5 Ways to Avoid Spinning Your Wheels While Blogging

Boosting your blog into view isn’t as easy as “If you write it, they will come.” There are millions of other bloggers out there who have been at this for a long time and have taken steps to get results from blogging. It’s not enough to just show up, you have to roll up your sleeves and get in there. Yes, writing is hard work, but unless you have a media company behind you, you need to take the steps that will boost your blog up the search engine rankings.

1. Pick a topic and stick with it. Cooking, sports, politics, interior design, picking apart movie gaffes? Whatever it is, make the subject the primary focus of your blog and let that make up the majority of your posts. That’s not to say you can’t have Caturday, or that your vacation photos have no place, they do. You just need to establish what your blog is doing first. Lifehacker points out that narrowing your focus can actually give you more to write about instead of flailing around with different subjects.
2. Be informative. Think about what you’re writing and what it does for the community that you want to address. Link back to sources or other pertinent articles in the body of your posts. Bloggers are also a community, and will cite other bloggers as well as more conventional sources of information. Just make sure that the information you are linking to is informative as well. Linking back to other bloggers also lets them know that you’re writing about them.
3. A picture is worth a thousand words. Adding an image to your blog content can bring in traffic the way a big block of words just can’t. A photo catches the eye and says, “Hey! Look what I’m about. Read me.” It’s a simple visual cue, and Ad Week recommends using text overlays for emphasis. Memes are potent forms of communication because of their visual impact and their brevity.
4. Love your white space. When you’re writing longer posts, don’t forget to break up the test with visual attention getters like bullet pointed lists, tables, and subheaders. Think of white space as a background and frame for your text and images, used to complement and set them off like a piece of art in a gallery.
5. Go-go SEO. SEO can get a bad rap. It’s not about stuffing your articles with keywords and search terms of the moment, but rather writing in a manner that invites the attention of webcrawling search engine bots. Write at least 300 words, using your search terms a few times in the text. Use headings, bolding, and other emphasis tags to draw attention, and link back to your own articles if pertinent. Keep your practices strictly White Hat SEO, lest you incur the wrath of Google.

Above all, remember that building traffic and readership takes time, effort, and consistency. While a viral hit can boost your stats, consistent and relevant writing will keep them coming back.

Need help of a marketing specialist with your blog? Fill out this form and we will contact you today.

About 4 Step Studio

4 Step Studio is an online marketing agency that specializes in website design and redesign, SEO, social media and more. Our team of experts focuses on helping small business get found online, while educating them on what will make them successful in the digital world. To learn more about what we can do for you, visit our website at www.4StepStudio.com