How to write a blog post

How do you go about writing a blog post? Here are the steps that I would recommend:

1. Find a Blog Topic: First, you need to identify the right blog topic to write about. There are 1 Billion blogs, one for every 7 individuals. That is way too many blogs. How do you stand out? There are some tools you can use to know what to write about.

• BuzzSumo - Just type in the topic on BuzzSumo and check the top ranking blogs. See their evergreen Score or the number of social shares hey have received.
• Ahrefs / SEMRush - Just type in a competitors domain and have a look at the top pages / blogs that rank for the competitor. Create a blog that is 10X stronger than that of the competitor.
• Udemy - Udemy courses are also an excellent source for identifying blog topics.
• Amazon - Search for the topic on Amazon and find the top selling books. The book titles used on Amazon could be used as a blog topic title.
• YouTube - YouTube being the second largest search engine can be your source for blog topics. Search for a topic and check the highest ranking videos. Use their titles as blog topics.

2. Template / Structure for your post: There are different templates / structure that could work for you. These are proven templates used by most blogs that rank  higher

• Listicle - A listicle is a post where you are putting together a list of ideas /  sub-topics. Google loves listicles - they rank higher and get a high CTR.
• Case Study - If you have proven something, using a case study as a blog post would be a good idea. For e.g. a topic such as "How I grew my traffic by 3X" would fall under this category.
• Tools - If you could make a list of the tools available for a specific topic or an industry, there is a high chance that these would rank higher. For e.g. Top 100 SEO tools reviewed or top financial management tools to save money.
• Comprehensive / Detailed Guide - This is the kind of content that we recommend to most of our clients. Build a comprehensive guide on a topic identified. The guide should cover everything under the sun for that topic. It can be as detailed as 9000-10000 words on a subject.

3. Headline: The headline for your post is important. Most of the people will click on a link that takes them to your blog after reading the headline. It is advised that you spend a couple of hours on writing the headlines after you write the blog post. For consumer blogs, headlines such as  X Reasons why, X Things you, X Ways, X Best work well whereas for B2B blogs, headlines such as the Future of, X Ways to, Need to know, In the world, X Things,  The Top X get higher CTR%. 

The headline should be at the max 12-18 words.

4. Compelling Introduction: After the headline, comes the introductory paragraph. Keep it simple and limit it to 4-7 lines at the max. Take the user to the core topic of your blog as soon as possible. Use the introductory paragraph to set a context and inform the user on what he is going to read.

5. Body: The body of the blog is where you have the meat of the content. For SEO purposes, it is advised that you make your blog as comprehensive as possible, which means including 1800-2100 words of text. 

To make the blog readable use short paragraphs, sub-headings or sections heading and a font size greater than 15px. More importantly, be conversational.  Write like you are talking to a friend who is sitting besides you.

To create a better impact, use visuals such as charts, screenshots, videos, infographics that juxtapose the text in your blog.

6. SEO: One of the reasons that you are producing blog content is to generate traffic from Search Engines. Here are some of the basics you need to follow:

• Short URLs
• Use focus keyword in URLs, preferably at the start of the URL.
• Use Keyword in Title Tag, Meta Desc, Intro paragraph
• Build internal links to other blogs / pages and external links to authoritative websites.