Blogging is a potent weapon to connect with potential customers and build a brand. But like any weapon, it needs ammunition. A lot of good ammunition because on the Internet, there is a real content war going on.
Do you want to know how to write a perfect post that conquers your audience and defeats your competition in the results pages? Read this article to the end and take action!
What makes a post perfect?
It develops a topic in depth.
It is pleasant to see and read.
It is optimized for SEO.
Indeed: I mix writing and reading criteria with technical criteria. I do it this way because you write for a double audience: users and search engines on the Internet.
Writing an excellent article is not enough. If you only think about users or Google, you will be wasting opportunities. The “art” of writing on the Internet consists of creating balanced content for these two audiences.
In this article, you will find 18 tips for writing the perfect post. I have divided them into three categories: planning, writing, and layout to make them easier to apply. Let’s go through them!
Planning
Know your audience
What is your reader’s profile? What information is he/she looking for? How can you help him/her? What article format is he/she most comfortable with? Does he/she understand specialized vocabulary?
Spending time answering these questions helps to focus your blog strategy and save time and effort. The latter is very important because the results of a blog are not usually seen until the medium or long term.
Choose a new topic for your blog
It doesn’t matter if other websites are talking about that topic, because if you prepare good content, you will be able to compete with them. And in any case, a good post will always please your readers.
The problem arises when you write about something that already exists on your website.
Imagine that a nutrition portal has the article “Guide to a vegan diet” and publishes another one: “What foods to eat if you are vegan.” That’s two posts talking about the same thing or, as they say in SEO, trying to solve the same search intent.
Before you sit down to write new content, make sure it’s very different from what you already have published.
Select keywords
Search engines are still robots with limitations, and keywords help them to understand and classify content. The more related keywords you use, the better search engines will understand what your post is about.
A good practice is to do keyword research before you start writing.
Take note of Google’s suggestions when searching for the keyword (they appear below).
Use keyword tools: Ubbersuggest, Keyword Shitter, SemRush…
Develop the topic in-depth
Embody everything you know: show the reader that they won’t need to find out about it on any other page after reading your article.
And what if you don’t know “everything”? Nothing, because you can always edit your post and expand it.
Some studies correlate longer texts with better SEO positioning. They usually talk about a minimum number of words. I ignore the numbers and focus on creating good content.
Copywriting
Write a catchy headline
The post’s headline is the first opportunity to seduce your users. Many will come across your article while browsing a social network or searching on Google. If they see a suggestive title, they will click and visit you.
These three tips will help you write better headlines for your posts:
- Boost the benefit of reading your post. Instead of “Tips to improve your ads on Google Ads”, “Tips to multiply your results on Google Ads”.
- Use numbers (“The 10 best hotels in Paris”) or talk about guides and tips (“The definitive guide to the German Shepherd”, “Tips to become happy again after a breakup”).
- Don’t be afraid to use a long headline. The important thing is not to leave the reader indifferent.
And if you are not very inspired, you can always do different Google searches and note which headlines use the first results.
Keep your vocabulary simple
Your goal should not be that your articles are read but that they are understood. Using a natural vocabulary makes it easier for more users to read and prevents them from stopping and searching for what something means. As an example of good writing, you can visit an essay writer website and find some well-written samples of texts.
Technical terms are not bad, but they should be used as an addition and not as an exhibition of erudition.
Work with short paragraphs
Think of a printed newspaper page: a picture, a headline… and a seemingly endless stream of paragraphs. An avalanche of text puts off many readers.
Even if your publication is digital, long paragraphs can also cause your readers to abandon. And even more so on mobile devices, where paragraph size often doubles.
But the solution is simple: work with a maximum length that guarantees short and “nice to look at” paragraphs. In my case, I work in Google Docs and I try to keep my paragraphs to no more than three lines.
Use headings
Headings are used to dividing content into smaller sections and make reading faster. They also help search engines to establish relationships between concepts.
We introduce headings through HTML <h> tags that are numbered from 1 to 6: <h1> is more important than <h2>, which is more important than <h3>… You will understand it better with this example for an article about bonsai trees:
<h1>Care guide for your bonsai</h1>.
<h2>Bonsai watering</h2>.
<h3>How to water a bonsai</h3>
<h3>When to water a bonsai</h3> <h3>When to water a bonsai</h3>
<h2>Bonsai fertilizers<h2>
As you may have guessed, structuring your post into sections helps you to distribute keywords better. However, the use of headings is a personal thing. You can find two articles that talk about the same topic and are structured differently.
Use only one h1 header per page. Some CMS like WordPress assign an automatic h1 to the post title.
Summarize with bold
The bold type is helpful to summarize the main ideas of each section of the post.
Ideally, if a person skim-read your post, they should be able to retain the main ideas by reading only the bolded fragments.
I don’t like to see paragraphs too “stained” with bold because I know that not everything is equally important.
Imprint your personality
A common mistake among novice copywriters is to write texts so neutral and aseptic that they seem to have been written by artificial intelligence.
Some pieces require a strictly informative tone, but if you work on a personal blog, developing your communication style will help your audience recognize you (“this was written by X, for sure”) and remember you better.
Don’t be afraid to interject catchphrases and even jokes. And, of course, dare to publish content that goes beyond the didactic: ideas and opinions that show your readers what you think and feel.
Link related content
Links enhance your blog in three ways:
- They broaden the reading experience. They allow the reader to continue learning (or being entertained) through related content.
- They provide a differential value and help create a unique browsing experience.
- Improve dwell time and bounce rate, two key indicators of your website’s performance.
If you haven’t already done so, include internal links (to other pages of your website) or external links (to other relevant websites) in all your articles. There is no minimum number: quality is always better than quantity.
Add structured data
Design a powerful featured image
The featured image, also called the featured image, is the image that appears in the post’s header. It is also seen as a thumbnail when someone shares your article.
I always advocate that a perfect post also provides an aesthetic experience. That’s why I suggest you impress your readers right from the start with a good featured image.
You have two ways to design the main image of your post:
With vector images. These illustrations are easy to edit and bring a lot of freshness. You can find free vectors on Freepik.
With a photograph. Here you will have an extra job: find a photo that fits the content of your post. In Pixabay you have thousands of free photos.
You will be able to work both types of images from GIMP, or Krita, two free image editing programs.
Create Separator elements
The layout of a post involves working with and creating spaces between paragraphs. I call separator elements visual resources that help break the paragraph-paragraph-paragraph-paragraph monotony.
These elements are:
- Lists and quotes.
- Images related to the content.
- Highlighted texts.
- Color boxes.
- Click to tweet boxes.
Although they are very different elements, they all serve the same function: to separate blocks of text by creating spaces for the eye to “rest” while reading the post.
This highlighted text is made with CSS
Insert an author box
This simple resource brings credibility (it shows “the face” behind the article) and allows you to connect with the audience on social networks. It is such a valuable and discreet complement that should not be missing on any blog.
Many CMS automatically inserts the author box at the end of the post. If you use WordPress and you don’t get one, try Simple author box.
Conclusion
Writing the perfect post requires knowledge in many different areas beyond the subject of the article itself. Should this be a hindrance when it comes to publishing? Not at all.
You learn to blog by blogging. Enjoy writing and give yourself time to perfect your style, learn SEO techniques or improve your layout skills.
As Salvador Dalí said: “Don’t be afraid of perfection. You will never reach it”.
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