How to approach effective article writing?

First of all, what’s the difference between writing blog posts and writing articles? Aren’t they the same thing?

In terms of writing for the web, they are more or less the same, but articles are written for mostly news and opinion publications. When you write for traditional media such as print media, you write articles or opinion pieces. Blog posts, by their very nature, are informal, casual and conversational. Articles are much more formal, professional and factual. I’m not saying blogs shouldn’t be professional and factual, but this is an underlying difference between blog posts and articles.

For example, if you are writing for an online magazine or an online newspaper like Washington Post or New York Times, most probably you are writing an article and not a blog post although they have dedicated blog sections.

It is always beneficial to know how to write articles – the articles that can be published in professional publications.

Even if you yourself cannot write, getting some article published about your business and then getting an incoming link from the magazine or the newspaper can do wonders to your search engine rankings.

How does article writing and publishing help your business?

As mentioned above, articles are much more factual and formal. They are a good way to show your authority on a topic. Articles are more authoritative in the sense that people trust them more just because they are published in formal publications. You can publish a blog anywhere. But when you get an article published in a traditional newspaper or magazine it goes through an elaborate vetting process. Your writing is scrutinized by people who are less interested in you and more interested in the reputation of their publication. Hence, they will publish your article only if they find it worth publishing. That in itself increases your authority if you get to publish your article.

How should you approach writing an article?

Personally, since I get paid for every piece of content that I write, whenever I write, I give it my best shot, and I would do the same when writing an article. An article being approved by an editor of a magazine or newspaper is slightly same as a blog post or a web page being approved by a client, especially when the client knows exactly what he or she wants.

Here is what I would suggest for writing effective and profitable articles for your business:

Write on topics you have authority on

This is very important. If you have an authority on your topic you will be able to write in-depth. You will be able to find the right data. You will be linking to the right references.

That is why among journalists you come across “foreign-policy experts” or “economists” or “business correspondents” or “sports reporters”. Normally, if someone writes on entertainment, he or she mostly writes on entertainment. If someone writes on science, he or she mostly writes on science.

Do extensive research

When there was no Internet doing research was quite difficult. You had to visit libraries. I remember people used to maintain clippings from newspapers and magazines so that they could use them as references when writing their own articles. In the times of the Internet, doing research is simply laboring in front of your PC or laptop (some people even prefer their mobile phones).

Make sure what you want to research. If you don’t ask the right questions, you don’t get the right answers. Make a list of all the references and data sets you want to include in your article. Please remember that the more data you use, more authoritative your article sounds. Just make sure that you obtain your data from trusted and renowned sources.

Use simple language

By simple language I don’t mean write like a third grader. I prefer to write simple sentences unless there is a compelling reason to capture multiple ideas in a single sentence. Express one thought in one sentence. Don’t use unnecessarily complicated words and expressions. Remember that common folks will be reading your articles who may not be experts and may not be familiar with the words and expressions that you are familiar with. The purpose of your writing is not to impress people, but to inform and educate them, or change their opinion about something. Language is your tool. Use it appropriately.

Write an outline before writing the complete article

This will help you capture all the ideas that you want to include. Writing can be a laborious task and when writing, you may forget important points that you want to talk about. Hence, create a notebook or a Word document and in bulleted points make a list of everything that you want to cover. All the important points. Pros and cons of your main agenda. Some authoritative reference links. Some important quotes from other authority figures.

Write shorter sentences

Shorter sentences may create lots of white space, but they also make it easier to read your article. Preferably have 3-4 sentences in a paragraph and not more. Writing shorter sentences and paragraphs also makes it easier for search engine algorithms to analyze your text and then rank your content appropriately. It will be also easier for the editor to go through your article.

Edit and proofread your article after writing

This is what the editor of the magazine or newspaper does before publishing. Editing allows you to refine your sentences. There may be some typos that you may have typed in a hurry. There may be some hanging sentences. There may be some complicated or confusing sentences you may want to simplify. Maybe there are certain words you want to change? Editing helps you fine-tune your article and also gives you an opportunity to do a final reading before you submit it. How about using too many adverbs and adjectives? Don’t over obsess, though.

You may be tempted to use keywords more than necessary so, avoid that. When you publish an article, for example on LinkedIn, or any other publication, you would want the article to be found on Google and other search engines but keep in mind that content-intensive websites like LinkedIn are already ranking well for their content. Search engine algorithms can easily analyze content and decide on their own for what keywords to showcase individual links. Nonetheless, if the keywords are important, strategically use them within your title and the body text.

Why is it difficult to publish a blog regularly?

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Why is it difficult to write a blog post regularly

You want to, you need to, publish a blog regularly for multiple reasons.

When you publish a blog regularly, you regularly engage your visitors. You improve your search engine rankings. You get to demonstrate and share your knowledge. Your readers have a reason to come back to your website repeatedly. You have fresh content to share on social media websites and other platforms.

Most of the clients who approach me to write for them regular blog posts are looking to increase their organic traffic. This is the best form of traffic. Once your blog post begins to appear in search results, you don’t pay for every click. It is high quality traffic. It is free after you have recovered the cost of publishing the blog post.

How often should you publish a blog post?

Depends on what you’re trying to achieve. Websites like Hubspot recommend that businesses that publish 2-3 blog posts every week get 13X more traffic than businesses that publish 1-2 blog posts every 15 days. Ideally, you should aim for at least one or two blog posts every week. Again, it depends on what results you seek.

Let’s say you want to improve your search engine rankings in the coming two months. Then, I would recommend you publish a decently long blog post – 1000-1500 words – every day.

I have personally experienced good success by publishing even 400-500 words every day for a couple of months. Rankings improved. Targeted traffic improved. New content got crawled faster.

Why do businesses find it difficult to publish blog posts regularly?

Many reasons. You run out of ideas and topics. You feel demotivated by the lack of success that is hard to come due to competition and millions of web pages and blog posts being added to search engines and social media platforms every day. Writing every day can be a Herculean undertaking.

Some of the biggest challenges faced by individuals and businesses wanting to publish blog posts every day include

Lack of interesting topics.
Not knowing where to start and where to end.
Not enough time due to the core professional obligations (you may be a lawyer, a designer, a programmer or an architect and writing is not your main occupation).
Not having a content calendar or a clearly-defined plan.
Inability to come up with original content.
A sense of boredom – initially you may be full of excitement but as blogging becomes a usual business chore, it tends to become a boring activity.
Not knowing what to prioritize – writing what you love or writing what your core audience finds useful.
Not getting enough traffic – organic traffic doesn’t come in a few days. It may take a couple of months before the traffic begins to trickle.
Finding the perfect niche – if you don’t know your niche you are simply beating around the bush and wasting your time and precious resources, and this further leads to inertia.
The absence of the writer’s discipline – writing is a discipline and only professional writers seem to have it.
Not working with a professional writer – since writing is better done by a professional writer it is better to assign the task of writing a regular blog post to a professional blog writer.

How to make it easier and more profitable to publish a blog regularly?

You have two choices: become a prolific writer yourself or assign the task to someone who himself or herself is a prolific writer, preferably, a professional writer or content writer.

Why is it so?

A professional content writer is a dedicated writer who is everyday writing blog posts for different businesses. For a professional content writer or blog writer, writing is not a chore, it is a professional undertaking, it is a livelihood. Hence, the interest that a professional content writer shows in your blog writing, it may be difficult for you to show.

For your blog to be successful it needs to be relevant, regular and effective. Day after day it must deliver value. Your visitors must have a strong reason to come back to your website and check out your blog.

If your blog is not delivering value, it will fail to draw targeted traffic.

The problem with organic search engine rankings is that everything is interconnected. It is like an old motorbike – you need to keep kicking until the engine cranks up and your bike starts.

Somehow you need to make people come to your blog and enable them to stay there. If you don’t have quality content, people won’t stay and Google has a way of finding that out.

Here is an example:

You find one of my links on Google and come to my website. You don’t stay even for a few seconds. You go back to Google and start checking out other links. What does it tell Google?

It tells the Google algorithm that you didn’t find useful information on my website and consequently, the current rankings that the link enjoys should be degraded for the keyword that you used.

On the other hand, if you stay on my website for 3-4 minutes and you read a major portion of my web page or blog post, it tells Google that my link contains useful information and as a result, my rankings for that keyword for that link further improve.

These attributes for a successful blog can be delivered by a professional content writer or a professional blog writer. A professional content writer delivers

High quality blog posts regularly.
Quality research.
Engaging writing.
Publishing of your blog posts as per your calendar.
Targeted topics.
Search engine optimized content.

5 Tips for Writing Engaging Blog Posts

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5 Tips for Writing Engaging Blog Posts.

Writing an engaging blog post isn’t very easy.

Online readers have really short attention spans. Grabbing their attention, and holding on to it throughout the post is very difficult.

In this post, we are going to be looking at 5 tips that you can keep in mind when writing a blog post to make sure that it is interesting and engaging.

5 Tips for Writing Engaging Blog Posts

1. Do Proper Research

You can’t attract readers if you don’t know what you are talking about.

Take an example.

If someone was to say:

“The world probably has a lot of countries. There may be more than 180 but I’m not sure.”

It would sound horrible. No one would trust it. No one would rely on it and no one would quote it.

On the other hand, if someone was to say:

“The world has 197 countries. From these, 193 are members of the UN.”

It would sound way better. Even if it’s not true, it sounds like it because it’s said with determination and confidence.

And if you want to sound confident and determined, you have to have a proper command on the subject matter. You need to be so learned in your topic that you should be able to state facts and figures related to it without any hesitation.

When you want to write on something, take some time out beforehand and dedicate a session solely to research. Look at reliable articles, research papers and books on your topic.

Always remember to mention statistics and figures, and to link them back to their original source.

2. Focus on Making the Beginning Engaging

In writing, the old adage ‘First impression is the last impression’ holds a very accurate application.

If you manage to create an engaging and interesting introduction, you will be able to hook your readers and get them to read till the end of the post.

This will mean that if you’ve placed any links or sponsored elements in your blog, they will be more likely to appear in front of your readers.

Similarly, you will also increase the chances of your readers to click on any internal links that you may have left in between your content.

Here are some points that you can keep in mind to come up with an engaging introduction:

Discuss the main concept or topic of your content
Don’t dillydally. Get to the point without putting in a lot of fluff
Start with a relatable question
Keep it short and sweet

3. Break Your Content Down in Headings and Sub-Headings

By breaking your content down in headings and sub-headings, you will be able to make it easier to navigate and skip through.

If there is a reader who wants to just read a particular part of your post and not the whole of it, they can easily skip to their desired part and then leave. But, if you don’t add headings and sub-headings, your reader will get annoyed scanning through the content.

Other than that, headings and sub-headings can make your content appear less like a wall of text. And here is something you should know about walls of text.

If someone has written some highly interesting and information content, but without dividing and splitting it properly, it will appear boring to the readers.

But on the other hand, if the content itself is not very informative, but it is properly split up in headings, sub-headings, sections and bullet points, it will look interesting to the readers.

4. Make Sure Your Content is Unique

Plagiarized and copied content is, to be a little dramatic, the bane of reader-engagement. This problem can occur with writers who just take all their information from a single popular source on the internet without diversifying their research.

Plagiarized content, especially if it is taken from a popular source, can stick out to the readers, and it can easily be spotted.

However, there can be a lot of writers who don’t intentionally copy stuff from other sources. But even these types of writers can have trouble with plagiarism by committing it accidentally.

To make sure that there is no plagiarism, of any kind whatsoever, in your content, you should use a plagiarism checker.

Plagiarism checkers usually work by scanning the given text against online sources to see if there are any matches between them. This can help you easily see if there is any accidental duplication in your content from other sources on the internet.

5. Add Visuals and Graphics

There are few things that make written content more engaging than some visuals and graphics.

The logic behind adding visuals and graphics is the same as we discussed in the heading dealing with headings and sub-headings: they stop your content from looking like a giant wall of text.

But, here’s the thing.

While it is commendable and good for your content’s engagement to have images in it, some writers can go a little over-board. They can either start adding images at every other point in the blog post, which can make it impossible to peruse.

Or they can start adding images that have nothing to do with the content at hand.

This sort of excess or irrelevancy in the added visuals can, far from making the content engaging, take away whatever little engagement it may have previously had.

Conclusion

If you are writing for an online audience, you should understand well that your readers will not bother entertaining a dull and boring blog post.

In this post, we looked at some tips and steps that you can follow to make your content look interesting and gripping to your readers.

To sum it up, you should take care to do proper research before sitting down to write your blog post. Having thorough command and knowledge over your subject can make you sound authoritative.

Then, you should work on creating the beginning of the post interesting in order to hook the attention of your readers. You should also break your content up in headings and sub-headings so that it is easier for users to navigate through it.

Uniqueness is also necessary for making your content engaging, so you should be sure to check your final draft for duplication using a plagiarism checker.

And last but not least, you should take care to add visuals and graphics in your content.

5 types of content that I write

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5 types of content that I write

Although I have extensively explained on my website that being a writer I can write on a wide choice of topics and realms, many clients often ask me exactly what I do and what sort of writing I provide professionally.

I have spread my net quite wide in the previous years and I think this has been a mistake. There are many writing activities that are time wasting in terms of generating income. For example, email writing. Most of the clients think of email as number of words but sometimes, more effort is needed in writing a business email than writing a blog post. I’m gradually moving towards the payment model that is based on the effort and expertise rather than merely the number of words.

Broadly, I’m writing content for 5 types of requirements these days. I’m explaining below

1. Blog writing

I love writing blogs because it is mostly linear writing without fluff. It is educational. It is informative. It imparts value.

Although blogging requires research, in most of the cases clients these days send their own outline and sometimes even research material because I charge extra for that. As long as they are paying for my time, I don’t even mind extensive researching.

Although many clients hire me to write “SEO blog posts” I focus more on quality and relevance rather than simply stuffing keywords. This is primarily the reason why I charge slightly more than other content writers who don’t mind simply writing for SEO.

2. Web page writing

This involves writing for the homepage and other pages on the website such as the services page, the company profile, the about us page, or the product descriptions.

Web page writing is quite important, and I charge more than I charge for blog writing. This is where conversion happens. This is where you tell your visitors whether they should do business with you.

Web page writing or website writing is a mix of content writing and copywriting. You inform, educate, but more than that, you sell.

3. Email writing

As I have explained above, I’m shifting the focus to quality rather than the number of words. I like writing emails because I love to communicate. I can write convincingly. I can stick to the point. I can communicate what the client wants to communicate to his or her client or customer. The only precondition is, the client must be able to tell me what he or she exactly wants to communicate.

4. Case studies

A case study is a detailed examination of some problem a customer or client had been facing and how that problem was solved by a service or are product. Detailed method is described, including technologies.

A case study is like a story. You tell about a customer or a client and what problems he or she had been going through. Then how those problems were solved through your effort or through your product. It uses engaging storytelling to weave a narrative around what you offer.

5. Landing pages

Landing pages are very focused. Unlike the usual web page or the blog post page of a website, a landing page has a single objective – to prompt the viewer to take a particular action. This action might be buying a product, or a book, or subscribing to a mailing list.

Landing pages are used for PPC and email marketing campaigns. People are driven to landing pages by promoting the link to them. For example, if you want to draw people through Google AdWords campaigns or Facebook campaigns or even email marketing campaigns, you use a landing page.

Landing page is mostly copywriting.

Other than these five categories, I have also been writing e-books for some clients, but mostly it is blogging, website writing and landing pages.

How to Optimize Images For SEO

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How to optimize images for SEO

Images are an essential component of any website or blog. Not only do they help break up text and make your content more visually appealing, but they’re also important factors that Google looks at to determine a website’s SEO ranking.

In fact, the more relevant and optimized your images are, the better your website will perform in the search results. When appropriately configured, images improve your website’s SEO in a number of ways, including:

Help Google understand your website.
Help improve your website’s click-through rate.
Help enhance the time people spend on your website.

So, instead of asking, “why should I optimize my images for SEO?” a better question would be, “how can I optimize my images for SEO?”

This article will walk through effective optimization techniques to help your images rank higher in the search results and maximize their impact. By the end of this article, you should understand proper image strategies and how to use them to improve your website’s overall performance.

Let’s get started!

Basic Image Optimization Techniques

First, let’s talk about some basic image optimization techniques that you can use to improve your website’s SEO.

1. Choose the Right File Name

The first step in arranging your pictures for SEO is to give them descriptive, keyword-rich file names. Doing so will help Google understand the image and index it accordingly.

For example, if you download a dog’s picture, you should name it “brown-dog.jpg” instead of leaving the file name to the default name and number such as “IMG1234.jpg”.

Integrating an informative file name will aid in the discovery process of the viewers. Ultimately, this will increase organic traffic to your site.

So, how do you choose the correct file name for your images?

Here are a few tips to remember:

Include your target keywords but avoid stuffing. For instance, if your brand provides services for “new landscape design” and “landscape remodeling,” don’t name the picture as “landscape-design-new-remodel.” Instead, use a different keyword in the file name of each picture to enhance visibility.
Use dashes (-) to separate the words in the file name rather than underscores (_).
Keep things short and sweet. Longer names are more likely to be shortened in the search results, making them less effective. Ideally, you should use 5 – 6 words in your file name.

2. Choose the Right Dimensions

The second step in optimizing your images is to ensure that they’re the right size. This means choosing the appropriate width and height for your photos.

If your images are too large, they’ll slow down your website and hurt your SEO. On the other hand, if they’re too small, they will fail to grab attention and won’t help drive traffic.

So, how do you choose the correct dimensions for your images?

Here are a few tips:

Use pictures that are at least 1200px wide. This will ensure that your pictures are high-quality and look good on retina displays.
Choose dimensions that are in proportion to one another. For example, if you’re using an image with a landscape orientation (horizontal), you want the width to be significantly larger than the height.
If you’re using an image with portrait orientation (vertical), you want the height to be significantly larger than the width.

3. Choose High-Quality Images

Quality is a key factor when it comes to the selection of pictures. A high-quality and relevant picture impacts SEO, user experience, and conversions positively.

People love looking at visuals that boast superior quality. When visitors see a low-quality image, they perceive the business as inadequate. This can lead them to click away from your website and look for a competitor.

Remember, what works for users works with the Google algorithm too. Algorithms are designed to mimic user behavior, so it only makes sense that high-quality images would be favored.

But the things: Not every business can afford to hire a professional photographer for their product images. And not every company has the time or resources to create original visuals.

In that case, the best alternative is to invest in stock photos. There are many high-quality, affordable options for businesses of all sizes. 42% of marketers have said stock photos are the most frequently used visuals in marketing campaigns. They are available in various categories/niches and have the availability to transform your branding favorably. You can also get an istock promo code for fantastic discounts on istock images.

Advanced Image Optimization Techniques

Once you have chosen the proper file name and dimensions for your images, there are a few advanced techniques that you can use to further boost SEO.

Some of these techniques include:

1. Use SEO-friendly Image Alt Text

Image alt text or alt tag is a short description that you can add to your images. It’s crucial for SEO because it tells the search engine what your image is about. This can help your photo appear in relevant search results and improve your SEO.

Using relevant alt text can improve a user’s experience on your website. Suppose a webpage fails to display on a user’s screen due to a slow internet connection. In this case, the alt text will appear in the place of the media file to describe the picture.

A visually impaired individual who uses screen readers also benefits from alt tags as they are read aloud to them for better explanation.

Alt-text allows you to add the main keyword to your photos, which can help them rank higher in search results. However, Google emphasizes that you shouldn’t stuff keywords into alt text.

Instead, write descriptions that are relevant and easy to understand.

See how Google differentiates between good and bad image alt text:

When writing your alt text, focus on creating short and accurate descriptions that clearly convey what your image is about.

1. Devise a Sitemap

Google says: a sitemap is “a database where you give information about the pages, videos, and other files on your site.”

Sitemaps are essential for SEO because they help the search engine understand your website’s structure and index its contents precisely.

A sitemap for images is similar to the one you create for the pages of your website. Start by gathering all of your image URLs. Several tools are available to help you generate a sitemap for your photos.

Make sure that you keep your sitemap up to date and send it to Google Search Console whenever you add new images or make any changes to your site.

If you don’t create a sitemap, Google may not be able to properly index your images or interpret their relevance. This can negatively impact your SEO and make it harder for users to find your pictures.

2. Make Images Mobile-Friendly

We live in a mobile-first world, and your website should reflect that. Images are no exception. If they aren’t correctly sized or formatted for mobile devices, they can lag during loading or appear distorted. This will eventually frustrate the users.

If you are using WordPress, it auto-generates a mobile-friendly version of your images. If you aren’t using WordPress, you can use a tool like Mobile-Friendly Test to test the mobile-friendliness of your website.

Final Thoughts

To conclude, images are an integral part of your website’s content. They can significantly improve user experience and help you rank higher in search engine results.

You can’t neglect image optimization if you want your site to perform well in today’s highly competitive digital landscape.

Following the tips above can help you create and optimize high-quality images to improve your SEO and help you achieve your business goals.