Customer Focus
- Which niche you are writing for: e.g. work from home, sewing, parenting, health, spirituality, technology
- Audience persona: What are the attributes of the typical visitor to your blog or vlog (YouTube channel)
– e.g. age, sex, education, interests
Competitor Awareness
- Who are your top competitors
- Find your competitors’ keywords by running their post through a blog audit tool like Keyword analysis tool: Ninja Keyword Density Analysis Tool
- Find your competitors’ external link by posting his or her URL here: Moz Explorer
Keywords
- Search related words (SEO): which words would your readers use to search on topics related to your blog on Google, YouTube and Amazon
- Words which trigger emotions: e.g. Frustration, Love, Excitement, Admiration, Jealousy, Uncertainty, Stress, Desire
- Adjectives
Blog Plan
Blog URL
- optimized for search – include keywords
- make the url readable by humans
- not too long
- all lowercase – be wary of case sensitivity
- relevant to title
- avoid redirection
- fewer folders is better
Blog Headline – captivating and optimized
- Create a magnetic headline which is both attention grabbing and optimized for search engines
Blog Content
Blog Content = = Introduction + Body + Conclusion
Blog Introduction
Blog Introduction = Hook + Transition + Thesis
- Hook: How will you make it attention grabbing – e.g. cliffhangers which spark curiosity, anecdote, question, gentle confrontation, acknowledgment & thanks to the viewer
- Transition: The transition sentence clarifies the title and segways into the body
- Thesis: Highlights why the reader should read the post, e.g. “As a self-published author, knowing how to sell is even more important than having writing skills”
Blog Body
- Will your target audience find this insightful and useful?
- Is it fun and engaging?
- Would your audience relate to your blog post or video at an emotional level – e.g. fear, happiness, success, self-doubt?
- Duplicate check
- Grammar & spelling check
- Short paragraphs, ideally less than 5 sentences
- Easy to read: headlines, bullets and highlighted text
- Keywords for search engines, emotional triggers, adjectives
- Images with alt tags, embedded vidoe
- Outgoing links to authority sources – (but avoid having too many links)
- Minimize bounce rate and spread link juice: Link to other posts on your own website
- Number of words greater than 300, ideally close to 2000 words
Blog Conclusion
Blog Conclusion = Summary + CTA (call to action)
- Highlight the key points of your blog – e.g. benefits for your audience
- Call to action – What do you want your audience to do after reading your blog or viewing your video – e.g. link to a landing page of your product (e.g. your amazon book page), share on social media, read another post, subscribe or comment
- Use verbs in the beginning of the CTA sentence – e.g. “Download now”, “Sign up Today”
- Instill urgency in the call to action – “Sign up today and save 30%”
- Make the call to action sentence or button stand out
Blog Post Promotion
- Ask a friend to review your blog post – use the above checklist as a guide
- Ask for audience feedback – comments and email
- Find a paid reviewer
- Promote your post – external links, submit to niche directories, share on social media
- paid ads – Facebook, YouTube
- Monitor traffic after one week of posting
- Is the post bringing in desired result – e.g. traffic to your landing page, comments, shares
- Make a note of lessons learned from this post
- Plan another blog post referencing your current post
