Secrets to Writing Engaging Blog Posts | Bullseye Strategy
by Maria Harrison | Mar 12, 2014
When reading a blog post, people often make a decision in the first few sentences whether they want to continue reading or not. According to Smartbrief, the average online consumer has an attention span of eight seconds — a second less than a goldfish. We realize that cutting through all the noise to grab your reader’s attention is a challenge.
So the question is, how are you grabbing your reader in less than eight seconds?
The look and feel of your blog post is the first thing your reader will digest before they choose to dive in further or leave. If you don’t catch them in those first eight seconds they could be gone forever. Make your blog credible by mirroring what reputable sources do. Take note of respectable online news channels to see how they publish their articles and what formatting techniques they use.
Blog Formatting Tips:
Most likely your audience doesn’t have time to read your entire blog post. Give them the cliff notes version by bolding sentences or key phrases that are important within the blog. Entice your reader by using large font type and bolded headlines throughout the blog to catch their eye.
Use a mix of formatting by including indentations, numbering, and bullets to highlight certain areas of your blog. Keep each blog post fresh to entice your reader. Use ‘Justify Text’ in Word to create clean edges around your copy. Making small changes like this will allow your reader to more easily consume the content.
Use whitespace to break up your copy. Make your blog post easy to consume and less intimidating by breaking up text on the page. Wrap text around your images to create a natural flow and to create less scrolling for the reader.
Is your reader engaged with your blog? Add a call to action at the end of your blog post to get feedback, ask a question or tell them what to do next.
What formatting tips do you have that you think are important? Share with us in the comments below.
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