I have read tons of articles that give us reasons and statistics why bloggers fail. Most of these articles focus on bloggers who are on the scene already and try to bring out some factors surrounding their blogging activities that can bring about failure.
Some say the content isn't good enough, others say it's lack of promotion or a solid monetization strategy. Not posting consistently or not having enough time are the other reasons I see being mentioned most often! As a matter of fact, they are all correct. But I have not read where anyone mentioned any of these fundamental factors I'm going to list here in this post.
Why Fundamental?
These are fundamental because they are at the beginning of their blogging activities and they form the foundation on which other factors are built. I think at this level, if any mistake is not identified and dealt with, chances of succeeding and growing a thriving blogging business are slim. By discussing these foundational factors, I hope to help some who are about to start or who are at the verge of collapsing to take shape and possibly start off on a better foundation.
4 Fundamental Reasons Bloggers Fail!
1 – Choosing an unreliable web host
This is one of the bad reasons some people have left business today. Sadly, little or no one is talking about this particular factor. I think the reason is that there are so many great web hosting companies today so much that no one things this can ever be an issue.
But I'll shock you…
People have made wrong choices of where to host their sites. As soon as their businesses start picking up, the next thing is their website is unavailable. That's a big punch on your business;
- It kills trust
- It sends away prospective customers
- It sends out bad signals to partners
- It kills your SEO
- Etc
[tweet_box design=”box_03″]Make sure you choose a reliable web host for your blog so you don't fail! [/tweet_box]
Some weeks back, a friend contacted me from Nigeria to recommend a reliable web host. The reason was that his local (Nigerian) web hosting company had become so unreliable.
His business website and blog were online today and tomorrow offline. That almost crumbled his online business until he took a different move.
I sent him a list of web hosting companies I think are reliable but asked him to take time and investigate them. After scouting the net for information to help his decision, he wrote to me about Temok Hosting, which was his final choice:
If your web hosting company is making your business difficult, change it. A reliable web hosting company has the obligation to host your files and data and make them available each time requested by you or your readers.
A minimum guarantee must be 99.9% uptime, live customer support, enough disk space and bandwidth to carter for your traffic, tools and resources to allow you create and manage your databases, email accounts, upload files, etc.
If your cousin is running a web hosting company, that's no reason to buy hosting from him. Affinity should never be a business factor.
2 – Blogging in the wrong niche
Most of the other factors that cause people to drop from blogging are supported by the fact that they made some very wrong decisions from the start. As a matter of fact, people blog in different niches for different reasons. Some, to make money, some do it just to express themselves on certain topics, some do it for business, some do it because others are doing it, etc; If you don't have a solid reason why you want to blog, you may end up choosing the wrong niche.
Note that the wrong niche for you may be the most perfect one for some other people. The reason for this is that people are different! We can't all follow the same path, and if we tried, we would all turn into clones or even worse – robots!
When you choose the wrong topic, you may end up getting really bored, loosing interest and motivation, lacking creativity for picking blog topics, etc.
Now, if someone drops out here as a result of lack of motivation, everyone else will take that (lack of motivation) as a factor behind your abandonment. But we know from this post that the real reason is a wrong choice of topic that was made at the start. It's the foundation that's bad.
NB: If you want to be able to choose the write topic to blog about, check out this guide I wrote on my blog.
3 – Blogging in seasonal topics
After the bloggers forum we had here in Douala last year, one of the participants came to me and after about 5 minutes of discussion, she told me she'd like to blog about Christmas.
I told her it's a great topic but what will you be doing during Easter? She smiled!
You know, it's a good thing to create event-based blogs but these blogs become so dormant in dead seasons. Before you start a blog in any topic, be sure that topic is evergreen.
4 – Choosing the wrong coach
The best way to start a business and minimize cost is to be guided by a mentor or a coach. But if you choose the wrong guide or coach in the beginning, your success is already compromised.
I had a very active guy on my blog. At one moment, he became so silent and his blog went dormant. I shot him a mail, trying to know why he's been this absent. But he sent me a shocking reply:
“… I have tried everything my coach taught me but not even one is working…”
So sad!
You see that the role model you are following could be the reason you are not making it.
How did you get to know him? Did you do enough investigations? Does he have a track record as a coach?
How can you allow someone without a success story teach you how to succeed?
Recommended:
Born to Blog: Building Your Blog for Personal and Business Success One Post at a Time
Conclusion!
You see that all these 4 reasons have to do with the foundation. Once the foundation is broken, there is no way you can hope for a long lasting structure.
The solution is to go back to that bad foundation and do the corrections. Change your host, get a new coach, chose the right evergreen topic and you'll definitely success in blogging.
Drop a comment and let me know what you think. Don't fail to check out my blog here for more engagement
A very thoughtful post Enstine,
Those are really the fundamental things that many people usually ignore while starting their blog and later, the reality will start staring them on the face.
If you choose a wrong host while starting your blog then you’re bound to fail no matter.
Thanks for sharing.
Hey bro,
Thanks for your input on this post.
As a matter of fact, hosting has always remained a hidden problem but if we address properly on time, we’re a step ahead.
hope you are set for a wonderful weekend ahead
Your every words are very true. When I had started blogging then I was not conscious about hosting and I bought a local hosting for running my blog.
After working some days, I realized that I am not getting rank from search engine without any reason. I mean, I had analyzed a lot and get no answer why all of these happening. Then I have changes my web hosting and now I am getting better result.
Hi Enstine!
These are definitely very important reasons to really pay close attention to – when starting a new blog online.
Especially number One!!
I have to admit that I did not really care too much about the Hosting Quality for my blogs, at the beginning. And a few months ago one of my growing blogs was having too many down times – way too often.
So, I had to make a change of hosting!
Ever since I upgraded my hosting – my main blog has not been having loading issues and it has not crashed ever since. 😀
It was a smart move!
The one hosting service I would recommend is called; ‘Traffic Planet Hosting’. It is from the ones behind the traffic planet forum – for those who might be curious.
I think getting a high quality hosting plan from the very beginning of your blogging journey is very important. Because your ultimate plan is to get hundreds and hundreds of visitors every single day, right?!!
It would be a pain in the butt to have to move your entire site to a better hosting service. Trust me, I know from my own experiences! 😉
The other 3 reasons you have mentioned here are spot on as well man!
Thank you very much for sharing your valuable insights on blogging here, Enstine!
Keep up the great work!
Enjoy your week.
Cheers! 😀
Hi Freddy,
Thanks for adding to this post 😉
I remember my first website was hosted for $1/m. That was quite affordable but full of downtimes.
As you mentioned, getting the right host is crucial. I have checked out that host before and I think they are great 😉
Thanks for sharing your experience man and do have a wonderful weekend ahead
Hey Enstine,
Great to see you and this awesome content on Ileane’s place! 🙂
These four mistakes are too common and mostly done by the newcomers. As you know that thorough research is needed in the initial stage of the blogging; from domain name to niche and host to content.
You miss out on the research, you step up the foot on the last footstep of a bus where you have chances of falling more than getting entered inside of the bus.
As you spend the money for the web hosting, you deserve the best in industry.
And niche selection and topics, oh my!! I can imagine how much headache it causes. You keep on writing and you find no result and interest by people no matter how much effort one puts in.
In the last, coaches… Everyone just kicking the blogging industry finding themselves mentors and able to coach the masses. And in this world of competition, newcomers need to set foot up on the right track from start.
But unfortunately, selecting a low-credible, unknown, and with cheap rates, they set fire to their money, efforts and time. I’d always advice getting in touch with the top bloggers to find their recommendations for picking up coaches.
And what I want to add, as I live in a not-so-developed country, the ultimate core reason of the blogging here is to earn money. Just earn a few dollars! For that they do a heck of the effort to monetize their blogs from day one using AdSense, Chitika and InfoLinks.
After months of effort, they are doomed and abandoned their blogs because of no money and result. This is the mindset developed over here and long term blogs are hard to find.
Blogging does need good time, smart mind and consistent effort!
Thank you so much for the great share of you, Enstine! Happy to share it on my social life!
See ya! 🙂
~ Adeel
Hey buddy,
Good to see you here and thanks for covering every point here in the comment.
Just like here where most of the bloggers I have met express some desire to make money from their blogs. It’s not always easy the way they are being told and when they start facing tough times, most of them drop 😉
Thanks for being part of this post buddy. I hope you are having wonderful moments over there 😉
I am new in blogging, so not yet tasted any failure, nor success. However, I was wondering some out there must be failed with the bogging work, and I wanted to know possible reasons. So I went googling through various blogs. True that many guru’s mentioned acceptable reasons, however most of them skipped the ones you showed here. So it is just great to drop by here.
Hi Rocky,
Thanks man for being part of this post and for dropping a comment 😉
I hope you are doing great and ready for a wonderful weekend ahead
Yes, I was about to hurt my blog with the wrong server hosting service. This is a nice post.
Thanks for your feedback Sharma 😉
Very nice tips. I would like to add fail to create networking with other bloggers.
Hey Ravi,
Yeah that’s correct as they grow in blogging 😉
Thanks for your input bro
Thanks for nice information.planing is very important you are right many new blogger start blogging in wrong niche and then start publishing other niche post.i think making calendar to update blog or making daily schedule for blogging is very important thing for success.
Hey Suraj,
I have had some bloggers ask me questions to know if content in this or that topic can be good for their blogs. I just simply found out they started wrongly and that’s why they are trying to feed in content from other topics.
Proper research in the beginning is necessary
Hello Enstine,
You’ve just hit the nail on the head with the Fundamentals of Blogging. Most people want to become master bloggers yet they fail to go through the fundamentals in becoming masters in blogging.
As my team leader usually say, “When the fundamentals is flawed, everything will surely come crashing down.”
Once these 4 fundamentals of blogging are put in place, bloggers are bound to succeed with a long lasting structure.
Thanks for sharing.
Your leader is right bro Okolo 😉
The foundamentals make your foundation and if that’s weak, the structure cannot stand.
Thanks for your input bro.
I hop you are set for a wonderful weekend ahead
Hello Enstine Muki,
This is something great stuff to find here 🙂
Indeed no body talks about these in their post. You truly said, these are some fundamental
but unmentioned points.
Web host is something that is really a matter for concern for every blogger out there.
If the web site do not seems to be easy and reliable, the customers are flew away from us.
It should be fast enough and pretty much attractive, so that the customers are still stuck at our web
sites.
Thank you for this important share among us.
Keep Writing 🙂
Shantanu sinha
Hi Shantanu,
Good to see you here this morning and thanks for reading and taking time to drop this comment.
Hope you are having a wonderful week 😉
Hi Enstine
Not surprised by the quality of this post. You really hit the nail.
This a great reminder and these fundamentals are very important and mostly taken for granted.
Thanks for sharing. Take care
Hey bro,
once the foundation is poorly laid, failure is eminent 😉
Thanks for your comment
Hey Enstine,
Great article once again!
I do consider that choosing a wrong web host is one of the biggest mistakes if you are blogger, but I don’t agree with the fact that there is any wrong niche. The reason is if you are not passionate about blogging, then you won’t do any better in your favorite niche as well. There are many bloggers out there running popular blogs on topic that they don’t have any interest in. It all depends on the research and dedication.
In my opinion, blogging on seasonal topics is not a mistake, but more of a choice!
And I never had a coach, so I can’t comment on it.
What do you think about my answers?
– Arbaz Khan
Thanks for sharing your opinions bro.
It all depends on the angel you are coming from and the way you see it.
Questions!
What defines your passion for something?
Why decide to blog on a seasonal topic?
Answering these questions will help know whether a niche is wrong or not and whether it’s a mistake taking on seasonal topics or not.
Hope you are having a wonderful week
Adding to that, the type of content some blogs are presenting is totally pushing something else. The blog should give a solution not just talks.
Thanks for that contribution Ravish 😉
Many people don’t seek to resolve issues and that’s why their content is boring.
hope you are have a wonderful week
You are absolutely right… Selecting the wrong niche is the major reason for too many failure. The prime reason being people ideally look for niche which pays more rather than focusing on niche which interests them a lot. So after setting up the blog people tend to loose interest as it is something which they are not much aware of.
Thanks for the share it is really informative for every novice blogger.
Cheers
Hey Aalia,
Thanks for your wonderful contribution to the conversation. I hope you are set for a wonderful weekend 😉
Hi Enstine,
All your points are very valid – especially finding the right niche.
If you don’t think it through, it is easy to outgrow your niche and run out of things to blog about.
Another area that I think is challenging as a blogger is getting organized. There is so much to do – so if you don’t have good systems in place, it is hard to keep up with the schedule.
Hey Neena,
You are very correct about getting organized and that applies to most areas of our lives. There is a lot to do as you mentioned and not following a plan and being disciplined can lead to general failure.
Thanks Neena for adding to the conversation this weekend 😉
Enstine –
New to your site, but really enjoying the posts! One comment / question on this one: while reliability is obviously HUGE, how much of an impact do you find the web hosts speed makes on rankings? I forget what podcast I was listening to recently, but they were on about having a host that will give you faster page loads…but, assuming it’s not super slow, how much of difference will it really make? When you’re talking a second or two difference, will it really impact rankings? I currently thinking about just making sure my images are optimized and possibly using AWS or something similar to host the images for a speed bump.
Anyway, just curious if this is something you have insight on. Thanks again!
Hi John,
You know speed alone is just a factor and that really plays a lot if you competitors are better than you.
A lot of things affect your load speed, including server configuration, quality of scripts, images, etc
While you can handle areas like images, coding, etc, the server resources can only be a responsibility of your host.
I think the impact of speed depends on competition. Google matches different factors to determine the position of your entry on SERP. Speed may not be as heavy as backlinks and content relevance, but at one point, it could help your competitor with a faster site rank better than you.
A second or two difference can mean a lot, all things being equal. But a super fast new site with shallow content may not stand an old slower dog with a lot of meaty content 😉
Again an informative post. All these reasons behind blog failure are undoubtedly valid and the one which I think is the major reason is start blogging in wrong niche because many times it happens that bloggers plan to work on some niche and after some time they start publishing other niche post, and this push them to big failure. The points you have shared here must be keep in mind! Thank you again 🙂
Hi Pooja,
Good to hear from you and thanks for the comment. I hope you are in the right niche 😉
do have a wonderful weekend
My niche is inspirational blogging. I am growing a following, close to 4,000 email subscribers, but how do I take it to the next level? I want to stay personal and real while giving inspiration. I am also a Christian blog.
Hi Mary,
It’s great to hear your story and I have to recommend you stay focused.
First, there are things you’ve done that have grown your blog to where it is now. Why not rinse and repeat?
One of the ways is to connect with like-minded bloggers. It’s proven to generate impressive results.
Sharing your business cards with other Christians during live events and encouraging them to check out your blog can also be a go step forward. I know people want to connect with positive people so stay positive.
Nice to have you here Mary. I hope you are set for an exciting weekend
I completely agree with your list of failures. My last blog failed because I was blogging in wrong niche. I am a computer programmer but I created a blog on celebrity news gossips. As I didn’t had much experience in writing about celebrity.. my posts were not catching attention. Slowly I lost interest and closed my blog. I strongly recommend that .. we should not blindly follow the trend, I f we are not passionate about it.
Very helpful & important post for the new bloggers. Well, i will share my first blog fail the reason you have described in the first point. exactly 2 years back i started my first blog with free domain (weebly) i spent 3 days on design and written some articles. One fine day i cant able to login my free blog when i checked the mail (your website is blocked) , and the reason is you have used some custom html code ( very basic html tags i’ve used) and told me to update the premium account so you can use the blog as you wish. So, i wasted my valuable time and the next moment i purchased a domain hosting with godaddy.
99% of bloggers start with a purpose. so, dont go for any free services its really waste of time. Specially for commercial blogs. thanks Enstine Muki for sharing !