This Is Why No One Reads Your Blog

So you finally got round to starting your blog and you have been going strong for a few weeks. However, you only get one or two visitors and no one seems to stick around to read the other posts. You’re not making any money blogging. What could be wrong?

There could be a lot of contributing factors. You may have to do some detective work to diagnose the problem.

Fortunately for you, the heavy lifting has been done. This guide gives some potential reasons as to why no one reads your blog. After going through it, you will know what you have been doing wrong and what steps you should take to improve the situation.

You Are Not Offering Any Value

The first question you need to ask yourself is whether your blog is offering any real value.

Are your readers getting any of their problems solved after reading your articles?

Do you think you are giving them any viable solutions to their issues? If the answer is no, then this something you need to address urgently.

People visit blogs because they have a ‘need’ that has to be satisfied and a question that needs an answer. A successful blog will be able to sufficiently fulfil this.

Solution: Before writing an article or post, ask yourself what problem you are addressing and who you are writing it for. Aim to answer and solve this problem in the most effective and efficient way you can, while keeping your target audience in mind.

You May Be Offering Value, But You Are in an Overspecialized Niche

Some niches already have small audiences. Targeting an overspecialized one means you will have an even smaller well of readers to draw from. This means that even if your blog is extremely successful, you will not hit a huge number of readers as more general blogs would.

Solution: You can either accept that your blog will always have a smaller number of readers, or simply start a targeting a larger demographic within the general pool of your niche.

You Are Not Doing the Necessary SEO Work

In order to have a successful blog, your website’s SEO must be on point. You should have all the bells and whistles in order to rank high against other pages. If you are not filling out meta descriptions, using hierarchical headings, targeting specific keywords etc. then your blog will not rank well.

Unless you are manually sharing your blog or paying for advertising, no one will ever see your website naturally. SEO work is mandatory.

Solution: Getting to grips with SEO is fairly easy. There are a lot of free online courses available that will give you a comprehensive understanding.

A quick solution is to install Yoast SEO on your website. This plugin analyzes your content and points out what you need to do to optimize a given web page.

You Are Competing Against High Authority Websites

It is tough to muscle your way on to a search engine’s front page, especially when you have to compete against the likes of Medium, The Telegraph, Buzzfeed and HuffPost. It is a losing battle and your energy is best spent elsewhere.

Solution: You can use relevant long-tail keywords or target keywords that do not have as much competition. This allows you to rank high on search engines, while avoiding competition from the big name companies.

You Are Not Sharing Your Posts

You need to make good use of social media. Sharing your posts on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram allows you to reach users and build an audience. There is the huge potential of connecting with a core group of followers, who will always be eager and available to consume the information you share.

Solution: It is very easy to start a social media account and you can pick from any of the 3 above.

Also, share posts to Facebook groups, subreddits and other forums to target specific groups of individuals.

You Are Inconsistent in Your Posting

Consistent posting allows followers and readers to form a relationship with you. They are encouraged to look forward to your work during specific times of the week and to enjoy your writing on a regular basis.

Inconsistent posting robs of you of this benefit. Some potential long-term readers may even lose interest and forget about your blog if you do not update it regularly.

Solution: There are many applications and plugins that you can use to ensure your posts are published at specific times of the week. You can write out a number of posts in bulk and have them published one by one. Note that there are people who opt not to post a lot. However, they create giant guides and promote heavily.

Your Content Is Poorly Written

Last but not least, your content may be of poor quality—as simple as that. You may be excited about what you have written but a reader may not feel the same way; especially if your text is not easy to understand or follow.

Online content in general must be written concisely. It must be straight to the point and it has to be easy to understand for your target audience.

This is because online readers like to avoid huge paragraphs with complicated words and sentences. They want their information as quickly as possible and do not like scanning and deciphering huge walls of text.

Solution: There are books and courses available to improve how you write for an online audience. You can also use online apps like Grammarly and the Hemingway Editor to point out grammatical errors, or if your sentences are too difficult to understand.

Bottom Line

Getting a good following on your blog can feel like an uphill struggle at times or as though there are too many challenges to overcome, making it difficult to find a starting point.

Fortunately, once you get the ball rolling it becomes a lot easier. You start identifying what type of content your audience likes and you are able to cater to them more effectively. Your writing naturally starts improving and you will even find it fun to produce more impactful content that sells.

So, do not give up. Blogging is a skill that takes a while to get a hang of, and you need to allow yourself a grace period of trial and error.