A blog, short for “weblog,” is a text-based online diary or website product used for informational or entertainment purposes.
A blog can be written by a single writer, or a group of writers. And the information contained in this platform varies according to the topic or theme.
Generally speaking, a blog shares the viewpoint and opinions of its writers. However, blogs can also be written in a non-biased manner, depending on the desired goal.
Individuals can use blogs for personal reasons, such as sharing personal events. Businesses can use blogs for commercial purposes, such as informing clients about their products and services. Ultimately, the overall purpose of a blog is to connect the writer with a target audience by way of relevant content.
Structure of a Blog
In general, blogs have the following structure:
Main title
Table of contents and/or navigation bar
Main content section with subheadings
A sidebar with links to social media, e-commerce
sites, or a call to action
A footer with relevant disclaimers and contact
information
Writers can alter blogs to suit their needs. That’s why
formatting a blog often takes practice and experience.
Why Are Blogs Popular?
Blogs are popular for the following reasons:
They provide accurate and up-to-date information.
Companies use them to keep their clients and
suppliers informed.
Visitors can interact with individuals and
companies through comments and messages.
Bloggers can earn money by doing activities such
as affiliate marketing.
They generate traffic for websites and
e-commerce portals.
Who is a Blogger?
A blogger is essentially anyone who writes a blog. This includes individuals, companies, and organizations that share information and points of view through this type of format. Bloggers are informers or storytellers that have something to say to the world.
With the tools available nowadays, virtually anyone can become a blogger. But the success of a blog depends on the right message reaching the right audience.
Have you ever passed a house that had a really
cool front door? It could have been some cool glasswork or just a color that
popped. It immediately gives the whole house a more interesting vibe, and it
makes you want to see what’s inside.
Don’t settle for basic brown or white. Give it
some thought. Let it add some flair to your site. If you want your website to
have that “curb appeal,” you want to make your blog stand out and say, “Come on
in. There’s cool stuff here!”
Blogs can be fun or informative, or even
profoundly personal. Some draw you in and keep you reading to the very end,
while others you barely notice or, even worse, make you bounce out from boredom
or disgust.
Whether you are writing blogs for other people
or creating your own, there are a few things you can do to ensure that your
readers will actually want to finish reading your blog post. Here’s what you
need to know.
Define Your Audience
Who do you want to read this blog? Once you
know that, ask yourself the following questions:
What does my reader
care about?
What are they looking
for that brought them to my blog?
What emotions are in
play?
Understanding your audience is crucial to
creating a blog that will give them what they need and keep them coming back
for more.
Think about everything, including age, gender,
and even financial status. As you put your blog together, consider any factors
that may affect how and why someone is on your site and reading your blog.
Choose a Topic Carefully
The topic of your blog is paramount. This goes
for the overall concept as well as each blog entry.
Whenever possible, choose a topic you care
about so that your passion comes through in your post.
If you’re writing for someone else, though, it
may not always be something you care deeply about. However, once you try to
understand the audience and why they care about the topic, you’ll find that it
usually becomes interesting pretty quickly.
Now, before you can settle on a great topic,
you need to clarify what you want to accomplish with your blog. It’s kind of
like picking your destination before you choose a car to get you there.
What is your ultimate goal for the blog post?
Do you want to entertain, inform, or sell? Knowing your blog’s goal can help
you find a topic that will help check all of the boxes.
But no matter what your goal, it’s important
to remember that readers want to be informed, and they need to
be entertained. That doesn’t mean that it has to be amazingly witty or dramatic
but keep it interesting enough to retain their attention.
When you find your topic, you may think, “It’s
already been done!” You’re probably right. The internet is vast, and most
subjects have been touched on, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have something original
to contribute.
Twenty people can all write about the same
topic, and all 20 can be interesting if they each take a unique angle. Consider
this example:
(Topic)
The Amazing Honeybee
(Potential Angles)
The Intricate Social Structure in a Beehive (They can “create” a new queen if the old one dies!)
How Bees Pollinate the World
Bee Keeping in Ancient Egypt (This was a real thing!)
How One Kid is Trying to Save the Honeybees
10 Ways You Can Help Honeybees in Your Backyard
By finding an angle that is new, interesting,
and relevant to your audience, you’re creating something that is unique – and
adds value to your blog and your website.
Create a Structure
Good blogs have structure. And the best way to
get that structure is by starting with an outline. Some people may not be big
fans of this step, but doing an outline first is crucial.
An outline helps you plan out your blog post so that you know where everything goes and how much space each section gets. Once you have an outline in place, it can help you spot gaps where you may be missing information. It can also help make the writing part easier!
So, do yourself a favor and outline.
When it comes to the content, it’s important
to note that people read on the internet much differently than they do when
they pick up a novel.
Readers want articles to be broken down into
sections that they can easily digest. And to help them identify what they are
going to be reading about, each section should be divided by a header that tells
the content of the section.
Your audience also wants content that flows
logically, transitioning from one section to the next while using short
paragraphs, bullet points, quotes — anything to make it easier for them to
consume information quickly.
Craft a Great Opening
The internet is full of content. To keep your
readers on your page, you must hook them right away.
Your opening identifies your style and tone.
It tells the reader what you’ll be talking about and why they need to read it.
If your opening doesn’t evoke curiosity,
amusement, or some other emotion within the first couple of seconds, your
reader will click away and find someone else’s blog to read.
Let Your Voice Shine
Don’t be dull. Blogs aren’t the place for
stuffy, academic writing.
Even if you’re tackling a technical topic,
handle it like you are talking to a friend. Use the first person to convey your
own experience or use the second person to speak directly to the reader. Avoid
using the third person as it distances the reader from the blog.
Your readers want to feel like they’re getting
to know you. So, let them in!
If you’re worried that you’re going a little
overboard with your voice and it’s bordering on obnoxious, stick with it for a
bit. Your blog is fighting for attention on a crowded internet. That bold voice
of yours may be just what you need to cut through the noise.
If, after a few tries, you see too big of a
bounce rate, it may be time to dial it back. Go big first. Besides, you can
have a lot of fun writing that way.
Unless your topic is a first-person narrative
of something from your own life, you’ll probably need to do some research.
Don’t fake it. Do your due diligence and get
it right. If you get things wrong, you will get called out. That’s pretty much
guaranteed. But for every reader who has the guts to point out your error,
dozens more will say nothing and just click away from your page.
The worst part is that you’ll lose credibility
with those readers, and you may not get a second chance.
Speak to Emotion
Regardless of what you are writing about, find
a way to connect your topic to emotion.
What if you are writing about a technical
topic? Then it’s even more important. People are driven by emotion.
A good example of this can be seen in effective
advertising campaigns. Take Michelin, for example.
In 1986, Michelin ran an ad for car tires that
didn’t tell us about the tread, or the special rubber used. The ad never even
showed us a car. It just had a baby resting inside of a tire and a dad talking
about tires: “Michelin. Because so much is riding on your tires.”
Or even better:
The Dawn dish soap ad that shows people using
their product to clean baby ducks at an oil spill. Think about how those images
affect the viewer. Is Dawn…powerful? Check. Environmentally conscious? Check.
Aww…baby ducks! Check.
The same is true for your blog post. It
doesn’t matter what you are writing about, if you speak to emotion, you’ll take
your blog from good to amazing.
Finish It Strong
Have you ever been to a live concert and heard
a band completely nail a song only to flub the ending? No matter what came
before, that ending ruined it. It’s what you’ll remember.
Find a good way to end your blog post that
ties the information together and hammers your point home. One great way to do
this is to find a way to tie it back to your intro.
Most writers don’t really enjoy editing, but
it separates the good ones from the rest. If you’re not great at editing, make use
of the grammar tools available to you like Grammarly or the Hemingway Editor. Or,
even better, find someone
who can help you out.
Typos and goofs all through your blog will
guarantee that you lose credibility, and people will stop reading it. It looks
sloppy and unprofessional.
Come Up With a Compelling
Headline
Wait. What? Why is the headline so far down
this list? Because your best bet at writing a compelling headline that captures
your blog post perfectly is to do it after you’ve written the post.
Don’t fall in love with a headline and try to
shoehorn your blog post to fit it. That’s backwards, and while it may lead to a
lot of clicks, people will be disappointed when they get there.
You don’t always know where a blog post is
going to go as you write it, even if you outlined it in detail.
Writing is an organic process, and every
project tends to morph a little bit as you go. And, sometimes, those changes
are the best part. Once you’re done, you’ll have a lot of good ideas for
headlines. Write them all out and then choose the one you like the best.
Take the time to add a couple of strong,
emotion-evoking images. They help to break up the text and leave a memorable
mental picture for the reader.
Be sure to use high-quality images that will
look great and fit the size you need on your screen. Hazy, pixelated images
will give your blog the same appearance as a bunch of typos. It looks
unprofessional.
If you have the eye and the equipment to take
your own photos, that’s fantastic. But not everyone can pull that off, and
that’s okay. There are a number of duty-free image websites where you can source pictures for free or for a small
fee. Just be certain to credit where you got them.
Optimize for SEO
If no one can find your blog, how will they
read it? Luckily, today’s search engines put the most value on content that
meets reader expectations, so having a great headline and a blog post that
follows up on that headline is a great start.
Here are a few of the other basics you should
consider:
Do a little research on keywords for your topic and incorporate them into your blog organically.
Use subheads and work the keywords in there, too, when you can.
Optimize your meta description to describe your blog post accurately.
Create a few links to other internal web pages or a few highly reputable external websites.
You don’t have to obsess over SEO to make your
post SEO friendly. Focus on writing great, useful content, and you’re most of
the way there. Then, add the other elements I mentioned to make it work even
better.
Now, Go Forth and Blog!
A great website needs to be constructed
thoughtfully. From your landing page to your opt-in or sales pages, you need to
look at it from your website visitor’s point of view. Is it easy to navigate?
Does it make sense? And most of all, is it interesting?
Your blog can be a tool that helps people find
your website and start their exploration. It’s your front door. Make it smart,
interesting, and well-written so your visitors will be intrigued enough to come
in and stay for a while. Then, when they leave happy, they’ll keep coming back
and maybe even tell their friends.
Our writers and editors manage multiple topics, multiple subject matter experts (SMEs), and multiple deadlines, all with equal ease. After hundreds of clients and decades of experience, it’s likely we’ve written about a business or focus like yours. But if we haven’t, rest easy: we’re quick learners who love research and never miss an opportunity to check a fact.
We’ve also come to grips with the realization that, online at least, readers want to get the point, fast. So we’ve mastered the art of the scannable post, including:
Strong headlines
Compelling subheads
Infographics
Bullet points
Highlighting important content
Links (learn more about our thought leadership capabilities here).
Calls to action that make people move. Now!
We’ll Work (Well) With Your SMEs
Your SMEs have vast knowledge
to share and keen insights to impart, but they’re generally so
caught up in their own work that they don’t have time to sit down
and write a blog post. (Which might be just as well, inclined as they
are to include everything they know instead of the key messages your
audience wants to hear.)
Fortunately,
our writers have the copywriting chops necessary to prepare content
that keeps readers coming back for more. They also have the people
skills to work with your SMEs.
They’ll respect your SME’s time, do their homework, and come prepared.
They know how to ask thoughtful questions, listen, and follow up. That helps them reach the gems hiding under the surface.
They’ll do the hand-holding needed to get the project completed on time. Like discussing goals, deadlines, and expectations at the start. Agreeing on ways to track progress. And implementing an established process for copy review and revisions.
They’re diplomatic. They understand that sometimes SMEs feel the piece won’t be complete without those 117 slides they did in 1982. Our writers will explain why that isn’t the best approach and offer alternatives that will keep everyone happy.
In other words, our writers
create great partnerships with subject matter experts that result in
great work.
In-House SEO Expert
SEO has changed dramatically
over the past decade: Today’s Google rankings are more complex and
sophisticated than ever — and it takes more than repeated use of
keywords to keep your brand on the first page. Authentic, engaging
content matters more than keywords. If you aren’t offering anything
of value, readers — and Google rankings — will quickly go
elsewhere.
When
you work with The Writers For Hire, you’ll have access to a
full-time SEO expert who can help you create blog campaigns that rank
for search terms your target audience will use. That means your blog
campaign will be built around a steady stream of relevant,
high-quality content — no keyword stuffing here!
Every time we write, draw, paint, photograph, sketch, etc. something, we want to claim it as ours. Shout it from the rooftops, let everyone know: This is mine. I did this.
Copyright has always been the legal protection for writers, artists, thinkers, developers, photographers, etc., to protect their ideas from being stolen and reproduced. Now introduce the Internet. Suddenly, the established rules of copyright are flying out the window.
Why copyright doesn’t work on the Internet:
Blogs. Social Media. Wikipedia. Do these things ring a bell? The Internet brings together a bunch of different people, and they’re all there to do one thing: share information. (Ok, you can order a pizza and pay your electricity bill online too, but just humor me). And they can’t share that information if Continue reading “How Releasing Your Copyright = Free Marketing”
It’s called “astroturfing”. Chances are, you’ve been exposed to it. And, if the folks behind it have done their jobs right, the chances are pretty good that you didn’t even know it.
Social media is powerful stuff. In its most basic form, it’s the high-tech equivalent of your best friend recommending Gap jeans or your next-door neighbor telling you that she never shops at XYZ grocery store anymore because the cashiers are rude.
The truth is, we’re all influenced by what our friends think. Most of us buy books or see films based on the recommendations of friends we trust. We’re probably more likely to try a new restaurant if a few people from work say the food’s good. And yes, if everybody jumped off a bridge . . .
Well, we’d probably at least think about it for a second.
But imagine if your friend was getting kickbacks from the Gap. If every time she plugged her favorite jeans, she got fifty bucks. Or if your neighbor was getting free groceries from XYZ grocery store’s competitors whenever she badmouthed the competition.
