It is Thursday, and all ready we have covered a lot of things you can do to help your content out. Now, we get to how to improve the content of the blog post itself. Tomorrow we will finish up with publishing your content.
Start with a Sentence
The first thing you should do is to start with a basic idea or opinion. All books, magazine articles, newspapers, and 5th grade writing papers start with a thesis that outlines the rest of the paper. Put down a single sentence that tries to encompass the entire post. You might not be able to go into detail, but if you were going to post your blog post on Twitter, what would you say?
Outline the Paragraphs of Your Post
Next, take that single sentence, and begin to outline it. This will make it easier to write your content later on. Outline it paragraph by paragraph, making each paragraph a single idea. If you don’t want to write a paragraph, you could always just use a modified version of your outline, which is, in fact, a list.
When you finally go to actually write the content, each paragraph should be 1-4 sentences, and the fewer sentences the better. Text that is broken up into a lot of different paragraphs, and more ideally, with pictures, make it seem a lot more readable than simply a big block of text. Also, shorter paragraphs allow the text to be scannable.
Be Clear
The main point of the post is to convey information to your reader, not to show off your fancy writing skills. Make sure to use clear words, and not fancy ones. Don’t use ‘utilize’, when you could just as easily use, ‘use’. As a general rule, use the word you are thinking of, instead of the word that you want to say to make it sound more professional. People don’t have time for unclear words, or to figure out what your fancy and sophisticated mind has to say.
Also, analogies and stories make content easier to understand. This is important especially if you are writing about something that is more complex, such as coding. Finally, being specific instead of vague is always beneficial to your credibility. Saying “Most Doctors Recommend” isn’t as clear as saying “98% of Doctors Recommend”.
Do Something Different
Don’t have the exact same voice as everyone else. If you do, people will might not find you interesting because of all the other posts they have read on the internet that sounds exactly like yours. Having a distinct tone, opinion, and point of view give your writing a unique quality.
Revise Your Post. Now, Do it Again.
Making your post simpler, shorter, and more clear is one of the most important things you can do to help your readers understand your content. Strive to make your posts short, sweet, and too the point.
It is almost over! Tomorrow we will talk about: Publishing Your Content. Then on Saturday, we will do a wrap up of all the content.
