Amateur Blogger

Writing a successful blog posts takes effort. Anyone can peck away on the keyboard and hit the publish button. It’s easy. Next thing you know you’ve published an article for all the world to see.

But is the world looking? Is your blog post engaging enough to attract attention from your target audience? It makes no difference if your target group is ten strong or 100,000 strong – without engaging and useful content you are going to miss your mark.

1. An Engaging Post Title

Your post title is the first thing that a site visitor sees.  Regardless if the visitor is visiting your site directly, regarding on a third party reader, or using a direct RSS feed, the title of the post is what the visitor will see first.  The title needs to lead the visitor, by the hand, into the content of your post.  Asking the reader a question is a tried and true way to gain their attention.  Of course, they need to be inquisitive and the question needs to strike a chord with that inquisitiveness.

Another method often used to encourage further reading is to have the title of your post indicate a list of items will follow in the full article.  In fact, that’s just what I did with this post.  The fact that you are reading this paragraph is living proof that this technique has some validity.

2. Connect with the Reader

Your blog post needs to connect with the reader.  You are a real person and the reader needs to understand this.  Readers who feel engaged with the author are much more likely to return for a second visit or to subscribe to an RSS feed for your blog.  Nobody wants to be lectured to, and blog readers are no exception.  Make your reader feel as though the two of you are having a discussion in the same room.  If you succeed at this you are well on your way to having a successful blog post.

3. Comments are a Two Way Street

People who leave comments on your blog do so for many different reasons.  Some people just like to hear themselves talk.  Others believe their words have value and they wish to leave an impression on others who may follow later and read their comments.  Some people just like to be heard.  Whatever the motivation of a commenter, one sure-fire way to discourage them is to never hear any feedback from the post author.

Although it’s often not possible to respond to every comment, a blog author who takes the time to connect with their readers and comment back, establishing a conversation of sorts, is far more likely to retain and improve the readership of their blog than someone who ignores the readers.

4. Be Professional

There’s no excuse for poor writing.   Before you push the publish key, make sure you have checked and double-checked what you have written.  Sloppy work and poor writing can do nothing to improve your blog’s status.  That much is obvious.

On the other hand, a well written article may very well attract the attention of a reader who otherwise would have scanned and walked away as soon as they realized that they were reading something that the author did not care enough about to produce in a quality fashion.  That’s human nature.  If you can’t be proud of your writing, please don’t expect others to be.

5. Keep Your Cool

There will always be times when a commenter gets under your skin.  Depending on the subject matter of your blog, this may occur regularly or hardly ever, but suffice it to say it will occur at some point in your blogging career.

My advice: never let them see you sweat.  If they want to act a fool, then so be it.  Engaging with them in a similar fashion is unlikely to bring credit to your blog, unless the content and makeup of your site is designed to solicit this type of response from your readers.  When possible, be nice.  Everyone usually wins in this scenario.

As always, I welcome your observations and suggestions and encourage you to leave a comment.