Having a successful blog depends on various factors and one of them is always creating interesting, informative blog posts. Getting the right topic is crucial, as this can often be the difference between a reader that stays, and a visitor that simply leaves the site.
The blog title is also the part that other users will see when a reader shares your post, so you need to make it catchy, relevant and accurate. The more interesting your blog article title, the more likely people are to share it among friends, family and colleagues.
Using attention-grabbing headlines is essential for your blog to be successful, but how do you do it? Here are a few great tips.
Find a topic you enjoy
Starting or even maintaining a blog should be something you enjoy. When you are excited about a topic you will enjoy writing the post and your passion for the topic will come through.
From buying the domain to setting up your blog – it can all be very exciting, but many people give it all up after a few months because they lose interest. This is why it’s important to choose a topic you love to write about and are passionate about.
This can be a hobby, your work, or even experiences you had. A quick tip is to take a pen and paper and quickly write down 10 topics you would love to write about. This will help you figure out what you are really passionate about.
Always do research
The next step is to do thorough research and make sure that the market you chose is big enough for your topic. You need to know what topic you are interested in and use a tool such as Google Trends to see if the topic has any interest and if people are searching for it.
You’ll be able to see if a specific topic has experienced an increase in popularity, or a decrease. If the topic is stable or increasing every year, it means that the audience is large enough to help drive traffic to your blog.
Use helpful content tools
You can use a variety of tools to make sure that you choose the right topic and do proper research before you start writing. BuzzSumo will give you a list of popular topics as well as their traffic and social media statistics, so that you can easily see how popular each one is. You can use this to choose a popular topic for your blog.
Another great content tool you can use to generate blog topics is Alltop. Alltop lists all the popular articles based on the topics you are looking for. It will help you to get a great topic idea and perhaps an angle you haven’t through about yet.
Between these two tools (and there are many more) you will definitely find inspiration to use a trending blog topic for your next post.
Work with a smaller niche
It’s important to see what competition you have within your niche. Search for your topic on Google and then see how many results you get. If it’s a very broad topic, try to narrow it down.
For e.g. if you want to choose ‘rock climbing’ it might be too broad. Try searching for something like ‘rock climbing for beginners’ and see how many results there are. You can also scroll down to the bottom of the page and see the related search terms that Google shows. This will also give you a few ideas on what topics to use.
Then you can use Google’s Keyword Planner to see how many times people search for a specific topic and how much competition you are up against. You’ll be able to see the average monthly searches for every term as well as the competition you’ll have – ideally, you’ll want to stick to low or medium competition when starting out.
Choose a topic that is profitable
If you are planning on earning money from your blog, you need to make sure you set up a blog that is profitable enough so that you can monetize it and earn enough money for a good income.
To do that, you need to start by fining out if there are any businesses advertising for your keyword.
If people are spending money to advertise a product with specific keywords, then you know it can be profitable. This also means that you’ll likely be able to monetize your blog with AdSense ads. However, a good idea is to sell affiliate products on your blog. You can sign up for Amazon’s affiliate program for example and earn commission for every buyer you send their way. That’s why choosing the right topic and choosing the right niche is so important.
You can write product reviews or buyer’s guides, to name a few, to help your blog get organic traffic and encourage people to buy the product after reading your blog.
Use a winning formula
Over the years, a lot of bloggers have tried to perfect the formula of choosing the best blog topic. Here are a few proven techniques that work:
- Any headline that starts with a number, i.e. ‘5 Ways…’
- ‘How To’ headlines that solve a problem
- Famous comparisons, i.e. ‘# Lessons I’ve Learned Listening to Rihanna’
- A headline that promises results, i.e. ‘The Ultimate Guide to…’
These are a few great formulas that have been proven to drive results and are popular among readers. Combine this with a popular topic that you love to write about and you’ll be much closer to success.
In conclusion
It might not happen overnight but turning your blog into a success will happen with consistency and perseverance. Always do your research, choose the right topic, and give your readers what they want – quality, helpful and optimised blog posts.
