Writing blog posts can help an entrepreneur promote a business or help novelists supplement their creative writing. Therefore, the time spent learning how to write a blog post can serve as an investment in your broader career.
4 Elements of a Good Blog Post
There are many different types of blog, but a good blog often has certain characteristics regardless of its subject matter. Whether you are writing a movie review blog on WordPress or a personal diary blog on Tumblr, here are some elements of a good blog post that you might want to incorporate into your work:
1. A clear subject: Step one of creating your own blog is having a clear subject and point of view. In order to attract an audience and grow your base through social shares, you need to communicate well and have a clearly defined subject matter that you are knowledgeable and passionate about. Choose topic ideas that appeal to your audience, and read other blog posts to learn from writers who are addressing similar topics.
2. A great headline: A great blog post needs a great headline. Strong, punchy headlines will attract a reader’s attention and also generate hits if they’re well optimized for search engines. When crafting your headlines, subheadings and bullet points, take search engine optimization (SEO) into account and do some keyword research. A successful blog generally has well-written headlines that make someone want to stop and read more.
3. A hook: Most good blog posts hook readers with a problem or issue that’s first advanced in a headline. Once into the body of a blog post, writers should set up the premise of the post succinctly with a hook that promises a reader more. Blog posts can be thought of like persuasive essays because no matter the style or subject matter, a blogger is trying to bring a reader around to seeing and agreeing with their point of view.
4. A solution: Once you’ve established a clear subject, it’s time to offer your distinct take on the subject matter or solution to the problem you’ve raised. Readers return to blogs time and time again because they feel a connection to the blogger. They relate to the blogger’s point of view and have come to rely on their insight. The best blog posts offer a personal take on an issue or subject and clearly express a blogger’s feelings and point of view.
How to Write a Blog Post in 10 Steps
It is your job as a blogger to seek out resources that will continually improve your writing and make your blog that much more successful. Here’s a list of tips that can help improve your blog posts.
1. Address a compelling topic. The most popular posts address a compelling topic that will appeal to your target audience. Once you’ve settled on a topic that fits your blog’s area of focus, it’s time to put your writing skills to work and start to craft the corresponding blog post.
2. Come up with a great post title. Titles are important in attracting an audience to your blog and getting your post pageviews. Without a title that attracts eyes, a good blog post can languish. Come up with a catchy title that will hook readers and make them want to read your article.
3. Outline your post. Before you begin writing, it’s important to outline your post. Blogs allow you the freedom to experiment with structure and form. Decide how you want to lay out your ideas and outline your post in order to walk readers through your thought process and help them relate to your point of view.
4. Explain your connection to the topic. From the beginning, blogging has been a highly personal form of writing. Bloggers connect with their audience and produce great content by making their blog writing personal and demonstrating a connection with their blog content.
5. Use a clear layout. Most successful blogs have short paragraphs with clear topics. Often bloggers will use bullet points list out ideas that support their main point. Make sure your post is laid out in a clear and visually clean way to help readers follow along with your thoughts.
6. Write from the heart. Bloggers are no different from other writers in that they occasionally suffer from writer’s block. The most important thing you can do to overcome stumbling blocks in your work is to come up with blog post ideas that you connect with on a deep, personal level. Writing blog posts should be a labor of love. Writing blog posts that you feel passionately about will help readers connect with your work and grow your audience base.
7. Propose solutions. It’s important to have a clear point of view in your blog posts and wrap up posts with a clear conclusion or solution to a problem you’ve focused on. It’s not enough to just give a cursory overview of a topic, readers depend on you to walk them through an issue in a well-informed way. Instead of giving light anecdotal examples, provide your readers with a well-sourced case study that relates to the topic at hand.
8. Consider search engine optimization. Make sure that your page SEO is up to snuff in order to get clicks on your articles and bring new readers to your page. Research SEO trends and SEO key terms and compare your blog post against the top-ranking results for search terms relevant to your topic. Ideally, you want to make sure your posts are near the top of search engine results.
9. Proofread. Once you have a first draft of a blog post, it’s time to do a read-through to look for typos and tweak awkward sentences. New bloggers working on their first blog often skip this part of the process and rush to publish their new posts. It’s not enough to focus on search engine optimization or designing a flashy infographic for your homepage; professional bloggers should take pains to make sure their posts are free from typos and careless errors.
10. Promote your writing. Once you have enough posts on your blog, it’s time to start networking and promoting your work. Promotion is especially important if your blog is connected with your business. Consider appearing on a podcast, starting an email list, or guest blogging on a related blog as ways to promote your own work. Content marketing is a hugely important part of being a successful blogger. Make sure to tweet and post about your work on social media, showcasing blog posts that are particularly good examples of the sort of writing readers can find on your blog.
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