How To Write A Better Blog Post

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Nov 20, 2015 / by
How To Write A Better Blog Post

If you’re serious about content marketing, this means committing to researching, writing and uploading a blog post or other piece of content once every week at least. For some businesses, a post every couple of days is required.


As a business owner, weighing up the time it takes to put out regular content versus pursuing other objectives can be a serious dilemma, and if you’re writing the blog content yourself (instead of outsourcing), the way you approach this problem can have serious consequences for your business. Fortunately, there are powerful methods you can employ which will help you to optimise the time it takes to produce new content, giving you more time to focus on other business objectives.

1 – Write first, edit after

One of the most common mistakes made by rookie content writers is that they write and edit within the same timeframe. Instead, it’s far more effective to unload the content direct from the brain and come back to fix the inevitable flaws afterwards. If you prefer to speak rather than type, using the ‘Voice Typing’ feature (under the ‘Tools’ menu) in Google Docs can save you a lot of time. Expressing yourself and analysing the work requires two very different mental dispositions, and it takes time to shift from one to another. Therefore, it’s a lot more time efficient to neglect editing until you’ve finished writing. This can be extremely difficult if you’re like me and tend to agonise over each word and phrase, but with practice you can learn to keep the editor at bay, at least temporarily!

2 – Write an outline

While it can be highly effective to unload your content without editing, there is a risk that you will go off at a tangent and that the content will be inferior because of this. To avoid this, plan out your content with bullet points in advance, complete with the external sources that you plan to reference in each section. With a clear plan in front of you, it’s simply a case of expanding upon the points until you have a complete article. This is an excellent way to combat writer’s block and if you’re writing a highly technical article, an outline always ensures that you don’t forget any vital points which are essential for your narrative.

Blogger Leah McClellan is a firm advocate of using an outline to write blog posts. She states: “No matter what kind of blog post you’re writing, though, or how much time you take, using an outline can reduce time, stress, and worry. Plus it keeps you organized and on track, especially if you’re writing something long and involved.”

3 – Experiment with conclusions and introductions

While not every blog post requires a conclusion and introduction (particularly for list posts such as this), experimenting with the sequence in which you write your blogs can be beneficial. Conventional wisdom would suggest that you write the introduction first and the conclusion last, but this can be counterproductive. By drafting the conclusion first, you already know the direction towards which all of your paragraphs need to point. For this reason, it can actually make sense to write the introduction last rather than first. Try both ways and see which works for you.

Set aside time for writing and turn off all of the distractions, online and offline

Set aside time for writing and turn off all of the distractions, online and offline

4 – Set designated writing periods

Writing is inevitably going to take longer when you’re also multitasking. Managing your email inbox, conversing with coworkers and trying to prevent your cat from climbing on your lap is highly unadvisable if you want to write faster!

Kill all the distractions (especially social media) for a designated period and get to work. You may find that timing yourself gives you an extra mental boost. So long as you aren’t compromising on quality, it can be a fun challenge to try and outdo yourself in terms of the time it takes to complete a finished article. If writing for you is a struggle at the moment, just know that the more you do it the quicker you will become, and before you know it you will be able to write multiple articles in the time it used to take you to write one!

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