You’ve opened up Evernote, picked one of the blog post ideas you recorded in the “blog post ideas” notebook and settling in to write the first draft of your post. From that moment to hitting the publish button, there are a host of steps you need to remember.
A blog post checklist can help, especially if you employ guest authors to help you produce content.
Here’s a 12-point checklist to get you started:
Write first draft – 400-600 words is a good range for today’s attention-span challenged. Evernote features a word counter.
Add a title – Avoid turning your title into a sentence. 7-9 words will do.
Reference 2-4 prior posts – Internal linking increases page views and helps your readers. Include an external link or two to helpful posts.
Add 3 related posts at the end of the piece – If you’re using WordPress, check out theirRelated Posts plugins.
Assign a category – One category will do. Two is OK, but no more.
Add tags – You can go crazy here. Add as many as you wish. Blog categories are to table of contents as tags are to an index.
Add an image – Flickr and Creative Commons are good places to look for free images. I just discovered another cool site, The Noun Project. Remember to include attribution if called for.
Spelling and grammar check – Evernote, WordPress and just about all writing platforms have a spell-checker. After the Deadline is a great WordPress grammar and spell check plugin.
Formatting – This includes blockquotes, checklists (like this post), bold/italics, bullet points, paragraphs, headlines, etc.
Edit – This usually means chopping off a good 50-100 words. keep the piece tight.
Check the links in your post. Make sure they work – This seems like a no-brainer, but in a rush to get a post out, bloggers often skip this check and resulting in broken links.
Share on Twitter, Facebook, and other social media channels – Social media are primary referral traffic back to your blog with Twitter and Facebook usually among the top 5.
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