When you first start running a blog, it can be a very painful experience putting lots of time and effort into your blog posts and articles and knowing that no one is really reading them. You can slave away over an article but unless you already have a dedicated audience, there’s a good chance that only a couple of people will read it.
But if you want to make sure that people start reading as quickly as possible, then it’s not enough to simply keep posting the same old stuff – you need to think about the type of content that people actually want to read and the kind of content that will hold attention for long enough to make an impact.
Let’s take a look at how you do that…
The Title
The first thing that will help you to get more readers is your title. Of course, if your title isn’t interesting, then people aren’t going to feel motivated to click on your link or to read past the first line.
This is something that sites like Buzzfeed know all-too well. And this is also what has given rise to ‘clickbait’. It’s important not to create clickbait yourself (which famously doesn’t provide any real value) but you can learn from the way that these posts structure their titles.
Try to make your articles stand out by writing about something that people haven’t already read a thousand times, or at least providing a fresh spin. Find an emotional hook and try to introduce a little curiosity.
In short, the best way to make your articles naturally engaging is to write about something different that hasn’t already been covered a hundred times before by every other blog in your niche. Always ask yourself: would you read it?
Presentation
Presentation is so important when it comes to getting your content to be read. This is something that is often overlooked but if you use the right font, the right headings and the right spacing – then add in some nice high definition images – you’ll see your visitor retention go up a large amount. People hate being greeted by a massive wall of text and this is one of the fastest ways to get them to turn around and go back.
Tell a Story
I read somewhere that ‘storytelling is SEO for the human brain’. This is true to a big extent. People love hearing stories. They like to hear how the techniques you’re recommending helped you. They like to hear about how you discovered the strange underground parkour movement in the early 2000s. Stories engage people because the human brain is wired to read stories. This allows you to create suspense, cliff-hangers and emotional engagement.
People love hearing stories. They like to hear how the techniques you’re recommending helped you. Click To TweetSo if you’re looking at your content right now and it feels a little dull or a little dry, think about how you can perhaps make it into more of a story.
Do all this well and you’ll find that your content becomes much more engaging and that people stay on your site that much longer!
