Writing a blog should be standard practice for anyone with a website.
Blogs are an essential tool for providing your target audience with useful information in an easy to read narrative format.
They don’t necessarily have to be used to promote one of your products or services.
Rather, they should add value by telling your readership something they don’t already know or could benefit from.
So how to you go about writing your first blog?
Here are five simple steps to writing the perfect blog:
1) Come up with an original idea
With millions of blogs produced every day, you need to write one that stands out from the rest.
They should also be relevant to your specific market.
For example, if your core industry is weddings then you could write a guide on how to find the best wedding dress or make the best wedding cake.
The best way to find a good idea is to focus on the key challenges facing your clients and the potential solutions that could work.
You can also look at what your competitors are writing about and see how you can improve upon that.
And you can get feedback from your customers on what they would most like to hear or know about.
2) Decide on a snappy headline and killer introduction
Once you have settled on the idea, it’s time to come up with a headline that’s going to grab the reader’s attention from the start.
It needs to be short and succinct and contain the key phrases that they would be searching for.
That could be a startling fact or opinion, or a searching question that needs answering.
Your introduction should then be limited to three sentences covering all of the key information that you want to address.
In those you should include the what, why, when, where, who and how?
It must also accurately reflect the headline, setting out what your audience will learn from reading the blog.
3) Structure and write your main blog
Having written the headline and introduction, you are then well placed to set out the rest of the blog.
List out all the main points you have covered in the introduction and decide which you are going to give the most weight to.
Break each point into a section, starting with the most important first, and expand on each point using greater factual detail or quotes.
Add any bonus material to further illustrate the subject such as sidebars, graphs, infographics, pictures, videos, and advice and tips.
Make sure you include any relevant links to other topics, or products or services on your website or influencer websites.
A good way to end a blog is to ask a question that encourages further discussion or prompts a call to action.
4) Edit your blog thoroughly
After you have written the initial blog leave it for 24 hours, giving you a chance to go away and gather any new ideas that will improve upon it.
Then come back to it, integrating the new concepts and rereading what you have written to ensure it flows, makes sense and is factually correct.
Get a second opinion by asking a trusted family member, friend or colleague to cast their eye over it and take in their feedback.
Decide who you are going to publish your blog to – is it going to be accessible to everyone who visits your website or exclusively to clients or those who have signed up to your website?
Determine the best time to publish your blog when the most people are going to read it.
Typically it is best to publish when people have the most time to read on their daily commute at the beginning or end of the day when they are sitting on the bus or train.
5) Get constructive feedback
Once you have published your blog you are only halfway.
The most important part is measuring how successful it has been.
That can include seeking constructive feedback from readers to see what they did and didn’t like about it.
You can also monitor who is reading it, where your traffic is coming from and how long is spent on average reading it and then compare it to other blogs you have published using programmes such as Google Analytics.
Once you have that information you are in a much stronger position to know what your audience is most interested in when writing future blogs.
Get in touch
- Need help with writing your blog? Give me a call on +44 (0)7949 590213 or email alex@alexwrightjournalist.com
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