by Writing a successful article doesn’t end when you hit the publish button. For content marketing, you need to make sure that your content reaches enough eyeballs and converts those clicks into sales or new leads for your business.
But with all the competition, how can you stand out from the rest of the hype and write content that converts? Here are some important tips:
1. Identify your target reader profile
Before you start writing, take a few steps back and first consider who you are writing for. Ask yourself important questions:
- What market are you targeting?
- What kind of audience do you want to attract?
- What are their needs, desires, problems and goals?
- What do you think you can offer your target readers that will make them want to listen to you as you do, and more importantly, trust you in the long run?
Once you have these questions answered, create a goal profile and plan your content from there.
ChatGPR can help you create your customer profiles. For example, I gave it the following prompt:
My company sells electric bicycles. Please create profiles of my target customers
This is the type of customer profile that lends itself to, say, a blog post about a more scalable, affordable, easy-to-use, all-in-one CRM tool.
2. Construct an intriguing headline
Headlines determine whether any of your target readers will click to read your article at all, so you better make your headline stand out.
When crafting your headline, start with a number and then follow that with valuable information to keep your target audience interested.
For example, if you’re targeting a content marketer, here’s a list of potential titles you might be interested in:
- 10 steps to create a blog post that keeps converting
- 7 reasons why your click-through rates are terrible (and how to fix them)
- 12 foolproof strategies for getting more return visits to your website
- 5 things you should never post on your corporate social media page
It’s always best to have more than one headline for a single article, so if you’re running out of ideas, here’s a cool headline generator.
3. Write a convincing lede
Once a catchy headline attracts your target audience, complement it with an equally intriguing introduction. This is called a lede, and as Merriam-Webster defines it, it is the introductory part of your article intended to “encourage the reader to read the whole story.”
If your lede can tell your readers that your article will answer their questions in concise sentences, with easy vocabulary and excellent grammar, then you have the perfect lede recipe to encourage readers to keep reading.
A well-written led can lower your bounce rate and encourage more people to interact with your website.
4. Tell an engaging story
Don’t disappoint your readers with a clickbait headline only to fail with the actual content of the article. If your title says you have 10 tips to increase social media engagement, give your readers these 10 tips and make them clear and doable.
Otherwise, you will leave readers disappointed and reluctant to return to your site.
5. Provide your evidence
Unless you are sharing experiences, always support your statements with facts.
These days, readers are not so easily persuaded – and the smarter ones may even suspect something – if you simply repeat claim after claim without any hard evidence to back up your claims.
To become a true thought leader, able to convert your readers into returning followers or buyers, back up your claims with research and statistics from legitimate sources. Make sure your source materials are up to date.
A good rule of thumb is to stick to sources within two years of publication. Any references older than two years are outdated and likely to become unreliable due to age, especially statistics as time-sensitive as search engine algorithm updates, social media sentiment, online surveys and other fast-moving sectors.
6. Use the power of influencer marketing
One way to accelerate the path to gaining the attention and trust of your target audience is to enlist support from influencers.
- Search your target niche to see who the influencers are in your space. Social media can help you see who’s who. Usually, people (your target readers) will share tons of posts written by these influencers.
- Then check out influencer blogs. Read what they have to say. As in step 1, try to profile their needs, wants, goals and what you have to offer them.
- Then see if you can find the influencer’s email address.
If you’re doing international marketing, it’s a good idea to look for influencers in different countries.
Based on the profile you’ve created, start tagging third-party influencers that you think might be relevant to them.
Let’s say you post a link to an upcoming social media marketing webinar or social media marketer forum, and tag one of your target influencers: a social media manager.
On the other hand, you can also write your own social media marketing blog post, link to one of your influencer’s social media marketing posts – even insert a quote or two from your influencer, then post the link and tag your influencer on it .
A good way to see if you’ve caught the attention of your target influencer at all is to see if the influencer has re-shared or liked your post.
If your influencer has liked or retweeted, now is the time to move on: Create a message that is likely to spark the influencer’s interest.
Here you can do two things:
- Invite influencers to collaborate on content with your writers
- Publish an expert summary blog post featuring targeted influencers
If you are successful in both endeavors, you are well on your way to raising the social proof of your article in the blogosphere. When you share an influencer’s article or expert blog post on social media, especially with the support of said person, the influencer’s followers will also start to take notice of you.
7. Never forget to sound the call
As with any blog post that aims to convert, a clear call to action (CTA) is always up to par.
The CTA is where you then lead your satisfied readers to take action, as in the examples below where you encourage them to:
- Subscribe to the newsletter: All email marketing platforms allow you to set up consent forms to be used in your content
- Sign up for a free trial of their services
- Make an appointment: There are appointment scheduling apps that even allow clients to pay in advance for an appointment
- Buy a monthly (or yearly) membership for your app
- Call you. You can scale these phone calls with technology like IVR
- Order an ebook on Amazon, etc.
The conversion efficiency of your article is measured by the number of readers who actually follow your call to action. Therefore, place your call to action in a prominent place. Reliable CTA by writing clear instructions with visual elements such as screenshots or videos.
Application
With millions of blog posts published daily, publishing a blog post that converts can be a challenge. But you can never go wrong with well-researched, influencer-backed, personalized content and a clear call to action. Try it out and see how it works for you.
Image: Depositphotos
