As a business, you want to produce valuable and engaging content that’s going to keep people coming back to your website. Blogging is a excellent tool for this and we believe critical for every small business. But to be effective, you’ll have to know how to write the perfect blog post.
To get people reading your blog posts, they need to be eye-catching and provide essential information users need, without being overwhelming. To do this there are some essential steps you can take to create and structure your blog posts.
Here are 7 steps to write and structure a solid blog post to draw in readers — and keep them reading.
Start with a Solid Headline
The headline is one of the most important parts of the blog post. A headline is how you’re going to draw readers in and make them click on your post to go to your site and read more. To create an effective headline, start with the very basics of what this post is about and go from there.
Keep the headline short and sweet, but use language that’ll appeal to your target audience. They may want something plain and direct or something a bit more flowery, depending on the industry.
Try to optimize the headline for search engines as well. What are the keywords you think your audience will be searching? Try to work one or two of those in to pique their interest and drive traffic to your site.
CoSchedule has a great tool you can use to analyze how effective your headline will be.
Put Your All Into Your Intro
The introductory paragraph of your blog post is one of the most important features. It’s the make-or-break area where people are either going to continue to read, or they’re going to click away. Draw in your core audience by implying that you’re going to answer a question they had — which you can do with your headline.
The intro needs to pack a big punch in a short amount of time. Maybe leave things open-ended with a question mark or ellipses at the end of the last sentence, beckoning readers to keep going and see what comes up next. Getting people to click on your post is the first hurdle, but you want them to continue reading and keep coming back.
Always Use Subheaders
Subheaders are an essential part of blog posts. People are used to scanning instead of full-on reading, and subheaders break up big blocks of text, while also summarizing what the paragraphs below them are going to be about.
Subheaders are eye-catching, and they give the reader the necessary information about the post — such as if it is worth reading.
Utilize Bullet Points and Numbered Lists
Put numbered lists and bullet points under your subheaders to break things up even more when you can — people are drawn to them. These features also make the article easier to scan to find the important stuff, which is what most readers are known to do.
Optimize Readability
One factor of SEO for blog posts is the readability of the content. If you use the Yoast SEO plugin on your blog posts, you will often see this as a factor when rating your content
Varying sentence length is what keeps things interesting. It keeps readers engrossed. Too often, we get used to writing in a certain way and forget to change things up a bit. Make this something you’re actively monitoring. And remember, your sentences should never be more than 20 words.
You also want to write in an ‘active’ voice to keep readers engaged and use effective transition words such as ‘most important’, ‘thus’ and ‘because’.
Add Images
Adding relevant images to your blog post is a great way to draw people to your brand and make your blog post more interesting. You can do a generic blog post about something in your industry, but with pictures that emphasize your brand, that’s how people are going to remember your business.
This blog post utilizes both images and subheaders well by color-coding them to the business’ logo. The little facts on each image are helpful and something important for the reader. The readers’ eyes are naturally drawn to the image, but they also learn something and get a little reminder of the company.
Don’t Forget Your Call to Action
Each blog post you write should end with a call to action. Your call to action can be advice and offer or any other meaningful action you believe the reader could value from. Some examples would be:
- “Read more about this topic” – and then point them to another blog post to read.
- “Check out these resources to help you get started” – and then point them to a service you offer or other resources available.
- “Know someone who needs help? Share this blog with them” – and then allow them to share the blog post across social platforms.
A blog post with the right elements can help drive traffic to your website, which exposes you to more customers and clients thus improving sales. This is why it’s so important to use the right formula to make your next blog post a perfect one.
Need help turning your blog into a powerful marketing tool for your business? Check out our Content Marketing Packages. We’ve designed them to be a powerful and affordable tool for small businesses looking for greater online visibility.
