You’ve put a lot into writing your blog posts. You’ve chosen a blog topic about which you’re passionate. You’ve carefully researched and chosen exactly the right audience grabbing words to create a blog post title that is as attractive to the search engines as it is the human readers of your blog.
You’ve put your best writing first – creating a powerful opening line to pull readers into the blog post you’ve written. You’ve chosen an image which not only draws the reader’s eye into the blog post but also helps to provide visual “glue” for your blog posts.
However, even with all of these considerations behind you – there’s still the all important issue of formatting your blog posts to consider.
It’s important to know that the human eye reacts differently to content presented on a computer screen as opposed to content presented on a written page.
Keep in mind as you write your blog post the four rules of formatting your blog post:
- Blog visitors tend to scan rather than read.
- White space is your friend when it comes to formatting blog posts.
- Use bold print to draw their eye to important words.
- You can also draw a reader’s eye by using images as well.
When you’re writing a blog post – formatting is an important consideration. While 300 words can be a comfortable paragraph on the written page – it’s way too many words to present in a single blog paragraph.
Since blog visitors tend to scan rather than read every single word, by breaking your content up into easily consumed “bite sized chunks” – you’ll find visitors will find it easier to “consume” the blog post you’ve worked so hard to write.
As a result, some blog post paragraphs may one be a single sentence in length.
It’s also important to note that bullets are very important in the formatting of your blog post. Notice above how I’ve used bullets to distinguish the four “rules” of blog post format. It’s much easier to read that information than to read it all contained within a single paragraph, such as:
Keep in mind as you write your blog post the four rules of formatting your blog post. #1 Blog visitors tend to scan rather than read. #2 White space is your friend when it comes to formatting blog posts. #3 Use bold print to draw their eye to important words. #4 You can also draw a reader’s eye by using images as well.
White space is a REALLY good thing when it comes to blog posts. While you may have written a lot of great content – if you pack it too tightly within the blog post page – you’ll find you lose readers.
Another good way to direct the human eye is by using headers to segment your blog post. If a blog post gets longer than 300 words, it’s best to use H3 tags to create a visual “break” for the reader’s eye.
Because the post Creating Comment Friendly Posts, is longer than 300 words, I use bold type to “break up” the three steps to create comment friendly posts. As a reader, you can scan and pick up the three tips without reading every word in between.
Finally, use images to draw your reader’s eye to important elements within your blog post. If you’re going to insert an image within your post – make sure you do so next to content that you want to highlight. Oh, and since Western readers read from left to right, be sure to place photos to the left hand side of your blog post. If you place a photo on the right hand side of a blog post – you’ll find it attracts the eye and “breaks” the scanning sequence.
Writing great blog post content and presenting it in a reader friendly fashion is essential to blogging success.
