Let me start off this post with a little assumption … Every one of us wants to be a good blogger, right?

But it’s not like we get a lot of direct opinions about how good we actually are… I mean, your friends and family will tell you that you’re great. A number of haters will tell you that you suck. But it’s not like these opinions reflect the actual situation.

The negative voices are always more vocal than the positive ones, and the things your friends say … well, they just don’t have the guts to say anything bad. So how you can find out for sure?

First of all, let’s explain what it means to actually be a good blogger.

Who’s a good blogger?

The most important distinction is that being a good blogger is not the same thing as being a good writer. Writing is a single activity – you take an idea, and write an article around it. Blogging involves a lot more elements. Apart from writing.

• Bloggers have to network with other bloggers
• Master the art of online promotion,marketing and social media
• Do brand building
• Attract new followers and subscribers
• Have some business sense and be able to turn pro at some point
• They need to learn how to make things happen
• Manage their own work and time, and much much more

Taking all this into account, there are 7 signs that you’re NOT a good blogger.

1. You’re not publishing regularly

This is really basic, but some people still forget that publishing regularly is, essentially, your main task as a blogger. If you don’t publish regularly, people will lose track of what’s going on with your blog, or even forget about you completely, which is not good for business. If, at some point, you get distracted and don’t publish a post for a longer while, just return to your everyday blogging like nothing ever happened.

Whatever you do, don’t publish a “sorry I’ve been away post.” The reason is simple. Some people won’t even notice that you were gone, unless you tell them…

2. You’re not managing your time properly

Time management may sound like something only people loaded with extreme amount of work need, but it’s not the case. Whatever your career is, and whatever you’re doing, you can always use a time management system to make you more effective. Let’s face it, there are a lot of tasks a blogger needs to do on a daily basis, and if you try to keep it all in your head, you’ll inevitably forget some of it.

First of all, I encourage you to check out a methodology called Getting Things Done. Then try different online tools to make you more effective. Tools like: Remember The Milk, Teambox, Google Calendar, Dropbox, and others.

3. You have no blogging friends

Bloggers who try to make things happen on their own will have a lot harder time achieving success. Building a network of contacts and utilizing it for various purposes is a lot better approach. Here are some of the possible benefits:

• you can email your blogging friends notifying them about a new post of yours,
• you can take part in joint ventures,
• you can promote each other on different occasions,
• they can help you get guest posting spots on other blogs,
• you can host guest posts from them,
• you can promote each other’s products as affiliates, and much more.

Quite frankly, building a network of contacts is a great practice in any industry, blogging included. Don’t pretend that it doesn’t concern you.

4. No one contacts you with freelance writing opportunities

If you’re a good blogger, chances are that some people will notice and reach out to you with new opportunities. The most obvious opportunity for a blogger is a freelance writing project of some kind. If you’re inside a fairly popular niche, you should get offers like that every now and then. If there aren’t any then maybe you’re not as good as you think. But still, you can help the situation a little by providing an easy-to-use contact form or any other clear way of getting a hold of you.

It still amazes me that some bloggers have absolutely no contact information on their sites, or that the info is buried so deep that it’s like it wasn’t there at all.

5. You don’t know what SEO is

I’m sorry, but good blogging has a lot to do with SEO. Good bloggers accept this fact and try to make the most out of it. Bad bloggers think that SEO is not relevant and that content is the only king. From my perspective, there’s no point in providing great content if you’re going to do nothing to promote it in the search engines.

Every post you publish should include some form of SEO (optimization), even if it’s just some simple keyword research and good subheadings. Remember that Google is the biggest provider of traffic online. You can really earn a lot in terms of traffic and recognition if you decide to play their game.

6. You don’t know what your most popular articles are

This one is about knowing your audience and being aware what’s going on on your OWN blog. If you don’t know what your most popular content is then how are you going to create more of it? I mean, there’s really little point in publishing posts just for the sake of it.

Every blogger should aim at publishing only posts that have the biggest chance of going viral. To be up-to-date with your blog start by installing a plugin like WordPress Popular Postsand including a Google Analytics embed code in your blog. This will give you all the information you need.

What matters is ongoing work. Check your stats every week or every month and note which articles have become the most popular, then create your publishing schedule for the next months to include more articles similar to the popular ones in some way (topic, style, etc.).

7. You have no plan for your blog’s nearest future

Bad bloggers are always running around like a chicken with its head cut off. Remember that you’re a blogger long term (at least that’s my assumption). So you need to have a plan for your blog, or else your success will be a lot less predictable. Things worth including in your plan are:

• Your publishing schedule.
• New keywords to tackle.
• A list of blogs where you want to guest post.
• A list of products you want to create.
• A list of products you want to promote as an affiliate.
• A list of joint venture projects and their execution schedules.
• The general goal your blog should achieve in one year’s time.

Of course, this is just an example, and you’re free to include whatever else you find suitable. That’s it for my list of 7 signs that you’re not a good blogger. Feel free to comment and share your own insights. Also, what would look good as the item #8 on this list?

About the author: Karol K. is a freelance writer and blogger. If you’re interested in learning how to start writing paid articles feel free to visit him at YoungPrePro.

 

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