Do you know how to write a technical blog easily? Well! It is every content marketer’s dream: to write blogs that generate a huge amount of traffic.
Are you planning to start blogging? Then this guide is for you. We guide you through the 9 steps we follow to write a blog.
How to write a technical blog? Writing a blog seems easy. But in practice, you are often disappointed.
I know from experience how annoying it is to put your soul and bliss (and a lot of hours) into a blog and then tap 25 views per year.
But how do you write a blog that people do want to read, and that generates thousands of visitors per month?
In this blog, I will show you step by step how we write successful blogs.
Why blog?
Blogs are the ideal means to strengthen your brand and generate more traffic. By consistently blogging, the organic traffic to our blog The Health Issue grew from 0 to 6000 visitors per month within six months.
The great thing is that our positions are still improving every month. Traffic continues to grow, without us having to do anything for it.
Step 1: Decide what you want to blog about
Are you bursting with inspiration and do you already know exactly what you want to blog about? Then write down all the topics that come to mind.
But don’t worry if you don’t have the faintest idea what to write about, or if you’re having trouble coming up with good topics.
The solution is simpler than you think: look at what others in your industry are writing about.
All you need is an SEO tool. We use a paid version of SEMrush, but you can also use a free tool (such as Neil Patel’s Ubersuggest).
Enter the URL of the website in the SEO tool and choose organic research. You can analyze the website at keyword level or page level. Analyzing the website at the page level will give you a better understanding of the traffic that a particular page is bringing in.
With this data, you can gain a lot of inspiration for good blogging topics. The keywords that other websites rank with have already proven themselves. Analyze multiple websites and create a shortlist with about 10 interesting blog topics.
Look for topics that have sufficient potential, but keep in mind that the topics should also interest you. Otherwise, writing will become a boring job.
Step 2: Choose the subject with the most potential
You now have a list of about 10 interesting blogging topics, but which topic do you start with? It is important to research which subject has the most potential.
Some topics are simply not worth the time investment. We spend over 15 hours on most of the long blogs we publish. When you spend that much time on a blog, you want it to actually pay off.
That’s why you should delete the low-potency topics.
The potential of a blog should be approached in 2 ways: the business potential and the traffic potential.
Business potential is high if your topic is highly relevant to your niche or industry and if a visitor is likely to convert easily.
For example, if you’re selling a diet plan, “natural fat burners” would be a good topic for a blog. It is relevant and it is plausible that someone seeking a fat burner wants to lose weight. But a blog about ‘the importance of time registration for companies’ adds little, despite the high traffic potential.
To determine the traffic potential, we again use our SEO tool.
Enter the keyword into your SEO tool and analyze the search volume and SERP reporting. The search volume tells you how often this term is searched per month.
The SERP report gives you an estimate of how organic traffic is ‘distributed’ across URLs with the analyzed search term.
Step 3: Check what you need to write to rank
If you have followed the first two steps, you now have a list of topics that are very interesting and have high potential. Before you start writing, it is crucial to know how to write your blog.
This has everything to do with search intent. That’s how it works: Google wants to provide its users with the most relevant results for their questions.
Do you want to rank high in Google and generate a lot of organic traffic to your website? Then you have to provide the most relevant answer for the search.
In other words: the content you create must match the search intent.
How do you determine search intent?
Determining search intent is easier than you think. Google is your friend. All you have to do is google your topic. Then you can immediately see which results are on the SERP (search engine result pages).
For example, if you search for “start yoga” in Google, you will get the following results. You now know that you have to write a similar blog to rank in the top 10.
Compare this with another search query: ‘start with yoga Groningen’. Now you see that only product pages rank. In this case, it is unlikely that you will rank in the top 10 with a blog.
Step 4: Make it easy on yourself with a design of your blog
Writing a blog is a lot of work, even for professional bloggers. That is why we always use a fixed format to make writing blogs easier.
Our format provides guidance while writing and forces you to think about the structure. The great thing about the previous step – determining the search intent – is that it already largely determines the structure.
Keep in mind that we are making a plan: you don’t have to be super concrete at this stage. It’s really about the backbone of your blog.
- Header : These are 5 natural fat burners that really work
- Subheader : Burn fat with natural fat burners
- Subheader : What is a natural fat burner?
- Sub-sub-header : Definition of a Natural Fat Burner
- Subheader : 1. Caffeine
- Subheader : 2. Protein powder
- Subheader : 3. Green Tea Extract
- Subheader : 4. Cayenne Pepper
- Subheader : 5. Matcha Powder
With this overview, you have a clear idea of what exactly you are going to write about. This allows you to work on your blog in a structured way.
And the table of contents of your blog? You now have that right away:
You can make writing even easier by maintaining a fixed format per header. In this example about fat burners, it is important to cover the following points with each fat burner:
- Short intro about the fat burner.
- How does it work and what is the effect of this fat burner?
- Has scientific research been done on this fat burner?
- Summary.
A fixed setup makes your research a lot easier and ensures consistency.
Based on this overview, you can also start your on-page SEO optimization . You can directly add the html heading tags to your blog post.
- <h1>These are 5 natural fat burners that really work</h1>
- <h2>Burning fat with natural fat burners</h2>
- <h2>What is a natural fat burner?</h2>
- <h3>Definition of a natural fat burner</h3>
- <h2>1. Caffeine</h2>
- <h2>2. Protein powder</h2>
- <h2>3. Green tea extract</h2>
- <h2>4. Cayenne pepper</h2>
- <h2>5. Matcha powder</h2>
Step 5: Write a rough draft
All right, your base is rock solid. Now is the time to really write your blog. I’ve written literally hundreds of blogs, and this is the most important tip I can give you.
Just start writing. Don’t expect perfection right away. Don’t get me wrong, I also want to write perfect blogs. But if you already strive for perfection at this stage, you will immediately get stuck.
You’re probably staring at a blank screen and you’re scratching every sentence or paragraph faster than you can write.
So: don’t think, but write.
Use your well-thought-out draft as a guideline and work on your first rough draft. You must have confidence in your writing skills.
In this phase, perfection is not important: it is about getting the content on paper. You should do your best to avoid any kind of interruption in your writing. So don’t check for spelling mistakes in between.
It’s easier said than done, but just keep typing. You will soon have more than enough time to fine-tune your rough draft and rewrite pieces. And just to reassure you: professional bloggers also work with a rough version. It’s about creating something tangible that you can build on.
Only when you have completely written the first draft do you check it and fix any errors.
Step 6: Ask for feedback
Finally: the first rough version of your blog is finished!
Now it’s time to perfect your blog. The best thing to do at this stage is to let someone else read your blog and ask for feedback. You can ask for feedback on content and you can ask a reviewer to scan the text for language errors.
At Shezahanif.com we always have our texts edited by a colleague. And usually, we also ask for an extra check on the content.
An example: we write a lot for legal companies. We have years of experience with this and we have a lot of knowledge about this industry. Nevertheless, we always make sure that a lawyer checks these texts. He or she immediately sees whether the content of the text is 100% correct.
You should absolutely never view feedback as criticism or an attack.
State clearly what exactly you want to receive feedback about. In our example, we know that our legal substantiation must be checked and supplemented. We therefore explicitly ask for this.
By asking for specific feedback, you can improve your blog optimally. Not only that: in the end, you also learn a lot from good feedback. This is how you become a better writer!
Step 7: Improve Your Rough Blog Design
You may find it annoying to get feedback, but you have to realize what you’re doing it for: a content-strong blog that ranks high in Google.
Remember what I said at step 3?
” Google wants to offer its users the most relevant results for their queries. Do you want to rank high in Google and generate a lot of organic traffic to your website? Then you have to give the most relevant answer for the search. ”
By processing the input of others, you improve your blog. In other words: you provide a more relevant answer to the search query for which you want to rank.
So: it’s high time to process the feedback!
When you get feedback from others, use their ideas, advice, and opinions to enrich your blog.
Read the feedback carefully, with a neutral attitude. When I process feedback, all I think is how can I use this to make the blog even better. There may also be points with which you disagree. You are of course not obliged to process all feedback – it is ultimately your blog.
How to write a technical blog? Write everything down and then start working on the next version. Try to incorporate the feedback you have received into your second version as much as possible.
Now you can finally strive for perfection. You can rewrite sentences until they sound right and you can move paragraphs to make them stand out.
Are you still unsure about your blog, or are you a starting writer? Then you can repeat steps 6 and 7 again.
Step 8: Format your blog
How to write a technical blog? Creating your blog is just as important as writing your blog.
Remember this: a poorly written blog that is nicely formatted will be read better than a well-written blog that is poorly formatted.
When we talk about formatting your blog, we mean that you should make your blog easy to read.
Tips & tricks to make your blog look nice:
- Images always do well. Place relevant images between your text. By alternating images and text, you better hold the reader’s attention.
- Write short sentences and avoid complicated words. Some writers think that they should always use difficult words, otherwise they will not be taken seriously. But actually this only makes the text difficult to read. Words like however, basically, normally, ideally, the fact that, furthermore and which (instead of that) are not okay in blogging.
- Make smart use of titles, headings and subheadings. Subheadings guide the reader through your text. You take your reader by the hand, as it were and show the main line of your text. By using good subheadings, the reader immediately understands the essence of your text. A good rule of thumb: the reader must understand the common thread of your text if he or she only reads the subheadings.
- Lists, lists and lists. Every reader likes lists because they briefly summarize what is being said. In addition, they break up the text, just like images.
Adding supportive visuals and formatting your blog are really crucial. Can you create visuals yourself, such as videos, images, or infographics? Then you should take this as seriously as the writing itself.
Step 9: A Great Title
Your blog is almost ready for publication. Time to dot the i’s and cross the t’s.
The best title wins the fight. It pays to think carefully about your title.
When coming up with a good title, take a look at clickbait websites and tabloids. The content they publish is not good, but you also regularly click on such a clickbait title in your Facebook timeline.
One that makes you think: I know it’s junk, but I need to know what the answer is. People are very eager to learn and curious. So they want to know how you do things.
The blog about fat burners can be given the following title: ‘natural fat burners at a glance’. You can upgrade this title quite easily. Take a look at these two variants:
‘These are 5 natural fat burners that really work’
‘5 natural fat burners with proven effect’
Much more attractive, right?
This does not mean that you should use clickbait titles for your blogs, but that you should think carefully about the appeal of your title.
Also, make sure that the URL of your blog is short and to the point. An extremely long and “meaningless” URL can hurt your page’s visibility. Research even shows that short URLs often rank better in Google search results.
Avoid URLs like this:
https://xyz.com/2020/12/12/123456789/3/
It is better to choose a URL like this:
https://xyz.com/how-to-write-technical-blog/
Have you optimized your title and URL? Congratulations: your blog is ready for publication and on its way to the top of search results!
Now it’s your turn: How to write a technical blog?
How to write a technical blog? We have shared our step-by-step plan with you. To write a good blog, you have to make the necessary preparations. You need to focus on the right topics and tailor the content to the search intent. A brief overview of our step-by-step plan:
- 1: Decide what to write about
- 2: Choose the subject with the most potential
- 3: Check what you need to write to rank
- 4: Make it easy on yourself with a design of your blog
- 5: Write a rough draft
- 6: Ask for feedback
- 7: Improve Your Rough Blog Design
- 8: Format your blog
- 9: A Great Title
As you can see, it worked really well for our blog Shezahanif.com.
There’s nothing stopping you from writing fantastic blogs yourself now!
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