There are so many blogs out there on the Internet (with even more being set up each day) that it is absolutely essential to get that thing called “professionalism” firmly nailed down. Lose it and people will never believe a word you say ever again. Lose it and you will probably never get it back again.

The ironic thing is that it is not difficult at all to get things right but people just don’t do it, perhaps because of laziness or because of a perceived need to rush out posts to beat the competition. But if you take an extra couple of minutes before hitting that “publish” button, your reputation to the readers will rise monumentally.

Here are the top three things to remember.

1. Check your grammar - The most important one of all. How can you expect anyone to take you seriously if you can’t even spell and write your own language properly? If you are serious about blogging, buy a good dictionary and a style book and keep them on the desk beside you at all times. Or use an online dictionary such as Dictionary.com

2. Check your facts – Print newspaper journalists can be sued for libel if they get their facts wrong and bloggers are no different. Don’t believe for a second that bloggers can say whatever they want and get away with it. If you defame someone online, you will be held legally accountable for it and suffer the consequences that come with that. So check your facts – then check them again. You can never do this often enough.

3. Format your posts properly – Not only do your posts have to be well written and free of spelling mistakes, they also have to be pleasant viewing to the eyes. When someone visits your post, they have to be interested and impressed enough to want to read it, comment on it and share it with others. They won’t do that if the Facebook post is humping the Twitter box and the post image is slapped on top of the text.

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Mark O’Neill is a freelance writer of 20 years experience, and also the managing editor of MakeUseOf.com, since August 2007. You can see his personal website at markoneill.org Mark has 21 post(s) at Free Writing Center