I’m still finding my footing as a blogger. I’ve always enjoyed writing, but my background is in academic writing, not blog posts. Figuring out how to craft the perfect blog post is an art, and I’ve been picking up blogging tips and tricks along the way that I’m going to share here. The basics to blog writing are the same as writing for any medium: have a catchy title, break down content into structured paragraphs, and use language suitable to your audience. If you want a great resource for blogging structure, check out this post by Blogambitious. But what are the next steps when writing for a blog?

Use subheadings

This is the most basic tip that I’m going to include here because it really is fundamental to blogging. Instead of dividing your content into paragraphs, break it up into subsections with separate headers. This improves both readability and is beneficial to SEO, if thats something you care about. We all know that people don’t have attention spans anymore, so adding subheadings to your blog posts make it easy for readers to skim your content to find the information they want more easily.

Know your brand and stick to it

Branding can have a weird meaning when it comes to blogging. Typically it applies to the way that a company or product is portrayed and the personality that it has. But if you are writing for your own blog, you may not have thought about what your “brand” is. Blog writing necessitates a personality to base your content around. Regardless of what that personality is, you are creating a brand that your readers will come to know, relate to, and expect.

Know your audience and write for them

Think about who you are writing your blog for. What kind of people are going to be reading and enjoying it? If you don’t have an audience in mind and are writing for yourself, base your audience around yourself. Anticipate the kind of content that your imaginary audience would want to read, and create it for them! Pairing your imaginary audience with your personal branding (as mentioned above) will create the ideal content for your blog. Another big part of good blog writing is knowing how to write for your audience. For example: if your target demographic is mid to late 20s (which I guess mine is), don’t write about how cray lit the tea is and whether or not it slaps. That ain’t it. Take the L. Don’t write like this if it’s not suited for your audience.

Deliver on content

We live in an Internet age where clickbait is all too common. Creating catchy, “clickable” titles is an important part of blogging, but sacrificing content for the sake of the title is never worth it. One of the most disappointing experiences I had with a blog was when I was looking for ways to shake pre-travel anxiety. I found a blog post through Pinterest promising ways to alleviate said nerves. It was two short paragraphs about how browsing aspirational pictures on Pinterest and Instagram inspires them to travel, and that makes the anxiety go away. Not to discredit the value of aspirational imagery, but that’s not at all what I was looking for, or what I was promised. If you’re creating content, make it worth reading, and don’t oversell it for clicks.

Engage your audience and get feedback

Interaction is essential in social media. That’s how it all started, as a platform for people to share, connect, and engage with each other. As social media has developed into the behemoth that it is today, it’s only become more essential that you have people engaging with and sharing your content. From a business standpoint, it’s the only thing that matters. From a hobby standpoint, it feels really good to know people are interested in what you are creating. It’s harder to get this interaction on blog posts than it is on other social media platforms such as Instagram or Twitter. Ask open-ended questions that generate discussion; “What do you think about…” or “What are your experiences with…” are great ways to up engagement in your blog posts.

On that note, what are your thoughts on blog writing? What do you think makes a good blog post? I’m still trying to strike a balance between what is recommended for blogging by social media experts, and what I like in a blog. Ultimately, it’s very important that whatever you are creating is something that you are happy with. Blogging is meant to be fun!