Once a relatively obscure form of digital journaling, blogs are now a dime a dozen. That’s not to say your blog isn’t worthy of attention; It’s just exceptionally hard to stand out when millions of new blog posts are published every single day.

The solution, of course, is promotion. And if you’re wondering how to promote your blog effectively without busting your budget, fret not— paid advertisements aren’t the only option. With the right fundamental strategies, you can leverage great content and networking for blog marketing success.

Want Higher Rankings and More Readers? Learn How to Promote Your Blog.

Imagine you’ve just finished a new blog post after hours of work. You followed a blog checklist, did all your research and plumbed the depths of your vocabulary. The only step remaining is to publish the post and hope it garners some kind of response.

Days later, you’ve been met with nothing but radio silence. You know readers would enjoy your post, but they’re just not showing up. In the end, you can’t help but feel like you’re talking to an empty room.

For many bloggers, this scenario is highly disappointing. For business bloggers, it’s nothing short of a nightmare.

You’ll be glad to know it only takes seven core promotional strategies to learn how to promote your blog and avoid this situation entirely. Once you master them, you’ll be able to achieve better search rankings, bring back old readers and attract new ones.

1. Don’t Compromise on Quality

It may not be a groundbreaking concept, but it’s true nonetheless: High-quality content is its own form of promotion. In Google’s words, it’s the single most important thing you can do.

Why? Because top-notch content:

• is prioritized by search engines;
• is more likely to be organically shared;
• tends to have a lower bounce rate than its low-quality counterparts;
• encourages visitors to return;
• helps generate backlinks from other sites; and
• builds credibility and trust.

Users actively dislike low-quality content, too. Adobe conducted a survey in 2019 and found 39 percent of customers are most annoyed by excessively wordy or poorly written content:

The bottom line is, your SEO efforts will be in vain if you don’t have excellent blog posts to back them up. With that in mind, never publish rushed or sloppy blog posts, and always take the time to polish each one from beginning to end.

2. Create Shareable Content

When’s the last time you saw someone share a blog post on social media, and what was your reaction? If someone other than the author posted it, you were likely at least a little intrigued. That’s because when we see someone link to a blog they’re not associated with, we assume it must have something interesting to say.

Thus, one of the best ways to promote your blog is to get other, unaffiliated people to share it on social media. Unlike other methods of promotion, this isn’t something you have direct control over. So, the best strategy is to always strive to create content that people will want to share.

A handful of strategies can help you accomplish that goal:

• Write punchy headlines: When a blog post is linked on social media, readers will use the title as a clue to what it contains. If that title is memorable, you’ll be more likely to convince readers that the post’s content is too. Need some inspiration? Try plugging your keywords into SEOPressor’s Blog Title Generator to get a list of ideas.
• Include aesthetically pleasing graphics: This is especially true for visuals like infographics which serve to communicate nuggets of interesting information in an easily digestible format. Don’t have a graphic designer on call? Check out this HubSpot tutorial to learn how to create beautiful infographics in 15 minutes or less, or try using a free tool like Canva to create professional-looking images.
• Say something unique: To be clear, “unique” doesn’t necessarily mean you need to post original research or exclusive news stories to stand out. Instead, it means you should aim to provide visitors with fresh content they haven’t seen before—including ideas, perspectives, imagery, humor, technical information and anything else that can stimulate readers’ minds.
• Embrace video content: If you’ve ever scrolled through Facebook then you already know how popular videos are on social media. Whether they’re of cute animals, cooking, DIY crafts, tutorials or presentations, videos are highly shareable. Given that 54 percent of consumers in an international survey reported wanting to see more video content from brands, it’s likely worth your while to start incorporating video content into your blog.

Don’t forget to include social media sharing buttons on all your blog posts—readers will be able to spread the word about your blog with just a couple of clicks.

Finally, be sure to promote your blog on your own social media accounts by posting links to each new post. Even if your audience is small, your LinkedIn connections, Facebook friends or Twitter followers could be your blog’s next readers.

3. Work with Influencers

Influencers have something of a bad rap—the mere mention of the word can conjure images of Instagram celebrities posing with bottles of herbal supplements.

However, those types of influencers only represent a narrow portion of influencers as a whole. Every content creator—whether they make educational videos, in-depth blog posts or beautiful social media photos—has the potential to be an influencer, even if their following is modest.

More importantly, consumers listen to what influencers have to say: The 2019 Edelman Trust Barometer found that among consumers aged 18 to 34:

• 63 percent trust influencers more than brands;
• 58 percent bought a new product in the last six months because of an influencer;
• 40 percent trusted a brand in the last six months because of an influencer; and
• 33 percent talked about a brand in the last six months because of an influencer.

Consumers don’t even need influencers to be popular in order to trust them. Rather, they tend to put their trust in influencers who are relatable: The same study found relatability is twice as important as popularity in attracting consumers.

What does this information mean for you? Influencers have the ability to promote your blog successfully, whether they have millions of followers or not.

To find influencers who are a good fit for you, hop on social media and keep an eye out for trusted figures whose content is relevant to your niche. Do you blog about cybersecurity? Think about collaborating with an influencer who reviews tech products. Do you write blog posts for a company selling personal care products? You might want to work with an influencer who’s known for their immaculate makeup.

The most important factor when choosing which influencers to collaborate with is relevance. If an influencer creates content related to your industry and has an audience who would be interested in your blog, they’re probably worth your consideration.

4. Implement Internal Links

Internal links are robust tools with many applications, and blog marketing is no exception. By linking to your blog’s posts from its parent site (or between blog posts), you’ll be able to boost website indexation and make it easier for readers to keep reading your content.

Moreover, internal links pass link equity to their destination pages. In other words, if you link to an underperforming blog post from a high-performing one, the former will gain ranking power from the latter (in Google’s algorithm, that ranking power is known as PageRank).

The advantage of such linking is tangible—a case study from NinjaOutreach found that over the course of a few months, an internal linking SEO campaign led to a 40 percent increase in organic traffic:

To help your blog benefit from the power of internal links, start by identifying keywords elsewhere on the blog or site where it might make sense to link to an existing blog post. If you wrote a post about the history of sandwiches, for example, you could link to it from any other onsite page briefly mentioning sandwiches.

Just be sure to avoid anything approaching link spam, and don’t link to the same blog post multiple times on the same page.

5. Write and Welcome Guest Posts

By both writing guest posts for other blogs and publishing them on your own, you’ll be able to create mutually beneficial agreements driving traffic to everyone involved. The guest post’s author will get backlinks to their own site, and the blog the post is published on will enjoy fresh content with minimal effort. Better yet, guest posts can lead to long-lasting relationships that help cement each party’s authority and reputation.

Of course, the same rules of high-quality content creation also apply to guest posts: Whether you’re writing a guest post or publishing one, don’t settle for anything unpolished, unoriginal or lacking value. Instead, uphold your standards of quality so everyone wins.

Ready to start writing and publishing guest posts? You’ll first need to connect with peers who have a history of exceptional content creation. To do that, you’ll need to evaluate your current professional network and work to expand it. Try going through the people in your professional Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook networks to get started. Once you’ve identified a few possibilities, it’s time to start doing some outreach.

If you’re requesting a guest post from a high-profile person, you may need to open up your wallet. After all, it takes time to write high-quality content that’ll add genuine value to your blog, so you can’t expect well-known pros to do it for free.

If you’re writing a guest post for another blog, however, you might consider doing it free of charge (unless you’re already an established personality). This can help you get your foot in the door, and if the post successfully drives traffic to your own blog then you’ll still be gaining value in the end.

Keep in mind the guest posts you submit can be duplicates of articles you’ve already published on your own blog, i.e. syndicated content. If you go that route, remember to point search engine crawlers back to your original post via the canonical tag.

6. Use IRL Networking

When you’re trying to figure out how to promote your blog, it can be easy to forget the importance of face-to-face networking. In fact, real-life interactions are overflowing with invaluable opportunities for promotion.

This is especially true at large industry events such as conferences, seminars and trade shows. There, you’ll have the chance to promote your blog to just as many people as you could via any social media channel (provided that you don’t already have tens of thousands of online followers, of course).

One of the simplest and most cost-effective ways to accomplish this is by giving out business cards printed with your blog URL. If you really want to pique their interest, be sure to briefly mention the value your blog offers. For instance, if you’re attending a seminar touching on a specific topic you’ve blogged about, don’t be afraid to share your previous coverage with other attendees.

Want to make sure everyone at an industry event knows about your blog? Try using custom promotional products to get your blog’s name and URL out there. Items such as lanyards, pens and tote bags are perfect for such events, and are generally available from wholesalers at a low price point.

Also remember that anyone you meet who has a blog of their own is a possible connection for future guest posts, collaborations and backlinks. Try not to view other bloggers as your competitors—instead, think of them as potential business partners.

7. Link to Your Blog Wherever Possible

Internal site links are absolutely important to successfully promoting your blog, but it can be equally beneficial to include a blog link in other places, too.

For instance, trying linking to your blog in:

• your email signature;
• your social media profiles;
• your author bio on publishing platforms like Medium; and
• relevant Facebook and LinkedIn groups.

Just be careful not to inundate those you talk to with excessive links. You want to give folks easy access to your blog from multiple platforms, not overwhelm them with constant self-promotion.

To avoid social media algorithms viewing your links as spammy, also strive to create original, engaging content to accompany them.

Blog Smarter, Not Harder

According to WordPress, its users produce about 70 million new blog posts each month. If you’re relying on word of mouth alone, you could spend every waking moment creating posts and still never see a spike in popularity.

That’s why the fundamental tactics of blog promotion are so essential. When you focus on quality over quantity, you can stop trying to crank out as many posts as possible and start focusing on creating useful, engaging and high-quality content that helps attract readers and turn them into customers.

Image credits
Adobe / February 2019
NinjaOutreach / March 2018

Blogging has come a long way since its 1990s inception. Once the territory of digital diarists chronicling their personal lives, it’s now a key component of digital marketing and SEO. Successful business blogging is an art in itself, though. With millions of new blog posts published daily, it takes finesse and strategy to make posts stand out.

The foundation of that strategy is a detailed blog checklist. From initial research to final proofreading, every item on your checklist can take you one step closer to a well-written, well-optimized blog post, and two steps closer to better rankings and more traffic.

15-Step Blog Checklist

Writing successful blog posts is challenging even when you take extra care and time to produce quality content. So if you’re cranking out one rushed, haphazard post after another, neither readers nor search engines will be impressed.

Instead, follow a blog post checklist to create consistent content and get consistent results.

1. Choose a Topic
2. Consider the Shelf Life
3. Research Keywords
4. Optimize the Title
5. Create an Outline
6. Write an Engaging Introduction
7. Flesh out the Body
8. Craft a Unique Wrap-Up
9. Craft a Custom Meta Description
10. Add Links
11. Copyedit
12. Confirm Compatibility
13. Proofread
14. Schedule and Publish
15. Update as Needed

1. Choose a Topic

When choosing what to write about, always keep the blog’s purpose and audience in mind. You’ll be able to come up with topics both relevant and interesting to readers.

Running short of ideas? You can try:

• seeing which topics get results for direct competitors;
• polling readers on potential topics;
• getting inspiration from previous high-performing posts; or
• using a tool like Semrush to find blog topics.

2. Consider the Shelf Life

Before you begin writing a blog post, it’s crucial to think about its intended lifespan. Do you want your post to be evergreen (remain indefinitely relevant) or time-sensitive (remain relevant for a limited period of time)?

If you want it to be evergreen, remember to avoid words like recently and last week/month/year. Instead, use wording that will always be true. For example, write “a 2020 study” rather than “a study published last year.”

3. Research Keywords

Once you’ve settled on a topic, you’ll need to identify the keywords you want to be found and rank for. To do so, enter your general topic into the keyword research tool of your choice.

From the list of results, identify those most relevant to your topic before narrowing down your options to those best-suited to your audience and the context of your post. Include the primary keyword in the post’s title, meta description, introduction and first H2 to further reinforce the page’s topicality.

4. Optimize the Title

A blog post title has three jobs: indicate the post’s topic to both readers and search engines; attract clicks to drive traffic; and boost rankings. To do all of that, your post titles need to include the primary keyword, and reach out and grab searchers as they scan the SERPs.

If you need a little help in the title-writing department, you can use a tool like CoSchedule’s Headline Analyzer.

5. Create an Outline

Take a few minutes to make an outline before you start writing. You’ll boost your efficiency and make your post easier for both users and search engine crawlers to navigate.

Be sure to include descriptive headings to help separate topics within your post, make it easy for skimmers to find what they need, and break up the text on the page.

6. Write an Engaging Introduction

Given the sheer number of blog posts floating around the web, it’s vital to grab readers’ attention right off the bat. Your post’s introduction presents a perfect opportunity to do so—don’t let it go to waste.

Focus on making your introduction unique and natural-sounding, and keep it to no more than a couple of paragraphs to hold readers’ interest and keep them reading.

7. Flesh Out the Body

Once you begin writing your post’s body text, be sure to thoroughly address the topic and concentrate on providing value to the reader.

As you write, remember to:

• use an on-brand voice and tone as specified in your internal style guide;
• adhere to your chosen general style guide;
• write for the target audience; and
• add relevant images or videos where appropriate.

8. Craft a Unique Conclusion

You’ve probably seen plenty of blog posts with conclusions preceded by headings like “Final Thoughts,” “Conclusion” or “In Summary.” There’s nothing wrong with such headings, but you can make your post stand out from the crowd by crafting a one-of-a-kind conclusion with a more creative heading.

In your wrap-up, be sure to remind readers of the value of the topic being discussed, and try to limit yourself to a paragraph or two. If you plan on including a call to action (CTA), add it here.

9. Craft a Custom Meta Description

Google doesn’t always use the meta descriptions written for blog posts, and will instead pull from the page. If you want to keep this from happening, apply three tactics when writing your meta descriptions:

• Make them unique to each post.
• Keep them short enough to avoid truncation in the SERPs.
• Ensure they match user intent for the content on that page.

10. Add Links

Outbound links can help build site authority, nurture relationships with other sites and provide value to readers. Internal links enhance a site’s crawlability, improve the user experience and pass link equity from one page to another.

Make an effort to include both internal and outbound links throughout your blog post where appropriate and relevant. When adding internal links, don’t forget to optimize—but not overoptimize—the anchor text.

11. Copyedit

You’re not going to publish a first draft, are you? Even if a professional editor is going to go over your post, it’s incumbent upon you to edit your own work and make sure you’re turning in the best content you’re capable of producing.

Get out your fine-toothed comb and check:

• grammar, punctuation and spelling;
• style guide adherence and consistency;
• readability and flow;
• link validity and placement; and
• logical organization.

Also, give it a once-over for plagiarism. You’d never intentionally copy someone else’s work and call it your own. Of course not. That’s just wrong. But maybe you pasted in a passage from another post to use as a reference, and forgot to delete it.

Maybe you plagiarized past work of your own—self-plagiarism is real, and it’s unethical. Make sure what you’re about to publish is unique and totally your own work.

12. Confirm Compatibility

From smartphones to laptops to desktops, readers use a vast array of devices to access your blog. With that in mind, remember to check how your post will render on various devices.

13. Proofread

Yes, you already edited the post. Now take some time to give it at least one more read to check for all the little things. A missing period. An apostrophe where there shouldn’t be one. A “their” that should be a “there.”

No one is immune to those tiny mistakes, and they love to sneak through when you’re not looking.

14. Schedule and Publish

Schedule your post to be published using the content management system of your choice. If you’re not sure when to publish it, refer to your past posts’ analytics to identify timeframes which have historically delivered good results.

Check the post preview to make sure everything’s in order, and then hit publish. You’re done! Well, almost.

15. Update as Needed

After all that work, it can be tempting to forget your blog post once it’s published. However, you can achieve greater long-term SEO if you update it periodically.

For example, you can go back to add relevant internal links as they become available, or provide updated statistics and graphics. This is true for both evergreen and time-sensitive content.

Stellar Blog Posts? Check. Stronger SEO? Check.

Blogging is no longer the niche activity it once was. Today, the internet is teeming with both business and personal blogs vying for attention. But while the competition may be stiff, writing exceptional blog posts to stand out from the rest is as easy as following a checklist.

Get your pen (or your clicker finger) ready. With a comprehensive blog checklist in your toolkit, you’re well on your way to creating professional-quality blog posts that visitors—and search engines—will love.

You know how to write a blog post, right? You sit down, you type up your thoughts on a topic, and voilà! Blog post! It may be that simple for a personal blog, or one that you maintain for a hobby. But for a blog that complements your business site, it’s not enough.

Content that delivers relevant, high-quality content to your readers, and performs consistently in the search engine results pages (SERPs) requires more time, more attention to detail, and yes, more work. But once you get the process down, it becomes easier with each post.

Writing Blog Posts Can Mean More Leads

Top-notch blogs have a bigger job than just providing visitors with reading material. Research shows blogging can have a significant effect on SEO metrics, from visitor count to lead generation.

That may help to explain why 77 percent of marketers prioritize written content and blog posts over all other channels.

Knowing how to write a blog post as opposed to just knowing how to write can make the difference between leads, conversions and revenue, and just a nice little blog your family and friends read.

Get to Know the Audience

A blog is nothing without readers. Make your first goal getting to know who the audience is—and isn’t—and what they want.

Start by asking a few key questions:

• Who are they? Remember to take age, geographical location and profession into account, and any other factors that may be applicable to the blog and its purpose.
• What do they want to know? Do they need to solve certain types of problems? Do they want to learn how to do something? Do they need help making informed buying decisions?
• What’s their level of expertise? Consider whether the audience is likely to have a beginner, intermediate or advanced understanding of the topics.
• What are their common problems? Understanding the obstacles an audience faces is the first step to creating blog posts that offer solutions.

When writing a blog post, staying focused on the audience is key. To do this more easily, try creating reader personas. Similar to customer personas, these are semi-fictional representations of the blog’s core audience.

A reader persona should include both general information and specific details, from demographics to personal interests and hobbies. Want to keep things simple? Try creating reader personas by filling out a premade template.

PERSONA TEMPLATE IMAGE HERE

Stick to the Style Guide

Even if a blog is full of well-written posts, it won’t look truly professional unless all its posts are consistent in voice, tone, format, syntax and design.

That’s why style guides are essential to content creation. By writing each blog post in adherence to both an established and an internal style guide, you’ll create polished, cohesive content that resonates with readers.

Whether you’re creating posts for a blog that already has a detailed style guide or one with no guidelines at all, it’s well worth your time to get acquainted with the style guide basics.

Several major style guides are used in an array of settings. Some of the most widely used include:

• The Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS): Typically used in the writing and publishing industries.
• The Associated Press (AP) Stylebook: Frequently used in the news and journalism industries.
• American Psychological Association (APA) Style: Used in academic settings, particularly for scientific disciplines.
• Modern Language Association (MLA) style: Also used in academic settings, often for the humanities.

If you’re writing a blog post for an academia-related site, you’ll likely be using either APA or MLA. Otherwise, you’ll probably be using CMOS or AP Style. Both are adaptable options that can be applied to a wide variety of topics and industries.

The main difference between CMOS and AP Style is the latter is designed for use in news and journalism, and so tends to emphasize brevity and simple punctuation. CMOS is designed for use in editing, publishing and literary writing, and thus is more nuanced, flexible and conducive to creative expression.

In addition to a general style guide, create one that’s internal and brand-specific. That’s where the blog’s stylistic idiosyncrasies will be defined, as well as its brand personality and overarching voice. Having an internal document will also help an entire content team be consistent in their content creation.

Choose a Crowd-Pleasing Topic

A post written on a fascinating topic can not only engage a blog’s existing audience, but also bring in new readers. You’ll want to avoid just echoing the topics of well-ranking blogs, regardless of whether they’re a good fit or not.

So how can you find relevant topics readers will search for while still staying true to the blog’s purpose and strengths? Topic research.

• Study the competition. While you should never flat-out copy the topics of competing blogs, analyzing what works for the competition can serve as a practical jumping-off point. Ignore topics unrelated to your blog’s primary focus, and only take inspiration from those your audience would find compelling.
• Look at high-performing previous posts. This strategy is so simple it can be easy to overlook. Want to know which topics really speak to your audience? Try taking a cue from successful past posts.
• Refer to personas. The reader personas you’ve created can help you identify engaging topics. If a topic sounds like it would interest your reader personas, it could be worth pursuing.
• Use a research tool. If you’re willing to pay (or sign up for a free trial), you can use Semrush to come up with blog topics. Their Topic Research tool is second to none and can also double as a keyword research tool. Looking for free options? Try using AnswerThePublic to find out what people are asking, or check out Google’s “people also search for” box after performing a search.
• Poll your readers: If the blog you’re writing for already has an active reader base, get topic ideas straight from the source by polling them. You can easily create polls on Facebook and Twitter, or use Google Forms to send polls directly to readers on the email list.

Target the Right Keywords

If you’re not including valuable, relevant keywords in your content, then you’re not really writing a blog post. You’re writing something you may as well print out for all the attention it’s going to garner from the search engines.

The overarching topic of your blog post is important, and topicality is one thing that’ll help your posts rank. And one of the easiest ways to indicate topicality is by choosing the right keywords.

Do keyword research before you begin writing. While it’s possible (and sometimes necessary) to optimize content after the fact, you’ll save yourself a lot of time if you incorporate target keywords from the get-go.

Create an Outline

You know your audience, you have your style guide handy, you’ve settled on a topic, and you’ve researched which keywords to target. Now you can finally start writing the blog post itself.

Start by creating an outline. Consider the type of blog post you’re going to write. Will it be a listicle? What about a how-to guide, or maybe a product review? Your final outline will vary depending on the answer.

An outline will also help you stay on topic, and keep the post focused so you don’t take your readers off on tangents.

Focus on Value

No matter how well you think your post might be able to rank for a keyword or topic, it’s unlikely to contribute to the blog’s long-term success if it doesn’t offer value to readers.

Google ranks pages based on quality as well as relevance. They instruct their search quality evaluators to consider reputation, expertise and helpfulness when rating pages, and part of its mission statement is to “deliver the most relevant and reliable information available.”

In other words, if the blog post you’re writing doesn’t offer accurate, valuable information to readers, then it probably won’t do you much good in terms of SEO.

The solution is to focus on value and quality when writing a blog post. Steer clear of fluff, and always keep the purpose of the post, blog and website in mind.

If you’re writing for a news blog, for instance, the purpose is to deliver accurate news. If you’re writing for an entertainment blog, the purpose could be to deliver funny content. Whatever the case, never forget your goal.

To stay on track, try asking yourself if the post is:

• going to adequately answer readers’ questions;
• going to satisfy searcher intent;
• providing readers with content, information or a perspective they can’t get elsewhere;
• well-researched and filled with authoritative information; and
• in line with the blog and website’s overall purpose.

Use Proper HTML Tags

HTML is the foundation of every web page, and it’ll be the foundation of your blog post’s page too. Even if you’re using a content management system (CMS) like WordPress, learning some basic HTML can make it that much easier to transfer posts from your word processor to the blog.

Tip: Yes, you can write blog posts inside WordPress or another CMS. But you may find it easier to draft in a word processing program, and then paste into the CMS. It’s a personal preference, really.

While “what you see is what you get” (WYSIWYG) editors like those in Google Docs and Microsoft Word can show you what your finished post will look like, you’ll probably have to spend more time tweaking the formatting than you would if you wrote your post with proper HTML tags from the start.

If you already have the right HTML tags in place, you can simply paste your post straight into the HTML editor you’re using. So while WYSIWYG editors may be helpful in some instances, they just can’t give you the convenient copy-and-paste functionality of HTML.

Common HTML tags you can easily incorporate throughout the writing process include:

• Metadata: Denoted by a number of meta tags within the HTML head element, metadata communicates fundamental information about the blog post to search engines. This can include the title, description, canonical and social media tags, and more. To see every meta tag you can use, check out this complete list.
• Section headings: Denoted by the tags h1 to h6, with h1 being the highest level of headings and h6 being the lowest. The h1 tag tells search engines what the page is about—that’s why it’s essential for the h1 heading to contain the blog post’s primary keyword. Google’s John Mueller has said pages can technically have multiple h1 tags without hurting SEO, but other sources such as MDN Web Docs recommend against it for organizational reasons. Sticking to a single h1 tag also has the benefit of ensuring accurate semantic markup, (i.e., HTML tags conveying information about the content’s meaning) and accessibility.
• Lists: Denoted by the ul or ol tag. Unordered (i.e., bulleted) lists are denoted by the former, and ordered (i.e., numbered) lists are denoted by the latter. Each separate list item is marked by the li tag. Use unordered lists for individual pieces of information, and reserve ordered lists for step-by-step sequences.
• Bold: Bold text is denoted by the b or strong tag. Both tags result in a similar visual change, but the former indicates a purely cosmetic difference while the latter indicates importance. Use the strong tag to indicate importance to visitors using text-to-speech software. They’ll hear a change in the text reader’s inflection.
• Italic: Italicized text is denoted by the i or em tag. Similar to the b and strong tags, the former indicates a cosmetic difference while the latter conveys emphasis. Thus, the same guidelines apply: The i tag creates a visual effect, while em instructs text-to-speech software to apply proper inflection.
• Hyperlinks: Denoted by the tag a href="URL", which will open the linked page in the same browser tab by default. To specify the linked page should open in a new window or tab instead, you’ll need to use the target attribute and _blank value after the URL: target="_blank".

Once you learn those tags and get in the habit of using them during the writing process, you’ll be able to save yourself hours of future frustration.

Note: Some CMS platforms like WordPress or themes like Divi offer blocks or drag-and-drop options, doing away with the need for HTML. Incorporating HTML into your content can give you a little more control at the code level.

Include Links

Besides helping readers easily access other pages and additional information, links offer several benefits to a blog post.

Internal links can:

• pass link equity (i.e., value and authority) from one page to another;
• facilitate indexing by making it easier for search engine bots to find and navigate among pages;
• encourage interested readers to spend more time on the site; and
• help the destination page rank for keywords included in the anchor text.

Outbound links can:

• establish a connection between your blog post and relevant, authoritative sites;
• positively affect Google search rankings;
• signal to readers you want to be as helpful as possible, not try to prevent them from leaving your post; and
• help create (or maintain) symbiotic relationships between your blog and other sites.

It is possible to have too much of a good thing, though. If the links you include start to look spammy or unnatural in the eyes of search engines, or if you’re writing a blog post solely to build links, the site your blog posts are published on could see a rankings loss.

To avoid triggering red flags, be sure to:

• stay away from anything that could be construed as a link scheme;
• qualify outbound links with the appropriate value, such as rel=nofollow or rel=ugc; and
• only link to relevant pages, whether internal or external, in places where it’s natural and makes sense.

Links are one of the most powerful tools in your blog toolkit. Use them wisely.

Add Relevant Images and Videos

You only have a few seconds to capture readers’ attention. Visual media can help you do that. Research from MIT found that the human brain can identify images in as little as 13 milliseconds.

The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences conducted a study and found people remember images better than they remember words.

For you, this means that images can serve as an effective way to pique readers’ interest and help your blog post stand out in their minds. It doesn’t, however, mean that any image is better than no image at all. A generic stock photo of someone typing on a laptop won’t contribute much to your post and certainly won’t grab readers’ attention.

Instead, focus on adding images and videos exclusively where it makes sense, and only use those that add real value to your post. For instance, you might include:

• charts and graphs to illustrate data you’re referencing;
• screenshots to clarify a step-by-step process;
• video tutorials covering the topic at hand;
• videos of an event you’re discussing;
• photos of people to accompany their quotes; or
• graphics to simplify a complex concept.

Make sure any images and videos you use are of high quality, and always:

• optimize them to help boost page speed;
• include a source where appropriate; and
• follow Google’s image best practices and video best practices for proper SEO.

Proofread Twice, Publish Once

The last blog post writing task is inarguably one of the most crucial: Proofread twice (or more), and you’ll only need to publish once.

Even if you’re a skilled writer with an exceptional understanding of grammar, spelling and syntax, treat every blog post you write as if it’s full of hidden errors. No one is immune to careless mistakes—the New York Times, widely considered one of the most venerable newspapers of all time, published a typo on its front page every day for more than 100 years.

While proofreading, keep your style guide close at hand and remember to check for:

• formatting (i.e., line spacing, font, text size, etc.);
• organization and numbering;
• accessibility;
• spelling errors;
• incorrect or inconsistent grammar; and
• improper, missing or left-open HTML tags.

It may be helpful to skim over your style guide before you start proofreading to ensure it’s fresh in your mind.

Loosen up Those Fingers!

You knew there’d be more to writing a blog post than just the writing. Right? Now it’s time to get to the actual writing part. But none of these tactics are out of your reach. They just take time, a little skill, some experience, and maybe a bit of luck. But applied consistently, you’ll see your content’s quality and performance go up in no time, and you may even have a little more fun along the way.

Image Credits
Illustration by iloveseo.com / April 2020