The Ultimate Blog Podcast - 40. Myths, FAQs, and tips on creating content for your blog

Episode Date: September 20, 2022

Hey there! It’s Jennifer and I’m doing a solo today. Today I’m talking all about creating content for your blog. We often get asked by people who are just getting started in blogging, “how do I write content?” Today I want to share some myths with you about content as well as address frequently asked questions and give you some tips on creating content for your blog.Check out the show notes (link below) for more information including links and resources mentioned in this episode!Connect with us on Instagram: @sparkmediaconceptsCheck out The Blog Depot. This is a community and course that we have set up for you if you need questions answered before you start your blog. Join the waitlist for The Ultimate Blog Bootcamp, our online course and coaching that helps you build the blog that you have always dreamed of.SHOW NOTES: www.sparkmediaconcepts.com/episode40

Welcome to the Ultimate Blog Podcast with Amy Reinecke and Jennifer Draper. We're on a mission to empower women who want to start or grow their own blog. This podcast is for women who want to learn blogging basics and who crave inspiration and encouragement. Whether you're just getting started or have been a blogger for years, we're excited to welcome you into this space where we are passionate about creating community over competition. We are bloggers who want to encourage you to believe in your potential, step outside the norm, and step into a life where you create your own schedule, your own success, and your own story. Join us for weekly episodes as we navigate blogging

and work from home life, all while raising a family and having some serious fun along the way. all while raising a family and having some serious fun along the way. Well, hey there, and welcome back to this episode of the Ultimate Blog Podcast. This is Jennifer, and today I'm going to be doing a solo episode. Amy and I decided we would try out a few of these episodes for a couple of reasons. One, so that we could get to know you kind of more on a one-on-one basis. And also because we each have different areas of blogging that are important to us or that we feel passionate about. And today I just wanted to talk to you a little bit about creating content. So one of the big questions we get when people get started in blogging is how do I write content?

get started in blogging is how do I write content? Obviously, that's why we all start blogging. We get really excited about it. We want to write blog posts, but we want to do a good job. We want to get traffic to our sites. And so a lot of questions come up in regards to what is content and what is good content and what do I need to be doing to get traffic to my website? what is good content and what do I need to be doing to get traffic to my website? So first of all, I thought we'd start off and just address some of the myths that come about when people come to us and say, I heard this about writing a blog post. So let's just address those right up front here. I know one thing that people are often told is your blog post has to be a certain number of words. And while it's true that a longer blog post may be more helpful and may be more likely

to rank on Google, it's not necessarily the case all of the time. So there really is no true rule in terms of how long a blog post should be or how many words it should have. Really, the most important thing is whatever the topic is of your blog post, that you've completely addressed that topic. So you've answered any questions people might have. You've explained things clearly. So there really is no tried and true number of words that any blog post should have.

no tried and true number of words that any blog post should have. Another common myth that people hear is that you should use your keywords over and over again. And your keywords are essentially like the title of your blog post. And it used to be the case that you could sort of fool the algorithm by putting your keywords in over and over and over again. And that is actually not the case anymore. Google has so many ways that they look at your content. They have real people looking at your content. And so just trying to fool an algorithm is never going to help you or your readers at all. So the myth that keyword stuffing your post will be helpful or beneficial is just flat out not true. You really want to write in an extremely natural way. Sometimes you may use those words a couple of times. Sometimes you may not use them that many

times at all, but you definitely do not want to have them over and over and over again in your post. And finally, another myth is that you have to be like a great writer or an English major to write a blog. And that is simply not true. You can write a great blog post and not have to be like a polished, seasoned, professional writer. So now that we've got that all cleared up, and we can encourage you that yes, you can write good content. And you don't have to listen to all the hype out there that terrifies you.

Let's talk about what we really mean by content for your blog. And what we want to talk about today is essentially the posts and the pages that are on your website. Now, content can also mean the things that you share to your social media accounts as well. And most likely you're going to be repurposing some of the content that you have on your blog to share on your social media. And the way that you share content there is going to be different than your blog. And we're not going to dive into all that today. We're really going to focus on your website and your blog. So if you haven't already, I would recommend going back and listening to one of our very first episodes. I believe it was episode number two, the benefits of having a blog so that you can understand like, why would

you even want to put all this work in in the first place? What am I going to get from having a blog from creating all of this content? But the short answer is creating content can bring so much to your business and it can help people in such a deep and meaningful way. And it can bring so much back to you in terms of creating a business and an income and all of that as well. So having a blog can be super beneficial and creating content is such a key component of having a blog. Creating content is really so much more though than a lot of people think of when they first sit down. They're like, oh, I'm going to write a blog. I have all these ideas. I'm going to write about what I'm feeling today, what feels good to me. And that is really important. But

what feels good to me. And that is really important. But creating good content to share on a blog that you want to grow is so much more than sitting down to write a diary type post of what's on your mind. But I don't want to scare you off because it doesn't mean it can't be fulfilling, therapeutic, meaningful, all of those things that you want to get out of this. You can create such helpful content, but you can also have a little bit of a plan too. It is really, truly a balancing act. So before you ever start sitting down to write a blog post, before you ever create content, you need to think about a few things.

You need to think about what is the main overarching topic of your whole blog? What message are you trying to share? And who are you trying to reach? Who is this content for? And how will it help them? That is so important because if you don't know, then you don't really have your purpose defined just yet. And in addition to like how it's going to help them, it's also important to know why do you want to create this kind of content? You know, what do you want this to bring back to you? Do you want to drive more traffic to your business? Do you want to help people in a certain way? Maybe you have a coaching program. Just really know your why in terms of why you want to create the content. And then finally, you want to know what you want the people

who are reading your blog posts to gain or what action you want them to take after you're reading your blog post. Don't just let them come and leave. Have a clear call to action or purpose for them once they've read your blog post. Maybe it's something as simple as you want them to read another blog post and stay on your site. Maybe you want them to sign up for your email list. Maybe you have a program or a product that you're selling. So really take people on a journey with your content. So now that you know

like the essentials, like who you're writing for, what you're writing about, you need to start doing some research. So when you're feeling inspired, what I encourage you to do is grab a notebook or open up a document and just start writing down your ideas. Take those notes that you may have previously put into a blog post and write them down. And then what you're going to do is when you have some blocks of time, you're going to come back and take all of that inspiration and you're going to use it to start doing some research. So there's some things that you're going to need to know before you start creating content. If you want that to be content that people are searching for, wanting and needing out there. So first of all, you really need to think about what does your audience need. And if you don't have an audience yet, don't worry. This can feel a little

tricky, but over time you'll start to, you'll start to get a better feeling for this, but there are still so many ways to figure out what your audience needs, whether it's an audience you already have or the audience that you want to gain. So one of the things you can look at is like, what questions do you get asked? Whether that's online on your social media accounts, whether that's in your real life, like what things do people ask you about so that you may be an expert in that area, or you may just have something special to offer in that area that people are asking you about it a lot. So maybe that's good content for you to share. You can go out to different forums or boards.

There's all kinds of like Reddit and things like that that you can go out to and start typing in your topic, seeing what questions people are asking, seeing what answers people are giving. seeing what questions people are asking, seeing what answers people are giving. Use all of that to help you shape and think about how people are truly living their lives, what real questions, what real problems that they have, and think about solutions that you can offer to those things. Another thing you can do is just keep your ears open. What are your friends talking about? What problems do they have? Is any of it relate to what you want to blog about? Maybe ask them a few more questions, get the, you know,

get the conversation going and see what are their struggles or their needs or their desires and what can you do to help them with those things? You can also, if you do have a little bit of an audience, whether that be on a blog or on social media, you could send out a survey and just find out like, what are people wanting and needing from you? And then one of the most reliable ways is to do keyword research. So I want to talk a little bit more about that. Keyword research is essentially a method of finding words and phrases that people type into a search engine like Google to find information. And there are ways that you can either use free or paid software to find out what people are actually typing in the search bars. And so that is important because

that is what people are actually looking for when they go to that web browser, they open it up, they have this search bar and they're looking for something. They type it in. If you can match what people are actually looking for, then you have a better chance of your content being shown to them when the search results come back from that search they just did. And so really, that's such an ultimate goal is for people to organically, people you don't even know, people you've never met, and they're finding the content that you've created. They're coming to your site and they are reading that content. So if you can create a blog post that matches the intent of what they are looking for,

you're making it so easy for people. Now, there's other ways people find you besides just Google. Obviously, social media like Instagram and Facebook, Pinterest, all kinds of ways people can come to your site. So you can search on those platforms as well to see what types of information people are looking for. And you can kind of create a balance in terms of the content you're creating on your site to ensure that you're meeting the

needs of various people in terms of how they're coming to your site from different platforms. But ultimately, if you really create the solid foundation of keyword research, you will be meeting the needs of so many people and you have a much better opportunity to grow traffic to your site and to grow like this relationship with your readers. I know it sounds like a lot, but research is so important because you don't want to waste your time. You don't want to waste your time. You don't want to waste your energy. And it is so possible to find a balance between just writing what inspires you and writing what people need. And it is so fulfilling when you see those comments start to come in, when people say, thank you, this helped me because, or I really enjoyed this because,

and they start making that connection with you. It makes it so worth taking that little bit of extra time to find the right marriage of inspiration and keyword research. And it's such a, it's such a fine art and a little bit of a science and it sounds a little crazy at first, but it is so rewarding in the long run. Do you want to start building a foundation for your blog? Do you have questions you need to answer before you start? Do you wish that you had someone there to hold your hand through the process? We are so excited to share that we have created a membership community just for you. The blog depot is an

online course and membership community that will teach you the foundations you need to build a blog. We teach you about niching down, finding the right mindset, the best platform to build a blog on, and so much more. With monthly coaching calls inside the community, you will find the support you need to finally make your dream a reality. The doors are open to join this amazing blogging community, and we can't wait to help you find the link to join the blog Depot in the show notes. So once you know what you're going to write about, what actually makes a good blog post or a good page on your website? So you're definitely going to address this from a blogging perspective because that's really what we like to focus on as a foundation.

I'm going to go over some of the most common questions about creating content for your website. So these are questions that we see or questions that we get asked often. So these are questions that we see or questions that we get asked often. One, we already discussed, is there a certain number of words your blog post should have? And that we determined was pretty much a myth. Again, you really want to go back to serving your reader. And there's different ways you can go about seeing what types of common questions they have.

If you're addressing those in your blog posts and you are covering everything thoroughly, then your blog posts could be short, it could be long, and it could be somewhere in between. And quite honestly, most really well-written blogs with different types of content on them are going to have like a few of each of those

all the time anyway. Do I have to be a great writer to be a blogger? We're going to dive into this one just a little bit more because I think what's important to know is your writing should actually be fairly simple. You want this to be something that busy people, anybody out there who's searching for this is going to be able to easily read. So you don't, unless you have like a really like specialty blog, you're going into a lot of terminology and things like that. For most bloggers, you want to write at an actually really simple level. And it's going to feel a little bit like your English teacher

may come along and scold you because you're not probably writing in the paragraph forms that they recommend. It's going to look a lot different because people are reading blogs mainly on mobile devices. So we are going to write simple content that is meant for reading quickly on mobile devices. Okay, next question. Should I worry about my competition? Yes and no. Just because a big website, a popular website wrote about a topic that you wanna write about does not mean that you can't rank for it. It may be more difficult, but that's okay.

You are capable of outranking other platforms, other blogs with your content. So what's important is just to look and see like, what are they offering? And then ask yourself, can I offer something better, different, more? And if so, maybe I should write a blog post about this and see what happens and see how I can help people in a different way. So never let that completely scare you off. It's certainly something to consider, but don't ever tell yourself that you can't rank for something just because another big website is ranking for it. You can certainly write a better blog post that is more helpful. And at the end of the day, that's the most important thing.

Should I include photos in my blog posts? In general? Yes. Photos are very helpful to people. And especially depending on what your topic is, people are very visual. Like if you're creating a recipe, you absolutely need photos. You may need step-by-step photos. If you're crafting something, you may need step-by-step photos. If you're crafting something, if you're showing how to garden, if you are showing how to do exercises, any kind of media like that, that you can add to your blog post is just going to add to the user experience. You know, think about if you pull up a blog post and it's just words everywhere, you might just click off of it because our attention spans are kind of short. But if we break up with lists and then photos and explanations and visuals, maybe it's a graph that's going to keep people's attention a lot more. So really think about how you can add visually to your blog post with photos,

videos, graphics, things like that, that really enhance the content and maybe show step-by-step or any tricky parts or just really anything you want to emphasize. Should I link to other websites from my website? You definitely can. And in some cases you should. So think about what you're writing and what you want to link to. Is linking to something else going to give you credibility? Is it going to help the reader in some way? Is it going to offer value? And sometimes those links can be links to a product that you think might be helpful to them.

Sometimes it just may be to another resource or to another blog even. And that's okay. It is totally okay to link to another website from your website. Just always be authentic about that and only provide things that are truly valuable and helpful. A super common question is, can I write about personal topics or how much personal information should I share? And this one is a little bit tricky because it's obviously going to depend on the topic of your blog. But at the end of the day, what's really important is to ultimately think about how you are helping someone else and how much personal information you share is completely up to you. We want you to be safe out there on the internet. So obviously be very careful. But if you wanna share your story

and that enhances what topic you're talking about, what you're teaching, what you're sharing and can offer the reader some perspective or give them some connection with you, that is great. I think it's just really a balance between sharing helpful information, giving them some how-tos, giving them some tips, enhancing their life versus like just talking about yourself. So you can marry those

two together to share a little bit about your story and create that connection. Show them why you are qualified to talk about this topic or why they would want to listen to you. But just don't are qualified to talk about this topic or why they would want to listen to you. But just don't overshare, I guess would be my suggestion. Just be really careful to make sure that you're still creating a ton of value when you're writing that blog post. Okay, finally, what components should a well done blog post have? So we talked about keyword research that is going to help you create a great title that people can find and people are going to want to click on to read. You're going to want to have a great intro or like we like to call it a hook. So two, three sentences at the beginning of your blog posts that really tell people, wow, this is what you're going to get when you come read this

blog post and it is going to be amazing. So be creative here and really try to hook people in to read the rest of the post and make sure you deliver on the promise that you make to them. You're going to want to break up your post with subheadings. Make this really logical, really easy for them to read as they're scrolling through quickly so that they can stop on the sections that are important to them. Underneath those subheadings, you're going to want to have some different components. You're going to want to have some short paragraphs, two to three sentences typically. You're going to want to have some step-by-step instructions or bullet points or things that are super easy to read. Make sure you're bolding important information. You can use italics. Just really make it easy for the eye to read and the brain to digest what you are sharing.

We talked about links, anything that would be helpful to the reader, whether it's a link to something else on your site that might further explain something or an external link to a product or another resource. Those are great to include in your blog posts because it just enhances the reader experience. Make sure all of your content is relevant to your topic. Kind of stay on track, stay on topic, stay, keep it very relevant to what you're talking about and don't veer off too much if you find yourself talking about too many things or your blog posts getting too long that's when you know it's time to break it down probably into multiple blog posts you want to keep your blog post really focused on your current topic and then finally you want to make sure you have a really clear

call to action or engaging question or something that you want the reader to do when they get to the end of that post. Don't just let them click off and say goodbye forever. How can you capture them? Can you ask them a question that will prompt them to leave a comment and you give them a call to action like, hey, sign up for my email list. Can you get them to click on another post that you think would be really helpful for them? Really think about how to offer value all the time when you're creating these blog posts and also think about how to keep the reader engaged with you. Hopefully this was helpful. I know there's so much to cover when you think about creating content, writing blog posts. So if you guys have any other questions, we'd love for you to reach out to us. You can

find us obviously on Instagram or head over to our website and you can contact us there. We would love to answer any questions you have about creating content. Okay. Talk to you guys next time. Thanks so much for tuning in today. If you'd like to continue the conversation about blogging with us, please find us on Instagram at spark media concepts. You can also sign up for our weekly newsletter where we share blogging tips and inspiration. You can sign up by finding the link in the show notes for those of you who are ready for the next step and want to start your own blog, join the wait list for the ultimate blog

bootcamp. The link to join the wait list is also in the show notes. Go out and make today a great day.