5 No-Nonsense Blogging Rules That are Catastrophic If You Blatantly Ignore Them

This is your worst nightmare, right?

You slave away at your blog – day after day – trying to make a name for yourself. Surely you’ll reap the rewards from your everyday struggles, right?

But you don’t.

In fact, many people rarely do – because they don’t understand the rules of blogging. Specifically, the unwritten rules.

They do the usual – comment on other posts, promote their own posts on social media, etc. — and then out of nowhere … BOOM!

Their blog is desperately trying to tread above water. Flailing around in a panic because no matter what they do, they’re going under.

It’s inevitable.

And you want to know why?

Because they chose to ignore the rules. They chose to“make it” their own way.

Unfortunately, you can’t pick and choose which rules to obey — and which to flat out ignore. It’s either you obey them all, or ultimately fail.

Seems like an easy choice, right?

Here’s a list of rules that’ll destroy your blog if you choose to ignore them. How many are you breaking?

Rule #1 – Build An Email List

I know. I completely shocked you with that, right?

But let’s be completely honest here. This has, and will always be, the most important rule in blogging.

Because if you ever want to grow your blog, you have to build your list. If you ever want to make more than just a few pennies from blog ads, then you have to build your list. If you ever want to become a popular blogger one day, guess what you have to do?

But why do you have to do this? Why is it so important?

Because let’s say something were to happen to your blog and you were unable to log on to your site for weeks.

*knock on wood*

By not building your list, you have no way of communicating with your readers to let them know about the situation. Whereas if you had a list, you could simply email them to explain what’s happening – and direct them to a temporary solution if necessary.

What’s the Next Step

So many people are fixated on getting more unique visitors – or even worse, page views. But those aren’t as important as growing your email list.

Here’s what you should do:

1. Put sign up forms in key places like the sidebar, at the end of each post and insert them on some of the most visited pages on your blog (i.e. the about page).
2. To boost the number of subscribers you receive, try to come up with a compelling offer that people will sign up for. It can be an eBook, an e-Course or videos — as long as it’s good enough to create curiosity.

Rule #2 – Create Original and USEFUL Content

“Content is king … Content … is king.”

*rolls eyes*

Want to know something?

I find it surprising that there’s still bloggers out there misleading people with that false information.

But while what they’re saying is no longer the truth, let me share some information you need to know about creating content:

1. You can’t just create any type of content as a blogger. Your content has to be unique and relevant to what your readers are looking for. For instance, if you blog mainly about SEO, what sense does it make to write a post about tips for getting started with WordPress?
2. Your content has to be catered for, and useful to the audience that’s reading it. So many bloggers write about whatever they want to talk about. But let’s be 100% honest here. Your readers don’t care about what you want to talk about. They don’t care about your opinions. All they want is information that’ll help them resolve their problems — and that’s what you should give them.
3. A little bit of research goes along way. Many posts fail to create that impact the author intended because the bloggers don’t research their posts before they write them. Sites like Quora and even some forums related your niche are great places to get content ideas. It’s important that you research thoroughly because nothing hurts your brand faster than false or incomplete information.

Listen, it’s not always easy to create original and useful content. But you shouldn’t be putting content out there if it’s not useful.

Because your blog isn’t just a blog — it’s your image. So make sure your image stays intact by putting out quality, useful content at all times.

What’s the Next Step

Hang out in various groups and communities in Facebook and Google+ that’s strictly no promotion. Usually they have good discussions there where bloggers have questions about certain things related to blogging.

Once you find some good questions, do some keyword research for the main issue. If there’s a fair amount of people searching for it each month, then create a topic around it.

Rule #3 – Create Compelling Headlines

Wait … do you hear that?

It’s the sound of another blogger cursing themselves after a post they spent time on, doesn’t get the exposure they expected.

Aww shucks.

Now why do you suppose that happened? After all, they did what they were supposed to do, didn’t they?

Let’s see — ultra useful content that they thought would help their readers? Check.

Strategically placed keywords within their post that’ll hopefully get them ranked? Check.

Shared it on all of their social media platforms, and with those they mentioned in the post, as soon as the post was published. Check and check.

Hmm, so what went wrong?

Well, even though they did all those things, the one thing they didn’t do was focus on the most important part of their post. The headline. That’s the true bread and butter of the whole post, isn’t it?

I mean, don’t you read blog posts based on how captivating the headline is? Or how much it catches your attention?

As a blogger, you have to focus a considerable amount of your attention on the headline because anything that’s not “eye-catching” will result in your post not even being clicked on.

What’s the Next Step

Did you get the hang of driving the first time you put a car into drive? Or how about your favorite hobby. Did you understand everything about it in your first attempt?

Thing is, many people never get something right on their first attempt. So why do you think that you should go with the first headline you come up with?

That’s something even the experts don’t do. Headlines are a tricky thing and you should never go with the first one.

Here’s what you should do:

1. For each post you write, try to come up with 10 – 20 different headlines. Say them out loud and don’t be afraid to mix and match to create some compelling combinations.
2. To see what works best, analyze each headline with both CoSchedule Headline Analyzer and theEmotional Marketing Value Headline Analyzer.

Rule #4 – Be Consistent

Step out of your blogger loafers for a minute and let’s examine this rule through the eyes of the reader, shall we?

Okay, you found a blog that you like and really enjoyed some of the posts they come out with. Not only do you love the bloggers conversational style of writing, but they deliver some pretty high quality content as well.

Even on their posts from a year ago, it’s better than most of the stuff you read.

You smile to yourself and think, “This blogger is awesome. I’m going to bookmark them and follow them on a regular basis.”

So, you sign up to join their email list and eagerly wait for the next time they come out with a blog post. You’re in luck, they come out with an epic post within a few days — better than anything of theirs you’ve read so far.

From that point on, you check their blog to see if they came out with some more awesome content — but you wait.

… and wait …

… and wait some more.

Finally, they come out with new content on their blog 40 days later.

“Perhaps they had some type of emergency that caused this?” you thought to yourself.

But from that point on, each post you receive, you notice that there’s a 30+ day wait in-between posts.

Now, you don’t know what to do or even think about it.

Surely you know their content is great, but they’re not consistent enough with it. And that’s when you decide to not check their blog so often.

You’re no longer amped up for their content.

Heck, you don’t even visit their blog every other day anymore.

Whenever you remember their blog, that’s when you’ll visit to see some new content.

This is how a reader thinks.

You may be thinking that this is an elaborate situation, but this type of thing happens all the time IF you’re not consistent with your blog posts.

What’s The Next Step

We all should know that consistency is key in blogging. But when you’re selecting a posting schedule, choose one and stick with it.

In the beginning stages, there’s nothing wrong with testing out various days to publish and see which works best. But when you decide on what day(s) you’re publishing your post, make sure you stick with it no matter what.

Rule #5 – Build Relationships

In this day and age of blogging, you CAN’T make it on your own.

Nobody can.

And by the way, why would you want to?

Building relationships is the main cog that keeps those that are successful … successful. Think about it.

Who are some of the most popular bloggers out there?

Now think about the people they mention in their posts. The people they have no problems promoting their blog posts — or product. And while you’re thinking about that, hopefully you’ll start putting the pieces together.

Bloggers can go from a legitimate nobody to a somebody virtually overnight because of the relationships they’ve built. And when they’ve successfully done that, they can open themselves to whatever monetization strategy they want.

And assuming that you want to grow your blog to new and exciting heights, I suggest you get started on building those relationships.

What’s the Next Step

Here’s what you should do:

1. Make a list of bloggers in your niche that you want to make a connection with. These should be bloggers that have a similar audience to you.
2. Start commenting on their posts, sharing their content and engaging with them on a regular basis. The more you do, the more you’ll start standing out to them.

Conclusion

You’re trying to make a name for yourself, right?

I get it.

However, you won’t make it very far if you’re foolishly ignoring the rules. And it’s not enough to follow a few and not the others. If you want to leave a gigantic-sized impact in the blogging world, you have to follow all of these rules.

Now, I want to hear from you. How many of these rules are/were you breaking? Leave a comment below and share your thoughts on the importance of these rules. Also, make sure to share this post with your friends as well.