In last week’s article, I discussed what blogging is and – hopefully – demystified the concept for you. In this week’s article, I’m going to go one step further and look at how you write the articles for your blog.

Watch your tone in your blog

Make sure that how you write matches the company that you’re writing for. For example, if you’re writing for a fun brand – say a make-up line – you can afford to use more clichés and less formal language.

However, if you’re writing for a bank or similar institution, you’ll need to write in a more formal tone. But remember that just because you may be writing formally doesn’t mean that no one should understand you. So always write clearly and understandably because if your readers can’t understand what you’re trying to say, they’ll move off.

In your headline give people a reason to carry on reading

Most readers skim headlines – a bit like they do with a printed newspaper – so your headline must be incredibly informative and give them a reason to stop and click through. Copywriting guru, Michael Masterson, has developed the following formula – the 4U’s – which you should apply to every one of your headlines to make it stand out.

Urgent

Your headline must provoke, in your readers, a sense of urgency so that when they see your blog title, they feel that they have no choice but to click through and read what you have to say.

Unique

Your headline must be unique to your article. Yes, there are several swipe files available to download on the Internet which are collections of headlines that copywriters have seen to work in the past. However, be careful of using these verbatim as they may not fit the purpose of what you’re trying to say. Use these files as your inspiration and add your flavour to it.

Useful

When reading your headline, people must see some value in it or benefits for them. If they do, they will click through because they want to understand what you’ve written. So, make sure that your headline clearly states this. Don’t worry about trying to create a smart, punny headline. If you can think about something, by all means, put it in but if you can’t rather keep your headline simple.

Ultra-specific

This links into the point above. If your readers don’t understand what the article is about, they won’t click through. So make sure that your headline clearly outlines what the article is about.

Make your article meaty

Your article won’t get indexed by Google if it’s thin as the search engine giant actively penalises sites with thin content. As a rule of thumb, make sure that your articles are between 500 and 750 words because if they’re longer than this, people will lose interest.

Related to this is the issue of plagiarism and duplicate content. Putting together a quality blog is indeed a big job but don’t cheat and lift content directly from one blog and put it on your own. Also, make sure that all pages on your website have unique content on them as Google will red flag you if they see this.

Always include a call to action

At the end of every single blog, you need to have a call to action which tells people the action that you want them to take, such as contact us, sign up for our newsletter, or purchase a specific product.

You, as the owner of your business, are a subject-matter expert in the field which makes you the perfect person to write a blog. Follow the steps above, and you’ll be well on your way to creating useful and valuable content for your website visitors.

Contact Lia Marus

If you feel that you don’t want to write your blog yourself, but still want a blog on your website I can help you! Give me a ring on 082 709 7876 or WhatsApp me on the same number so we can chat about what you need. Otherwise, fill in this contact form.