A guest post by John Haydon of Inbound Zombie.
You’re smart enough to decide within a few seconds if you’re getting what you need from this post. And it’s my job to keep you here so that you can at least get to the first subheading.
If my stopwatch is correct, it took you approximately 7 seconds to get to this point. And in order to keep you here, I have to combat a host of reasons for you to go elsewhere:
- You’re not finding what you want, and searching for it on Google might be a whole lot less painful than staying here.
- The web is an interactive medium that makes you feel that if you’re not clicking a link every few seconds, you’re not getting value from it.
- You might be reading this post on an iPhone, which severely limits what you can view at any moment.
- The dings of real-time web notifications are calling you even now.
How to Get Visitors to Read Your Entire Post
This may be obvious, but the best way to get people to read your posts is to get them to stick around for seven more seconds. And then seven more seconds after that—and so on.
7 Ways to Re-captivate Attention
- Use subheadings. Every two paragraphs, break up the text with a subheading. This way, readers can scan the post for the section they find most relevant.
- Use bullet points. Like what I’m doing here. People like lists. It puts your content in a nice container.
- Use white space. Line height is important in posts. Most premium WordPress themes allow you multiple ways of creating more white space.
- Use images. If you read CopyBlogger, you might notice that authors always put an image at the top of every post. Sonia Simone calls these images “steroids for your headline.” Where applicable, use images through your post, like I do in “Essential Social Media Connections For Your Blog.”
- Ask a question that begs an answer. It’s one thing to provide information based on your expertise, but what about asking the reader questions that get him or her thinking about their experience? Like I just did in the preceding sentence.
- Keep the focus on them. Try writing your posts as if they are emails to a specific person you have in mind. Maybe it’s a client who asked you a thoughtful question. For me, this way of writing flows more naturally and comes across more personal.
- Keep word count under 500 words. Call it cheating, but why not make the finish line closer?
John Haydon is a social media strategist for non-profits at Inbound Zombie.
Tags: blogs, customers, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy and Tactics
Actually, I went directly to the seven points and did not read the opening. Since you said there were seven points I thought I would save time and just read those. This brings up a number 8 you might want to add to your list. Write compelling titles, which you did.
Harry – Great point! Especially these days where people decide to click (or not) based on the title.
I read a study months ago about numbered items mentioned in titles: “7 tips for writing a killer blog post” will garner more clicks than “How to write a killer blog post”.
John,
To be sincere I only read the post because you are good looking (and like every woman, I’m IN for good looking guys). Why do I say this? Because I agree with the use of pictures but next time try something newer than “7 ways, or 10 easy steps, or Blogs 1,2, 3…” It’s not only you, but many of us do the same mistake and I think we need to innovate in titles and approaches also. Harry is right that writing a compelling title catches the attention, but if you browse this site you will find the “easy steps” recipes everywhere.
Keep using your picture, though. That will get you female attention. I use mine, it captures male clients…:). Maybe we can partner?
Having said this…I liked your post!
Marketing is an art of seduction, isn’t it?
i tend to read “compelling titles” like this (7 Tips, 5 Ways, 6 Reaons, blah blah blah) just for fun, to see if the author has even one single item among the bunch that is new. As in this example, it rarely occurs…
Kevin – what would you add that might be new?
(Sorry if this gets posted twice – rewriting from memory since i forgot my captcha the first time)
That’s my point John. I wouldn’t have written it at all if this was all i had – i only write if i think i have something new to add. This topic has been written a billion times – just mix and match the tips of your choice. Especially when you add “killer” to the headline – raises an even higher bar on expectations that made me say “Well maybe this won’t be a rehash…”
But i guess you write to what the audience seems to want to, and does, consume. There seems to be an unsatiable demand for the 5 tips, 7 reasons, whatever (the comments in the rest of this thread sure prove that -”I jumped right down to the tips blah blah”). I prefer articles that drill down on an item or two in detail. But my (old) blog is living proof that people don’t prefer analysis over tips.
Thanks for engaging me in the discussion, nonetheless.
You raise a good point Kevin.
I think there’s room for both kinds of blogs. Maybe a way around this is to hyperlink chosed points in a general type (7 points etc) blog to posts that expand on those tips.
Although we know that people will read quickly, we shouldn’t expect that they will forgive us for writing quickly. Please take a few minutes to proofread your blog so that things like
Call it cheating, by why not make the finish line closer?
can be changed to
Call it cheating, but why not make the finish line closer?
If you have a nice picture but the copy is hard to read because of typos, you’ll lose your reader.
Bullet 8: Remember to proof for missing words and grammatical errors.
Great advice here, John. I tend to get pulled in by the title and the lead sentence. Design and layout matter, too.
Sorry to spoil things, but I would add Number 9 – Proofread your post. I spotted seven mistakes.
Nothing makes me leave a blog faster than grammatical errors. You should definitely proof read before you post to eliminate mistakes in that crucial 7 seconds. Otherwise good advice.
I, too, went directly to the 7 tips, then back to the top, which I skimmed but didn’t fully read, since it’s mostly fluff. I absolutely have to add #8, though: proofread and edit your work. This post is a case in point. It consists of 429 words with at least 9 — count ‘em, 9 — errors that potentially change the meaning or cause trouble for the reader. It gives the impression you don’t care about the quality of your work and therefore calls into question the quality of your content/advice.
I liked the title and the bulleted points, but unfortnately you didn’t grab me for 7 seconds in your opening statement. I skimmed and went for the bullets
Thanks, Elaine. White space and line height.
[...] guru’s over at Marketing Profs have the full article! [...]
One last important tip: don’t forget to proof read your blog post! Speaking of proof reading, there’s a typo in your first bullet point and in points #3 and #5.
If you’ve used juicy adjectives in your blog headline, your post should get picked up by SEO and Google Alerts too, especially if it’s event-specific.
I have to say, like Harry, I moved from the title straight down to the 7 points. They were all great ideas – and I especially appreciate the reminder that posts don’t need to be super long.
I totally agree on what John says!
I write but only sometimes when i feel to.. i wanted to post an article about my last visit to Gaza on my blog which had around 200 viewers only and applying some of these steps like: the photos, polls and sub headlines and the most important thing is attracting people to visit my blog so in one day the viewer of this post raised to 1021 in 24 hrs only!
Nice article! Just like Harry and Kirsten, I jumped straight to the 7 points. I agree on all 7, but mainly on having bullet points and keeping it short and focused.
Hi, everyone.
I’m the editor for the MarketingProfs Daily Fix. I wanted to chime in for a moment and say that we usually do proofread posts before publishing them. This time, however, we accidentally posted the unedited version of John’s blog post. Yikes.
Sorry about that, folks.
An adage from journalism school is this: “The most important line you will ever write is the first line to a story. The second most important line you will ever write is the second line.”
As you say, John: “The best way to get people to read your posts is to get them to stick around for seven more seconds….and then seven more seconds after that… and so on.”
Thanks for the post here!
Hi John,
Very informative article. Thanks! Another great way to spice up your blog posts is to incorporate a short video. I haven’t done that yet on my blog, but it’s on my priority list.
Keep up the great work!
Emily
Hi John,
Thought I’d chime in to reinforce the importance of Tip #6 which I think is related to creating user personas for your website that you can then use to “humanize” your writing as you suggest.
Tx for the guest post!