The great thing about blogging is that you can write about nearly anything. There’s a category for every single topic you could possibly imagine. So how does your brand break out of the noise to get your readers engaged? Try this simple formula to make your blog posts look amazing, and stand out.
Step 1: Understand your audience.
If you don’t know who your target market is or what your audience is looking for, then your posts will not go far. Ask yourself: What does my audience want to read/learn/know about? What will resonate with them?
Step 2: Start with a working title.
Before you do anything, know what you are writing about. You could go anywhere with this as long as the title is relevant to your brand. Remember, a working title is specific and will guide your post so you can start writing. The best way to approach this is to grab a motivation for your audience to latch onto. These titles evolve over time and may change completely depending on what you choose, so keep it simple and concise. You want your final title to really stick with your reader so it draws them right in.
Step 3: Write a captivating introduction.
Grab your reader’s attention from the beginning. The best way to start an introduction is to tell a brief but engaging story, be empathetic, grab them with a fact or statistic, whatever it may be. After that, you want to describe the purpose of your post. This will help your audience have a reason to keep reading since you are laying the groundwork for a connection to help them improve their lives or work.
Step 4: Organize your content.
The idea here is not to intimidate your reader. Some posts can be quite lengthy. The goal is to organize your information so readers will stay engaged. You can make it easier for them by making lists, sections, or including subheadings. Regardless of what you do, keep it clean and organized so the person reading your blog wants to continue reading.
Step 5: Write your blog.
Fill in the blanks to the outline you created. You can get in much more detail here to really captivate your audience and keep them interested and engaged with your post. Don’t forget to add a little bit of your personality into it as well. That will make your blog easier to read and keeps the content interesting.
Step 6: Make sure people can find your post.
Keywords are a great way for your blog to break through barriers and get noticed. Focus on just a few keyword phrases, as too many can dilute your content and could end up looking like spam to your readers. Search engines, like Google, usually put more weight on words that are linked. More weight means more visibility. If possible, try to stick those keywords around those linked words, giving them more of an opportunity to pop up in a search.
Step 7: Edit your post.
This is a must! Reread what you wrote, once, twice, three times over so you make sure it’s free and clear of any typos and grammatical errors. Get a second reader to review as you can glaze over a basic typo. Once this base is covered, focus on making it visually appealing by adding a relevant photo. Social media is more based on imagery than anything today. In fact, content with relevant imagery receives far more views than content with none at all.
Finally, remember to maintain formatting consistency with your post and any others you work on in the future. Maintaining consistency across your blog posts makes your content (and brand) look much more professional and appealing.
Remember, getting your name out there is the goal for your blog. Use keywords, links, imagery, anything to capture a reader and get them to find your content. If you can master these steps, you are well on your way to an amazing blog post.
Written by Joseph Clifford, communications intern
