7 Ways to Write Blog Posts That Subscribers Can’t Resist Reading

Blogging can be a lucrative online business, but it takes perfecting methods to succeed. In addition to learning about what it takes to create a successful blog, our free webinar training provides additional techniques to work on and increase chances of making a blog a success. Below are some tips on how to write compelling blog posts that subscribers will love. Plus, if they enjoy reading recent blog posts, they’ll likely come back for more!

Start with the Audience and the Angle

Do you know your audience well? Copyblogger recommends targeting your audience and figuring out what topics are going to resonate with them the most. Based on what you find out, decide on a new angle to approach the subject. Hopefully, the popular topic you select, and the new perspective will reel them in.

It all starts by understanding the people you’re writing for.

I’m not talking about some vague description like “moms aged 25-45” or anything like that — I mean getting down to something very specific: “representative readers of Site X,” where Site X is the blog or website you want to write for. You need to do this step whether you’re creating content for someone else’s site or for your own.

You need to figure out what they want to read by seeing what they’ve responded well to in the past. No guesswork, no conjecture — it’s all right there for you to see.

Here’s what you do …

First, go through the site’s list of most popular posts. If there are more than 10 of them, then open them all up, and make a list of the top 10 (based on comments, shares, or whatever else the blog tracks). And if the site doesn’t list the most popular posts, just go through the last 30 or so that they’ve published, and pull out the 10 most successful ones.

Second, now that you’ve got that list of 10, start looking for patterns. Specifically, look for topics that are shared by several of the posts. You’ll probably find that over half of those posts are about the same 1-3 topics. No reinventing of the wheel needed — those are the topics that the audience likes best, so pick one and write about it!

Third, think about one insight that you can offer about one of those hot subjects. Just one. That’s your angle.

Decide on What Topics to Write About

This one sounds obvious enough, but similar to what Copyblogger recommends, you need to have an idea what topics you’re going to write about. Here are a few different issues Articulate Marketing recommends focusing on:

Industry news. Rather than simply rewriting a previously published article, dig out the main points and analyse them. What does it mean for the industry and the people within it? Can you analyse it in a way that will encourage debate, or in create a fresh angle that hasn’t been considered before?

Company news. What does it mean for customers? Can you encourage them to feel happy or proud that they’ve chosen you? How can you use it to develop a personal front to your business? What photos and illustrations can you use to bring the piece to life?

‘How to’ articles. Provide practical help for your readers. This does depend on the industry you’re in – some may find it easier than others. Step by step guides are easiest to follow, but be aware that you may need to answer questions if people leave comments. Videos are also great for this.

Lists and roundups. Online resources, including valuable written content, videos, podcasts, industry-specific freebies and so on are always popular. The hardest part is thinking of an original topic or a new twist on an old favourite.

Interviews with experts. If they are very popular in your field, ask your visitors to contribute questions beforehand. Don’t be afraid to ask complex or controversial questions.

Challenge Your Readers

It’s more than just writing a compelling blog article; it’s about challenging your readers and figuring out how to connect with them. Don’t just write to write – have meaning and purpose through your writing. Business2Community elaborates on this topic:

One of the hardest things for a regular blog writer to do is to connect with readers with every post. You can accomplish a lot in this area by making a point of writing in such a way as to convey that you truly care about what you are doing. ProBlogger’s Darren Rowse describes it as writing with passion. In other words, put your whole heart into every post.

Challenge Your Readers – Lastly, do not just write a blog post for the sake of writing. Challenge your readers to do something with the information you have provided. In some cases that challenge may be a call to action. In other cases, it might simply be a challenge to seriously think about what you have written and then respond in kind.

Make it Easy to Scan Through

Making it easy for a writer to scan through the article easily is helpful when writing a blog post. That means Should Me Loud says you have to try to pull your reader in rather quickly and expect they won’t stick around for more than 96 seconds. That’s pretty crazy!

Is your blog or your article scan-able? Now what is this scan-able posts? With the advent of technology, the tools for producing and consuming information is at an all time high. Most of the content being generated acts just as a source of noise with little to no added advantage. So how do people figure out what’s noise and what’s not? They just scan!

Don’t expect someone to read your entire content word-by-word just because you have chalked out a Shakespeare-ic work, they won’t. They don’t even have a need to. It has been found in recent surveys that an average visitor just stays for 96 seconds on an article! Just how much could he read in that time? He scans. Make sure your blog and your articles are scan-able. Ask out your friends or someone from your network to take a quick look and see what they say.

Bullet Points

Bullet points go a long way when composing a new post. It helps divide longer sections, and OptinMonster also says it grabs the attention of readers.

Since we know that people skim before they read, you need to make sure to highlight your best information.

Aside from subheadings, bullet lists are perfect because they’re very easy to skim through.

Here are some tips that I use to write bullet points that people will actually read:

Express clear benefit. Think of bullets as mini-headlines.
Keep your bullets symmetrical. 1-2 lines each.
Avoid bullet clutter. Don’t write paragraphs in bullets.
Remember bullets are not sentences. They’re just like headlines.

Try a Controversial Opening

Have you thought about writing your blog posts with a controversial opening? Sometimes this works, and Neil Patel also says sometimes it doesn’t. Create a compelling blog post that resonates with a reader, and you’ll have struck gold.

One of the key purposes of creating great blogs is to build an audience that trusts, believes, and buys from you.

Content marketers love blog posts because of the results it produces. In fact, many bloggers believe that good blog posts are the most valuable type of content marketing.

However, your blogging success isn’t in the quantity of blog posts you publish, but the quality. It’s not enough to just have a good blog post idea, your blog post ideas and titles must attract people, and your introductions must hook them further.

One way to hook readers correctly after you’ve captured their attention with your title is to leverage a controversial topic in your blog introduction.

But you need to use caution with this tactic. Whether you’re using controversy in your title, introduction, or body of the blog post, be careful not to hurt your loyal audience and remember to stay loyal to your personal brand.

According to HongKiat, controversy may sell, but leaving it at that is “an invitation to trouble.”

Controversy can be a compelling force. But you need to use it well.

Use a Call to Action

Using a call to action is vital for making money on your blog, and Huffington Post offers advice on how to do that.

You are writing for a reason – to connect with the readers and trigger an action. You should always end a blog with something that moves the reader to perform a desired action; however, be very careful about using your blog posts to ask readers to buy things. That could backfire.  

HubSpot’s Customer Demand Manager Rachel Sprung says “you can increase conversions by including more CTAs on your blog if they’re several different types of CTAs, in different formats, addressing different parts of your marketing funnel.”

ProBlogger offers some quick tips on how to write effective and attention-getting blog posts:

Be Useful – if your post isn’t informing, inspiring, entertaining or making someone’s life better – don’t publish it until it does.
Share your Opinion – opinions are often what sets bloggers apart from the pack.
Cut out the Fluff – before you hit publish, revise your post and remove anything that doesn’t add value.
Visualise Your Reader – writing with a reader in mind personalises your writing.

Now that you’ve learned some tips on how to make money using your blog, join us for our free webinar training to learn additional techniques. By applying these tips and the ones we talk about during our webinar, you can turn your blog into a profitable powerhouse!

Sources: Copyblogger, Articulate Marketing, Shout Me Loud, HuffPost, ProBlogger, Business2Community, OptinMonster, Neil Patel