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by Nadine Nocero-Tye on Fri, May 17, 2013 @ 01:35
Anatomy of a Perfect Blog Post to Kick-Start Your Inbound Marketing
Blogging is growing popularity and impact every day. The impact it can have on website traffic, leads and sales is well documented. Blogging can't be beat as a great way to create content to enhance the SEO value of your site.
We realized recently that we have not before listed the aspects of the perfect blog post. So, simply put, these are the elements of a blog post that is correctly set up and thoroughly developed to meet the needs of the reader as well as search engines for SEO purposes.
(PDF Document) Anatomy of a Perfect Blog Post
The Anatomy of a Perfect Blog Post
The Headline
The goal here is to provide an attention grabber! Your headline gets read more than anything else. That’s why it has one goal: grab attention so that people click through to read the whole article.
The Opening
If you get people to read your first 3-4 sentences, they’re more likely to read the entire article. The point of your opening is simply to get people to read your opening... and that’s it!
The Image
People often make snap decisions about blog posts – they are less likely to read and more likely to simply look or browse. An image will always benefit the read rate, so be sure to include one within your post.
The Sub-Head
This is your big promise! It has one main goal: to get people to read the main body content. So, make them a promise. Do they have a problem? Give the solution or a benefit. This is usually broken out as an H2 in the formatting.
The Content Area #1
This is your chance to connect with the reader - this big body piece of content should trigger an emotion.
The 2nd Sub-Head
This is your second promise to the reader. Here’s where you tell them exactly what they’ll learn, the step-by-step method, the How To, etc. Again, this will break out as another H2, which draws in the reader’s eye, but also breaks up your content nicely.
The Content Area #2
This is the meat of it all- a place to give people practical, easy to implement advice. Get people results, and they’ll remember you forever. This area also includes a brief conclusion of what you’ve stated in content area #1 and area #2.
The Author Bio
All posts should have an author bio at the end of the content. Readers want to know where the content is coming from and what makes the person who wrote it an expert. People like listening to other people too, so bios give a post a human aspect.
The CTA
Last but not least- the close out of your article should always have a call to action. You can include a CTA button, a link, or a subscribe option. Anything that takes the reader to a next step is what you are looking to achieve.
(PDF Document) Anatomy of a Perfect Blog Post
Additional Best Practices
Sentence Spacing
All digital content (blog posts, white-papers, emails) should have sentences written with single spacing. Meaning, after each punctuation point you only hit the space bar once before beginning your next sentence. This is a best practice for writing on the web because additional spacing leaves room for junk code to ‘live’ on the back-end, sometimes creating a jumbled mess of text for the search engines.
Methods of Delivery
Blog content is preferred in several methods of delivery. For each post try and choose one of the following:
- Positive - Write something informative that shares the benefits or showcases the right way to do something.
- Negative - Write something informative that shares what a reader could be doing wrong and how to fix it (e.g., Common Mistakes of _____).
- Comparisons - People love to compare things. Give them a piece of your business and compare it- X vs. Y or for example, Inbound Marketing vs. Outbound Marketing.
- Lists - Share content that prepares the reader with what to expect (e.g., 6 Steps to Creating a Blog Post or Top 5 Reasons You Should Do _____).
- Newsworthy - Did something big happen in your industry and are people talking about it? Give your two cents on the subject and share how it relates to your business. This is also a great time to ask for feedback on how your readers are dealing with the news.
(PDF Document) Anatomy of a Perfect Blog Post
You've probably heard it said "Any monkey can blog." We don't have the facts to dispute that, but we do know that not every monkey can blog CORRECTLY!
Now that you have a template to go by, there is no excuse not to get started blogging. That is, unless you're not looking for more website traffic, more leads which should eventually lead to more sales.
In the comments below tell us your biggest BLOGGING challenge. Ask for help. Ask for ideas in a certain niche. If you don't ask, we can't help.
Another post by Nadine Nocero on Content Creation or Inbound Marketing: Top 5 Things to Know About Sales and Digital Marketing
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles via FreeDigitalPhotos.net