Creating Content That’s Worth Following

The best blogs have tons of followers, relevant topics and creativity flowing on a daily basis. No matter how effortless the end product might look, it takes time, hard work and struggle to achieve blogging success.

For beginning bloggers, one of the biggest challenges is trying to develop content that will drive an audience to follow on a regular basis. Creating follow-worthy content requires dedication, research and creativity.

Apathy can be a leading cause of flat content, which in turn can mean a lack of followers. To keep a blog fresh and inspired for a long period of time takes passion and planning. Interacting with readers is a great way to develop contacts as well as glean ideas for new content. Instead of writing a long piece of content, post a simple but pointed question about a topic or ask followers to offer suggestions as to what they would like to know more about.

Another option is to review old posts for new ideas. If there was a particularly hot topic, look at it again to see whether there is another angle that could be explored. Developing a series also can lead to new blogging interest. Take a larger topic and offer information over the course of a week to provide the opportunity to go deeper into a subject and to freshen up the blog.

Once a blog is moving forward again with responses from followers, new topics or a series, then it is time to develop a long-term plan to keep blogging. Consider these tips:

• Strive for Originality – Instead of simply writing about what everyone else is writing about, look deeper. Don’t rely on your news aggregator for the best topics or sources. A good deal of the work of a blogger is to find the news that no one is talking about and offer an opinion on it; don’t just offer commentary on work that has already been done. Getting out of the comfort zone is an excellent goal for a blogger.

• Create Great Work – So many bloggers are more concerned about how their blog ranks in terms of Internet marketing than they are about the content that is on the blog. Remember, if the content is notable, readers will find their way to the work and so will the indexes.

• Variety Creates Interest – Instead of linking your blog back to the same sources again and again, offer your readers more options. Variety is the spice of life. Giving readers the opportunity to visit more sites is a critical step in developing your blog’s voice and point of view.

Other options for increasing traffic include commenting on other blogs and sites that have readers you would like to attract.

Be sure also to link your blog to Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn and Facebook. With a presence on those and other social networking sites, your blog can attract more interest from those who know you as well as from those who are connected to people who know you. Leveraging social media is a smart way to get referrals to your blog.

Creating follow-worthy content is much more than just figuring out how to achieve a top ranking on a search engine site. By taking steps such as offering in-depth original work and promoting their blog on social media sites, bloggers can lay the groundwork for developing new followers.

[note]This guest post was provided by University Alliance and submitted on behalf of University of San Francisco.  USF offers online marketing certificate courses including SEO training, search engine marketing, social media training, mobile marketing and more.  To learn more about University of San Francisco’s certificate programs visit www.usanfranonline.com[/note]