In today’s digital age, where content is king, having a fantastic blog post is crucial to grab the audience’s attention and rank high in search engine results. A well-crafted blog post will also keep the readers engaged, encourage shares, and improve the website’s overall credibility.
However, creating a post that ticks all the above objectives requires a strategic and careful approach. A proper understanding of the essential elements of creating a great ‘write-up’ is required, coupled with effective SEO strategies to ensure your content truly stands out for both human readers and search engine crawlers.
Our intention in the guide below is to help you unearth some best practices to create blog posts that rank well in search engine result pages (SERPs) and drive valuable targeted traffic that converts.
Table of Contents
Understand Your Target Audience and Goals
Just before you get started with crafting articles, first, have a clear description of who your target audience is and what your business goals are.
You can create a customer avatar by answering questions like:
- Who is your primary audience?
- Do they have a specific interest?
- What are their pain points?
- How can you help resolve these issues with your blog posts?
More like it to consider are the results you intended to achieve with your writing. Are you writing the post to improve sales, readership, shares, or authority?
Conduct thorough research on your audience and business goals to tailor your article outline accordingly.
Select an Engaging Topic
Now that you have created a customer avatar, it’s time to come up with a list of topics that your readers want to read. The main goal of these is to identify ‘key phrases’ that best appeals to your audience, relate well to what they are searching for and the ones you want your page to rank for.
To achieve this, start by checking the user’s search intent. Observe the SERPs appearing when you type your focus topic in the Google search bar. You will notice the results fall under 4 categories:
- Information: I want to know
- Navigational: I want to go
- Investigational / Commercial: I want to choose
- Transactional: I want to make a purchase
Since you already have a goal in your mind, you can look for the top-ranking pages that resonate with both – your goal and the audience’s search intent.
Explore these pages to succinctly establish a list of keywords and outlines for your blog.
You can take things yet farther by using keyword research tools like Ahrefs, The Hoth Keyword Planner, and SEMrush to find relevant keywords with low competition and high search volume.
Compile the keywords that align with the theme of your blog and systemically integrate them in your headings and the body of your blog posts. Do it as natural as possible so it doesn’t appear to search engine that you’re trying to be manipulation in your on-page optimization efforts.
Craft an Engaging Title and Introduction
The first impression is the last; therefore, you must create a catchy title and introduction for your blog post to attract the audience. After all, this is the first area your readers will view, and a compelling one will definitely encourage them to continue reading.
Use powerful words, numbers, or intriguing statements to make your title stand out. Similarly, the introduction should hook the readers by highlighting the value they will gain from reading the post. Engage them with an interesting story, a question to pique their curiosity or a surprising statistic.
Remember, the goal is to make your readers curious and eager to explore the rest of your content.
Write High-Quality and Informative Content
The main content is the heart and soul of your blog post. Through your writing, you should provide the readers with valuable information, insights, and strategies. Make sure to conduct comprehensive research for accurate and updated information about your topic. Add case studies, examples, or personal experiences to illustrate a point.
You should also focus on structuring your content to improve the readability of the audience.
Some tips to follow include:
- Break down your content into sections using headings (H2, H3, …)
- Use bullet points to improve readability.
- Write in a conversational tone.
- Avoid using overwhelming vocabulary and blocks of text.
- Use short sentences.
- Use reader-friendly fonts.
- Use bold fonts to emphasize words or phrases you want to stand out.
Add Engaging Visuals
High-quality and relevant visual elements help supplement your message and make your content attractive.
Use professional and custom pictures if there are no budget and time constraints. But if you are just starting your blogging journey or have a low marketing budget, consider stock photo sites where you can get superior quality images. These sites are packed with visual options to help you find relevant ones for your content.
However, don’t neglect page speed when uploading pictures to your blog post. Since images take up a significant amount of server space, make sure to compress their size so they don’t weigh down your site.
Optimize the Blog Post for SEO
Besides the content, optimizing your post to enhance their visibility in search engine results is important. Here are some strategies you can follow:
- Include the focus and long-tail keywords naturally in your article’s headings and body paragraphs.
- The meta title and description are displayed in the search engine results so they ensure they benefit the readers and the search algorithms. Ideally these are a summary of your content and must include your focus keywords. Keep the meta title length to 60 characters and the description up to 160 characters.
- Focus on image SEO and optimize the file name, alt tag, and format of your visuals.
- Make sure your webpage is mobile responsive and can successfully adapt to any screen.
- Add external links to reputable and authoritative sources.
- Add internal links to the existing blog and services pages of your website.
- The links you include should be relevant to the context and provide value to the readers.
Add a Compelling CTA
A CTA or a call-to-action will guide your readers towards the ‘action’ you want them to perform. This could be subscribing to your newsletter, downloading a resource, sharing on a social network, or leaving a comment.
Craft a persuasive CTA that conveys the benefit and urgency of the action you want your readers to take. Make it easy for them to follow through by providing clear instructions and clickable buttons or links.
Publish the Content
Finalize the content and layout by going through it comprehensively. You can also run the article through tools like Grammarly and Hemingway app to check for mistakes and ensure readability. Publish your blog post once you are satisfied with the output.
But remember, your work is NOT done as you hit the ‘publish’ button. To maximize the reach of your article, you need to promote it on social media channels. You can also collaborate with influencers or industry leaders to share your content on their network.
Review the Blog Post Regularly
Make it a habit of regularly reviewing the performance of your blog post. Tools like Google Analytics to monitor metrics such as page views, time on page, bounce rate, and social shares. Identify areas of improvement periodically and make changes according to the changing trends of the industry and the reader’s preference.
Regularly updating your blog post will signal to the search engine bots that your article is actively maintained and accurate. This indicates that you and your content cater to readers’ needs and interests.
Final Words
Creating a blog post that ranks well requires an in-depth understanding of the target audience and attention to detail. By following the steps above, you can craft content that attracts your audience, keeps them engaged, and boosts your website’s visibility in search engine results.
Author Bio:
Ivy Attie is an enthusiastic communicator with expertise in content management, research, and authorship across diverse publications focusing on visual media. She has a profound affection for visual imagery, e-commerce, and digital marketing.
