Many seem to avoid vacuuming their carpeting. Preferring instead to postpone or delay the task for another day. And no big deal right? It doesn’t hurt anything to put off a task that few relish or enjoy.

Not the right approach actually. As avoiding vacuuming isn’t good for your family or the carpeting. Left alone eventually the ground in sand and grit will wear away at the fibers leaving you with carpet that doesn’t look as it once did. While accumulating dust mites and dust build up may leave allergy sufferers, well, suffering.

Plus there is a right way and a wrong way to vacuum. And would you believe most do it wrong?

Anyway, once all this is clearly explained vacuuming regularly will just make sense. As will moving it up the priority on your house cleaning to do list. Even better, here are nine simple tips for problem free yet effective vacuuming that will inspire you to vacuum regularly. .

Regular vacuuming avoids dirt build-up. You want to hit high traffic areas, like hallways, maybe as often as twice a week. While once a week is okay for the low to medium traffic areas.

Most dirt that comes into your house comes in on the bottom of your shoes. Use walk mats to reduce this. Even better get everyone to leave their shoes at the door.

When you vacuum you want your vacuum to do a good job. And you can best maintain it’s suction power by changing bags and filters when needed. It’s false economy to try to extend the life of these dirt filters as dirty bags and filters eventually clog which can cut your vacuum’s suction power by up to half. Replace bags when they are three quarters full and wash or replace the filter on bagless models every 3 months with typical usage.

Here’s the most common mistake most make – they’re in too big of a hurry. That’s right, one quick pass and they call it good. Actually it’s better to run over high traffic areas like five or six times. Giving the beater bar a chance to do it’s job and thoroughly extract the dirt.

Make sure your vacuum is set at the correct height: If you set the cleaner too low you risk damage to the carpet, belts and roller brushes of vacuum cleaner. Too high and you will not extract embedded dirt or pet hair.

The idea is to work against the pile, if you would, to loosen the embedded dirt particles in the pile. Using the power and weight of the vacuum head to accomplish this after repeated passes over the same section.

Keep your vacuum maintained: Clean the brushes, check the belts, inspect the vacuum head regularly. Removing anything that has wrapped itself around the beater brush.

Avoid running over the cord with the vacuum. Find a central location, plug it in and keep it behind you as much as you can.

Despite the mounted light, do this job when you can see where you’re vacuuming.

Nothing beats the look of a freshly vacuumed carpet. If you have a bagless vac you can even see how much dirt, dust, hair and debris you’ve extracted from the rug. And it’s a good feeling knowing your home is clean and fresh.

Featured Author Aiden Mundt knows improper care can lead to the death of your carpet. But is one of the Dirt Devil vacuum cleaners best for your situation? Or maybe a Miele Capricorn would work better? Get the advice you’re looking for at AskTheVacuumGuy.com. There you’ll find many help articles on related topics of interest.