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The key to a successful blog is making as few mistakes as possible. The more of them you can avoid the better. These tips will not only save you time and extra work, but help you get your blog to the level it needs to be to make some serious money. Feel free to post comments and tell me your first mistakes.

• Crappy template: Whenever you start a blog the first thing you need to do is pick a fresh looking template. There are dozens of free template sites that you can get a free template for a wordpress blog and similar blog types. Do this before you do any customization. If you work on your site and then pick a new template, you could wipe out all your hard work.

• Greed: Joining too many money making programs for your blog is a bad idea. It is ok to test, just don’t run too many things at one time. The more programs you have running the longer it will take to collect your money. You’ll spread you revenue across a lot of networks.

• Unsociable: Joining blogging communities is smart. Communities such as MyBlogLog are great for getting traffic and RSS subscribers. However, joining too many communities will make your blog look sloppy. If you do join MyBlogLog take the time to build a community. The benefit of a community is you can reach targeted readers. Don’t bother joining if you won’t be apart of that community. Remember… other bloggers are your friends, they need material and you need links. Be sure to join the right blog and you’ll get links and readers.

• Feed: Where is your RSS button? Is it above the fold? Is it easy to spot? You can even ask readers to subscribe to your feed in every post as a reminder. If possible allow them to subscribe via email as well. Feedburner makes it easy for you to add a feed counter, RSS button and email subscription box.

• Touting too soon: Don’t have many readers? Don’t advertise it. Unless you have at least several hundred subscribers, don’t use the feed burner subscriber chicklet. Nothing says pathetic more than a low number of subscribers. No one wants to be the first to join anything. The less they know the better.

• Lack of content: Nothing makes subscribers bail faster than a lack of writing. Try to write at least twice a week. The same can be said about writing too much. If you do 3 or more posts a day, you could be losing subscribers. Many people don’t have time to read blogs daily. If subscribers see they’ve missed a lot of posts they may feel that it is no longer enjoyment… but work to keep up and they will unsubscribe. Informative posts take longer to write and are worth more to the engines and readers. Invest your time in quality content not quantity.

• Too many ads: Blogs are great for making money. However, if your blog is littered with ads, visitors may feel it holds no “real” value to them. The key to making money is quality content that drives traffic and readers. Looking like a scrapper site or MFAS ( made for adsense) is not the way to do it.

• Share: Don’t be selfish. Link to other sites and blogs. If you find something great and it gives you something to blog about then link to it. You would want the same, wouldn’t you? Sometimes the only way to receive is to be the first to give.

• Interaction: Remember you are talking to an audience. Try to get them to participate. Ask questions at the end of your post. Has this happened to you? What was your experience with so and so. A blog is personal and it gives you a chance to interact with your readers. So do so as often as possible.

• Spam: Controlling spam. When your blog is new, spam isn’t much to worry about. However… as it grows so does the spam. If you have spammy comments in your blog it gives the impression that your blog is not maintained and that you don’t care. Be smart an install a spam plugin, especially if you run wordpress, as soon as possible.

What did I miss? What mistakes did you make as a blogger? How did you correct them?