Newbie Blogging Mistake 2: Writing for Everyone

In my previous post on newbie blogging mistakes, I focused on overlooking the visual aspect of your blog. In this post, I’m going to discuss not having or not sticking to a niche.
Writing for everyone is a nice (and somewhat impossible) idea, but it’s not realistic and it probably won’t build you a loyal readership. Plus, you run the risk of your posts becoming too generic. Writing for a niche means that your blog is targeting a specific area or industry. And unless you’re running a personal blog, having a particular audience in mind is essential.
You might worry about running out of topics if you stick to only one subject, but this shouldn’t be a problem if you’re good at what you do and/or if you’re an expert in your field. If you stumble across writer’s block every now and again (it happens to everyone), enlist the help of other bloggers in your industry. Guest posts also bring in new readers and contribute toward building your blog’s credibility.

Writing for a Niche

Before you write your very first post, identify your ideal reader. Think about what they’d want to learn about, how they’d like to be “spoken to,” how you could bring value to them, etc. Then visualize that reader when you’re actually writing. Doing so helps to infuse an engaging quality into your posts.
Once you have narrowed down a target audience and writing style, try not to forget about or even stray away from them! Revisit this target audience and the corresponding writing style every time you’re about to write a new post. This is not to say that you can’t tweak your style, or work to expand or even change your readership. You should, however, maintain some sort of consistency if you want your blog visitors to keep coming back for more.
Lastly, it’s still possible to write too broadly even if sticking to just one industry. Whatever you choose to blog about, avoid writing about general topics. For example, “Tips for Online Marketing” is unlikely to deliver any new or practical information to your readers. In this case, you could narrow it down to one platform, such as “How to Make the Most Out of Google AdWords,” or something even more specific. Sometimes, starting off with a particular title before actually writing helps with the narrowing-down process and brings focus to your blog post.

Do you have any suggestions about writing for a niche? Who’s the target reader for your blog? Let me know in the comments…