This is a guest post by David Sneen from EarnMoreSpendMoreGroup.com
Whoa, with a title like that, what if this article turns out to be a dud? Pressure! My goal is to write a superior article–otherwise my content will contradict my heading. Therefore, I welcome your feedback (comment).
(I wrote this article with the written blog post in mind. You may find some of this information to be irrelevant if you are creating videos or Powerpoint content.)
Finding a topic
What am I going to write about? Everything interesting has already been said. What can I say that no one else has said?
Do you ever get those thoughts and ask yourself those types of questions before you begin? It is natural. Some of it is concern. Some of it is resistance to getting started. Either way, the solution is simple; make up your mind that you are going to write, and get started. If your goal is to write a superior blog post that your visitors and Google will love, keep reading!
Decide what category (for instance, blogging tips) that you wish to write about. Look at the news and trends. If you can tie your article to a current event, you may get a whole new set of visitors. Then brainstorm. What do you want to write about? Consider your options. Then, go for a walk, do yard work, or take a nap. But, have a pad of paper and a pen handy to jot down ideas that come to you. Your subconscious may very well take over; it could easily shower you with three or four great blog post ideas!
Writing your blog post
Once you have your idea, then it is time to brainstorm again. Write down items that you wish to include in your blog post. Then make an outline. You might be thinking, “Hey, wait a minute! I did this in English class when I wrote essays!” Exactly! And the technique that worked then will work now!
With your outline to guide you, you are ready. Don’t worry about saying everything right the first time. You can always come back and make corrections. Move from one topic to the next — get your ideas down. Just write like you are talking to the paper. If you are having trouble with writer’s block at this point, this recent SmartBloggerz’s blog post should help you.
Many people write their opening and concluding paragraphs after they have written their content. Your introduction (what you are going to say) and your conclusion (wrapping it up) are your two most important paragraphs.
After I am done with my draft, I ask myself, “Where can I insert keywords without taking away from the flow of my blog post?” Keywords are important to getting yourself ranked in the search engines. My keywords are goals, subconscious, and blog post. (I may have underused them–optimum use is between 3-5%. However, I would rather be a bit short, than force my keywords into my blog post and detract from its content.) Search engine visitors are likely to be your best visitors, because they requested your article.
Proofread your blog post; let your subconscious work for you if you get stuck
Next is the fun part. Proofread your article. Use your spell checker first and make changes as necessary. Make sure it reads well. It sounds hokey, but I recommend reading it aloud at this point. You catch far more mistakes when you read aloud than you do skimming or scanning your article.
When you think you said something wrong, think of an alternative way of saying it. When I had just started blogging, I would frequently ask myself, “Should this sentence be worded this way…or that way?” If neither feels right, don’t waste more than a minute thinking about it. Move on!
When I am at an impasse like that, I let my subconscious come up with the answer. And, I have found that the correct answer is almost always…neither way! My subconscious will deliver a third way of wording that sentence that is far superior to either of the options I had been considering.
Next, create your subtitles and links.
- You want at least three subtitles. I like bold Heading 2 or Heading 3 (WordPress) .
- At first, your links will be to authoritary sites. To get the most link juice, link to the topic that Google likes most. For instance, if I was going to link to the term “subconscious” from the previous paragraphs, I would Google “subconscious,” and link to one of their top choices. Once you have several articles, you will want to link them together. Google likes this internal linking and your visitors remain on your site longer, reading one blog post after another.
Always include pictures!
Don’t forget your pictures. People are likely to leave your site immediately if your blog post does not have at least one picture on it. I recently read an article about saying what you need to say with pictures. The article had multiple pictures on it. And, he had a good point—60% of us are primarily visual.
The title — last, but definitely NOT least!
Lastly, the title! You might say, “Oh, I created my title right away!” You could be right. But…there may be a better title. I am not going to say I have the best title in the world. But, what if I had entitled this blog post, Writing Great Blog Post Stuff? Would anyone read it? And, if no one reads it, why bother to write it? If you are at all unsure of how to create a great title, Google it!
You can Google blog post titles. Many top bloggers spend more time and effort creating a title than they do creating the material within their blog post. It is that important.
Writing an essay is a relatively simple thing. A blog post is a bit more complicated. But, when you create a great one, Google will love you, your readers will seek out more of your material, and you can reach your online goals!
Top 10 Search Terms:
• how to write blogs on google
Thank you David. You came followed through with your promise from the article headline. The blog post title is my biggest challenge. I still need to practice creating my title even after blogging for the last five years on two blogs. Good solid advice. Thanks. Suzanne
Welcome to the blogging world, Joe. There are tons of blogs out there. But, most bloggers are starving. Most blogs fail.
Why? There is tons of information at your fingertips. Make sure you learn and do. Learn and do. And then again. Most bloggers tend to get frustrated, and quit before they make any money. Had they used the information at their fingertips, they would have succeeded!
Hey, you put a smile on my face, Suzanne. I thank you for your kind words. If I can share tips that someone with five years experience on two blogs can use,…you made my day!
Creating a title so compelling that people can’t not (intentional double negative) read your post is not easy. It never will be easy. But, the important thing is; now you realize how important they are, and you have a plan in place to create the best possible title!
Great put up, very informative. Tips are all good and really help us bloggers. As I observed, it should be in correct way and more on emphasizing words and it should be relevant too. Meaningful blog making is still making bloggers great. Thank you.
Thank you, Jenna! I hope I have come up with some tips that you and the other bloggers can use. Meaningful blogging and emphasizing key words correctly will make reading your blogs fun…and make Google happy, too!
Well SEO title of a page helps a lot to get traffic. Also loved your point to include images as google also considers images in content and increases your rank
Thanks, Prateek for your comments. Google has had a difficult time with the question, “how do we give credit for images?” They can’t judge the picture. But, people stay longer if your blog is well illustrated, and you get credit if you use keywords in the picture’s subtitle.
Hey David,
this was an interesting read – I hope you don’t mind but I have a couple of Qs…
You said your keywords for this article were goals, subconcious and blog posts. I saw that you used these quite well through the post, e.g. particularly the latter in your sub-heads.
my 2 Qs are this:
1 – why not use any of these keywords in your main heading then?
2 – isn’t it better to use long-tail keywords? These seem awfully short to be of any use
I’m no SEO expert myself by the way, just trying to learn as keywords is something I don’t do very well at all myself…
You caught me, Alan. Those keywords are worthless. I may have said the right things, but I did the opposite. Keyword knowledge is invaluable. But, like anything else, it is only useful when it is used correctly.
Hello David! It’s good to know that I bumped into your site. What you wrote here is very informative and really make Google happy. I think that every one on the Internet especially SEO practitioners should write original content because according to Google, it is King. Thanks as well for the minor tips that you gave, to be honest, I also employ the tips that you gave and the minors insights that you said are sure worth incorporating to my site as well.
Hey, Cory; thanks for visiting my site. I appreciate that.
Based on your comment, you have a pretty good knowledge of blog writing. What I wrote was nothing new–just the basics. But, how much time do the professionals in any sport spend on the basics?
David it is admitted fact that if you have a lot of research on topic you can have complete picture of your article.Research on topic make your article versatile. If you a picture consistent with your article it will give a new life to the article.I agree all of your points that are very helpful to make an article unique and can attract all of search engine a lot.
You must be a visual person, Nawaz. What you say about having a complete picture of your article is accurate. You want to have a thorough understanding of what you are writing, so researching what you do not know is vital to your success.
I like what you say about pictures. They do indeed “give a new life to the article.”
I think first one must know about what he/she is going to write and that is the most important and initial step for making superior blog content.
I strongly believe in the last but not least thing “Title” – it does play an important role in fetching many people.
Yes, Nanm, one must have a thorough mental map of what one is going to write. Without direction, the blog will falter.
A good title will indeed bring people in.
Proofreading is one of the best thing mentioned in the above post, I always proofread articles before posting them cause most of the time your readers find hard to read your content..
Yes, Vishal I have caught some laughable mistakes when I proofread. My computer must have a mind of its own, because I would never write that garbage! And, you are right….readers find it hard to read through errors. There is no “y’know what I mean” button on the computer.
Awesome post. I agree that people should proofread content well. These days many kids have also joined blogging that to for the sake of money having very poor grammar.
As a retired teacher, I see constant evidence of what you are refering to. Poor grammar and terrible spelling is the rule—even amongst advanced kids in the high schools.
Proofreading can go only so far for some of those kids. It is tough to find an error if you don’t know it is an error.
Unique and quality content. Google is really making it hard. I will use some of these tips next time i build an article. It just might help!
Blogging is much harder than it used to be. There are many more blogs out there. Google can’t rate everyone on page one.
I hope some of these comments help in your online journey, Jacob.