21: What makes a good blog post great
Picture this: It's a rainy Sunday afternoon, you're curled up on the couch with a warm cup of coffee, and you decide to browse the internet for some interesting reads. An hour later, your coffee is cold and your into your fourth article on this fascinating website. Now, what is it about these blog posts that make you lose track of time and get completely absorbed? That's exactly what we're going to talk about in this episode.
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Picture this. It's a rainy Sunday afternoon. You're curled up on the couch with a warm cup of coffee and you decide to browse the Internet for some interesting reads. An hour later, your coffee is cold and you're in your fourth article on a fascinating website. Now, what is it about this blog post that made you lose track of time and get completely absorbed? That's exactly what we're going to talk about in this episode.
Welcome to Think Inside the Square, a podcast full of quick tips and tricks to help you create a Squarespace website that you're proud of. I'm your host, Rebecca Harpain, Squarespace expert and founder of InsideTheSquare.co.
In this episode, we're going to be talking about what makes a good blog post great. And no, it's not just the platform you use to host it. Yes, I am a Squarespace fan and this is a podcast where I talk a lot about Squarespace, but I promise that these tips are for any blogger out there. For a transcript of this episode, along with the links to any resources mentioned visit insidethesquare.co/podcast
The term Squarespace is a trademark of Squarespace Inc. This content is not affiliated with Squarespace Inc.
A great blog post has an irresistible title that someone just can't help but click on because they want to read more.
There are two types of blog post titles that I found to be the most effective in getting engaged readers to click on the title and read more. The first type is designed specifically for tutorial blogs, like my blogs that provide a solution or an answer to a problem. This blog post title mimics the language the person uses. I don't use complicated tech jargon in my blog post titles. I try to match the actual search they're typing into Google to make sure that someone brand new to solving this problem has the information that they need. When my language matches their language, they're much more likely to click on the title and read the article. Let me give you an example. Let's say you want to change the color of an accordion divider line. That would literally be the title of my blog post. How to Change the Color of an Accordion Divider Line in Squarespace. My blog post title would not be How to change the color property for an accordion lower border selector in Squarespace. While that's an accurate title, somewhat is not likely to be searching not on Google. So I would again mimic the actual language that my reader is going to be using. How to change the color of an accordion divider line in Squarespace. if you aren't doing How to Style blog, then I strongly recommend using an emotional term in your headline. Too emotional terms if you can swing it now. What are emotional terms? Literally terms that elicit a strong emotion. You want your reader to be captivated by what you write, And emotional terms are the key thing curiosity. Excitement, joy. Intriguing. Empowering.
I have an entire list of 200 emotional terms in the show notes for this podcast episode that you can pull from. That's available at insidethesquare.co/podcast
Now, I'm not going to sit here and read all 200 terms to you, but I'm going to give you a little bit of a sneak peek here. Okay. Let's think about a blog post title that needs to elicit curiosity. Some words you could use here would be unveiling, exploring, or discovering. Maybe have a blog post title and you want to empower someone with the content. Think about terms like inspire, transform, elevate, strengthen, amplify. Maybe your main goal is to inform them of something. Think about terms like insightful, profound educational demystify. What about inspiring? We've got visionary in vision. Creativity. Innovation.
As you can see, all of these terms really elicit a lot of the strong emotions when you hear them. And it's important to capture the person's attention by using these terms in your blog post title. That'll definitely increase the likelihood that someone's going to click on that title to read more. So again, I've got a full list of 200 available in the show notes for this episode and insidethesquare.co/podcast
Now that you have some awesome headlines planned, let's talk about the bulk of your blog post, the actual blog content, whether you're a seasoned blogger or just starting out. The key is to provide value. I'll say that one more time for the people in the back. The key of a great blog post is to provide value to the reader. I want you to share your expertise.
Tell stories. Don't be afraid to let your personality shine through. Your readers want authenticity, so give them a reason to keep reading. Whether you're a subject matter expert, you're a passionate enthusiast Your readers are looking to you for insight, for guidance, for information that they can't find anywhere else. So don't hold back. Dove deep into your subject matter, share your unique insights, and offer solutions to the problems your readers face. Weaving anecdotes, personal experiences, or real life examples of your content not only makes it more relatable, but it also keeps your audience engaged. Stories have a way of connecting people on a personal level, and by incorporating them into your blog post, you're making your content memorable and enjoyable to read. But make sure you keep it authentic.
Don't be afraid to let your personality shine through when you're writing. Your readers want to connect with you as a real person, not just a faceless author. Share your quirks, your passion, your unique perspective. When you embrace your authenticity, you build a genuine connection with your audience, and they'll be more likely to return for more of your content.I want you to remember that a blog is not a one way street. Encourage interaction with your readers. Invite them to share their thoughts, ask questions, participate in discussions, and respond to comments. If you have them turned on promptly and thoughtfully, maybe you have a lead magnet to give away that's related to the content, including inline forms They can sign up for it and get access a.s.a.p.
Or maybe you're teaching people how to use a product that you sell, use a product blog to promote it directly on that blog post. Or maybe all you want is the interaction, their thoughts, opinions, and general feedback about your blog post. Enabling comments isn't enough. Tell your reader to comment on something specific inside the actual text on your blog. Ask them a direct question that requires a detailed answer below. And while all the text that you write for this blog post is important, so is the supporting content and the design itself. A wall of text can be really overwhelming, especially if you're reading a long blog post on a phone. It is so easy to get lost if you look away for a second and then you struggle to find your place in the text when you get back to reading. So make sure you break up large walls of text with images and with spacing.
Our eyes need to rest when we're absorbing a lot of information, so adding these visuals will help keep it interesting. When we're thinking about images, I want you to incorporate high quality, relevant images that complement your text content. But you don't have to use just images to break up this wall of text. Separate concepts in your blog post with subheadings and horizontal lines.
I consider pulling out specific text as a quote in a larger font style or even an actual quote block. The design of your blog posts is just as important as the content, so make sure that it's easy for your reader to digest all the information by giving them little breaks with visuals. We covered a lot. So let's recap this magic how to turn a good blog post into a great one. Start with an amazing, powerful, exciting headline. Create thoughtful content and displayed in a way that makes it easy to read. Insert visuals, blank spaces, subtitles. Anything to break up a wall of text. And be sure to include a call to action that encourages your reader to do something.
Even if you don't have a freebie to offer or a product to sell, encourage them to move on to a related article. Create a simple call to action for every blog post. While all of those can help you turn any good blog post into a great one, I want to end this episode with a tip that isn't really part of the blog post, but an important part of blogging.
Building a successful blog takes time and consistency. Regularly publishing high quality content not only keeps your readers engaged, but it also helps establish you as the authority in your niche. So set up a publishing schedule that you can realistically adhere to and stick with it.
Consistency breeds trust, and trust builds a dedicated relationship with your readers. I'm going to share my opinion here because it's my podcast. Once a month is not enough. And honestly, I don't think twice a month is enough to be an established blogger in less than three years. Most people use the Internet every single day. So posting twice a month, 24 days out of 365 isn't even 10%. I think once a week is the only way to see real growth in your blog traffic. But that's based on my experience as a blogger and a reader. I might do a future episode about how I batch blog content, so I'm not just writing 24 seven, but for now, we'll call this episode a wrap.
Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Big Inside the Square. I hope you loved it. I have a lot more tips and tricks to share with you about making an amazing Squarespace website this uniquely yours. So be sure to subscribe to this podcast wherever you happen to be listening to this episode. Thanks again for listening and most importantly, have fun with your Squarespace website. Bye for now.
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