Blog Creation: Including Headlines, Links, Posts

Create a Blog post for your project, Including headline, imagery, links and post, content planning and writing

How to Write a Blog Post in Five Easy Steps [Summary]:

1. Step 1: Plan your blog post by choosing a topic, creating an outline, conducting research, and checking facts.
2. Step 2: Craft a headline that is both informative and will capture readers’ attentions.
3. Step 3: Write your post, either writing a draft in a single session or gradually word on parts of it.
4. Step 4: Use images to enhance your post, improve its flow, add humor, and explain complex topics.
5. Step 5: Edit your blog post. Make sure to avoid repetition, read your post aloud to check its flow, have someone else read it and provide feedback, keep sentences and paragraphs short, don’t be a perfectionist, don’t be afraid to cut out text or adapt your writing last minute.

Headlines

There are two main approaches you can take to writing blog post headlines. You can either decide on your final headline before you write the rest of your post (and use your headline to structure your outline), or you can write your blog post with a working title and see what fits when you’re done.

Using Images Effectively

Writing for the web is an entirely different animal than writing for print. Oftentimes, people simply don’t have the time, will, or ability to focus on lengthy blog posts without some visual stimulation. Even a well-formatted blog post consisting solely of text is likely to send your reader screaming back to Reddit or Twitter within minutes, which is why it’s so important to include images in your posts.

Images Help Your Blog Post Flow More Effectively

One of the most important reasons to include images in your blog posts is to break up the text. Many people scan blog posts rather than pore over every word, and interspersing images throughout the copy will make your post seem less intimidating and more visually appealing.

Images Make Great Visual Punchlines

Everyone likes a good laugh, and a well-chosen image can help lighten the tone of your posts and inject some much-needed humor into a piece. This can be particularly effective if you’re writing about a dry (or flat-out boring) topic.

Content planning and writing

You’ve got to find out which method works best for you, but here are the items we believe every content plan should contain:

• Delivery date/time: Remember, timing is important for content marketing, and this will help make sure you’re writing to deadline.
• Title: You can’t start writing without a title, even if it’s just a working one. This should outline the main premise of the piece.
• Wordcount: This will determine how much depth and detail the piece will go into.
• Quick summary: Just two or three sentences – outlining key points and your conclusion. You can always add an ‘additional ideas’ section if you want some extra room for your ideas.
• Sources: Find sources you can use for research and as inspiration for your piece. This will save you time later and might spark some ideas. Just make sure they’re credible!

6 Tips for Top-Notch Content Planning:

So, you know what your content plan should include, but you could probably do with a few additional pointers to get you going. We’re happy to oblige – take a look!

1. Consider your brand’s stance

Everything you say should fit with your brand’s guidelines, ethos and values. So, forget what you know about the subject personally – what does your brand think?

Your content plan should be written from your brand’s perspective and subtly align your offering as the solution. Remember that word though – ‘subtle’ – as your content should always be more educational than promotional.

2. Know your audience

Who is your piece meant to be targeting? Which segment of your audience should it speak to?

You need to think long and hard about this, as it will define the direction of your piece. Think about the needs of the individual and where he or she might be in your sales funnel by using audience personas based on existing customers.

Think about how you can structure your content specifically for your users, and give them everything they want to know about the subject. Then you can think about getting started on writing your content.

3. Brainstorm lots of ideas

With those two key things in your mind, start brainstorming ideas – we find mind-maps work well!

Generate as many ideas as possible, just go crazy. Yes, some may not be as good as others, and some may not even be realistic, but you can hone these down to create highly-targeted, engaging content.

4. Decide which angle you’ll take

This is key to good content planning – an angle that will grab attention and help you stand out from the crowd.

Visit competitor sites to see what they’re doing and see if you can switch it on its head. If you’re stuck, use the four-pillar approach like this:

1. What is happening to Uber in London?
2. Where can I still get an Uber?
3. Why is TFL and Sadiq Kahn banning Uber in London?
4. How can I stop Uber leaving London?

There you go, four different approaches to the same topic. Take your pick!

5. Set a goal for each piece of content

Each piece of content should have a goal. It can either be something explicit (e.g. increasing newsletter sign-ups, or downloading guides), or something more implicit (like educating, informing or explaining a process). The latter is more suited to content marketing.

6. Choose a strong focus keyword

Pick a keyword now, so you can consider it throughout the content planning process. It will help you stay on track and prepare your piece for SEO.

These content planning tips will help you create an effective plan that will act as a great foundation for your content. Try our ideas out next time content planning rolls around, and see how your content quality improves!

Publishing Blogs and Webinars, Sharing Videos/Images, Social Networks

1) It helps drive traffic to your website

Raise your hand if you want more website visitors. Yeah, me too.

Now think about the ways people find your website:

• They could type your name right in to their browser, but that’s an audience you already have. They know who you are, you’re on their radar, and that doesn’t help you getmore traffic on top of what you’re already getting.
• You couldpay for traffic by buying an email list (don’t you dare!), blasting them, and hoping some people open and click through on the emails. But that’s expensive and, you know, illegal.
• You couldpay for traffic by placing tons of paid ads, which isn’t illegal, but still quite expensive. And the second you run out of money, your traffic stops coming, too.

2) It helps convert that traffic into leads.

Now that you have traffic coming to your website through your blog, you have an opportunity to convert that traffic into leads.

Just like every blog post you write is another indexed page, each post is a new opportunity to generate new leads. The way this works is really simple: Just add a lead-generating call-to-action to every blog post.

Often, these calls-to-action lead to things like free ebooks, free whitepapers, free fact sheets, free webinars, free trials … basically, any content asset for which someone would be willing to exchange their information. To be super clear for anyone unfamiliar with how traffic-to-lead conversions work, it’s as simple as this:

3) It helps establish authority.

The best business blogs answer common questions their leads and customers have. If you’re consistently creating content that’s helpful for your target customer, it’ll help establish you as an authority in their eyes. This is a particularly handy tool for Sales and Service professionals.

Can you imagine the impact of sending an educational blog post you wrote to clear things up for a confused customer? Or how many more deals a salesperson could close if their leads discovered blog content written by their salesperson?

There are other reasons businesses might want to blog, but I think they’re smaller and stray from the core benefits of blogging.

For instance, I love to use our blog to test out big campaigns on the cheap — before we invest a lot of money and time into their creation. I also love to use our blog to help understand our persona better. And while this shouldn’t be their primary use, blogs also become great outlets through with marketers can communicate other PR-type important information — things like product releases or event information. It’s certainly easier to get attention for more company-focused initiatives if you’ve built up your own audience on your own property, as opposed to pitching your story to journalists and hoping one of them bites.

These are all great side effects or uses of a business blog, but they’re secondary benefits to me.

If you’re looking to start a business blog or get more investment for one you’ve already started, the reasons above are a great place to start arguing your case.

Are you already well underway when it comes to business blogging? Just starting out? Share your thoughts on business blogging below and what you’re looking to get out of it.