10 Tips for an SEO-Friendly Blog Post

Writing blog posts requires skill. To keep readers interested, you should think about the structure of your content and keep it enjoyable. Because if people like and understand your blog post, they’re much more likely going to share it with others – and that will increase your rankings. So, if you want to improve your writing skills and your rankings, start with these tips on how to write an SEO-friendly blog post!

It might sound like writing for SEO and writing to attract and engage your audience are two conflicting goals. But that’s actually not true. Sure, if you want to write an SEO-friendly post, you should feature the words you want to be found in a prominent place. But over-using keywords severely damages the readability of your text. In fact, a high keyphrase density can even be a signal to Google that you might be stuffing keywords in your text, which can negatively affect your rankings.

This post provides tips on writing blog posts that are SEO-friendly and readable. These two goals should always go hand in hand. Because we believe that writing in understandable language gets you more visitors and keeps them on your site!

Before you start: do keyword research

Before you start writing, you have to do keyword research. If you want to dominate the search results, you’ll have to figure out which words your audience actually searches for. These are the topics you should write about and the keywords you should use in your text.

When you’ve done your keyword research and have a list of focus keywords to write about, it’s time to get on with writing. Here are 10 tips to help you end up with an awesome blog post!

Writing tips for SEO-friendly blog posts

Above all, your blog post has to be a good piece of writing. When starting a new post, many bloggers just start writing. While this may work for some people, others need more guidance. Personally, I always follow these ‘rules’ when I write a new blog.

1. Think before you write!

Before you start, think carefully about the message of your piece. It helps to answer the following questions:

  • What do you want to tell your readers, or which central question do you want to answer?
  • What’s the purpose of your article?
  • What do you want your readers to do at the end of the page?

It’s also good to think about the search intent someone may have. An easy way to get an insight into this is by looking at the search results for the search term you want to rank with.

2. Devise a structure for your post

To write a readable and SEO-friendly blog post, you need to create a clear structure. This means that every post should have:

  • some sort of introduction (in which you introduce your topic).
  • a body (in which the main message is written).
  • a conclusion (in which you summarize the main ideas or draw a conclusion).

In a few sentences, write down what you want to say in all three sections. You’ve now created a summary of your post. This will help you create a structured and readable blog post. Now the real writing can begin.

3. Use paragraphs and headings

Everybody uses paragraphs, but not everybody uses them well. For example, it might be tempting to start each new sentence on a new line because it looks nice. But you shouldn’t do that! You also shouldn’t make your paragraphs too lengthy, as each paragraph should have its own idea or subject. So, ask yourself what the main idea of each paragraph is. You should be able to summarize that main idea in one sentence. If that’s not possible and you need more sentences to explain the main idea, you simply need to use more paragraphs.

Proper headings also help your readers understand what a specific part of your text is about. If you want people to find their way through your articles, use subheadings to lead them. Subheadings help readers scan your page, and clarify the structure of your articles. They’re not just important for readability, but for SEO as well. That’s why we also advise to use your keyword in some of your subheadings. Don’t use your keyword in every heading! It will make your text read clunky and unnatural. Plus, it will put people off from reading further.

4. Use transition words

Transition words help people scan through your text and understand the relationship between sentences and paragraphs. For example, let’s say there are three reasons for people to buy your product. You should use signal words like: ‘first of all’; ‘secondly’ and ‘finally’. Also, words like ‘however’, ‘similarly’ and ‘for example’ give a clear signal to your readers. Readers will instantly get that a conclusion will follow after words like ‘to sum up’ or ‘in short’. Transition words are therefore very important to add structure to your text.

5. Use related keywords

Stuffing your article with your focus keyword makes it less attractive to read, and it can hurt your rankings. Google is getting smarter, after all. It wants you to write content that users will love. It doesn’t want you to use your focus keyword in every other sentence, because Google now has other ways to analyze what your text is about. For example, one of the ways Google understands the topic of your text is by recognizing synonyms and other keywords that are related to your focus keyphrase. That’s why you should use synonyms and related keywords throughout your copy.

6. Optimize the length of your article

Make sure your blog posts have a minimum of 300 words but keep the length of your article balanced. Google likes long articles. However, if your article is too long, you might scare users away. So, what should you do? Our advice is to write short to medium-length articles. When you know you’re a skilled writer, you can also try your hand at longer articles. Check out this article if you’re not quite sure how long a blog post should be.

And remember to keep using your focus keyphrase throughout your text to make sure you end up with an SEO-friendly blog post!

9. Add content regularly

Regularly adding new blog posts to your website tells Google that your website is alive. This is important! Because if your site isn’t active, Google will crawl it less often and this might negatively affect your rankings. But don’t just post for the sake of posting. Make sure that everything you post is high-quality content: informative, well-written articles that entertain readers and fit their search intent.

If you have difficulty posting on a regular basis, it might be a great idea to create an editorial calendar for your blog. This allows you to structure the process in a way that fits you and your team. It’s also a good idea to update your old blog posts once in a while to avoid them getting stale.

10. Use Yoast SEO plugin

The analysis tool in our Yoast SEO plugin helps you write readable and SEO-friendly blog posts. Start by choosing the most important search term you want people to find this particular page for. This will be your focus key phrase. After you fill this in, our plugin runs all kinds of checks to see whether your post is optimized or still needs improving. Such as:

  • Our plugin checks your post to see whether you’ve used the keyphrase in the right places, like your copy, SEO title, meta description, alt text and URL. Yoast SEO Premium also recognizes different word forms of your keyphrase.
  • It gives you suggestions for related keyphrases that you can add to boost the quality and relevance of your content.
  • It checks the readability of your text: Are your sentences or paragraphs too long? Do you use transition words?
  • It checks the internal and external links in your article. Yoast SEO Premium even provides suggestions for links to related articles on your site.
  • It calculates how often you use your keyphrase throughout your text: not enough or too often? When you have Premium it also checks if you’ve distributed your keyphrase evenly throughout your post.
  • It checks if you’ve used potentially non-inclusive words or phrases, so you can make your content relatable for everyone.

Analysis results as shown in the Yoast SEO sidebar

Kind of a cool way to get feedback on your content, right?

The bottom line

The days when a few SEO tricks were enough to get your website to rank well in Google are long gone. Nowadays, quality content is king. And good content also leads to more links, shares, tweets and returning visitors to your website. Of course, there are always other things you can do to maximize the SEO friendliness of your post, but the most important thing is to just write very, very good posts! 

My Top SEO Strategies: The Best Ones For Content Marketing Success

Seth Godin certainly gets it … probably had it down before anyone else. What may you be asking? My top SEO strategies are what creates content marketing success, of course. Secrets? Probably not. But certainly essential for success.

 

my top seo strategies
My top SEO strategies.

We don’t have an information shortage; we have an attention shortage.

– Seth Godin

 

Whenever you write an article or record a videospeak or write authentically, from the heart. Don’t worry about what people will think.

 

Content marketing tactics such as; blog posts feature articles, optimized website copy, white papers, social media content and press releases. They are what move consumers along a specific path. Content marketing generates awareness of your brand, product or service. It inspires consumers to engage and consider you. It converts them into leads and sales and creates advocates. Lots to gain, yes?

More to learn: Press Coverage … 9 Actionable Ways to Get Good Coverage

 

Discover how content marketing exposes consumers to your brand, engages potential customers, and converts them into leads and sales. The following are our recommendations for ensuring the success of an online content marketing strategy. A strategy that even small businesses can successfully implement today.

 

My top SEO strategies … influence marketing

There is nothing more valuable than contact with people who already have popular websites. Do not try to ask them to promote you. The better option is to some ego-bait stuff (like interview) with them then ask them for a guest blog.

 

  

In-depth articles 

Forget about writing average blog posts. Instead of this write some 10X stuff – 10X Content is the Future.

 

 

generate quality backlinks
Generate quality backlinks.

Combine techniques

 It is a mix of skills you already know but from your perspective. For example, I used to check the volume of keywords through Google PPC and Bing PPC program then make a new content map strategy.
 

Competitors

Tools designed for spying on your competitors cover just 50% of this job. Check every post, comment and article your competitors push. This way you can measure what strategy could be fruitful for your business.

 

 

Content

Not just SEO’d and unique but also useful. Your content should be shared and liked. Your goal here is to be noticed and mentioned. You need to receive as much attention as possible.

 

 

Promotion

No matter how good your content is, you won’t get any benefit from it unless you promote it. Hard. Remember: 99% of perspiration and 1% of inspiration.

 

 

Content comes first

A website with brilliant content can do great with or without SEO. A website with bad content will not survive with or without SEO. Note that a website with good content can become even better with SEO!

 

So, what is considered good content?

 

SEO strategies and techniques … original content

seo strategy plan
SEO strategy plan.

(articles, text, images, videos, presentations, infographics, comments, etc.)  No copies or re-writes of existing articles.

 

Content published on your website first

Even if it’s your content, if you have already published it on another website then it’s not good for your site.

 

Content that includes text as well

Try to have text to accompany your non-text content. For example, if you post videos on your website, try to add a text description as well. If you add images, try to describe in words what the image is all about.

 

Content that is well researched

Users don’t want to read quickly prepared posts and neither do search engines. If you are writing about a certain topic or answering a question, make sure that what you write is justified and covers both sides of a story. Long articles are proven to rank better than short articles.

 

Posting frequency

Two things are important when it comes to posting frequency. First is to have fresh content on your website and second to establish a publishing strategy and stick to it.

 

 

Keyword research 

Keyword research is the main driver of successful SEO. To improve your search engine ranking, you’ll need first to analyze keywords that are relevant to your industry.

 

 

Sound link building 

It’s simple: high-quality link building produces greater results.

 

 

Creating quality content 

Don’t let poor content affect your site’s search engine rank. It’s vital that you offer engaging and useful information to keep your visitors coming back.

 

When you go about implementing SEO strategies ( to guarantee a favorable search engine ranking), try following these methods to improve your ranking.

 

 

Content marketing strategy

Every website should have a content strategy focused around your top keywords. When you create content such as blog posts, videos, whitepapers, research reports and webinars, it gives people something to link to. Also, the content you create can rank by itself in the search engines.

 

For example, if you write a blog post on “How to Pick an SEO Company,” there is a possibility it will rank for some of the keywords you use in the title and the body post. This is especially true if the post gets linked to from other websites or shared a lot on social media. It also helps if your website, as a whole, already has significant high-quality links.

 

This results in high domain authority, which translates into better rankings for all of your content. Also, regular content creation shows Google that your website is alive and active. By sending this fresh content signal to Google on a continual basis, it will result in better rankings for your website as a whole.

 

 

Generate quality backlinks

Having an influencer and content marketing strategy will help you develop backlinks to your website. It is also important to actively seek ways to get people to link to you. Some of the best ways to do this are to write for a large publication, do industry interviews, and recommend your powerful content to people who matter.

 

Also, you can also use tools like Majestic SEO to see who is linking to your competitors. Once you identify the links to your competitor’s sites, you can analyze these links and learn how they got them. This will pave the way for the implementation of a similar strategy for your website. For example, did they donate to a charity causing the charity to link to their site? You can do the same thing.

 

 

Be mobile-friendly

In 2015, there was a major Google update known as Mobilegeddon. This meant that if you did not have a mobile version of your website by April 21, 2015, you lost a significant amount of your rankings in the mobile version of the Google search listings.

Keep studying: 19 Top Marketing Initiatives We Should Be Discussing

 

So your website needs to be mobile-ready. There are three types of accepted options for a mobile site in Google’s eyes. The first is a responsive design. The second is being set up on a mobile subdomain or use dynamic serving. And finally, Google also now ranks websites higher that apply SEO for their apps. So if you have an app, make sure you are taking the time to implement application SEO.

 

 

Move to HTTPS, a secure site

The “S” in HTTPS stands for security, and if your URL leads with HTTPS (Example Domain) instead of HTTP (Example Domain), then your website is secure. Google wants you to move your site to HTTPS so badly that they are now giving a ranking boost to websites that are secure. As we moved into 2016, we started seeing many new websites transferring to HTTPS.

 

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Need some help in finding ways to grow your customers?

 

Such as creative ideas to help the differentiation with potential customers? Or perhaps finding ways to work with other businesses?

 

Call today for a FREE consultation or a FREE quote. Learn about some options to scope your job.

Call Mike at 607-725-8240.

 

So what’s the conclusion? The conclusion is there is no conclusion. There is only the next step. And that next step is completely up to you. But believe in the effectiveness of collaborative innovation. And put it to good use in adapting to changes in your business environment.

 

It’s up to you to keep improving your learning and experience with innovation and creativity efforts. Lessons are all around you. In this case, your competitor may be providing the ideas and or inspiration. But the key is in knowing that it is within you already.

 

All you get is what you bring to the fight. And that fight gets better every day you learn and apply new lessons.

 

When things go wrong, what’s most important is your next step.

 

Try. Learn. Improve. Repeat.

 

 

 

When things are not what you want them to be, what’s most important is your next step. Call today.

 

Are you devoting enough energy to improving your continuous learning for yourself and your team?

 

Mike Schoultz is the founder of Digital Spark Marketing, a digital marketing and customer service agency. With 40 years of business experience, he blogs on topics that relate to improving the performance of your business. Find them on G+Twitter, and LinkedIn.  

 

Digital Spark Marketing will stretch your thinking and your ability to adapt to change.  We also provide some fun and inspiration along the way. Call us for a free quote today. You will be amazed how reasonable we will be.

 

More reading on social media marketing and advertising from Digital Spark Marketing’s Library:

What Marketers Need to Know about Personalization Strategies 

19 Top Marketing Initiatives We Should Be Discussing

My Top SEO Strategies for Content Marketing Success

Innovation in Marketing … the Birchbox Subscription Model

 

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