SEO
How to Write a Blog Post (That People Actually Want to Read) in 9 Steps

Type a couple of hundred words and publish them somewhere—poof, you have a blog post. Or do you?
If a blog post is published and no one reads it, is it still a blog post?
Anyone can write a blog post. But not everyone can create one that people want to read.
In this post, you’ll learn how to write blog posts that actually get readers.
Let’s get started.
A proven topic is a topic that people want to read about.
If you’re familiar with the niche, then this shouldn’t be a biggie. You probably already have a lot of ideas you want to cover. Open Google Docs and write all of them down (use a notepad if you prefer analog).
Otherwise, there’s no better way to find proven topics than to write about topics people are searching for. After all, if there are many people searching for the same topic month after month, then it’s very likely it’s something they want to read about.
Here’s how to find these topics:
- Go to Ahrefs’ Keywords Explorer
- Enter a term relevant to your site or niche
- Go to the Matching terms report
- Switch the tab to Questions

Shop around a little and look for the topics that interest you. Make a list—5 to 10 should be enough to start with.
Ideally, they should have some traffic potential too. Our metric, Traffic Potential, is the estimated amount of search traffic you can potentially gain if you rank #1 for that topic. You can see if a topic has Traffic Potential by looking at the TP column.
With more than 4.4 million new blog posts published each day, your blog post has to stand out. Otherwise, it won’t get discovered and no one will read it.
The key ingredient here is novelty.
According to Julian Shapiro, there are five novelty categories:
- Counter-intuitive – “Oh, I never realized the world worked that way.”
- Counter-narrative – “Wow, that’s not how I was told the world worked!”
- Shock and awe – “That’s crazy. I would have never believed it.”
- Elegant articulations – “Beautiful. I couldn’t have said it better myself.”
- Make someone feel seen – “Yes! That’s exactly how I feel!”
For example, check out this blog post by finance writer Morgan Housel:

He states something that is counter-intuitive to what most people know and think. The best idea or “truth” doesn’t win—instead, the best story does. This is incredibly compelling to people in his field of finance. Indeed, it stands out from the other news-based, fact-driven kind of articles they read.
Morgan does this all the time. He rarely writes about finance directly—instead, he’s always looking at the topic from the lenses of history, biology, anthropology, psychology, and more. It makes his posts unique, and the angle of his articles always stands out.
It’s what you must do. So take your time and think of an angle that is unique and novel to your target audience. Use these questions to get started:
- Do you have personal experience with this topic? For example, if you’ve successfully implemented the keto diet, you can write about your experience and how you did it.
- Can you interview experts? For example, you can interview an expert about the latest research and findings in the keto world.
- Can you crowdsource opinions and ideas? For example, if you’re writing about making keto-friendly ice cream, you can crowdsource recipes.
- Can you provide data or back your post with science? Consider running a study (if possible) or looking through scientific research papers.
- Can you be contrarian? Don’t be the devil’s advocate just for the sake of it. But if you truly have an opinion that’s opposite to everyone else’s, it can be a great angle.
Editor’s Note
If you’re blogging with SEO in mind, then you’ll likely have to match search intent. Search intent is the why behind a search query. We can look at the current top-ranking pages to figure it out.
Specifically, we want to understand the three Cs of search intent:
- Content type – Is there a dominant type of content on the SERP, such as blog posts, product pages, videos, or landing pages? If you followed step #1, this is most likely a blog post.
- Content format – Is there a dominant content format on the SERP, such as guides, listicles, news articles, opinion pieces, or reviews?
- Content angle – Is there a dominant angle on the SERP, such as freshly updated content or content aimed at beginners?
For example, let’s look at the topic of “date ideas”:

- Content type – They’re all blog posts.
- Content format – They’re all listicles.
- Content angle – A potential angle is “fun date ideas.”
If you’re writing about this topic, you may have to create something similar.
But note that this is not a rule but a guideline. Even if your post is ranking high on Google, it still has to stand out from the rest of the ranking articles. So it goes back to finding a novel and unique angle for your article. If you can create one that’s better than the other top-ranking articles, go for it.

The hardest part of writing is facing the blank page. It is possible to sit in front of your computer for six hours and churn nothing out. It happens to the best of us.
Creating an outline “solves” this problem. When you have an outline, you’re not writing from scratch. Instead, you’re filling the “gaps” in it.
What’s even better is that you don’t have to create the outline from scratch either. Spend enough time online, and you’ll realize that most blog posts’ structures are pretty much the same.
So don’t be afraid to use templates. For example, we use this template for almost all our list-style posts:

Here are three more templates for other blog post styles you can use.
When you have the skeletal structure in place, the next step is to figure out what you need to fill in, especially the H2s, H3s, H4s, and more. Here are some ideas to help you out:
A. Use your personal experience and expertise
Nothing beats your own experience and expertise. If you know there’s a right way to do something, use that knowledge to create your outline.
For example, I’ve been breakdancing for more than 10 years now. If I had to create a blog post on how to do the six-step, I wouldn’t even need to do any research—I can simply pour the information directly from my brain.
B. Run a content gap analysis
If there are subtopics that almost all the top-ranking pages cover, then it’s likely that they’re important to readers too.
Here’s how to find these subtopics:
- Paste a few top-ranking URLs for your main topic into Ahrefs’ Content Gap tool
- Leave the bottom section blank
- Hit Show keywords
- Set the Intersection filter to 3 and 4 targets


Here, you’ll see that these pages are ranking for subtopics like:
- What is inbound marketing.
- Inbound marketing strategies.
- Inbound marketing examples.
And more.
If you’re writing a blog post on “inbound marketing,” they’ll likely make good H2s.
Note that your goal is not to copy and rephrase the top-ranking pages. The internet’s full of that—cookie-cutter content no one’s interested in.
Your goal is simply to use top-ranking pages as inspiration. If they make good points, you can consider including them in your post. If they’re stating something that’s completely wrong, then even better—take the chance to correct the misconceptions.
With your outline in place, it’s time to flesh that skeleton out into a rough draft.
I write mostly in Google Docs. An immediate perk is that I can turn the headings I’ve created into actual headings. I just have to click the “Styles” dropdown on the menu and change them:

You’ll be able to see your outline on the side too:

From here, use your headers as a guide and write your first draft. This stage is all about “getting it out.” That means:
- Avoiding any interruptions to your writing.
- Not self-censoring as you go along.
- Not repeatedly rearranging your outline to make things flow better.
- Not rewriting the same sentence 10 times just because it “doesn’t read quite right.” 😅
I know, I know. It’s easier said than done. Still, try to minimize interruptions. There’s time to edit for perfection later—this stage is all about getting everything down on paper (or screen) so you have something tangible to work with. As author Shannon Hale writes:
I’m writing a first draft and reminding myself that I’m simply shoveling sand into a box so that later I can build castles.
One “trick” you can consider is to use the Pomodoro Technique. It’s my go-to if I’m stuck, distracted, or procrastinating.
The basic idea: Set a timer for 25 minutes, write as much as you can, then take a break for five minutes. Rinse and repeat. You can use a Chrome extension like Marinara to automate your Pomodoros.
Recommendation
- State the Problem
- Agitate the problem by digging more into the pain (felt by the reader)
- Offer a potential Solution

Here’s what it looks like in the wild:

“I have rewritten—often several times—every word I have ever published. My pencils outlast their erasers.”
Here’s the surprise: Even though the activity is known as “writing,” the magic is not in that. Rather, it’s in the editing phase where the true blog post appears.
This stage—after you’re done with your first draft—is all about editing, polishing, trimming, and rewriting.
My recommendation is to only edit after one or two days have passed. Why? Because you’re too emotionally invested when you’re first done drafting. The time gap will be helpful to remove this attachment so you can actually edit with fresh eyes.
Here’s what you can do during the editing process:
- Use Grammarly – Great for checking grammar mistakes.
- Read your draft out loud – Catch where it doesn’t flow well.
- Break up long sentences – Turn sentences with endless “ands” and “thats” into short, punchier ones.
- Add formatting where relevant – Images, GIFs, bullets, numbered lists, bold, italics, and more make your writing easier to read.
- Pepper in “flow” – Wherever the opportunity arises, consider adding transition words and cliffhangers so that the rhythm of your post is not static.
You should also pay extra attention to your intro, as that is how your reader will decide if they will continue reading.
When you’re done with the self-editing, get feedback from someone else. If you have an editor to show your draft to, great. Otherwise, a friend or colleague works absolutely fine as well.
What’s important here is to get an impartial pair of eyes on your work.
Chances are that a third party will be able to point out things like logical loopholes and poor flow that you won’t be able to spot on your own.
We do this for every blog post at Ahrefs. We even “call out” the contributors:

When they’re done, incorporate their feedback where relevant. Build off their ideas and opinions to produce the best piece of work possible.
Take the time to think about each point that was made. Set aside your ego and really try to see things from a third party’s perspective: Which points do you agree with, which are you unsure about, and which do you definitely not agree with?
Make edits based on the suggestions you believe in and leave out the things you feel strongly against (but be sure to have a logical explanation for doing this). If you’re on the fence, it all comes down to how much you trust the person giving you feedback.
Also, be careful not to accidentally adopt the writing style of a third party, especially if they give feedback in long form or if you’re incorporating many of their suggestions. Again, if possible, take a break from drafting and work on something else. Then, when you come back to it, try and rewrite the section in your own voice and style.
Now is the time to rewrite sentences until they “sound right” or rearrange your points over and over again until they flow the best they can.
Keep getting feedback and revising your draft until you’re happy with the final product.
“On the average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy.”
Your headline is one of the most important aspects of your blog post. It determines whether someone decides to click through and read. So you should take the time and polish it until it is compelling.
Don’t stop on the first headline you create. Come up with a few and see which one looks best. Viral site Upworthy notoriously created 25 headlines for each article it published.

I’m not asking you to create clickbait headlines like it. But the exercise can be a fruitful one. As singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran puts it, and I paraphrase, “It helps to clear the wastewater from the faucet.”
That said, here are some tips for writing better headlines:
- Use “power words” – Words like “remarkable” and “noteworthy” help trigger an emotional response. Sprinkling one or two can make your headlines more compelling.
- Add parentheses – Parentheses strengthen your title tag by adding the “icing on the cake.”
Even if you’re not blogging with SEO in mind, you’ll want search engines like Google to find your post and rank it. After all, Googling is still one of the major ways people discover new content to read online.
It’s a good idea to follow simple SEO best practices for every blog post you’re publishing. At the basic level, you should:
- Include the topic in the title – You’ve probably naturally included this while you were brainstorming your headlines. After all, if you’re writing about intermittent fasting, it’s difficult to not mention it. Don’t worry if you haven’t, though; a close variation works too.
- Write a compelling meta description – This is not a Google ranking factor, but it helps to “sell” your article in the search results.
- Use short, descriptive URLs – This type of URLs makes it easy for searchers to understand what your post is about. The simplest way is to make the slug your topic.
- Add alt text to your images – Google uses alt text to understand images. Create a concise but accurate one for every image you use.
- Link to internal and external resources – Cite other people where relevant. It’s also helpful for readers who want to learn more.
If you’re using a content management system (CMS) like WordPress, installing plugins like Yoast or RankMath can make doing all of this a cinch.
Recommended reading: On-Page SEO: The Beginner’s Guide
You’re finally ready to publish your post!
Upload your post into your CMS. Or if you’re using WordPress and have some budget, consider using Wordable. This allows you to do a one-click upload from Google Docs into WordPress. Really easy.
Then give it another quick look to make sure all’s looking good. Finally, hit “publish”!

It’s the truth—blogging is extremely competitive today. Your content, no matter how good, will not be discovered by itself. You need to go out and let people know it exists.
Consider using some of these tactics to promote your content:
- Share it with your audience – You may think you don’t have an “audience,” especially if you’re just starting out. But you have friends, family, colleagues, and followers on existing social media accounts. Share it with them! They’ll be your biggest supporters. Then, over time, as you build up your audience (e.g., an email list), you can share your articles with them too.
- Email people you mentioned in your content – Find the emails of those people you’ve cited or linked to and reach out to them. They’ll be happy to know they’ve been featured.
- Share your content in relevant communities – Facebook groups, Slack communities, Discord, Reddit, and forums—if you are a member of any communities, you can consider sharing your content there. But remember, don’t spam!
Recommended reading: 13 Content Promotion Tactics to Get More Eyeballs on Your Content
Final thoughts
Hopefully, this post has shown you writing a blog post that people want to read is not a difficult process. You can do it too.
Now, go on and get started—that blog post isn’t going to write itself.
Any questions or comments? Let me know on Twitter.
SEO
Google Updating Cryptocurrency Advertising Policy For 2024

Google published an announcement of upcoming changes to their cryptocurrency advertising policies and advises advertisers to make themselves aware of the changes and prepare to be in compliance with the new requirements.
The upcoming updates are to Google’s Cryptocurrencies and related products policy for the advertisement of Cryptocurrency Coin Trusts. The changes are set to take effect on January 29th, 2024.
Cryptocurrency Coin Trusts are financial products that enable investors to trade shares in trusts holding substantial amounts of digital currency. These trusts provide investors with equity in cryptocurrencies without having direct ownership. They are also an option for creating a more diversified portfolio.
The policy updates by Google that are coming in 2024 aim to describe the scope and requirements for the advertisement of Cryptocurrency Coin Trusts. Advertisers targeting the United States will be able to promote these products and services as long as they abide by specific policies outlined in the updated requirements and that they also obtain certification from Google.
The updated policy changes are not limited to the United States. They will apply globally to all accounts advertising Cryptocurrency Coin Trusts.
Google’s announcement also reminded advertisers of their obligation for compliance to local laws in the areas where the ads are targeted.
Google’s approach for violations of the new policy will be to first give a warning before imposing an account suspension.
Advertisers that fail to comply with the updated policy will receive a warning at least seven days before a potential account suspension. This time period provides advertisers with an opportunity to fix non-compliance issues and to get back into compliance with the revised guidelines.
Advertisers are encouraged to refer to Google’s documentation on “About restricted financial products certification.”
The deadline for the change in policy is January 29th, 2024. Cryptocurrency Coin Trusts advertisers will need to pay close attention to the updated policies in order to ensure compliance.
Read Google’s announcement:
Updates to Cryptocurrencies and related products policy (December 2023)
SEO
SEO Trends You Can’t Ignore In 2024

Most SEO trends fade quickly. But some of them stick and deserve your attention.
Let’s explore what those are and how to take advantage of them.
If you give ChatGPT a title and ask it to write a blog post, it will—in seconds.
This is super impressive, but there are a couple of issues:
- Everyone else using ChatGPT is creating the same content. It’s the same for users of other GPT-powered AI writing tools, too—which is basically all of them.
- The content is extremely dull. Sure, you can ask ChatGPT to “make it more entertaining,” but it usually overcompensates and hands back a cringe version of the same boring content.
In the words of Gael Breton:
How to take advantage of this SEO trend
Don’t use AI to write entire articles. They’ll be boring as heck. Instead, use it as a creative sparring partner to help you write better content and automate monotonous tasks.
For example, you can ask ChatGPT To write an outline from a working title and a list of keywords (which you can pull from Ahrefs)—and it does a pretty decent job.
Prompt:
Create an outline for a post entitled “[working title]” based on these keywords: [list]
Result:


When you’ve written your draft, you can ask to polish it in seconds by asking ChatGPT to proofread it.


Then you can automate the boring stuff, like creating more enticing title tags…


… and writing a meta description:


If you notice a few months down the line that your content ranks well but hasn’t won the featured snippet, ChatGPT can help with that, too.
For example, Ahrefs tells us we rank in position 3 for “affiliate marketing” but don’t own the snippet.


If we check Google, the snippet is a definition. Asking ChatGPT to simplify our definition may solve this problem.


In short, there are a near-infinite number of ways to use ChatGPT (and other AI writing tools) to create better content. And all of them buck the trend of asking it to write boring, boilerplate articles from scratch.
Programmatic SEO refers to the creation of keyword-targeted pages in an automatic (or near automatic) way.
Nomadlist’s location pages are a perfect example:


Each page focuses on a specific city and shares the same core information—internet speeds, cost, temperature, etc. All of this information is pulled programmatically from a database and the site gets an estimated 46k monthly search visits in total.


Programmatic SEO is nothing new. It’s been around forever. It’s just the hot thing right now because AI tools like ChatGPT make it easier and more accessible than ever before.
The problem? As John Mueller pointed out on Twitter X, much of it is spam:
I love fire, but also programmatic SEO is often a fancy banner for spam.
— I am John – ⭐ Say no to cookies – biscuits only ⭐ (@JohnMu) July 25, 2023
How to take advantage of this SEO trend
Don’t use programmatic SEO to publish insane amounts of spam that’ll probably get hit in the next Google update. Use it to scale valuable content that will stand the test of time.
For example, Wise’s currency conversion pages currently get an estimated 31.7M monthly search visits:


This is because the content is actually useful. Each page features an interactive tool showing the live exchange rate for any amount…


… the exchange rate over time…


… a handy email notification option when the exchange rates exceed a certain amount…


… handy conversion charts for popular amounts…


… and a comparison of the cheapest ways to send money abroad in your chosen currency:


It doesn’t matter that all of these pages use the same template. The data is exactly what you want to see when you search [currency 1] to [currency 2]
.
That’s probably why Wise ranks in the top 10 for over 66,000 of these keywords:


Looking to take advantage of programmatic content in 2024 like Wise? Check out the guide below.
People love ChatGPT because it answers questions fast and succinctly, so it’s no surprise that generative AI is already making its way into search.
For example, if you ask Bing for a definition or how to do something basic, AI will generate an answer on the fly right there in the search results.




In other words, thanks to AI, users no longer have to click on a search result for answers to simple questions. It’s like featured snippets on steroids.
This might not be a huge deal right now, but when Google’s version of this (Search Generative Experience) comes out of beta, many websites will see clicks fall off a cliff.
How to take advantage of this SEO trend
Don’t invest too much in topics that generative AI can easily answer. You’ll only lose clicks like crazy to AI in the long run. Instead, start prioritizing topics that AI will struggle to answer.
How do you know which topics it will struggle to answer? Try asking ChatGPT. If it gives a good and concise answer, it’s clearly an easy question.
For example, there are hundreds of searches for how to calculate a percentage in Google Sheets every month in the US:


If you ask ChatGPT for the solution, it gives you a perfect answer in about fifty words.


This is the perfect example of a topic where generative AI will remove the need to click on a search result for many.
That’s probably not going to be the case for a topic like this:


Sure. Generative AI might be able to tell you how to create a template—but it can’t make one for you. And even if it can in the future, it will never be a personal finance expert with experience. You’ll always have to click on a search result for a template created by that person.
These are the kinds of topics to prioritize in 2024 and beyond.
Sidenote.
None of this means you should stop targeting “simple” topics altogether. You’ll always be able to get some traffic from them. My point is not to be obsessed with ranking for keywords whose days are numbered. Prioritize topics with long-term value instead.
Bonus: 3 SEO trends to ignore in 2024
Not all SEO trends move the needle. Here are just a few of those trends and why you should ignore them.
People are using voice search more than ever
In 2014, Google revealed that 41% of Americans use voice search daily. According to research by UpCity, that number was up to 50% as of 2022. I haven’t seen any data for 2023 yet, but I’d imagine it’s above 50%.
Why you should ignore this SEO trend
75% of voice search results come from a page ranking in the top 3, and 40.7% come from a featured snippet. If you’re already optimizing for those things, there’s not much more you can do.
People are using visual search for shopping more than ever
In 2022, Insider Intelligence reported that 22% of US adults have shopped with visual search (Google Lens, Bing Visual Search, etc.). That number is up from just 15% in 2021.
Why you should ignore this SEO trend
Much like voice search, there’s no real way to optimize for visual search. Sure, it helps to have good quality product images, optimized filenames and alt text, and product schema markup on your pages—but you should be doing this stuff anyway as it’s been a best practice since forever.
People are using Bing more than ever before
Bing’s Yusuf Mehdi announced in March 2023 that the search engine had surpassed 100M daily active users for the first time ever. This came just one month after the launch of AI-powered Bing.
Why you should ignore this SEO trend
Bing might be more popular than ever, but its market share still only stands at around ~3% according to estimates by Statcounter. Google’s market share stands at roughly 92%, so that’s the one you should be optimizing for.
Plus, it’s often the case that if you rank in Google, you also rank in Bing—so it really doesn’t deserve any focus.
Final thoughts
Keeping your finger on the pulse and taking advantage of trends makes sense, but don’t let them distract you from the boring stuff that’s always worked: find what people are searching for > create content about it > build backlinks > repeat.
Got questions? Ping me on Twitter X.
SEO
Mozilla VPN Security Risks Discovered

Mozilla published the results of a recent third-party security audit of its VPN services as part of it’s commitment to user privacy and security. The survey revealed security issues which were presented to Mozilla to be addressed with fixes to ensure user privacy and security.
Many search marketers use VPNs during the course of their business especially when using a Wi-Fi connection in order to protect sensitive data, so the trustworthiness of a VNP is essential.
Mozilla VPN
A Virtual Private Network (VPN), is a service that hides (encrypts) a user’s Internet traffic so that no third party (like an ISP) can snoop and see what sites a user is visiting.
VPNs also add a layer of security from malicious activities such as session hijacking which can give an attacker full access to the websites a user is visiting.
There is a high expectation from users that the VPN will protect their privacy when they are browsing on the Internet.
Mozilla thus employs the services of a third party to conduct a security audit to make sure their VPN is thoroughly locked down.
Security Risks Discovered
The audit revealed vulnerabilities of medium or higher severity, ranging from Denial of Service (DoS). risks to keychain access leaks (related to encryption) and the lack of access controls.
Cure53, the third party security firm, discovered and addressed several risks. Among the issues were potential VPN leaks to the vulnerability of a rogue extension that disabled the VPN.
The scope of the audit encompassed the following products:
- Mozilla VPN Qt6 App for macOS
- Mozilla VPN Qt6 App for Linux
- Mozilla VPN Qt6 App for Windows
- Mozilla VPN Qt6 App for iOS
- Mozilla VPN Qt6 App for Androi
These are the risks identified by the security audit:
- FVP-03-003: DoS via serialized intent
- FVP-03-008: Keychain access level leaks WG private key to iCloud
- VP-03-010: VPN leak via captive portal detection
- FVP-03-011: Lack of local TCP server access controls
- FVP-03-012: Rogue extension can disable VPN using mozillavpnnp (High)
The rogue extension issue was rated as high severity. Each risk was subsequently addressed by Mozilla.
Mozilla presented the results of the security audit as part of their commitment to transparency and to maintain the trust and security of their users. Conducting a third party security audit is a best practice for a VPN provider that helps assure that the VPN is trustworthy and reliable.
Read Mozilla’s announcement:
Mozilla VPN Security Audit 2023
Featured Image by Shutterstock/Meilun
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