Feb
Planning your content is the first step for building a successful blog and attracting new customers.
Creating regular blogs will build your SEO, drive website traffic and help you build trust with potential customers [1]. Putting together a plan to achieve this will help you stay organised, never run out of ideas to write about and improve your chances of success [2]. It will also allow you to avoid the dreaded procrastination and writer’s block from striking just when you need to pump out content.
Here’s how to plan your blog content in 5 easy steps:
Step 1: Define your goals
Setting clear goals will provide your blogs with direction and intent, helping you to successfully build an audience [3]. Without them, you may be channelling hours into an inefficient strategy. Or worse, attracting the wrong type of client who will only waste your time.
A successful blog can help you achieve a broad range of business goals, such as:
- Driving traffic to your website and business
- Increasing sales or generating leads
- Educating customers on what you do
- Providing company updates and news
- Entering a new market
- Building your brand
A good and actionable strategy is focussed. Choose a maximum of three goals for your blog and make them specific. For example, do you want to increase sales by 10% or educate customers on a specific service you provide?
Step 2: Define your audience
Now you know what you want to achieve, the next step is defining your audience. A deep understanding of your audience will allow you to better market yourself to the right people. As a brand, you want to strongly appeal to a specific group of people, who are most likely to do business with you. People form deep bonds with brands that give them what they need and dismiss others which don’t directly connect with them [4].
To define your audience, first consider who your ideal client is. Remember this isn’t necessarily who you are dealing with now as it could be a market you’d like to grow. Look through any booking or sales data you have available, get researching and call on your own knowledge and networks then jot down as much about your ideal client as possible.
This could include:
- Demographic data, such as where they live, marital status, kids, income, etc.
- What are their concerns/problems which prompt them to look for your products/services?
- How do you solve these problems?
- Aside from a simple product or service, what do they get out of dealing with you? For example, do you provide superior customer service, simplicity or additional perks?
Step 3: Brainstorm ideas and do keyword research
Next, it’s time to get creative and jot down every blog idea you might have. Start broad and keep in mind what your audience would find interesting and useful. The goal is to come up with as many ideas as you can, not to come up with the perfect title first go.
Some great techniques to get your creative juices flowing include:
- Thinking about your audience’s needs or desires and how you satisfy them. Consider what things they might be exploring before buying your product.
- Run through the different stages in the buying process, right from what would prompt them to want your product/service through to making those final sales decisions.
- What questions do you regularly hear from customers?
- Look at what other people are writing in the space and think about how you can say something different. Being on trend is fantastic, but you also want to add to the conversation.
- Consider what is topical – are there any new timely concerns or upcoming industry changes your audience should be aware of?
- Use tools such as Google Search Console, Google Ads and Ubersuggest. These will allow you to see what terms people are already using to find your website and also what your competitors are ranking for. When you are prioritising keywords, opt for those that have high search volume and lower competition as this will allow you to rank more easily.
- Talk to your customers, staff and friends and bounce your ideas off them. What do they think is the most interesting and what jumps out at them?
Step 4: Choose the top ideas and map out each blog
Now you have a long list of ideas, the next step in planning your blog content is picking the best ideas and planning your writing. Choose the ideas which will most appeal to your audience. Use the best keywords in a way which feels natural, not forced, and which align with your business and blog goals.
You have a list of blog topics, but DON’T STOP THERE! Jot down a few key points under each topic, outlining the subheadings and call to action (such as “buy now” or “click here”). This will help you stay on track when you are writing, avoiding long and unnecessary tangents and reducing your editing load. It will also make it easier to get started when you come to write your articles.
Step 5: Create a schedule (with reminders) and make it a priority
Next, map out your articles against your calendar and create realistic goals. Set yourself up for success by finding or making time to write. Factor in what time of day you know you will be in a better frame of mind to write and leave time for careful proofreading.
After you have decided on a schedule, block it out in your calendar, set yourself reminders and make writing a priority. Now you have a concrete plan in place, it will be much easier to start writing.
What comes next?
Make sure you are making the most of your strategy by amplifying your posts on social media, keeping track of how they perform and watching your analytics. The more regularly you post and the bigger following you gain, the more useful information that analytic platforms such as Google Search Data will provide for you to further tailor your content.
Although you have spent time carefully planning out your blog content, you still need to be flexible. If something major happens in your industry that you can provide your audience advice on, be ready to jump in and write about that. Don’t put it off – being timely will help boost your traffic, shareability and SEO.
To talk to a professional Sydney copywriter about your business’ blog, get in touch.
What is the best way to plan blog content?
- Define your goals: Setting clear goals will provide your blogs with direction and intent, helping you to successfully build an audience.
- Define your audience: A deep understanding of your audience will allow you to better market yourself to the right people.
- Brainstorm ideas and do keyword research: Get creative and jot down every blog idea you might have. Then, use keyword research to build on and refine those ideas and come up with more.
- Choose the top ideas and map out each blog: Choose the ideas which will most appeal to your audience and jot down a few key points under each.
- Create a schedule (with reminders) and make it a priority: Map out your articles against your calendar and create realistic goals.
References
[1] https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/the-benefits-of-business-blogging-ht
[2] https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/5-indisputable-reasons-why-you-need-a-blogging-strategy/561998/#:~:text=Having%20a%20blogging%20strategy%2C%20and,shared%20by%20your%20ideal%20clients.
[3] https://heidicohen.com/blog-goals-why-do-you-need-them/#:~:text=As%20such%20it%20needs%20a,in%20a%20sea%20of%20content.&text=(This%20is%20important%20if%20you,your%20blog’s%20breakthrough%20year!)
[4] https://www.business2community.com/marketing/must-define-target-audience-01582183