A blog post should be a valuable piece of content that your website readership will want to digest, but written with a goal in mind. The nature of the blog isn’t to exploit or sell something to you, though, if you do it well, the effect is that your products are sold.
The nature of the blog is to bring value to your readers.
Why? Because marketing has changed. Free value to your audience = loyal readership = money in your pocket.
The blog is your chance to give back to your readers, your customers, and your audience. It helps your audience wade through all the “give me” out there and say, refreshingly, “have this.”
It doesn’t matter whether you have an online shop, a personal website or portfolio, you need to blog, at least occasionally.
If you blog regularly, Google will see your site as active, alive and relevant – and that will definitely help your overall rankings. In addition, blogging allows you to rank for new keywords and to keep ranking for those you’re already being found for. It allows your readers to get to know your brand and your products better. What’s more, you can use your blog to actively present yourself as a reliable source of information for prospective customers.
In total, there are 5 steps you should take when writing and publishing a blog post.
Step 1: Choose your topic
Step 2: Set the direction
Step 3: Write!
Step 4: End with a CTA
Step 5: Optimize for SEO
A step-by-step guide to writing an irresistible post
There are a lot of factors that contribute to making your blog post a success and you will find plenty of articles and guidelines out there, I’ve summarized the best of the best for you here.
Step 1: Choose your topic
The first step towards writing a blog post is to pick a good topic.
Don’t be fooled by thinking that you have to write something that’s never been written before. You just have to write it better than the competition did.
- Look at what your competitors are talking about (and what’s working for them)
- Read through competitor’s and your reviews, and seeing what the pain points are
- Search your topic on the many websites out there that will tell you the most shared social posts on that topic
- Ask your customers and audience what they want to see
While you do your research keep a notebook handy where you can take down the important points and outline your topic.
When you choose your topic you must make sure that it is something that your audience will be able to relate to. You’ll need to find out what your followers want to know and read about, so your post will continue to get traffic after it’s published.
People read blogs because they are interested in what other people think, so don’t hesitate to make it personal, a reflection of yourself, your thoughts and opinions. Try to focus on what makes you unique, even if you’re in a competitive niche.
Claire Guiot, DIGITAL Design + Development Faculty
Step 2: Set the direction
Decide on the purpose of your post:
- You can write because you want to persuade people. You want to convince them to buy your product or adopt your ideas.
- The aim of your article could also be to entertain and amuse people. A column is a good example of an entertaining text.
- Your blog or article could also be informative. In this case, you write to share knowledge about a certain topic.
Come up with a working title. This will give you direction and will keep you on topic as you flesh out your post. You will probably change the title after you’ve finished editing your blog so don’t spend too much time on this thinking that it needs to be perfect.
Write an outline for your blog post. This is essentially a very concise list of the different topics or points you are going to cover and how they articulate. If you miss this step then your post will likely end up messy and off-topic.
Step 3: Write!
At this point, you’ll have all the information you need and an outline of the subjects you want to discuss in your blog post so it is finally time to start writing. Here are some guideline to follow:
- Aim for 1000+ words. A higher word count helps Google to better understand what your text is about. And, generally speaking, Google tends to rank longer articles higher.
- Hook your readers with a great opening. If you can hook your readers with a good opening consider half your work to be done. Because if your introduction is boring, people wouldn’t bother to read the rest. Many writers find it easier to write the body of the blog post first, and save writing the intro for last.
- Write like you talk. Don’t overlook the style and tone of your writing. Both these elements can make a big difference. Writing like you’re talking to your reader will make it feel a lot more personal and add character to your copy. After all, you’re not writing an academic essay. Remember, nobody likes boring. Nobody likes stuffy. Have fun with it!
- Make it scannable. People usually don’t read blog posts word-for-word. Instead, they scan them for the information they’re looking for. That’s why it’s important to format your posts in a way that’s easy to scan. It’ll help your readers to get the info they’re looking for quickly, so they’re more likely to stick around your blog. Here are a few ways you can make your blog posts scannable:
- Use Subheadings: Subheadings help your readers to see the main topics of your post, and will help you to stay organized and on track when writing.
- Write Short Sentences: Short sentences are much easier to read. Long sentences can make it complicated to understand.
- Keep Paragraphs Short: When your paragraphs are too long, it’s harder to read. I recommend using 2-4 sentences in most of your paragraphs, with some 1-sentence paragraphs to grab the eye.
- Use Bullet Points: Whenever you have a list, you can use bullet points to make your message precise and clear and easy to scan, instead of listing items in a sentence.
- If you use these tips to make your text visually engaging, your readers will be more likely to read the whole post.
- Use images for visual engagement. A simple image has the power to make a boring post much more fun and engaging. It breaks the monotony of words and offers a refreshing visual break to the reader keeping them engaged for longer.
- Add a featured image. Believe it or not, your readers won’t waste more than 2 seconds to decide whether or not to click on your post. Adding an eye-catching featured image to your post is a great way to get more clicks, shares, and engagement. Shutterstock, Unsplash, and Pixabay are great platforms to help you find an appealing image to use. You can also use Canva or Photoshop if you want to edit them. Make sure you have the right to use the image you choose.
- Proof-read, spell check and edit out any unnecessary content. Revisit your working title to make it catchy and a good reflection of the content of the post.
Step 4: End with a CTA
Conclude your blog post with a call-to-action that indicates what you want the reader to do next. Whether it’s to ask your readers to leave a comment, share your blog post, follow you on social media, or purchase your product, make sure you clearly state what you’d like them to do.
Step 5: Optimize for SEO
I’m going to be quick here because there are millions (billions? trillions?) of “good SEO” resources that can be found on this subject, some with their own bible (I’m looking at you, Moz).
But, as a baseline, make sure to…
- Have a solid searchable title
- Use H1 Tags
- Fill out the meta description
- Add keywords
- Alt-tag your photos
- Re-write your url slug to be searchable, while removing stop points (and, or, to, etc.)
- A good rule of thumb is, at minimum, three internal links and three external links.
Writing a blog post can be a lot of fun, but it’s also a lot of work. You need to invest time in preparing your blog post, writing it, and even once it’s written, it’s important to make sure it gets the attention it deserves by sharing it. It might seem like a lot, but in the end, you’ll see your content perform well consistently. And trust me, it will be worth it!
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