When you have an interesting blog post idea revolving in your mind, it’s enticing to sit and start banging on the keyboard. But is it the right method of writing a blog post? Well, that’s not enough.
By practicing this, you will eventually run off on rabbit trails and fail to provide a logical meaning to the reader. You need to create a robust strategy and do a lot of research before writing a blog post. Moreover, writing a blog post outline is essential for creating a fantastic blog post.
Here, I will be sharing some practical ways to write an impressive blog post outline. But, before we start, let me answer some common questions.
Do You Really Need To Create A Blog Post Outline?
Before creating a blog post outline, think about these questions for a moment:
- Are you struggling to drive traffic towards your blog content?
- Are you struggling in picking up appropriate topics for your blog posts?
- Is the writing process painful for you?
- Do you struggle in maintaining consistency in writing blog content?
- Are you frequently missing deadlines?
- Do you need more readers?
- Is your blog content able to rank on the Search Engine Results Page (SERP)?
- Do you have a solid marketing strategy for your blog posts?
If you face any of these problems, then you should consider creating a blog post outline.
What Are The Steps Involved In Creating A Blog Post Outline?
1. Decide On Your Thesis
Deciding upon your main point becomes crucial, and you should also understand the problem you are trying to solve. This will help you understand what value your readers will receive from your blog post.
The best way to do this is to think about what you want your readers to remember from your blog once reading your blog post.
This can also help you figure out the form of the blog post you want to write.
Additionally, there are plenty of blog post templates available to convey your information to the readers. Each of the functions in a different manner in getting your information to the readers.
Here are I have provided some of the most common types of blogs for your convenience:
- Tutorials and How-To Articles
- Listicles
- Interviews
- Checklists
- Comparison Posts
- Long-Form and Well-Researched Blogs
- Professional Advice
- Roundup Posts
And, there are a variety of other formats available, but these are the most effective ones. Planning a design for your blog post can be useful in restricting the focus of your blog.
Through a Tutorial Blog Post, you will be showing a bit-by-bit process that your reader can easily follow.
Through a Review Blog Post, you will be helping the reader determine if they should invest their hard-earned money in purchasing a product or service.
Through a Listicle Blog Post, you will be providing multiple ideas and comparisons along with an in-depth analysis of which product is better and why they should purchase it.
Furthermore, if you are looking to diversify your content, you can consider using multiple formats for a single topic. In the end, if you are successful in determining what answers and value your audience wants from your writing, you can use the blog to back it up.
2. Conduct Keyword Research
It becomes essential to conduct proper keyword research and use them in your blog post. Moreover, keywords are essential elements of a blog post, and it plays a vital role in creating a persuasive blog outline.
There are a variety of tools available for conducting keyword research. Ahrefs, Moz, and Semrush are some of the popular tools for keyword research. These tools allow us to know how often people search for specific keywords, how much they cost PPC Ads, what keywords your competitors are using, and much more helpful information.
You should start the outlining process by picking up the primary keyword. It is recommended to pick up one introductory keyword phrase for each blog post. After that, you can pick 2-3 secondary keywords relevant to your topics and naturally fit with the primary keyword to make the blog post enjoyable and easy to read. This way, you will also get an idea of what will help you rank that post.
Furthermore, if you target a broad primary keyword, you should try to write a blog post with over 2000 words. Whereas, for a long-tail keyword phrase, 1000-1500 words will do a great job for you.
Now, it’s time to think about the 3-4 main sections you want to cover in the blog post. By searching for your primary keyword on Google, you can find out what information the top-ranking blogs offer to their readers.
Also, make sure to coincide these main sections (H2s) with the other secondary keywords. It will be even better if you include 3-4 bullet points of information covering different aspects of the targeted keyword phrase.
It’s also recommended to include a relevant image after every 300-400 words, with alt-text reflecting the targeted keywords. You must ensure to include the primary keyword at the beginning and the ending of your blog post. Moreover, wrap up the blog post with a conclusion that contains the primary keyword in the subheadings and the main content.
3. Keep An Eye On The Competitors
This is one of the best practices to create valuable content and increase organic traffic.
Before organizing your ideas and creating a blog post outline, you should always check what type of content competitors have published. The best way to do this is to search for the relevant keywords and clicking the top results. Blogs appearing on the top of the search results will be your biggest competitors.
Check how your competitors have organized the content and what keywords they have used. This will help you figure out what type of content works best and what your target audience is looking for.
This can also help you know what topics are not covered yet and what questions need to be answered. This way, you get an opportunity to answer those questions and cover the trending topics. As a result, you can drive perpetual traffic to your blog. Hence, this is one of the most important steps in creating a blog post outline.
4. Start With The Main Header
Google always favors posts with a clear hierarchy. This means you should include multiple sub-points along with the main points in the content. First Header (H1) will be the post title, the essential text in a post. And, you must ensure to use the primary keyword compellingly in the H1.
Moreover, it becomes essential to use the target keyword in the H2 also. We usually make H2 look quite different from the H1just to avoid repetition on the page.
Furthermore, only one H2 is enough for every blog post. And, this will indicate the Google what your position is talking about. As it is the Echo of the Title, Google knows exactly what value this post will provide to the readers.
5. Brainstorm: Write Down All The Questions You Want To Answer
Once you come up with a persuasive Headline, it becomes necessary to start thinking of the relevant questions people will be searching for. However, that doesn’t mean that you will have to answer all the problems in your blog. But, this practice can help you create a unique point of view while educating your readers.
So, you have prepared the list of questions. Now it’s time to find out the answers to these questions. Also, try to answer the questions they struggle with the most. This will help you figure out the most impactful problems, and you will be able to cover the necessary information while avoiding a bunch of random stuff. But, you can keep those extra questions handy as it’s an amazing content creation fodder that can be used in the upcoming blog posts.
Furthermore, make sure to arrange the sections of your blog for your outline properly. And, it becomes essential for your content to have a sense of flow to it. In the end, you want to avoid a plethora of disjointed ideas.
It is also recommended to follow a proper structure while writing a blog post. Introduction, subheadings, and the conclusion are the essential elements of a blog post. But that’s not enough. You also need to follow an internal structure for these paragraphs.
The hook introduction, limiting the focus, thesis, showcasing the main content along with transition sentence.
Subheadings are the supporting paragraphs of a blog post. They encompass a topic sentence, idea, support, explanation, and transition.
The conclusion of your blog post should contain a summary of your thesis, point, along with an explanation of the idea.
That’s it! It’s not so difficult, but it might take some time and effort to make it look organized. Moreover, it is essential to outline a blog post because it lets you know what your readers are searching for.
6. Research
Now it’s time to conduct detailed research about your major questions and your subheadings.
At this stage, you won’t be looking for ideas anymore. Instead, it would help if you were researching to support your major takeaways and the subheadings. You also need to add some relevant points as this will make your content even more helpful.
Balancing your points with the research can also result in finding other blog posts that assist your point. However, you can also consider including the first-hand experience. This means you can include something as per your own knowledge or something experienced by the experts.
Additionally, research also contributes to adding authority to your content. This is because you are using the real facts to support your points.
Here you are just outlining to paste the links you want to include and properly cite them.
By adding accurate resources and data, you can add a lot of material to your blog post.
7. Revise
Revising your blog post outline will eventually save the time you spend revising your draft later.
Moreover, it’s a great opportunity to fix any major issues that appear in your blog post outline before you even start writing.
Revising your content can help you figure out the repetition of the same information or realize whether your point is strong enough. Additionally, there might be a part in the blog that cannot provide enough value to the readers.
8. Write Your Blog Post
So, you have now successfully created a fully-fledged blog outline. Now, it’s all set to become a real blog post. You will also be able to write your blog post at an incredible speed because you have already organized all your main points and ideas.
It is also recommended to wait for a couple of days to write the blog post after you have created an outline. This practice is effective in getting a little viewpoint on what you are writing.
9. Proofread And Edit Your Post
Writing an impressive blog post is hard. But, editing it is even more challenging. Most people usually assume that editing means only striking through the sentences that don’t work or fix grammatical errors. Although framing proper sentences with proper grammar plays a vital role in writing a killer blog post, editing is not just limited. It is all about seeing the piece as a whole. Sometimes, you also have to sacrifice the words (and the hours it took to write them) to stick together.
Here, I am sharing some self-editing along with them along with a few suggestions to help you edit your blog post like a pro:
- Avoid Repetition: What’s more irritating than reading repetition of certain words or phrases? Once you are done writing your blog post, you must ensure reading through it and checking how the words can be replaced to avoid repetition.
- Read your Post Aloud to Check Flow: This is one of the most incredible tricks that writers use to create a persuasive blog post outline. This trick is even taught in several workshops. Reading the content aloud can help you figure out the sentences or phrases that seem awkward while reading. This might seem to be quite weird, but believe me, this will help check for lengthy congestions or contrived sentences. Hence, if you ever feel like you cannot maintain the sentence’s flow while reading, you should rework it until it rolls off your tongue.
- Have Someone Else Read Your Work: Getting your work read by someone else becomes crucial for a newbie or casual blogger. Asking one or more of your friends to check your work doesn’t mean that you accept your weakness or failure. It is the promise of making your work as healthy as possible. It is recommended to ask an experienced editor to proofread your content. Moreover, you should make them understand that you are not looking for help in spotting and fixing grammatical errors or common mistakes (if they do so, then it’s really great). Still, you want to know their opinion on your content flow and whether it makes sense to the readers.
- Keep Sentences Short and Paragraphs Shorter: Nothing is more frustrating for a reader than reading a huge wall of texts. Most newbie writers often make this mistake. Try to keep the sentences as short as possible so that they are easier to read. Furthermore, short sentences also decrease the probability of going off on tangents. You should again try to keep the paragraphs short and sweet. Short paragraphs also motivate your readers to keep reading.
- Accept that your Blog Post will never be Perfect: A perfect blog post never exists. And, sooner you realize this, the better it will be for you to improve your blogging skills. This doesn’t mean that you should be publishing sloppy work, nor should you be compulsive towards the blog post’s minute details. I mean to say that it doesn’t matter how perfect and well-defined your position is, but there will always be a blog post better than yours. Hence, always appreciate your work but never forget that various blog posts are better than yours.
Conclusion
So, these were the steps involved in creating a blog post outline. Just ask yourself whether you need to create a design and if yes, then follow these steps to create a persuasive blog post outline.
In the end, you won’t see the results overnight. It’s a gradual process, but you can definitely achieve success with continuous efforts and patience.
