How To Write A Blog Post That Gets Google Traffic - Semalt Tips 

Why do you have a blog? You could say it's your hobby - you just love to write. Or you could say that you have heard about how numerous bloggers have made thousands of dollars blogging and you want yours too. Whatever your reason is, it sits at a single requirement - people have to read what you blog about. For those who love to blog just for the feeling of satisfaction, you'd want to share your thoughts, passion, ideas, and creations with the world - else, it will be no different from the diary sitting on your desk. On the other hand, bloggers that publish to make money need the traffic/the views to sell and advertise and promote links. So if you have been blogging for (no matter how long) and you can't seem to improve how many people read your post, this is for you. Make sure you read every letter because, by the end of this guide, you'd know how to write a blog post that gets Google traffic like a professional. 

The first thing you need to do is - not delete your old posts. Many bloggers are always tempted to delete it all and start over. But that's not the solution, it makes things worse. Since you already have an online presence, you can feed off that history to attain online popularity. So how can you restructure your posts? The simple answer is to create your blog FOR your audience. But then there's the other question - how do you do that?

A practical answer would be to enter your website's URL in a website analytics tool like the one that Semalt has. Then, study and write down the metrics of your website, like who visits, how long they stayed, what they read, if they stayed, and even the demographics of the visitors. By doing this, you would have an idea of your customers and what they like. Then you can simply prune your content base - maybe rewrite some of the blog posts to become just what your readers want. Some of the other things you might want to tweak as well as the wellness of your website such as the page load speed (make it faster), the layout of the website as a whole, the texts, and images (make them readable, valuable, and appealing), and so on. 

Finally, you would also want to cross-link your blog posts to each other since that would make your readers find new posts faster. The longer readers stay on your site, the more relevant Google sees your site to be. This then affects your SEO rating and hence your traffic. 

Sometimes, the key to improving your website traffic is to leave your blog and focus on other people's blogs - but differently. Here, you will not be writing for them but yourself on their platforms. That's why it is called guest posting because you'll be publishing a blog post on a third-party blog as a guest. So how can you do this correctly? It takes three steps - research, adds value, and pitch. 

While researching, you'll need to take your time to look for what blog has social media influence or Google's attention. Social media influence can be estimated with social media engagement rates and followers. Google's attention on the other hand can be estimated with the blog's views, and position on search engine results. But most often, high-ranking websites are at the tip of everyone's tongue like Moz or Forbes, Entrepreneur, and so on. Note this platform needs to have relevance to your niche.

 

The next step after figuring out what blog to guest post is to find the value that your post will bring to such a site. If the website you have picked has a blog post on 'how to be a better blogger,' it would be silly to envision yourself writing another post on the same topic. Not only silly, but it would also result in duplicate content for the website. That is why you need to look for the gap - the loophole that needs to be filled. Search for what topics they haven't written on, and how valuable such a topic is. After you have done this, all you'll have to do next is pitch your idea. 

While writing, give it your best shot - be yourself. Write for the audience you intend to capture but don't stray too far from the established audience of the high-ranking website. If they write formally, it would be best if you followed the path. Also, add the link to your page but don't spam it, and make sure it appears naturally within the content. Note that this strategy for building your blog's Google traffic is not an easy one and it is also time-consuming but it is guaranteed to help improve your page's traffic by over 100% - if done right. 

Keywords are not overrated but short-tail keywords are. If you have a website on pet food and you want a better chance of attracting readers, you should focus on 'is cucumber good for dogs?' and not 'pet food'. Why? Billions of articles online have used pet food in their blog posts but only a few have used the long tail keyword. The more specific your keyword is, the more likely you are to rank for such a keyword. But remember - they are not just words - but keywords. 

This means that whatever you are adding to your content are words that are popularly searched by internet searchers. So the question comes in again - how can you find long-tail keywords and how can you implement them correctly for increased google traffic? The answer to the first question is not so new - keyword research. But instead of picking the first ten or twenty options, you won't search for 'pet food' (using the cited illustration). The first thing to do is look for synonyms of the word. So instead of pet - which is generic and vague, try naming the pet like cat, dog, rabbit, and so on. Also, you could add quality to make things more specific like the breed, color, age, gender, and so on. That means 'dog food recipe' is not enough, but 'male German 2-year-old dog food ideas' is better. 

Where to add your keywords? Three places - headings, subheadings, meta tags, first and last 100 words in the introduction and conclusion, and scattered within the body of the text. The rules remain the same - look for variations (a total of 5 to 10 keywords for a 1000-word blog post) and don't spam the keywords. Make them appear naturally so that they flow with the text when your readers scroll through. Then give it some time, (analyze your website for keywords) and you'll see your results. If you don't know where to start, you can simply check your competitor's site for ideas. 

The final step to get Google traffic is to create content that is sustainable and always valuable - or rather, evergreen. These types of blog posts have one characteristic - they are always in demand, The blog posts are usually based on topics that users always search for. So what are these topics? Starting with what they are NOT; evergreen topics don't contain dates like 'secrets of blogging to know in December or 20XX' this will limit the lifespan of such a topic to that year or date. Also, don't base your topic on a trend or a season like a certain president, or a global issue like the pandemic or a war. 

So what should you do? First look for challenges that your readers go through and then a blog post that solves that problem, That's all. For instance, if you have a blog on parenting, a topic like 'How to take care of a newborn' is evergreen because there will always be a newborn for your readers. But a topic like 'Newborn tips for the pandemic' is limited. Also, restructure your headline to be appealing and unique. Don't copy other bloggers but you can take ideas from their works. Add creative adjectives and inviting keywords - and don't forget the magic of odd numbers. For instance, the original title 'How to take care of a newborn' can become 'You Don't Have To Stay Up At Night! 3 Secrets To Becoming A Master At Parenting.' The rewrite is more direct, promising, specific, and inviting - hence evergreen. 

The whole process of gaining more traffic starts with having a quality blog. If you don't know how to write a blog or have no idea about SEO, Google, and traffic, then this might all seem like too many technical terms. What you can do is this. Instead of handling all of these things yourself, outsource it to a professional in SEO and content writing. That way, you can be sure that while you enjoy the fun of blogging, the technical aspects and the part that makes your traffic grow is in the hands of an expert.