What makes a Good Blog

Main Characteristics and features of a good blog

A blog must always be Dynamic

While websites are mainly professional, blogs are intended to engage users. This means that a blog will always be more dynamic than a website. The content on a website will be presented on a static web page that doesn’t require any updates. Blogs are different as they include a publishing date and meta tags. New blog Posts and updates are key to running a successful blog. You must continuously post new and exciting blogs that will get users to your site. 

Blog Curation

By looking back and updating your blog posts regularly with more accurate and relevant information it will make your blogs posts a lot better over time and they will also stay relevant and more useful to readers for a longer period of time. By having a library of useful articles and about your chosen topic or a area your are knowledgeable in it will add value to your posts, you can them categories them and link them throughout your blogs

Posts Are displayed in reverse Order

This might seem a bit obvious, but you could miss it. Make sure to post your blogs is reverse chronological order so that the newest blog post will be at the top for users to see when they click on your site. The newest posts should push the oldest one down and eventually off the landing page 

Most Blogs Have the same Structure

Try and keep the same structure for each of your blog posts. This means having a header at the top of each page to make a great first impression. It will be followed by the main content area where the actual text will most likely be placed. You could have images or other relevant images on a sidebar with maybe a Call-to-action button too. At the bottom of the page included your footer then. 

The Blogs Leading Star is its Content

Every blog will be different in terms of what they post, although many of them will rely on the text that is written it doesn’t mean that a blog should be all massive amounts of text. If you are to use a lot of text try and break it up by adding an image or video in between. It doesn’t have to be all text, it could be a picture with a little text or an infographic about the intended topic.  

Headlines should be attention grabbers

Headlines should instantly grab a reader’s attention, a interesting headline will entice readers into clicking on the blog when they see it which will then result in more traffic going to your website and leaving the audience wanting more. Headlines in blog posts and news articles are one of the most if not the most important element when it comes to creating these types of posts. 

All blogs are about Communication

With or without open debate, communication is still the end purpose of every blog post. If the blog is promotional, its goal is to attract the audience and open a dialogue that will hopefully convince them to buy what the owner is selling. If not about sales, then it’s about spreading the word. 

Thought out design

You have just about 50 milliseconds to make a good first impression so a good thought-out design will help with this. Blocks of text are overwhelming for readers and if they cannot scan through the text with ease, it may deter the reader. Use different headings like H1, H2 or H3 to break of the content and make it easier for the reader to skim through, this will also help with SEO too. Make use of short paragraphs and break up text with some interesting visual such as images or videos. 

Perfect Length

Most people believe that because readers tend to have shorter attention spans that blog posts should be shorter. This isn’t necessary the case. If the blog post is informative and as long as it continues to answer questions, it doesn’t matter how long the post actual is. This means that some blog posts may be 2000 words, and some may only be 500 words, and some may even be 10,000 if it keeps being informative. 

Original Content

Regardless of your topic it is more than likely that someone has covered the topic before, but this doesn’t mean that you should copy and paste. Try and be Original and stand out from the crowd. You can do this by offering a new approach to the covered topics, things like your tone of voice or style of writing are ways of doing this. Credit any external sources too when you use content that isn’t yours and then curate the post and add to it as time moves on to keep it up to date and relevant. 

Your Content should flow like a story or book so that is makes sense as the readers moves through the post, so always proofread your posts to ensure this. 

Great Research

Every high-quality blog post requires time and effort invested in the research. The more you devote yourself to the research, the easier it becomes to write the post. 

Primarily, this will give you insight into other’s opinions on the topic, you’ll dive deeper into it, making it easier to form your own unique approach to it. 

Menu structure

Use categories and search filters to help people navigate their way around the blog items so that they can find the article or post that they are looking for. 

Blog article width  

Try and keep the article width less 100 characters so that it doesn’t look like a newspaper too much. 

CTAS Calls to Action

You should try and incorporate CTA buttons at the end of each blog posts to encourage readers into making the next move. This could be in the form off a social media sharing button or a comment section. Ask them to take action, doing this means you could get yourself a lot more readers and potential customers. 

Metadata

Try to include Metadata, so a page title less than 70 characters and a description of about 100 characters. Add in your keywords or key phrases for good measure. Add synonyms in the written text. Add the key phrase in photos, ensuring they are suitably sized and have a proper naming convention.  

Blog Optimisation

You should try and optimise every blog item for your blog to rank higher in the search engine optimisation rankings. Using tools like Google Search and Google Keywords or AdWords Planner the keyword tool you will be able to see if anyone searches for that specific blog title. Your aim is to try and outperform the top ranked blog post for your searched keyword. This means you will aim to have more words and images than them in order to claim the top spot. 

Blog Monetization

You can make money from a blog in one of two ways. 

1. Offer valuable information to attract visitors and sell books or courses or 121 coaching as a recognised authority or expert in a particular area
2. Attract very large numbers and sell on page advertising or get affiliate commission, which is more like a media website, where you keep your material up to date, to generate visitors and focus on conversion.