the article must go through. From now on, I won’t spend a week wondering what to write.
Ready to start blogging?
Read more: How to start a profitable blog?
4. Pick the Right Blogging Platform
One of the most important blogging tips to use the right blogging platform. There are several free platforms available, such as WordPress or Blogger, but I recommend starting with a self-hosted WordPress blog.
A good blogging platform should have features that make it easy to create and manage content, such as a user-friendly interface and powerful customization options. Additionally, it should be secure and reliable. It should also offer various plugins and extensions so you can customize your blog according to your needs.
WordPress is the only blogging platform that checks all the points mentioned above. Your blog will look professional and engaging. Iconic Blogging, the blog you are visiting right now, was created on WordPress. And my blog isn’t the only one; WordPress powers 63% of websites worldwide.
If you want to be a successful blogger, use the best blogging platform.
Read more: 4 Best Blogging Platforms to Start a Blog!
5. Publish Every Day
If you’re serious about blogging and want to attract a wide audience, you need to publish content regularly. I recommend publishing at least one blog post every day.
Publishing daily will help you maintain consistency, build trust with your readers, and keep them coming back for more.
It also gives search engines like Google more content to crawl and index, which can help your blog rank higher in the search results.
But yes, publishing daily can be exhausting if you’re new to blogging. Anything can happen and you’ll be forced to postpone the next article to tomorrow. You can also be tired and just feel lazy.
Sometimes, you lack inspiration or your mind doesn’t want to think about anything — especially if you’ve been writing every day.
These feelings are normal and trust me, every single blogger in the world experiences these feelings. In this case, take a day or week to relax and enjoy the beauty of life.
And when you are done resting, review your content calendar and adjust dates. Do you see why a content calendar is crucial?
So, we’ve gone through a few blogging tips already, but I have more for you. Keep it up!
You Are Just One Successful Blog Away...
... Just 1 Successful Blog Away From Reaching The Financial Freedom You Desire More than Anything Else in Your Life!
6. Start With an Outline and a Draft
You know the title of your topic and it’s now time to write. But before you begin to write, prepare an outline.
An outline is a plan for the content — you organize your thoughts and stay on track.
Start by writing subheadings for each point you want to cover in your blog post. It’ll help you keep your ideas focused and help ensure that everything flows logically. Moreover, you will write a comprehensive article.
You see, the outline can also measure the content quality. You already know if your blog post is worth reading before you write the first word. Now imagine you skip the outline step and begin with a draft immediately! The content quality will be poor.
Now that your outline is ready, we can start writing a draft.
It’s important to remember that when it comes to blogging, the first draft doesn’t have to be perfect. It just needs to get your ideas down on paper (or screen).
Don’t worry about mistakes, typos, facts, etc. You can always go back and edit later.
7. Write How You Talk
An important blogging tip is to write how you talk in real life. It sounds simple, but we often overlook this point. Writing how you talk will make your blog posts sound more natural and engaging.
Your readers want to read something that feels authentic and personal, not a textbook-like article filled with jargon.
It’s also important to choose words that you and your readers understand. Making your blog posts easy to read is essential if you want readers to stay on your page. People won’t bother trying to understand your jargon.
Some bloggers make the mistake of trying to sound smart in their blog posts. I see this often in technical articles. It’s already hard enough for me to understand the new technical words; I don’t have time to be impressed by your English level.
So do not make this mistake!
Yes, you should write the way you talk, but not everyone will understand you. Do you want people to keep reading? Use simple words.
8. Make Your Posts Easy to Read
Isn’t it the same as the previous point? Well, the previous point was about language, but this is about content structure.
To make your content easier to scan, use headings and subheadings, bullet points, bold texts for important points, and italics for emphasis. Also, avoid overly long and complicated sentences; break them up into smaller chunks. Make sure each sentence is clear and easy to follow.
One more thing to avoid is large paragraphs. Goodness, I just can’t enjoy reading such articles. Most readers don’t want to read a wall of text, either. Do you? I’m sure your answer is no!
Nobody wants to read something like this.
It’s boring, and you feel tired before you start reading it. It’s hard to understand and you walk away with nothing new.
9. Use Various Visuals in Your Posts
Using eye-catching visuals is an important tip not just for blogging but in any content marketing strategy.
To illustrate a point, use pictures or videos. And if you want to hook your readers, use memes, GIFs, and screenshots.
Moreover, you can use infographics to make complex topics easier to understand.
Apart from helping people understand the message, visuals will also make your blog post attractive and give readers a break from reading.
But don’t just put any visual you find online. Always use high-quality images relevant to your topic. Otherwise, it’ll look like you just threw something there for the sake of having something.
10. Add a Table of Contents
One of the top blogging tips I can share with you is adding a table of contents.
A table of contents can significantly help readers. They will know what the post is about and which sections to focus on. Furthermore, it’ll become easier for them to navigate your blog post.
Fortunately, creating a table of content isn’t hard at all. It may be included in your WordPress theme or website builder like Elementor.
So this is another tip for making your blog posts easier to read. It’s a good idea to use it when writing longer posts with many sections. Even if your post isn’t too long, you can still add a table of contents to make the navigation easier for readers.
11. Don’t Copy Content From Other Blogs
Obviously, you don’t want to plagiarize someone else’s work.
But will your readers know if you copied the content from another blog? Not really? They cannot find out if they haven’t read both articles.
But still, no one likes a copycat. So make sure that whatever content you publish on your blog is original and unique. Don’t just rewrite the same material in different words. If possible, try to look at the topic from a different angle or provide your own opinion.
But how am I supposed to know what to include in my post if I don’t see competitors’ articles?
That’s a nice point! In fact, you need to check other people’s articles to write your outline. I’m not telling you NOT to read other articles. The point is, ‘Don’t copy.’
Pro Tip:
When I have to write a technical article that I don’t fully understand, I spend two or three days reading competitors’ posts. I also watch videos to learn more. Then I take a two-day break to stop thinking about the article I have to write.
When I finally write the blog post, the flow is incredible, and every word I type is mine. I don’t need to check competitors’ posts anymore because I fully understand this topic.
The way I’ll cover it is different since I’ve forgotten about what and where this blogger said this or that.
I know that writing unique content is not easy, but it’s worth it. Doing so will help your blog stand out and give you an edge over other bloggers who just copy-paste content from other websites.
So don’t be lazy and create original content that your readers can enjoy. That’s one of the best blogging tips I can give you.
You Are Just One Successful Blog Away...
... Just 1 Successful Blog Away From Reaching The Financial Freedom You Desire More than Anything Else in Your Life!
12. Build an Email List
Another tip for successful blogging is to build an email list. Why? Because people don’t often visit blogs for updates, but they do check their emails every day.
And if you can get your readers to subscribe to your blog’s newsletter, it will be easier for them to get notified when you publish new content. Plus, you can also send out occasional promos and updates to your subscribers.
However, I don’t like building an email list to send newsletters. I do it to sell my products and make money. Don’t wait to hit 50K monthly site visits to start collecting emails. Do it now, don’t wait.
But the truth is people are not interested in receiving your newsletters; it’s boring. If you want to struggle to build your email list, add a newsletter form to your blog.
But if you want to get leads fast, give your subscribers something great in return, like an ebook, a webinar, or a course.
To build an email list, create a signup form and integrate it with an email services provider like MailChimp or ConvertKit. You can add this form on every page of your blog or place it as a pop-up.
Takeaway:
Start building an email list now if you want to make money blogging. It’s your list; it’s free to send them emails. No need to spend money on Google or Facebook ads or wait for your subscribers to visit your blog.
13. Learn About SEO
Search engine optimization (SEO) is necessary if you want to drive organic traffic to your blog. Without SEO, you won’t be able to rank your blog posts on the first page of Google or Bing.
You don’t have to become an expert, but it’s good to learn the basics. There is quite a lot to learn, like keyword research, on-page SEO, technical SEO, link building, internal linking, and other tips, hacks, and tricks.
Want to know where to learn this? Check out our list of the best SEO blogs to read and increase your traffic.
If you prefer to learn by watching videos, I recommend YouTube channels like Ahrefs, Matt Diggity, Neil Patel, and Brian Dean.
14. Use the Right SEO Tools and Plugins
SEO plugins and tools are essential for optimizing your blog posts. The best SEO tools help you understand what people search for, track your rankings, identify technical issues on your website, spy on competitors, and more.
We recommend you use SEO plugins like Yoast SEO or Rank Math to optimize the content of every page and post. Both plugins offer lots of features, like SEO analysis and readability checks, that you can use to improve your blog.
If you want advanced SEO tools, Ahrefs and SEMrush are great choices. They have keyword research capabilities, content optimization tools, backlink trackers, site auditors, and other features that will help you optimize your content and increase rankings.
Read more: Best WordPress SEO Plugins To Boost Blog Traffic!
15. Allow Readers to Comment and Reply to Their Comments
When people visit a blog, they want to feel like they belong to the community. They want to voice their opinion and get acknowledged.
That’s why allowing readers to comment on your blog posts is important. It builds relationships with your audience and encourages them to come back for more. It also creates an opportunity for you to engage with them and get to know them better.
Use a comment plugin like wpDiscuz if you want to allow readers to comment.
In Conclusion
In conclusion, blogging is a great way to express yourself and showcase your passions. With these 15 vital blogging tips for beginners, you can be on your way to a successful blog in 2023.
From optimizing your blog for SEO to choosing the perfect blogging platform, these tips will help you create engaging content and reach a larger audience. Do you use other blogging tips worth sharing with others? We’d love to read them.
Go ahead and share your blogging tips in the comment section below and let’s talk together!