Anyone can write a blog post. But if you want yours to stand out in the massive sea of posts online, you can’t write just any blog post. You’ve got to whip up an epic one, one that makes your audience say “Yes, reading this is totally worth my time!”
How do you write epic blog posts that engage your audience and help you grow your brand? Check out these 9 characteristics of great blog posts:
Want more blog traffic, email subscribers, clients, or customers? Learn how to craft blog posts that convert.
Download my free blog post template + example.
1. A powerful title
Your title is the first part of a blog post your audience will see. And if your blog post shows up on a Google search results page, it’ll be one of the key pieces of information your audience will use to decide whether they should click on your post. That’s why great blog posts have powerful titles that make strong impressions on audiences. Solid titles encourage your audience to click on your posts and spend time reading them.
How do you write powerful blog post titles? Make them engaging, and try list or how-to titles for best results. Want more details? Check out my post on how to avoid common blog post title mistakes.
Related: 9 blog title generator tools to help you craft the perfect headline + 72 title templates
2. An engaging intro
Great blog posts also contain engaging introductions. After all, a powerful title convinces your audience to click on your blog post and start reading it. But it’s the engaging introduction that makes sure they keep going.
When writing an introduction, draw the reader in with a hook (e.g., an interesting statistic or fact). Then describe the problem your blog post addresses and the solution or value it offers.
Check out this example from my blog post on how to write a welcome email series.
Related: How to start an epic blog post introduction
3. Scannable content
Most people don’t read blog posts from beginning to end. They scan them instead. How do you make sure all of the scanners in your audience absorb the information in your blog post? You make the content of your blog post scannable.
Here’s how:
- Add subheadings that group paragraphs into sections
- Write short paragraphs
- Use bullet points and numbered lists
- Include white space
- Use bold and italics to highlight key terms and phrases
Related: How to write scannable blog posts people actually read + a checklist
4. Images and video
Great blog posts never consist of several successive chunks of text. Why? Because blog posts that consist only of text are boring to read. Even if the text in your blog post is the most important information for your audience, break up your paragraphs with relevant images and videos. They’ll help you illustrate concepts you discuss in the text, appeal to the visual learners in your audience, and give everyone some good eye candy to look at.
Related: The 10 best stock photo sites for your blog or website + 15 bonus sites
Want more blog traffic, email subscribers, clients, or customers? Learn how to craft blog posts that convert.
Download my free blog post template + example.
5. Internal and external links
Great blog posts contain both internal and external links, which give your audience access to even more information and content.
Internal links are links that direct your audience to other blog posts or pages on your website. Because of this, they help keep visitors on your site.
External links, in comparison, direct readers to other blogs and websites. They help you position yourself as an authority within your niche by showing that you know your stuff.
Both internal and external links boost your blog post’s SEO. That’s why you want to include at least one internal link and a few external links in each post.
Related: How to properly add links to your blog posts + free worksheet
6. Accessible social sharing buttons
People love sharing great blog posts. So if you know you’ve written a masterpiece, make it easy for your audience to share it. Place buttons on each blog post to encourage your audience to share it on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and other relevant platforms.
7. A solid conclusion
Have you ever attended a presentation where the speaker wrapped up his or her last main point and then awkwardly said, “And so yeah…that’s it.”
It isn’t a pretty sight.
Write great blog posts by wrapping each one up with a solid conclusion. A solid conclusion summarizes the main points of your blog post, presents your take home message, and sets your audience up for one of the most important parts of your blog post: your call to action.
8. An irresistible call to action
The goal of having a business blog isn’t just to get people to read your blog posts. You ultimately want to convert the people who read your blog posts into email subscribers, clients, and customers. That’s why you need to include a call to action in your posts.
Calls to action tell people who read your blog post what you want them to do next. Do you want them to check out another post? Download a free checklist? Or sign up for a free webinar? Great blog posts contain clear calls to action that stand out and encourage people to take action.
Related: The 62 best words to use in your call to action + 80 free call-to-action templates
9. Key components of SEO
The best way to get a continuous stream of targeted traffic to your blog is to optimize your blog posts for search engines. That’s why a key characteristic of great blog posts is that they’re SEO friendly.
SEO friendly blog posts make it easy for Google and other search engines to figure out what they’re about. They also help search engines rate them as high-quality content. When search engines recognize your blog posts as high-quality pieces and know what topics they’re related to, your audience will be more likely to see them on search results pages when they Google things online.
The key components of SEO friendly blog posts include optimized titles, meta descriptions, and subheadings; keywords used with just the right frequency; and word counts no lower than 300.
Want to master the basics of optimizing your blog posts for Google? Download my free ebook “SEO Basics for Blog Posts.”
Writing great blog posts isn’t impossible
Writing great blog posts doesn’t mean slapping together a few half-baked ideas in less than 20 minutes. But it also isn’t an impossible goal that only the best bloggers and writers can aim for.
Create engaging blog posts that convert your audience into subscribers and customers by using the tips I’ve outlined above. They’ll help you transform mediocre and even good blog posts into great ones.
Want more blog traffic, email subscribers, clients, or customers? Learn how to craft blog posts that convert.
Download my free blog post template + example.
