No one likes being bored.
When people land on your blog, theyโre looking for something that captivates and moves them. They want something that is valuable, informative, and wholly irresistible.
If you canโt capture their attention within the first few seconds of them landing on your website, theyโll move onto something else that can.
When writing blog posts, you need to be aware that everything you do is being subconsciously processed by a highly susceptible reader.
They are trying to find reasons to love you, and if they only find reasons to hate you, itโll be hard to win them back.
The tiniest amount of boredom could be fatal to an otherwise amazing piece of writing.
Thatโs why you need to capture your readerโs attention from start to finish.
Here are 5 tips to help you do that.
1. Show everyone that you care about what youโre writing.
Many people think that they can simply identify a niche that has some potential to make money, throw out some blog posts about said niche, and watch the money roll in.
It doesnโt work that way.
Not only will you get tired and ultimately resentful with your blog, youโll write really boring blog posts.
Before you create a blog, make sure you are in love with your niche.
You need to be able to naturally give off the impression that you love what you do. You need to ooze passion for your niche. You need to have a burning desire in your soul to tell the world about the things youโre interested in.
If you donโt have that passion, you either need to find it or start writing about something you love.
Hereโs a test: If you canโt talk with your friends for hours about your niche, you arenโt blogging in the right niche.
But just loving what you do isnโt enough to get people excited.
You need to show the world that excitement.
Display some emotions
One way to really showcase how much you care is by using emotions in your writing.
Talk about the things that are making you happy, sad, frustrated, excited, etc. This will not only help you come across as passionate about your topic, but it will also help connect you with your readers.
Why does this work?
Because humans are emotional creatures. The majority of the decisions we make are based off our emotional reactions to things.
When we use emotions in our writings, we create a much more compelling thread for readers to follow.
Hereโs an example of writing without emotion:
My power cable wasnโt supposed to break, but then it broke. I bought another power cable online for $9.99. Itโs black and has an on/off button. Itโs not a perfect fit for my computer but it still fits. I donโt want to return it.
Hereโs that same piece of writing with emotion:
My supposedly โindestructibleโ power cable destroyed itself in under 3 days. Damn you HP! Anyway, I went online and found a replacement for under 10 bucks! Total score! Itโs not a perfect fit but nothing in life is perfect, right? I donโt think itโs gonna blow up my computerโฆ I hope not, at least. Hereโs the best part: Itโs black (like the color of my soul โ too dramatic?) and it has an on/off power button so I donโt run up my already way too expensive power bill. All in all, Iโm quite satisfied.
That emotion-filled piece of writing is way over the top, has sub-standard grammar, and has a lot of unnecessary things about it that would never make the cut in โtraditionalโ writing.
But itโs so much more compelling and interesting to read than the first one.
When writing, stop for a minute and ask yourself how youโre feeling. If it isnโt obvious that youโre feeling that way in your piece, make it more obvious.
But be warned: No one wants to read a rant. Itโs very easy to overdo emotions. Look at emotions like spices. Too little and the piece will be bland, but too much and the piece will be unreadable.
2. Write in a conversational tone.
People read things using the voice that is inside of their heads.
This is the same voice they use when they talk to themselves (donโt worry, everyone talks to themselves).
And if you pay close enough attention, you’ll realize that you’re doing it now.
You donโt know what my voice sounds like so youโre reading these words with that all-too-familiar mental voice (who probably sounds a lot like you).
When reading things, we all want to read something that is similar in tone to the voice that is already inside of our heads. This is the voice that we interact with every day, multiple times a day.
We donโt want to read something that sounds like someone completely unfamiliar.
But how do you write like the voice inside someone elseโs head?
Itโs easy…
- Write like youโre having a conversation with someone.
Pretty much every piece of writing benefits from a conversational tone.
In fact, I can only come up with a few reasons why you should not write in a conversational way and none of those reasons are good for bloggers or internet marketers (e.g. scientific research papers).
Conversational tones help readers connect with the stranger on the other side of the screen. It makes you seem like youโre a super nice person who just wants to give some helpful advice.
And if you talk in a friendly way, people will naturally want to be your friend.
Many writers are afraid to write this way. They feel that they should become the โauthorityโ and write with a lot of technical jargon in a cold, un-friendly way.
But even if youโre writing in a super technical niche, people would rather have a conversation with someone than sit through a lecture.
For pretty much anything, itโs entirely possible to lay out a lot of complex information in a simple, conversational way.
And when you do, people will appreciate the fact that youโve stepped down from your โteacherโ ledge and started engaging with them as an equal.
And itโs easy to do this. Simply follow this rule:
- Write the way you talk.
Donโt get fancy. How you talk is how you should write.
Imagine your friend is sitting on the other end of the computer screen and you are just having a conversation with them.
All youโre doing is writing out the thoughts in your head. Note: This does not mean donโt structure, organize, or edit those thoughts! Read this article.
As you write, say the words youโre writing out loud. If you do this and it sounds weird, then youโre not writing in a conversational tone.
Use first and second person
When you converse with a reader, youโre directly talking to them.
This means you should use words like โIโ and โyouโ when making references about yourself or directly addressing the reader.
When you arenโt doing either of these things, third-person language like โhe/sheโ and โtheyโ is OK.
But in general, you want to talk right at the reader and use reference words that make them feel like theyโre involved in the conversation.
For instance, in this piece, I know that people reading this are looking for writing tips. So all my writing tips are written using โyouโ. Iโm also referencing myself a lot, and Iโm using the word โIโ.
In highly formal writing, first and second person focal points are not good. But again, the overwhelming majority of blog writers do not need to be highly formal.
Hereโs an example of third person writing:
If an author writes an article about using first and second person but he/she doesnโt give an example of what that means, the reader may not understand what the author is referring to.
Hereโs that example written with first and second person:
If I write an article about using first and second person but I donโt give an example of what that means, you may not understand what Iโm referring to.
The second example is much easier to read and has a much more natural โflowโ.
But be warned: Donโt overdo it. Too much first and second person in the wrong places will come across as awkward and unnatural.
3. Use powerful images to convey your points.
Words are great.
They really are.
And if youโre a writer, your whole career rests on how well you can convey your point with words.
But if you arenโt a novelist or someone who works in โtraditionalโ print mediums, you have to fight to keep the attention of internet users who have specifically chosen to read you writings on the internet – a place with millions of competing distractions.
And these internet users have historically short attention spans.
So one way to keep a readerโs attention is by using pictures to add a little bit of flare to your blog posts.
Now, the pictures have to be relevant. You canโt just throw a bunch of random pictures into a post and think that people are going to be amused. Thatโs not going to work.
Donโt try to โtrickโ your readers with irrelevant pictures.
And donโt use images as a substitute for bad writing. Images are meant to heighten and amplify the words in the post, not replace them.
But when you find a perfect mix of images and words and you use the two in conjunction, then you are helping readers understand your point in a powerful and highly effective manner.
Write some captions
One great way to make your images more engaging is by using captions.
Captions are the text field underneath pictures.
Most people ignore them, but they are extremely useful in adding style to your articles. Because if you can add a little bit of spice to your images, your entire post will be much more engaging and will display a lot more of your personal style.
For instance, Iโve inserted captions on all the still images (not GIFs) in this post.
In my case, they’re mildly humorous asides meant to give this post a little bit of levity.
But captions donโt need to be funny to be effective.
Hereโs an article with a picture:
If you often find yourself partying until the early morning, you may be a โnight owlโ.
And hereโs that same article but with a caption on the picture:
If you often find yourself partying until the early morning, you may be a โnight owlโ.
Itโs not funny, itโs not relevant, and itโs completely unnecessary to mention that owls are silent in flight. But now you know this mildly interesting fact. And youโre a little bit better of a person because of it.
But be warned: Captions are not meant to add anything significant. Donโt make them too wordy or too important. Just use them to give your pictures a little spice.
4. Use short paragraphs.
As a general rule of thumb:
Assume that everyone on the internet has a super short attention span.
Even if the person reading your post doesnโt have a super short attention span, they may not be willing to sift through super dense paragraphs to find the information theyโre looking for.
Not only are dense blocks of text unpleasing to the eye, they can give off the impression that the entire article is going to be very time consuming to read.
Most internet readers like to scan through articles, and if the article has a lot of text crammed together, it becomes a lot less scan-able.
When they land on your site and see large chunks of text, they may not even bother trying to get through your information. Theyโre just going to move onto another website.
But you need to know that thereโs a fine line between too little and too much. Short paragraphs are good, but if every paragraph is only one line, the text will be too similar and it will come across as annoying.
Instead, group your paragraphs into immediate thoughts. For instance, this thought is immediately related to the preceding thought. As is this thought. Therefore, all of these thoughts belong in the same paragraph.
Push all other thoughts into their own paragraph.
Short paragraphs of no more than 4 sentences help capture everyoneโs interest, from the typical internet scanner to the more serious academic reader.
Yes, many serious academic readers prefer reading internet information in short bursts over menacing hunks of cramped letters.
Of course this varies by niche, but in general, keeping paragraphs short helps a reader digest more of your information.
Note: There are many exceptions out there as more โformalโ writing tends to prefer longer paragraphs. But most of those websites utilize a lot of white space and they make their font size really big to maximize scan-ability.
I like to think of reading internet writing as exercise. A lot of the reason that people stop exercising is because they look at how intimidating their overall exercise regimen needs to be to reach their goal.
Going to the gym for 2 hours 4 times per week for 6 months sounds like a herculean task. But if you break that down into immediate parts, it becomes:
- 10 minutes of jogging
- 20 minutes of squats
- 20 minutes of bench press
- and so on…
Breaking an exercise regimen down into short milestones rather than looking at how faraway the overall goal is helps people stay on the path.
Likewise, if you can break the overall goal of reaching the end of the article into short milestones (aka short paragraphs), youโll have a better chance of having that reader stay with you until the end.
Use bucket brigades
Bucket brigades are a kind of โtrickโ that copywriters use to heighten anticipation and shorten paragraphs.
They are stoppages in the paragraph in order to highlight something potentially profound.
A bucket brigade looks like:
This.
That was a bucket brigade.
It was a few words, a colon, and then another word.
Sometimes bucket brigades come in the form of lists, and other times theyโre just used to build a moment of expectation.
I used a bucket brigade at the start of this section to create a brief moment of tension between what would otherwise be a general, tension-less sentence.
However theyโre used, bucket brigades are an incredibly effective method of keeping a readerโs attention.
Hereโs an example of a normal paragraph:
I took a stroll along the lake and realized I am getting older every minute. This didnโt particularly come as shock to me considering the fact that I am losing my hair, getting fatter, and feeling drained of energy. It wonโt be long before the inevitable end. Death.
Hereโs that paragraph written for an internet audience:
I took a stroll along the lake and realized:
- I am getting older every minute.
This didnโt particularly come as a shock to me considering the fact that I am:
- Losing my hair.
- Getting fatter.
- Feeling drained of energy.
It wonโt be long before the inevitable end.
Death.
The words are all the same, but the anticipation is heightened between the major points. This makes it much easier to digest all the main ideas while quickly scanning through.
Now, if I were writing a novel or a short story or any kind of โtraditionalโ writing, I would never do this.
But when writing for the internet, you need to assume that everyoneโs thumb is perpetually scrolling down the screen. Creating a bucket brigade allows us to lay out information in a way that the reader can absorb quickly and easily.
But be warned: Bucket brigades are only powerful if used sparingly. If you throw out a bunch of them, your writing will look terrible. It is way better to use too little than it is to use too many.
5. Make it personal.
Readers want to feel a personal connection to your work.
They want to think that you wrote an article specifically for them.
They want to feel like youโre inside of their head, speaking all of their thoughts for them.
All of the tips that Iโve shared here will help you achieve this goal. But thereโs one surefire tactic to really nail down the personal aspect of blog posts.
Tell a story
Who doesnโt love a good story?
Stories are extremely effective literary tools that help make everything exciting, relatable, and real.
There are two kinds of stories:
1. Stories about yourself.
A lot of people shy away from stories about themselves because it makes them feel uncomfortable. But sharing vulnerability is one of the most effective ways of building a connection with a fellow human.
You should never be afraid to share a personal story because there are countless others out there in the internet world who have a similar story.
They need you to be vulnerable so that they can open themselves up to the healing that youโre offering in your article.
Stories about yourself also help in maintaining the authority that youโve built. Telling your audience about how you knew nothing is a great way to showcase the fact that now you know lots of things.
2. Stories about others.
Stories about others let readers know that there are many different kinds of people struggling with a certain kind of problem.
Like personal stories, they are relatable markers for overcoming a troubling situation.
These can be stories where youโve either heard about someone struggling, had a personal interaction with someone struggling, or personally helped someone overcome their struggles.
Whichever kind of story you use, telling your audience how something has impacted either you or someone else will let readers personally feel connected to your work.
Hereโs an example of writing without a story:
This waterproof rain jacket is so waterproof that it can withstand a monsoon.
Hereโs that writing but with a story:
It was a sunny day in northern Thailand when I started riding my motorbike. Within 10 minutes, a massive monsoon came pouring down. I was really worried because my phone and my computer were in my non-waterproof backpack. I had to think fast. I pulled out my rain jacket and wrapped it around my backpack. I got home, soaked to the bone, but my backpack โ along with my computer and phone โ was dry as a desert.
The story puts into focus just how effective the rain jacket was and backs up the claim that the jacket can withstand a monsoon.
Itโs one thing to say it, and itโs another thing to show it.
But be warned: Stories in blog writing should only be used to verify a claim or highlight an idea. The story should have a point relating to the overall point of the piece. Donโt just make a blog post with a bunch of unrelated stories.
Bonus Tip: Donโt be afraid to edit.
So, you definitely need to edit.
If you arenโt editing your work before it gets published, youโre definitely producing a bad article.
Editing is crucial to any kind of artistic process. Itโs how things get fine-tuned to ensure maximum success.
If youโve read my previous SML pieces, youโll know that Iโm a staunch advocate of editing.
And if you havenโt been editing, you need to start now. Read this to help you get started.
But thereโs one specific kind of editing that really helps a piece take shape.
Trim the fat
William Faulkner said:
โIn writing, you must kill all your darlings.โ
In this piece alone, I wrote a lot of really great stuff that I thought was super interesting and illuminating about various aspects of the human psyche.
But since this piece is not about human psychology, I took all of that stuff out.
Why?
Because it was clouding up the main purpose of the article.
In the art world, whether itโs music or theatre or writing, during any period of editing, โkilling your darlingsโ is a reality that we all have to face.
Our โdarlingsโ are those things that weโre so proud of, but are holding our art back. Itโs sad as hell to see that stuff go, but if we donโt get rid of them, weโll be letting them drag the whole piece down.
Itโs like pruning a garden; you cut off a little bit of the plant in order to foster better and healthier growth.
We need to prune our articles so that only the necessary and most important parts are seen. This helps us produce clear, concise, and highly professional pieces of writing.
So donโt be afraid to edit.
And donโt be afraid to โkill your darlingsโ.
Writing Irresistible Blog Posts
Thereโs an unfortunate truth that needs to be considered when trying to write irresistible blog posts.
- We donโt get to decide whatโs good.
The audience is the ultimate judge.
Iโve produced an unsettling number of artistic works over my life that I thought were absolutely brilliant. The public, however, disagreed.
But itโs from learning what works, why it works, and then refining that whole process that I started to figure out how to engage people with my art.
Because if we donโt refine our process and we donโt learn from the feedback we receive, then weโre just delusionally believing ourselves to be great when reality is telling us that we need to improve.
But when we do improve, and when we do understand how to impact a lot of people with our work, we can come to a place where we are acting in artistic harmony with the world around us.
We are seen as valuable to society, and we become fulfilled in our career.
All because our work is engaging.
And relatable.
And completely irresistible.
Hello Eric, I have become your fan. You do really write irresistible blog posts. This blogpost is a Mastercraft in itself. Got to know about Bucket brigades, will use it from now onwards. Thank you for such a great blog post, Eric.
Hi Eric,
Great Thanks to you for incredible tips for successful writer and I really like the point of enjoy first than you write anything. Writing is just a display unit for the emotions and feels.
Hello Eric,
Thank you so much. loved to read successful blogging.Thanks for sharing this article . Was helpful and informative.This helped me a lot.
Glad to have helped! Keep it up!
I really enjoyed reading your blog. Especially the part that how we can put emotions in our lifeless writings to make it more lively.
I’m glad you enjoyed! Yes, emotions are what life is made of, so putting them in your writings will make those pieces come alive!
I loved this part: “And if you pay close enough attention, youโll realize that youโre doing it now.”
Loved your blog. Nice ๐
Haha, glad you realized that you were doing it! ๐
Eric Blogs are the Epic Blogs- I had to say it brother…!!
So far, the unique blend of ‘conversational blog’ and ‘images’ has served a great mix in bestowing an immersive reading experience. I will certainly give ‘story’ a try but really don’t have much to share. You know, in my quest to become a professional writer, I finally discovered the key to a successful writer and the mantra is- Try To Enjoy It First. Writing is more like crafting your emotions and feelings. For me, it’s nothing less than a magical art. You need to add purpose and it doesn’t have to be monetary.
Thanks for the super kind words Gaurav!! Enjoying what you do is so crucial to being a successful communicator via the internet. And of course you have a story! You have a story about how you love what you do! And if you don’t feel inspired to tell people about your life, you can always tell a story about someone else. Everyone’s life is a story, so all you have to do is tell it!
Hi Eric,
I am writing content for last one year, and I am searching the best way to improve my writing skills. Basically, I am a beginner writer. Thank you so much for this awesome post, I was waiting for this.
You’re welcome Pijush! Keep going, keep learning, keep practicing, and you’ll get better and better!
Indeed, I believe that having the ability to touch, connect and giving your audience a reason to love what you were writing is definitely the best way to make them stick around and keep coming back. I love the tips specifically on having a personal connection for it could create a big impact to the audience. Great tips, keep posting.
Hey Rebecca! You’re definitely right that being able to connect with your readers is a great way to build a following. Keep producing great, relatable content and your audience will keep coming back!
Hello Eric,
Thanks for sharing these amazing tips. I just want to add that Title of the blog post is the first point of engagement you have with your audience. It should be attractive enough to captivate the audience to further read the blog. There are certain tools to test the score of Headline such as Coschedule headline analyzer. So writing an attractive headline is equally important in comparison with writing the whole blog post.
Hey Shruti! You’re definitely right that the title is an important thing to consider when attracting readers to your article. And yes, writing a good title is a great skill to have. But having a good title won’t keep a reader reading. The article needs to keep captivating your audience all throughout the whole thing. So yes, titles are important, but they can only get a reader to click. They can’t keep a reader there.
Hello Eric,
I have been following Shoutmeloud for past few years and I love the way you write articles. Your articles are a great piece of examples of How to write a irresistible blog posts. Image speaks a thousand word. Using visuals in your blog posts can definitely help increasing more engagement with the post. You are absolutely right, Writing a post in a conversational way can create bond between you and your readers. Thanks for sharing these beautiful tips.
Have a Great Day ๐
Vishwajeet
Thanks for the kind words, Vishwajeet! These are great ways to increase post engagement because they help your reader connect with you as a person. If you write in a boring and mechanical way. the writing will have no personality and no one will want to follow your work. Keep at it!