Showing posts with label blog post ideas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blog post ideas. Show all posts

Saturday, August 26, 2017

How to effectively plan out and create a complete blog post + how to write more - Blogging 101

August 26, 2017 3
I like to be very organized in planning my blog posts and I like to write more to make sure my tutorials or life hacks that I'm sharing are well explained and detailed. Here's how I plan out my blog posts and get inspired to write more for each post:

how to effectively plan a blog post
Disclaimer: This post is not sponsored.


FREE PRINTABLES AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST!

Planning blog posts aren't just writing a few words and clicking Publish (unless that's what your blog is, go ahead). You could just post pictures on your blog, but if you want to profit from and have traffic to your blog, only pictures probably won't do the job (unless you are super lucky).

Recently, I have been writing posts every day to stock up for this and the following hectic months so that I can spend more time with my family before I head off to the USA for university. Writing and coming up with a lot of blog ideas can create quite a mess and being organized is definitely the key for not going completely insane, if you too are writing blog posts every day, or more than 3 times a week.

1 Penning it down
I like to start off by making a list of new ideas and variation for a certain topic. When I have ideas for the body of the post I will quickly write them down under the title idea as a sub heading because I will most likely forget that point. If I do not think of a particularly good and important point, I will just continue with listing the ideas.

2 Expansion
The next step in planning out a blog post is expanding the topic into categories. I may start off by listing points I would like to include under the title written on a random page of an old planner or I may skip that step if I have time and create a flow chart or spider diagram to expand the topic. You will see ahead, a flow chart showing all the steps in making a blog post ready to be published below (like a summary of this post)

Once I expand the idea and create categories, I will begin writing my blog post. I start with an introduction as you can see in this post and on basically every recent post of mine. Once I type down the introduction, I evaluate it to see if it would make a good meta description. If you don't know what meta description is, it is basically the text you see below the title of the google suggestions when you carry out a search. Consciously or unconsciously, you read that description to know if the site really contains the information you are looking for. If you are using blogger, the only option to create a good meta description is by adding the relevant information in the first two sentences. If you are using Wordpress, there is a plug-in you can install to type down, separately, the meta description. If my introduction doesn't contain, in my opinion, a satisfying meta description, I add two more lines above it that perhaps would be a better description.

In the body of my blog posts, I write down the key points/categories and then continue to write under each of the headings.

3 Pictures & Links
I like to add pictures and links, when applicable, to my blog posts. In my opinion, images help make the post look more interesting rather than bland and "too many words". It adds a bit of color and doesn't keep the entire page from looking plain. I also add links to any relevant blog posts that I think you would like to read. For example, since you are probably a blogger or thinking about creating a blog (otherwise you wouldn't be reading this), you may want to click on the links and read the posts below:

I also like to add a picture at or near the beginning of the post to tell you, in a visual format, what the post is about. It is kind of like the thumbnail of the post. I usually use PicMonkey or iPiccy to edit and add text to this thumbnail. If I don't have a photo that I have taken to go with the blog post (I try to use one of my own photos when possible), I will head on over to Unsplash to get amazing quality pictures for free!


(Don't forget to add Title and Alt Title to your pictures)

If I have to link to a video or post that is not yet posted/created, I will type [VIDEO] or [LINK] and highlight it like shown, so that I don't miss it when I'm going through my post one final time before publishing incase I forgot to link the post/video.

4 Labels
Adding labels and adding the right labels can make a difference to your blog. Especially if you are a small blog, you may see a slight increase in your traffic when you start using the right labels. I use the Serps Keyword Research Tool to see what are the most used labels and which labels have the highest CPC.

5 Finishing touches and publishing
I add some finishing touches, like a change in the font style or spacing between paragraphs, etc. Next, I publish the post and promote the hell out of it on Instagram and sometimes Facebook (sorry not sorry for the spam).

6 Other Things I Do
I like to keep all my blog ideas typed into Google Sheets so I can make sure that I don't forget to link to other important blog posts and can keep track of how many posts I have ready for publishing and what posts I have to write next.

I like to use Draw.io to make my flowcharts and here's a flowchart to summarize this blog post
(but read below to know how I manage to write at least 1000 words per blog post):


I try to write at least 1000 to 2000 words per blog post. Mostly, I am not able to write 2000 words and sometimes I even fall short by a few words. Writing more words can increase your Google ranking and the more you write, the clearer of an idea Google will get what your post is about.

There are two methods I use to write more words:

  • I copy my entire blog post draft and use a word processing software like Microsoft Word to paste all part of the draft and see how many words there are in total. I proceed to try and add more if the word count isn't sufficient
  • Doing the same thing above, but first, I see how many words the introduction is. Then, I see how many categories/steps/subtitles the post has and calculate how many words on average should be written for each category. I then try to fulfill that average.
FREE PRINTABLES!
I created a basic printable so that you can easily plan your blog posts!
You can either right-click on the below image and click "save image as" or you can go to this Google Drive link and download the pdf version of the same printable (the second option would be easier for you to print). If you want me to email you the pdf file (in case you don't use google drive), then DM me on Instagram: @blackandwhiteandwise
If you download the printable, let me know in the comments or on Instagram if the printable was helpful!

Link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByYzoYNWNnsDVHNWRFJLeHdYczA/view?usp=sharing
blog organization printable

Friday, July 28, 2017

10 Tips on How to Come Up with More than Enough Blog Ideas - Blogging 101

July 28, 2017 0
When you start out, it's easier to come up with ideas but once you write a few posts you start running out of them...Here's a quick and simple guide on how to come up with blog post ideas!

how to come up with more than enough blog post ideas


1

What I do is, when I get one idea I try to think of variations or similar ideas and write them all down at once. It's like a boost of ideas.
2
Usually, when you're in bed at night and can't sleep, you get a lot of ideas. WRITE THEM! You think you'll recollect your thoughts in the morning but that usually doesn't happen easily, at least in my experience.
3
Go on YouTube, see what's trending. Look at what's in your subscriptions because what you like to see could also be what you enjoy writing about whether it's DIYs or social media growth tips, etc.

4
Google it. Google blogs similar to yours. For example, if you have a lifestyle blog then search for other lifestyle blogs and try to vary what they post a little bit so it doesn't seem like you are copying them (if that is something you would like to avoid). Many times you will also think of points not mentioned in that post so you could make up a completely original piece of work.

5
If you find ideas on the web, don't read the blog post from where you got the idea. Just read the title. Because you may get influenced and end up writing the same points. If you just read the title then your own thoughts will come up first. They could still be the same but you may get a few/a lot of new ones.
6
Make spider diagrams/bubble flow charts/whatever you prefer to call them. If even two things on your chart have a few differences, you have two separate blog post ideas from the same topic! You can decide if you want completely stand alone topics or not. However, if you have related topics you could put in links and self-promote your other posts on each post and maybe even get more views!

7
Keep your real life in mind, get inspired by things around you. This may be harder if you are pursuing a blog that isn't "lifestyle" or something like that, but it may still work!

8
If you are "DIYing" something, rearranging your bedroom, revamping something, etc all these things could become blog posts. If you found out a way to get more YouTube views, make it into a blog post! If you are experimenting with methods to increase you Instagram following, and it works, make it a blog post (Click Here to see how I increased my new Instagram account's following by more than 500 followers in less than a month!)

9
If you find a blog post/article about a topic and you don't agree with it or have more opinions/things to say because you feel the article doesn't cover all the points or doesn't justify the topic, you can write about that topic. Make sure not to copy from other people! Plagiarism is a big no-no even if you change words/sentence syntax of the other person's work!

10
Have different series if your blog isn't specific (e.g. my blog is just simply a "lifestyle blog". I haven't made it a very topic-specific blog). This way you don't have to worry about running out of ideas for that one theme you chose. You can write on different topics and have a lot of ideas for each topic. However, if you have expertise on one topic and that's what your blog is about, then go for it. In that case, tip numero uno would be more helpful than this one.