How to Responsibly Research a Blog Post
Learn how to efficiently and successfully research a blog post.
Any blog post that wants to include specific factual claims, statistics, or information beyond common knowledge will require careful and thorough research. Making sure your blog posts have accurate information is essential before you share your posts. Knowing how to research will help you avoid giving your readers false information. Of course, learning how to research a blog post and synthesize your data into a blog can be difficult, but with practice and careful planning, you can quickly become a pro. Read on for a few tips on how you can research a blog post intelligently and efficiently.
Begin With Planning The Blog Post
Every blog post begins with an idea. This idea is best defined by a title or a headline, which you can create to guide you. The best way to begin to research a blog post is to decide on a strong headline idea or variations of a headline. Then, determine what kind of post you want to create. The blog post types that deliver information and are attractive to online audiences include the following:
- Tutorials and how-tos
- Reviews
- Comparisons
- List posts
- Interviews and expert roundups
- Case studies
Decide which format fits your idea best and is most likely to engage your average reader.
Evaluate Your Idea
As you research a blog post, you should, of course, always remind yourself who this post is for and why they should care about your subject. You can start by searching online for your headline idea and browsing existing blogs on the topic. You can determine the audience of these posts, and note the comments and shares that they garner. This information can help you shape your idea, define your audience, and gauge how much people care about this topic.
Look for Sources
After identifying your working headline and your target audience, it is now time to start your research. When you prepare to research a blog post, think about the key elements you need to support your claims, including:
- Stats and data from reputable sources
- Popular articles on the same topic
- Quotes from experts and authoritative sources
As you find a source you like, take notes of the critical information as well as where you found it so you can attribute the source later.
Create Your Outline
As you research a blog post, you should start creating your outline. In the outline, add every subpoint that you want to make and include supporting comments, data, or quotes underneath each subpoint.
Complete Your Outline and Write Away
Your outline doesn’t need to be huge, but it should have a list of all key subheadings along with the supporting data and sources. Most importantly, you should aim for a clear, logical structure that you can follow as you write the post. As you write your blog post, try to make each section between the subheads roughly the same length to improve readability. Once you’re finished, schedule your post for an optimal time and share it with your audience through your social media accounts!
Contact Adventure Web Interactive Today
For more tips on how to optimize your web content and drive more traffic to your Facebook page, follow our blog. Adventure Web Interactive offers expert marketing solutions, including blog and copywriting and social media management. Take the stress of planning, posting, and plotting off of your team and contact us online or by giving us a call at (410) 788-7007. To see more information about our team and services, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn.
