Author: Chris Heiler
Blogging is not easy. This is one reason why so few companies in the green industry blog on a regular basis, even when presented with the proven and practical benefits that blogging delivers.
Blogging is more than just writing and sharing insights. Consideration must be given to how you format a blog post, how to optimize the post for search engines and how to share your post.
A lot goes into a blog post--if you actually want people to read it.
To make this process easier for you, we thought we would share the same process we use internally as well as with our clients when writing and publishing blog posts.
Below are the 10 steps to writing a great blog post. Be sure to download our handy checklist and keep it by your side when writing for your own blog.
Step #1: Choose your keywords
Optimize your blog post for one primary keyword phrase and one or two secondary keywords. (for this post we chose “how to write a blog post”)
We use HubSpot’s keyword tool for keyword research along with KeywordStrategy.org and KeywordEye.
Step #2: Craft a compelling headline
You draw attention and attract readers with a compelling headline. Give it considerable thought. And remember, the headline is often what you are sharing on social networks like Twitter and Facebook, so it must be interesting and compelling to get someone to click on it.
“List” posts and “How to” posts like what you are reading now always seem to attract more readers.
If you need ideas for consistently cranking out killer headlines, check out this book: “Advertising Headlines That Make You Rich”.
Step #3: Optimize your post
Include your keyword phrase in the headline, subheadings, copy, page metadata, page URL and in image alt tags.
Read this post for more detailed information on optimizing your blog post. And see this webpage that you can use as a template.
Step #4: Be concise
Keep your posts around 600 words or less.
Make one strong point and focus on brevity. Some of the most popular blogs on the planet consistently publish posts with fewer than 200 words (see Seth Godin’s blog). Many of the popular blogs in our industry focus more on imagery than on words.
Step #5: Proof for grammar and spelling
This is essential if you want to be taken seriously. Nothing kills your credibility like misspellings and consistent grammatical errors.
Make sure your software has a spellchecker and be sure to proofread your blog post before hitting “publish”. And have a second pair of eyeballs look it over first, if possible.
Step #6: Format the post properly
Writing for the Web is different than writing for print. You need to include more white space on your page to make your post more reader-friendly.
If someone visits your blog to find big chunks of text like they would in a magazine article they will quickly bounce somewhere else. Make it easy on the eyes. Use more paragraph breaks and subheadings to break up text and create more white space. Use bullet points to do the same.
Using bullets, as well as bolding important text, will allow readers to quickly scan your blog post without reading it in its entirety, yet still digest your main points.
Step #7: Include internal links
We recommend including at least one or two internal links in every blog post you write. This internal linking will drive visitors deeper into your website.
You can include these internal links in the body of your post and, if you use a content management system (CMS) like Wordpress, you can also use a plugin that displays other recent and/or relevant posts at the end of each blog post. Using a plugin like this ensures you always have internal links in your blog post even if you didn’t add any to the body of the post.
Step #8: Include a compelling image
You want to grab the attention of visitors by including at least one compelling image in the post. You’ll want this near the top of the page, “above the fold”. You can see how we included the image at the top of this post.
This image is also important when it comes to sharing your blog post on your social networks. When you link to a page on Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+ and others, these networks automatically pull an image from the page to display as a thumbnail image alongside your update. The more relevant and compelling the image, the higher click through rate (CTR) you’ll see.
Read this post for more details on how to do this and how to provide proper attribution.
Step #9: Include a strong call-to-action (CTA)
Encourage your readers to take a specific action in each post.
This could be as simple as asking readers to leave a comment or share the post. You could ask readers to subscribe to your blog. You might encourage your readers to pick up the phone and call you.
The best CTAs convert visitors into leads. This is why you’ll see us offer downloadable content at the end of every blog post we publish (just like this one).
Step #10: Share your post
If you spend time following these steps and create a great blog post then you’ll want to share it.
Share on your social networks like Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon and Pinterest. This will attract more visitors and also give you a couple of inbound links pointing back to the blog post.
Be sure to download our FREE checklist, 10 Steps to Writing a Great Blog Post.
image credit: mezone
