1. Cluttered design. There is a tendency for beginning bloggers to slap as much information as possible on the main page, using the sidebars and headers as places to display information. Avoid this temptation. The best blog design is a clean and simple one that displays only the necessary information.
2. Long blogrolls on the main page. There was a time when the fashion was for bloggers to put long blogrolls on their main pages. These were usually the results of link exchanges. But the days of link exchanges are behind us. The only thing you accomplish with a big blogroll is passing all of your PageRank to other sites. If you want a big blogroll, create a separate page for it.
3. Too many ads. We all need to make a little money, sure, especially if we’re spending money on hosting. But too many ads can become excessive and will turn away readers. Limit your blog to two or three well-placed ad spots.
4. Poor hosting. If you don’t get a good hosting package at first, you might notice your blog going offline frequently. Do some research into data centre companies that provide the best solutions. In the long run you’ll be happy you did.
5. Short posts. Not long ago bloggers could succeed by posting a lot of short posts. Ten 200-word posts was better for traffic than two 1,000-word posts. But the Google Panda update has changed that. You should be shooting for at least 600 words per post, and 750 is an even better goal.
6. No link building. It’s very tough to get people to link to your blog without asking. Since you need backlinks in order to rank in the search engines, you should go out and guest post. Those links will bring new visitors to your site, and will give you more authority in the search engine results.
7. Bad on-page SEO. Some say SEO is dead, but they really don’t get it. SEO — search engine optimization — is as important as ever. Make sure you’re using keywords important to your niche. Make sure that major pages on your site are no more than one click away from the main page. These elements will make it easier for search engines to find content on your site.
8. Poor internal linking. Go look at Wikipedia. They have tons of links to other Wikipedia pages in every article. You should set up something like this on your blog, so your major keywords automatically link to pages on your site. Check out the rb internel link plugin or seo smart link for WordPress. You can set up keywords to link automatically, which will boost your search rankings for those terms.
9. Linking irrelevant key words. Make sure that when you link, you’re linking using relevant key terms. The Google Penguin update is on the lookout for this type of linking, and your blog can be penalized for it.
10. Following paid links. Google frowns upon blogs that don’t use the rel=nofollow tag for paid links. If someone pays for a text link on your site, make sure to add the rel=nofollow tag. I had a blog penalized by this, and we had to apply to Google for reinstatement.
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