So you’ve started a blog. Nice!
You’ve started cranking out content and feel like you’ve been killing it! But the traffic isn’t coming. The blogs aren’t doing what you thought they would. We’ve all been there, and there are certainly ways to help to take your blogs to the next level.
Why is a blog important?
This is an important question to start out with. Blogs are great for a lot of reasons, and the big reason that most people start a blog is to help with your website’s SEO (Search Engine Optimization) – to rank better on search engines!
I’m sure that if you’re looking into ways to make your blog better you know that blogs have the ability to help your website rank better and generate more traffic. This is 100% true and there are a couple of simple reasons why blogs help your website’s SEO.
You can target specific keywords
By writing a blog, you can pick a specific topic that you want to be found for. While this does not have to be the primary reason for every blog that you write, It should always be something that you are thinking about when writing.
And it goes without saying, but if you rank well for a keyword or keyword phrase, you will get relevant traffic to your blog and website!
For example, ranking for “digital marketing blog for small businesses” is going to be more beneficial to us than “blog for small businesses”, since the latter could mean a lot of different things!
You’re updating your website often
Google and other search engines love seeing a regularly updated website. Adding new pages is one of the best and easiest ways to do this.
Every single blog that you publish on your website is exactly what we’re talking about here!
There are a couple of other quick reasons that I want to bring up that make blogs an important piece in your overall marketing.
First of all, you’re able to create blogs around common questions that you or your support team get. If a customer or potential customer is able to get their question answered instead of calling you, it’s a better experience for everyone.
Second, you’re able to create resources that you can use for communication purposes. Do you often get asked how to do something externally or even internally? Create a blog about it, and you can send a link to this article next time you get asked this.
Tips to take your blog to the next level
Obviously, you can see that I’m a very big fan of having a regularly updated blog on your website, but what types of things can you do to start improving them?
Something to note before reading these tips is that while we only mention the user experience benefit of each of these, every single one of them benefit the SEO of the blog too!
Break up your text with headings
If your blog is one big block of the same size text, it is really hard to read. No one wants to read one giant block of text with no breaks.
You’ll notice that there are headings throughout this blog, and we typically have multiple types of headings. H1s, H2s, H3s are all great ways to add various sizes and importance to the copy you have on your blog.
A quick guide: H1s are typically the titles, H2s are typically the main headings, and H3s and typically the subheadings.
But don’t overdo it with the headings either! Use enough to make sure that they are styled and look pleasing!
Make sure your blog has graphics
Another way to add some personality to your blog is to add some graphics or pictures! It’s an added bonus if these graphics or pictures are original too!
By adding these elements you help break up the content, make them more visually pleasing, and can help tell the story of your blog!
Again, don’t overdo the images, but if you’re talking about the top 10 pasta dishes, you should have an image of the dishes! I don’t know about you, but I have no clue what Tajarin al Tartufo is without seeing a picture of it!
Target all audiences with video
Not everyone learns best by reading. Some people skim the headings, some read the bullet points, and some try to find the videos!
Going back to the pasta example – I know I’m not a great cook, but I personally follow recipes much easier if there is a video showing me exactly what to do and what it should look like.
Adding video to every one of your blogs isn’t the right answer, but you’ll be able to figure out which ones could have value added with video by putting yourself into your blog reader’s shoes.
Add links to your copy
Adding internal links to your other blogs or web pages can be a great tool to help point to other content you’ve created in the past without having to rewrite the entire thing. ie – In a lot of our SEO type blogs, we link to our Beginners Guide to SEO because it goes way more in-depth than a blog should in some subjects
By linking to other websites, you create an external link. Your readers can get a lot of value out of external links for various reasons. Some of the most common are, siting sources & fact-checking, linking to a subject you’re not an expert in, and linking to a subject you don’t have a blog or webpage for yet.
Bonus: Write a blog or webpage for the things you link to!
Again, don’t overdo it with the links. Depending on the type of blog you’re writing, you don’t want to see too many links, too quickly. Rereading your blog and thinking about where your readers may want more information is a good place to start for adding links.
Second Bonus: Here’s a blog on how to build inbound links to your blog and website.
Other quick tips to improve your blogs
There are so many things you can do to improve the quality of your blogs. I’ll list a few of our favorites without going into too much detail.
- Add lists when you can
- Make sure you have no grammatical errors
- Remember to use formattings such as bold text and italicized text
- Learn from others ranking well for your keywords
- Add some personality to your copy #BeFun
- Hyperlink to other media sources: TikToks, podcasts, etc.
If I can leave you with one thing, the best thing you can do is to put yourself into your readers’ shoes. Figure out what they would want to see for it to be a more beneficial and easier read for them. It’s all about the user and not the search engine.