Tips to write better articles

Its the dream of every blogger to write a killer article. What does it take to write a killer article ? I’ve heard many people congratulate my for the fact that my articles are read by many people. I’ve got credit from authors of other sites for my guest articles, telling that people kept searching for my articles once they were out of the home page, they got good impressions, etc. Writing such articles is not impossible, its within the reach of every blogger. No one is perfect, you can always improve.

Here are some tips for writing better articles.

1. Choose a suitable topic

Its always better to write about something that you’re readers will like to read. Noting this, you should also write on something about which you’ve done a lot of research and know a lot about. Its pointless trying to write about something in which you’re not interested, basically because there is going to be another person who has an interest in that topic and that person is going to write straight from his heart.

2. Analyse your topic before writing

Its always good to spend a good 5-10 minutes for analysing your topic before writing. While analysing your post before writing, you’ll probably realise how difficult it is to explain the post.

3. Think like a kid

This not only plays an important role in getting more visitors to read your article but it also gets its place in SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). Readability is a very dense term in SEO. It determines how easy it is for a person to read your article. You should write articles that are easy to read. And for writing an article that even a kid could read, you should think like a kid. The mistake often done by many writers is using short forms. You should keep in mind that if your article is very difficult to read with high-level language then very few people would want to read it. The problem with this can start if someone who isn’t much fluent in a certain language reads your high-level language. Using translators on a post is a good idea, and for this you should note that simple language is the best.

4. Align your articles

As human beings we have a tendency towards something that looks good. An article that looks good will probably be read by more people than a huge block of letters that looks like a skyscraper. People find it easy to read your article once it is aligned. You should consider aligning your articles in such a way that even someone who is just scanning through the entire article without reading it will be able to pick out the main points.

5. Use the power of graphics to lure your readers

Actions are not the only things that speak louder than words, even images and videos speak louder than words. Most readers would prefer to look at a video with someone speaking to them, rather than stressing their eyes on tiny words they may not like to read. Its often, when a person shares an article to someone who is not used to reading articles on the web, that person will tend to see the images and videos there first. If he gets attracted to it, he may want to read your article.

6. Check if the topic of your article exists on other sites

Its always good to check if what you’re writing about is there on other sites. This should initiate a competitive spirit in you. You should know that your article is already a killer on another site. This would mean that many people have already read the article. You’ll have to write your article such that people who’ve already read it will find it completely different and want to read your version of it.

7. Write your articles FAST

This is one place where many writers fail. The problem is The mind works faster than your hands. Your mind will be filled with so many amazing ideas about the article, but in the end you’ll realise that you’ve missed out a lot of important points because of writing too slow. You should think slowly and write fast. That way you’ll be able to put down everything you want to tell your readers.

8. Write with a fresh mind

Its really not easy to write a killer article at the end of the day when you’re really tensed that you’ve lost a lot of visitors. Don’t worry if you’ve been getting less visitors in the previous days. You should patiently take care of that. Writing in a hurry is not going to impress your readers. A person who may write 1 good article everyday might get more visitors than a person who may write 10+ useless articles everyday. You should be in a good physical and mental condition to write at full intensity.

9. Language

This is often overlooked by many writers. Articles are often easier to read when they have proper language and punctuations at the appropriate places. You cannot convey emotions to your readers in words, but your punctuations at the appropriate places will give an idea on what you really meant. A full stop or a comma at different places in a sentence can convey different meanings, so you should take care of these.

You should also make sure that you don’t make any kind of spelling mistakes and don’t use the wrong words. Many words might confuse you, its always better to check the definitions of the words of which you might not be sure. Since its not easy to take out a dictionary and check the meanings, if you’re an online writer, just open google search in a new tab and search for Define WORD.

Not to forget that its always better to use a little high language, as, sometimes, high language words speak much more than simple words. But the overall language should be simple so that even a kid could understand your article.

Also, combining words can help. Phrases like IT IS can be written as ITS or IT’s. Each of them are used at different instances. Using the proper form of the phrase at different situations will surely lure your readers.

Apart from this, aligning your article’s beginning phrases do matter. Supposing you write:
Now -> Then -> Then -> Then -> etc…

That bores the reader. Instead you can write:
First -> Now -> Then -> After That -> Later -> etc…

These are the basics of grammar, which have effects on your readers.

10. Take time to review your articles

Though I did say that you should write your quickly, you shouldn’t publish it that soon. A good writer would always go through his articles several times. Sometimes, you’ll realise that you may write something today that you’ll realise is wrong tomorrow. Its always a good idea to review your article several times, even if it means that it’ll take days to publish the article.

11. Skip out anything which may not be of interest

You should always avoid writing huge articles, unless you know that your readers will be interested in reading such a huge article. Short articles with sufficient information are usually better than huge articles. But killer articles are usually huge. They give the readers all the information they need to know.

12. Make your article accurate and convincing

If you’re writing an article which is going to be read by many readers, you should make it convincing. Surely you wouldn’t want to get a comment stating THAT’S NOT TRUE !. That can be one of the worst mistakes you can ever make, if you write false info, then surely no one will want to read your article. I’ll only want to follow up on articles which have accurate information. At the same time, the author should be convincing in his article. An article should be correct as well as convincing to get a good set of readers.

13. Focus on Search Engine Optimisation – Internet articles only

Note: This is only if you’re writing your posts in HTML

You should always focus on SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). You may feel that there is no need to get your articles indexed by search engines, but the actual fact is that SEO sets standards that every good author should follow. Linking to other articles and using STRONG and EM tags along with META tags tell both your readers as well as search engines which parts of the article you want to highlight.

Here are SEO tags you should be familiar with:

• I – Italics – Make your letters italic
• B – Bold – Make letters bold
• EM – Italics + Emphasise – Highlight letters by making then italic
• STRONG – Bold + Strongly Emphasise – Highlight letters by making them bold

Using the above 4 codes in combination give a good SEO for your article. B and I are used for simple highlighting. EM is used to highlight something and STRONG is used to clearly highlight something.

14. Focus on Knowledge Sharing

Many bloggers start blogging hoping to get cash out of advertising. You can always write better articles when you want to share that knowledge you have. Money out of advertising should be no problem at all if you write good articles, it comes as a by-product.

Be an amateur

Many people misunderstand the meaning of amateur. An amateur is not a person who is bad at something, rather, an amateur is a person who does a certain profession as a hobby. A pro-writer or pro-blogger will always focus on getting cash by writing articles, but an amateur always writes his articles for sharing knowledge with everyone.

If you’ve bothered to read all this you would have realised that his is a lot, but to write a good article you should put in some effort. Writing being as a hobby to you can help you out in many ways. These are just some subjective views, but these things surely help me to make my articles better.

What do you think about these ? Is there anything other than this that makes your articles creative ?

Tagged as: Article, Blog, Blogging, Tips