Looking for the best blogging tips for beginners or anyone is not hard to find. But, it is hard to determine which are the best blogging tips to follow.
It’s kind of like when we had our daughter’s 4th birthday party at the place with the ball pit. She somehow got into the ball pit before I could get her shoes off.
You know what happened. When we finally pulled her out, one shoe was gone. We dug around and found a lot of things at the bottom of the pit. We even found some shoes.
But we never found her shoe.
So here’s where the blogging tips come in: There’s a lot of good advice about blogging out there (and a lot of bad, btw), but of all of that good advice, what is the right advice for you?
I’ve gone through our philosophy on blogging and how it pertains to business and broken it down into this list of 9 blogging tips (I really wish I could’ve given you the top 10 blogging tips, but 9 is cool) that I believe will get you on the right path with that blog of yours.
I’ve got you covered with links to additional resources you can access if you need more in-depth details on any of these blogging tips.
9 Blogging Tips You Can Trust For Your Business
Don’t kill me on this first tip. I know you’re probably giving me a look as I tell you the first of these blogging tips is not to start one in the first place.
Just give me a minute to explain. The first and greatest challenge a successful blogger has when it comes to making money with their blog is with their mindset, so that’s where I’m going with this.
#1: Don’t start a blog.
And if you already started a blog, stop calling it that.
You are starting a business, a blog is one piece of it. The best blogging tips I can give you are going to help you start looking at your blog in a different way.
If you’re aiming to make money with this blog, then it’s crucial to treat it as part of the business you’ve initiated. These blogging tips are designed to help you do just that.
It’s part of your marketing efforts.
At Odd Noodle we teach you to start a business that includes creating Offers that will help your audience.
The Pocket Business Framework says business happens in four steps:
- Get them to notice you
- Get them to pay attention
- Get them to trust you
- Convert that trust into money
Your blog, armed with the right blogging tips, can help with all four of those things.
You use headlines on your posts that get noticed —that’s one of my essential blogging tips for capturing attention. You write detailed, engaging articles that keep people reading, another critical point in the realm of blogging tips.
If you are ready to click away because you’re thinking, I can’t create a product, don’t do that.
Yes, you can. If you don’t believe it yet, just stick around here with me because I believe you can. Because believe me, you can. And if you’re following the blogging tips we’re doling out, you’re already on the right path.
I’ve seen too many other people just like you do it, so put that thought out of your head for now, and let’s keep looking at the blogging tips.
#2: Learn to write top-notch titles.
Now, this is one of those blogging tips you can’t ignore. Getting people to notice you isn’t the hardest part of running a business (though it’s up there).Getting people to notice you isn’t the most difficult part of running a business.
(Getting people to trust you probably is).
But, if you can’t get anyone to notice you, then it’s impossible to get anyone through the rest of the four steps.
It’s like the old question “If a tree falls in the forest and there’s no one around to hear it, does it make a noise?”
Here the answer is no. Unless the noise is quiet weeping because you’re working so hard on this BUSINESS AND NO ONE IS COMING!
Blog post titles, email subjects, and headlines for landing pages are some of the most important things you will ever write for your business.
They’re some of the most crucial pieces of copy you’ll ever write, and if you’re looking for blogging tips that make a difference, this is one you need to internalize.
They are what encourage your reader to click on a pin, or a search engine result, open your email, or continue reading your masterfully crafted landing page.
And they are not simple to write. You don’t get a whole paragraph’s worth of words to encourage the person to continue to keep reading.
They have to be brief, emotional, and eye-catching and they have to have some kind of promise in them to convince your reader that this is what they are looking for to solve their problem.
Whew, it’s a lot of work. I’m sweating just thinking about it. But trust me, it’s one of those blogging tips that you can’t afford to ignore.
Power words like the ones on this list can help, but that’s just the start.
Lucky for you we have an excellent resource for how to write better blog post titles.
#3: Write consistently.
When you start a “blog” it is easy to take a break from writing blog posts every now and then. When you start to really think about how to make money blogging, you need to break that habit.
You want to have a consistent schedule for writing blog posts and email marketing.
Depending on your niche, you might be surprised at the amount of writing that goes into the business of blogging.
It’s quite a lot.
But showing up consistently with new blog posts, new emails, and new social media content is important for a couple of reasons.
First of all, every one of those things is a new chance to get people to notice you and pay attention to you.
But, secondly, consistency is one way to build trust with your audience as well. It’s definitely not the only way and it’s not the most important, but if you’re not consistent and you find yourself starting an email to your list,
“HEY! Sorry, I took a break for a few months again!”
Then you are breaking down the trust that is the most important and most difficult step in the Pocket Business Framework.
If you need help with staying consistent with writing, try this post on how to get inspired to write.
#4: You don’t need ALL the traffic. You need the right traffic.
Ok, so let’s go once upon a time style here.
Once upon a time, in the sunshiney land of Pinterestia, a beautiful princess could start a blog, write a bunch of posts, throw a bunch of pins at Pinterest and get hundreds of thousands of pageviews in Google Analytics, get into an ad network and make happy, happy ad money.
It was a wonderful time while it lasted. But for new bloggers, that is exactly what it sounds like. A long ago fairy tale that is not the reality of 2020.
But that’s ok. To be honest, that old way had its own set of problems that made blogging life difficult and starting a business that doesn’t rely so heavily on traffic is the smart way to go.
However, you do still need traffic. It’s just that now, you want the right traffic.
You can absolutely still work toward putting ads on your site if that is the route you want to take, but we would encourage you to see that as just one small piece of your business.
Because when you are getting the right traffic to your site, the people who are specifically interested in what you have to offer them, you stand a much better chance of succeeding with the stable income that Offers will give you.
If you want to learn more about our methods for bringing in traffic, you can read this post on how to get more blog traffic.
#5: It’s not about You.
The About Me page is something that is dreaded by almost all bloggers. I think that the great majority of people who start blogs consider themselves introverts and they don’t like the idea of talking about themselves for a WHOLE page.
I can completely understand that. And I have good news to share about it.
Your About Me page is not about you!
It’s about your Hero and showing her that your journey is like hers and therefore you can help her.
The About Me page is a place where you can work on building trust with your Hero. It’s meant to show the reader that you understand the problems and the emotions that she has and that you have ways to fix them!
So don’t worry about revealing all of your life secrets there. You can stick to the important stuff that is going to help your Hero.
#6: Choose a niche that fits these two criteria.
We used to tell you that you had to choose a niche that fit into a teeny tiny list of 7 topics.
Yuck, right?
Well, now we want you to think about just two things when it comes to choosing your blog niche.
- Are there people who are looking to solve a problem in your desired niche?
- Are those people willing to spend money to solve that problem?
Those are pretty broad, I know. So if you have several topics that you can answer yes to those two questions with, then the final question you should ask yourself is,
“What do I want to talk about for the next 5-10 years or more?”
You do want to choose a niche that you are excited to talk, write and learn about for a long time. This is going to be your business, not just a blog you wrote some content for that collects ad money.
Make it something that gets you excited to get out of bed in the morning.
#7: Get good at SEO but never forget who you are writing for.
SEO is a great marketing tool. You obviously want to do what you can to show up at the top of search engine results.
However, not unlike our fickle friend, Pinterest, SEO is not something you have complete control over. You can do as much keyword research and linking as you possibly, but you don’t have complete control over your ranking.
What you do have complete control over is creating content that is valuable for your audience.
Writing that is informative AND engaging that makes them want to know more about how you can help them improve.
That’s your first mission with every blog post you write. Not pleasing Google. That can be your second mission.
Check out this post on how to write for Google and your audience to learn more about how to do that.
#8: Treat it like a job.
I don’t know about you, but when I used to work a regular job, I had a daily routine.
There were set things I knew I had to do every day to keep myself organized and get done everything that needed to be done by the end of the week.
You should treat your own business no differently.
But there are SO many different things that you are responsible for as a business owner.
Lucky for you all of the important things you need to do on a daily basis fall into four categories. Can you guess what they are?
That’s right!
The Pocket Business Framework: get noticed, get attention, get trust, get money.
We’ve got a Blogging Daily Checklist post that should help you figure out what will work for you.
#9: Don’t spend a fortune in the early days of starting your business.
Starting an online business with a blog successfully does not have to be expensive.
There is no reason whatsoever to spend a ton of money upfront on things like a designer, a theme, a VA, or expensive premium plug-ins or services.
Pick and choose where you want to spend money at first and as you make more money with your business, you can decide what you want to invest in. These should be things that will give you more time to work on your business.
If pinning is taking up precious time for you that could be spent better elsewhere, then when you are ready, a Pinterest VA might be a good option.
But in the beginning, keep it simple and cheap.
Start with free or relatively cheap services for the essentials like email service. We love Flodesk as an economical choice.
I wrote a story about a woman who started a blog for cheap. I hope you like it.
The one place you might want to choose to spend a good chunk of money in the beginning is on your education.
Back to The First of the Blogging Tips
Remember way back at the beginning of this post where I told you to stop calling this a blog?
Well, I mean it. If you have a blog and you intend to make money with it, then you have a business.
23 Blogging Tips from Actual Bloggers
The previous tips were all from us, but we wanted to get even more blogging tips from actual bloggers so we hit up some of our students to see what things they could share.
It Takes Time
I’m starting here with “it takes time” because it is a sentiment I heard over and over again.
And it’s true.
But it’s also not exactly true.
It will take time.
Catherine, Random Cath
Blogging isn’t a get-rich-quick scheme and these blogging tips won’t get you rich quick. It’s a business and there’s a lot to learn and a lot of actual work that goes into it that does take time.
I think it would have helped if I knew to be more patient longterm.
Charisty, Mouse Ear Memories
But that doesn’t mean that it has to take a LONG time to make money. We believe if you set yourself up for success from the beginning then you can find ways to monetize your blog from the start.
I wish I would’ve known that SEO takes a really long time before it starts kicking in. I would’ve been more patient.
Corey, Quickbooost.com
Things like SEO do take time. But waiting around for Google to pluck you out of the sandbox isn’t a reason to not start monetizing your site right away. There are a lot of ways to get people to notice your site, SEO is just one tactic that will do that.
It takes time so don’t rush it.
Darla, Famlee of Four
Start with the mindset that you are in this for the long haul, you’ll make better decisions for your blog. Have the patience to set a solid foundation and in six months you won’t be thinking about starting all over again.
But don’t be afraid to figure out how you can start making money right away.
It Doesn’t Have to Be Perfect
One thing that paralyzes new bloggers is the feeling of having to have everything just right on Day 1.
Well, guess what?
Practically no one is coming to see your site on Day 1. And you have literally forever to get things closer and closer to perfect. Whatever you imagine perfect to be.
I wish I had known not to strive for perfection. That sounds like a weird thing at first (who doesn’t want things to be perfect?), but in reality, perfectionism is something that just ended up slowing me down. I’ve learned now that things don’t have to be perfect the first time around, they can be improved over time.
Dylan, Swift Salary
I wish I had known that everything didn’t need to be perfect from the word go. I have had a really clear idea from Day 1 about what I wanted my website to be in the long term, but I really struggled with wanting everything out there, right now…I felt like I needed to have it aaaaaaall in place before I could move on. As soon as I scaled back and stopped trying to do it all at once, it all clicked.
Kath, The Life Spotters
There’s a balance to this idea of “it doesn’t have to be perfect”, however.
Not everything needs to be perfect, but there are a few things that you do want to do to the very best of your abilities right from the start.
Your content is #1 and your site experience is #2.
If your content is no good, you will not get anywhere. That is a scary fact to learn when you are starting out as a blogger.
Because you’re going to think, “How can I ever have the best Ultimate Guide to Homesteading” when I’m just starting and just murdered ALL of the parsley I was growing on my windowsill?”.
Content needs to be the best, and consistency is key.
Maria, Stachio
You don’t have to be an expert on your ENTIRE niche on Day 1, but for the posts you do write on the stuff you do know, like Maria says, that content needs to be the best.
It needs to make your reader feel like you are a step ahead of them on their journey and that you can guide them the rest of the way.
I wish I knew that everything isn’t important. It’s so easy to get caught up in wanting to do everything just because you see 100 people talk about 100 different things, but the reality is that blogging is only a couple of steps that you repeat over and over again.
Get good at those things and suddenly you have a blog business.
I will say that I got a ton of exercise chasing my own tail for 10 years though so I guess it wasn’t all bad.
Scrivs, PaulScrivens.com
And your theme doesn’t need to be the perfect dream theme that is in your head from the beginning.
But your theme does need to make it easy for your readers to consume the great content that you have written for them.
What I wished I knew before, was that I don’t have to have everything perfect in order to start.
Cassy, CassandrePierre.com
So watch the pop-ups and fancy sign-up boxes that you are dying to plaster all over the place. You stand a better chance of getting someone to sign up for your mailing list after they’ve peacefully read through your content without being hit with several annoying pop-ups or other distractions.
I was so stuck on this idea that everyone, all 7 billion people on earth, had to like me. That thought put a lot of pressure on myself to be perfect. After learning some things I realized I don’t need that many people to like me to be successful. I don’t even need 5% of those people to like me. I just need the few people who I can help, the few people that want to listen, and those that want to be a part of what I am creating.
Jasmin, Jazz Up Your Wanderlust
Jasmin is soo right. You aren’t going to try to please the whole entire world. You don’t have to be the perfect solution for everyone. You just have to be the perfect solution for the people that are in your tribe.
I wish I knew that nothing had to be perfect, not your theme, social media, or logo before launching. I focused on too many things being perfect before working on the part that really matters, helping readers solve problems.
Brittney, One Weird Mamma
In the end that’s what it all comes down to. If your content is helping to solve a problem for your reader, then you have crossed the first giant hurdle.
If you’re helping to solve someone’s problem, then you’re going to get people to pay attention to you.
It’s a Business with a Blog
That I was creating a business. I didn’t have that mindset shift til the fall of last year…almost 3 years in.
Shawna, Stress Less Be Healthy
A blog is an amazing part of your business. We believe there are four steps in the system to build a successful business:
- Get them to notice you.
- Get them to pay attention to you.
- Get them to trust you.
- Convert that trust into money.
And your blog is one part of achieving all four of those steps.
When you start to see that your blog is part of a business, you start to see the importance of talking to the right people.
I wish I truly understood what it means to be speaking directly to your ideal client. It’s so easy as a new online business owner to be swayed by the freebies offered to you in exchange for a blog post. Understanding who your website is created for will attract people naturally.
Jackie, Whole 9 Family
When you see your blog as a business, you start to think about who your audience is.
And it’s not everybody.
It’s one person, your Hero who represents your ideal reader. When you can define who your Hero is, everything will start to fall into place for you.
One thing I wish I knew before I started was that you should only write posts on topics and ideas that people are actually searching for! Who knew that the world wasn’t searching for your turkey meatball surprise or your story of giving birth to your child?!
Ree, Mind Body Spirit Bliss
Yes, as much as you might love your turkey meatball surprise, it’s not about you. It’s about helping your reader solve a problem. When you fully grasp the idea of writing about problems that your audience is looking for solutions to, you’ll start to see the difference between a hobby blog and a blog business.
A Lot of It Comes Down to Mindset
I used to be one of those people that kind of scoffed at things like “mindset”. Until I started to see very clearly my own mindset issues.
See, instead of saying I was afraid to do something, I would say, “I hate that. I’m not doing it”.
I said it about Instagram. I said it about video. I said it about guest posting.
I was wrong. I never hated any of that I was just scared to try them.
“I wish I had known how much I’d have to fight self-doubt”.
Kelley, Champagne and Mudboots
Most of the time, for those of us who can be honest with ourselves, you will see mindset issues crop up as feelings of self-doubt.
You look at people, other bloggers, who are farther down the track than you are and you don’t believe that you can ever get there. You see where they are now and assume it’s where they have always been.
As if they waved a wand on Day 1 and everything actually was perfect.
It’s not actually like that for anyone. Even those blogs that look perfect to you probably have miles still to go and the same self-doubt that you suffer from, they have it, too.
It’s so common that we actually created a series of workshops to battle mindset issues.
I wish I had known how lonely blogging would make me feel in a world where no one understands what I do all day.
Jen, Practical By Default
What makes the self-doubt even a little bit worse is that, as Jen says, blogging can be a lonely business.
Do you remember the day you decided to start your blog and you told an important person in your life about it? What was their reaction?
If it was completely supportive and enthusiastic, then congratulations to you.
But for a lot of people, when you tell someone you’re starting a blog, the reaction starts with a smirk and some really wide eyes. If they love you enough, they’ll cover that look up quickly with a “That’s GREAT, honey!”.
But it’s too late. You already saw the “what are you talking about now??” look that flashed across their face for a second.
Even under the best circumstances there just aren’t a lot of people in real life who are going to be following the same path you are with this blog thing.
It makes celebrating victories a little difficult. And it’s hard to turn to a sympathetic ear when things aren’t going so well.
You Don’t Have to Know EVERYTHING
I wish I knew I didn’t have to be an expert, and that a blog didn’t have to be about ‘me and what I knew/was doing’ and could be about a topic rather. I would have made so much more progress if I knew that when I started.
Joelle, Vardo Media
Joelle makes an excellent point.
There are a lot of benefits when you take what we call the “journeyman” route rather than the “expert” route.
As a journeyman, you are showing your reader what you know about a particular topic and how you are progressing as you master it.
To me, it’s a more interesting approach to “expert” because you get to see someone progress, try and fail, and show you the mistakes that they made so that you can avoid them.
When you are an “expert” it can be really hard to remember the learning process that you went through in order to become an expert. Small details that have become second nature for you are what might trip up a beginner.
So don’t be afraid to show your journey and let your reader know you are on that journey. It will help to make your story relatable.
You’re Going To Have to Be Flexible and Consistent
It’s not easy to be flexible and consistent. The words aren’t necessarily opposites, but they don’t always really go together.
You have to find a good balance between going with the flow and having a plan. If you don’t have a plan your business will lack direction and go nowhere. If you hold too tightly to a plan you will get caught up in the little things and will never grow.
Ana, aFriesen.com
It can be difficult to know when to stay the course and give things a little bit more time and when it is time to move on. Decisions like that come with the territory when you are running a blog business.
You have to learn to trust yourself to make decisions. It’s not as easy as it sounds.
What I wish I knew: don’t get caught up in every “shiny” thing that comes along; it’s more important to be committed to what you are good at and consistent in connecting to your tribe than chasing around after every trend or trying to be amazing at everything.
Audrey, Just An Organized Home
The shiny things that Audrey is talking about are kind of like peer pressure when you were a kid.
Every other blog suddenly has a cool new widget that sends people to your social media channels. That’s pretty cool, right? You want that, too, right??
You have to be able to take a step back and ask yourself, is that widget thingy a good idea? Do you really want to send people away from your site? Do you really want to interrupt their reading right in the middle of the post?
I know it sounds like I’m leaning toward “NO you don’t want to do that”, but there isn’t really a right or wrong answer I can give you. It’s up to you to think critically about whatever that shiny object might be and whether or not it’s going to move you forward.
Maybe growing your Instagram is a goal you have for your business, so maybe you do consider the widget.
To trust my intuition, and not give up.
Adrienne, Brownie Cat Club
Find Someone You Trust To Learn From
One thing I wished I’d known before I started blogging: That just because a blogger had success with one blog, that doesn’t mean he/she is qualified to give advice on how to build a successful online business.
Steph, Financial Freedom Crew
There is an ocean of information available to you, both free and paid in the form of courses on blogging and blogging tips. It is absolutely overwhelming to figure out who to listen to.
Find someone you trust to learn from and consume as much of their free material as you can and then decide if purchasing a course is right for you.
At Odd Noodle, we have more than half a million words written about how to blog that you can access for free before you decide whether or not you’d like to purchase one of our courses.
We keep starting blogs because we want to be sure that the methods we’re teaching are working today, in today’s blogging environment.
We don’t rely on what worked for sites that were started 1 year or 2 or more ago. And we don’t assume that what works in one niche is going to work in every niche.
So not only do we run several blogs, we run several blogs in different niches. Because not everyone is going to join the Make Money Online niche.
I wish I knew that I should have started writing regularly and trying things, instead of spending hours and days reading the advice of tens of people or watching videos on blogging and business.
Francois, Guide2Music
If you can find one guide that makes sense to you, that you feel like you can trust, that you can see is constantly keeping up with the ever-changing world of making money online with a blog, then you can block out all of the other noise that comes in the form of all the different courses, freebies and webinars that you come across every day.
I wish I had understood the difference between a tactic and a goal. I spent a ton of time implementing tactics that had no lasting value because they weren’t ultimately attached to a goal. Once I understood my overall goal, I was able to eliminate a lot of wasted time and energy.
Jodi, Wealthy N Wise
If you can find a guide who will help you see that a tactic is something that may or may not help you achieve your goals, that there’s a system that you need to follow in order for the tactics to actually stand a chance of working, then you will begin to be able to make the right decisions for your blog business.
