8 Tips to Create the Best Blog Post Every Time
Your blog is more important than you think it is.
A successful blog is a valuable marketing tool that helps you to build trust with your readers, educate them, build brand awareness, create engagement, and generate leads.
Creating a blog filled with posts that are engaging, delivering value, creating followers, bringing in sales, and are aligned with your business strategy doesn’t have to be difficult.
HERE ARE 8 POWERFUL TIPS HOW TO CREATE A GREAT BLOG POST EVERY TIME
NAIL THE TITLE
Your title is everything. You want people to click on it. Keep it short. Get your audience curious, but don’t over-share (eg. Why Plant-Based Protein Is Better for You). Speak to your audience by using “you” and “your” (eg. You Must Try This Fat-Blasting Green Juice). Use digits instead of spelling out numbers (eg. 10 Powerful Ways to Get in Shape This Spring). Use the Emotional Marketing Value Headline Analyzer titles that will draw your readers in. Check out this study to learn from the most engaging headlines.
WRITE A KILLER OPENING PARAGRAPH
Your opening paragraph is just as important as your headline. Most people will read your headline and your opening paragraph, but only a much smaller percentage will actually read the rest of your post. Make it compelling, engaging, and personal. Ask a question. Crack a joke. State some shocking facts. Draw them in, so they will read on.
CONSIDER YOUR READER
Understand your target audience. You can’t write for everyone. You can experience more success if you speak to a precisely identified target audience with clear needs. Creating a specific but imaginary reader, or having a real person in mind can be very helpful. Make your post relatable. Talk to them as you would to a friend addressing them as ‘you’. Respect your readers, and refrain from statements like ‘obviously’ and ‘everybody’ knows to avoid your reader feeling silly. Avoid too many questions, but give information, solutions, and doable tips.
CREATE A ROADMAP
Your blog post should be a roadmap that starts with a question or problem in hand leading to a solution and doable actions. You may be tempted to start writing without a solid plan. Stop yourself. Create an outline first. Once you have a fantastic outline and done all the research needed for your post, you are ready to write. Start with the body first, then move onto the introduction and conclusion. Save the title for last.
BE INFORMATIVE AND USEFUL
A blog post is not a creative writing piece (unless you are running a personal creative writing blog of course). You are there to serve your audience. Your goal is to educate your readers. Make your post useful and informative. Make lists. Be specific. If they learn something new that they can use right away, they will more likely to come back for more information.
REMEMBER YOUR WHAT, WHY, AND HOW
Each successful blog post should answer the following questions: What? Why? How? What are you talking about? (eg. You drink a glass of green juice every day.) Why is this important? (eg. Green juice is mega healthy. + list 5 health benefits) How your reader can implement this into their life? (eg. Give some tips on how to make green juice + some delicious recipes.) If you answer all these questions, your reader will leave satisfied, without questions, and ready to take action.
FORMAT SMART: MAKE IT SCAN-READY
Like it or not, most readers don’t read everything. Instead, they scan through your posts and perhaps read sections that catch their interest. Help them out by making your post scan-ready. Create bold headings and subheadings. Make important information bold without overusing it. Keep it simple and easy to read, understand, and use.
CALL FOR ACTION
Your blog has two goals: to connect with your reader and to trigger an action. Though you’ve likely shared a list of tips and action steps throughout your post, you should always end your post with a call for action. Your reader should be excited about this action. Be careful with specifically asking your reader to buy something, be more subtle if that’s part of your goal. Ask your readers some question and encourage them to comment on the post or on social media.
Using these tips you can create a powerful blog post that keeps your readers engaged, satisfied, and excited.
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How will you implement these tips? What is your next blog post about? Share your thoughts in the comments below. I would love to hear from you.
This post was originally posted at katgalwriter.com and the Medium.