There are many ways for proactive businesses to connect with their customers. Reaching out via email or text is standard and allows companies to send out time-sensitive information quickly and concisely. Other organizations rely on social media to build relationships with customers where they spend the most time.
While all these communication methods are helpful, every business should also have a robust blog marketing strategy. Blogs are a fantastic way to establish trust, build customer relationships, and increase brand engagement.
There are many different blog post formats you can start with to hit your marketing goals. However, getting started can feel intimidating if you’ve never created blogs for your business before. In this post, we break down each type of blog post and how you can structure your posts to grow your audience and your business.
Is starting a blog in 2022 worth it?
A common question that businesses want to know is whether starting a blog is really worth the effort. We say absolutely! While there are already lots of blogs out there (more than 600 million as of 2022, according to Ahrefs), 77% of internet users read blogs. Blog posts can help capture an audience, keep it engaged, and increase brand awareness.
74% of marketers surveyed said that content marketing increased both the quality and quantity of their marketing team’s leads, with a further 77% finding that their blogging efforts were responsible for driving real results.
If you’re not blogging yet, now is definitely the time to start.
The best blog post formats to engage your readers
There are lots of different ways to format a blog post. Depending on your needs and goals, there are plenty of different formats and templates you can use to guide your efforts.
Here are some of the most common examples of blog formats that can help increase engagement.
- The List Post: Also called a listicle, this blog provides helpful information in a way that is both concise and easy to skim. Readers get a high-level overview of several different ideas without having to read multiple articles.
- The Curated Post: This provides your audience with relevant, quality content they don’t have to find for themselves. It’s also useful when you’re short on ideas.
- The Comparison Post: This blog format template helps your audience by comparing the difference between two things – typically, two products you’d like to highlight.
- The Infographic Breakdown Post: This is a highly sharable piece of content that breaks down useful data in a fun and exciting way.
- The Q&A Post: A post that’s entirely made up of questions and answers helps reassure your customers that you’re listening to their concerns. It can also help convert new customers by pre-emptively answering any questions that may be holding them back from making a purchase.
How to format a blog
Regardless of which format of a blog you choose, it should not impact how it is read and understood by your audience. Whether you prioritize short-form blogs, long-form blogs, infographic posts, or any other format, your message should still be clear, concise, and tailored to your specific audience.
Here are a few tips and tricks that you can use to help with the structure of your blog.
Choose a catchy title
Your title is the first thing your readers see, and if it’s not strong or catchy, they won’t click on your blog. Think of different ways to summarize the content and entice your readers. If you’re having a hard time, challenge yourself to think of a few different options and ask your colleagues which one they like the best.
Also, if you’re optimizing your blog post for SEO, make sure to include your primary keyword in the title, but not in a way that compromises its readability.
Follow the standard best practices for blog formatting
The best practices for blog formatting help ensure that your post is well-structured and easy to read. Typically, the structure of a blog looks like this:
- Title
- Introduction
- H2s
- H3s or bullet points
- Call-to-action (CTA)
Of course, there are lots of ways to customize this structure to fit your needs. Add in multiple H2s, create sub-sections with H3s or H4s, and add bullets to ensure your key points aren’t lost in a sea of text. Here are a few examples of brands that have created beautiful and simple designs for their blogs.
Use images to add visual flair
Some readers are visual and get more information from images rather than text. By incorporating images, photos, diagrams, charts, and other infographics, you can help ensure your content resonates with a broader audience.
Include useful links
Links are a great way to show your audience that you’re not just blogging in a vacuum. By corroborating cited evidence with links and linking to other relevant internal content, you can place your content in a broader network that helps to improve its SEO performance and shows its utility to your audience.
Create CTAs that stand out
Your CTA shouldn’t be the sole focus of your article. Instead, it should be highlighted just enough to ensure your audience knows how to take the next step if they choose.
Let ClearVoice help you create blog format templates that work
There are many ways to blog, but not every strategy can bring real results. Instead of struggling to narrow down your audience, A/B test content, and create dynamic new blog post format templates on your own, let the experts at ClearVoice help.
Our extensive experience and knowledge of content marketing make us the perfect partner for any brand looking to deploy a new blog marketing strategy or refine the one they already have.
Want to create blog posts that resonate with your audience? Get in touch with us today.
