Quality content is finally getting its recognition as a powerful catalyst for digital growth. A study by BKA Content reveals that active blogs increase page indexation by 434% and significantly boost businesses’ opportunities for lead generation. And while anyone can fire up a laptop and jot down a blog post, not all writing is created equal and good enough to drive results. If you’re hungry for some quick ideas on how to improve yours, read on – we’ve drawn up a few.
Contents
Choosing a writing topic
Many underestimate the importance of topic choice for the overall performance of a blog. In fact, finding a topic that addresses trending issues and provides solutions to common problems is crucial for driving traffic to your website and increasing its visibility. But how do you go about crafting a successful blog strategy? Here are a few easy ways:
- Analyze your target audience: This is a must for every marketing activity and writing is no exception. Identify who your readers are and keep track of their pain points, interests and questions. Building a target persona is a useful starting point to crafting content that resonates.
- Research trending topics: Employ tools like Google Trends, identify keywords gaining traction and always keep an eye across social channels to spot potential ‘hot topics’. These will not only help you stay relevant, but are likely to score you better ranking online.
- Provide solutions: People generally read articles to fill in information gaps, which is why your content should be solution-oriented. Whatever your industry or topic, how-to guides and troubleshooting content are a great way to engage readers.
- Leverage personal expertise: Assess your own expertise and think about what topics relate to it. Leveraging your knowledge adds a unique touch to your content that also boosts your credibility as a creator.
- Consider your existing content: Take a look at your previous publications and identify topics that can be further expanded or explored from a different perspective. That also showcases a strive for improvement and growth.
If you need further inspiration, you can always rely on the assistance of AI tools like GrowthBar which has been designed to alleviate the pains of content planning and provide writers with unique content ideas.
Digging for gold in the sea of information
Once you have chosen a writing topic, it’s time to dive into the bottomless pit of information available online. While often overwhelming, this process can be boiled down to two simple phases.
Research
The effective research strategy relies on three fundamental pillars that you have to consider throughout the entirety of this stage:
- uniqueness of content;
- SEO performance;
- credibility.
Before you start flipping through the digital pages, take a look at what your competitors are doing. Analyze top performers and prominent brands in your respective industry. What are they talking about in their content? Is there a different angle through which you can approach topics relevant to your target audience? Finding that unique perspective is the starting point of your research journey.
Then, turn to SEO tools to identify trending questions and concerns which you can tackle with your own content. SEMrush, Mangools and Ahrefs are popular platforms you can include in your process, but if you’re operating with a tight budget and are looking for a free alternative, give AnswerSocrates a go.
When gathering information, avoid unverified websites and only trust reputable sources such as news outlets, expert publications and industry or academic blogs. To further boost your credibility, make sure you include relevant statistics and case studies to provide your reader with reliable information. If you have the opportunity, you can also conduct surveys or interviews with experts yourself – that is a great way to distinguish your writing as not only trustworthy, but also authentic.
Analysis
Now that you have a pile of useful information, it’s time to start giving it shape. Start by distilling your research into several essential points on which to base your writing. Keep your target persona in mind and prioritize only what would be considered valuable to them.
Outline a rough structure by organizing your findings logically and take a second look at them to ensure they align with your targeted keywords. And with that, you’re all set to move on to the next phase of crafting your piece.
The power of effective structuring
Structuring your article before you actually begin writing it is perhaps the most significant stage of the content creation process. With 80% of readers skimming through text nowadays, a well-organized post guarantees not only a positive user experience, but also higher engagement and time spent on your page.
In building an effective content structure, consider the reader’s journey. It is important to identify their initial motivation for reading your article, but predicting any related concerns that might arise is just as crucial.
Take, for example, one of our esteemed clients, Brenner Group – a mediation center for medical treatment in Turkey. Most readers find their blog by searching for treatment opportunities abroad. Yet, while reading about the benefits of Brenner Group’s services, they are likely to wonder about some of the following questions:
- Can I afford treatment abroad?
- How do I get to Turkey and where can I stay during the treatment process?
- Is there any language assistance for foreigners?
- How do I handle the exchange of medical documents?
These are all concerns that our client is prepared to meet through their service package. But if that’s not reflected in their blog articles and the writing is solely focused on the benefits of receiving treatment in Turkey, it is likely that the reader will get discouraged or assume that this option is not accessible to them.
With a clear vision of your reader’s journey in mind, you can start arranging their concerns in the logical order in which they appear to ensure that everything they might be looking for is available and easy to find with a simple scroll.
Writing tips for success
Crafting a successful blog post requires much more than simply “being good with words”. With plenty to consider – from target audiences and tone of voice to formatting and SEO tricks – content writing is both an artform and a science in itself.
Now that you have your article outline, it’s time to start expanding each part of its structure. Here are some things you need to keep in mind throughout this stage of the process.
Internal and external links
Internal links are an easy way to make readers spend more time in your blog and showcase extensive expertise in a particular area. From an SEO standpoint, internal links help search engines crawl and index your website more efficiently which improves your overall ranking online.
Linking to external high-authority sources is also beneficial for your content as it enhances its credibility and signals to search engines that your article is well-researched. Smaller websites might also link back to your post, which is yet another way to increase your reach.
Introduction and conclusion
The introduction and conclusion parts of an article are where the creativity of the author shines through the most. Ignite the reader’s curiosity with a surprising fact or a thought-provoking question and clearly explain what they stand to gain from reading your piece.
In your post’s final paragraph, avoid providing repetitive information. A conclusion’s main purpose is to inspire further engagement, whether that’s leaving a comment, subscribing to a service, purchasing a product or checking out related content. With a strong conclusion, you can not only reinforce your main points, but also extend the value of your writing beyond the article itself.
The rules of formatting and editing
The final push of content writing is all about assessing the work you’ve done and identifying areas for improvement. One way to do that is by trusting AI tools such as Read-able or Clearscope to run an audit of your content and suggest ideas on how to optimize it for better ranking. If you prefer a hands-on approach, here are some things to watch for when formatting your post:
Prioritizing SEO
To help your post achieve higher SERP ranking, be mindful about the elements you choose to ‘decorate’ your piece with. A recent OrbitMedia report reveals that audio and video elements are improving blog posts’ SEO performance significantly, which has resulted in a doubling of the number of authors diversifying their articles with visual materials. Do you know what elements are driving better results in your industry? If not, researching this might be a good starting point in taking your blog to the next level.
Headings, subheadings and bullets
Optimizing your article’s structure improves your content for both search engines and skim-readers. Separate your text in smaller, easy to digest chunks with subheadings and bullets to enhance the overall reader experience. A good idea to help users find what they’re looking for is to also add a table of contents plugin to your blog.
CTAs
The sad reality us writers have to live with is that we could give our readers free gold at the end of an article and nearly 70% of them won’t even see it. However, that doesn’t mean all hope is lost and you can still convert your blog visitors into customers, subscribers and devoted followers. To achieve that, be mindful about the positioning of your CTAs across the text – don’t just cram them all into your conclusion, but rather, have a CTA button or message appear even after the first few paragraphs, as most people don’t make it past the 30% mark of online articles.
In the end, always remember that readers crave value and engagement, not a soulless string of pretty words. So, try to be intentional with your content, add your unique flavor to every piece and sprinkle some SEO on top, to help more like-minded people find their way to it. Browse our content treasury to find more guidance and inspiration. And most importantly, don’t forget to put your heart in the process and write like you’re having a blast. After all, if you’re not enjoying it, why should anyone else?
