Good Content = More Traffic

How to Choose Blog Topics That Spur Engagement

You already know that content is vital for attracting visitors to your site, but it takes more than just content, or even good content, to turn visitors into loyal readers. For that to happen, you need to give them a reason to come back. The best way to create a community amongst your readers is to provide content that encourages interaction. Here are a few tips to get you started writing the kind of articles that will get your readers commenting and coming back again and again!

1. Know your audience.

This one seems like a no-brainer, but it can be easy to lose sight of when you’re scrambling for topics day after day. It’s so important to remember that your readers visit your site because whatever your site is about is interesting to them. That’s it. So keep it interesting, keep it targeted. Understand who your visitors are and WHY they visit, then tailor your content to keep them visiting.

Your blog’s stats will be very helpful in this endeavor. Check them to see which of the posts you’ve already made have the most comments and the most visits, then brainstorm related topics. The idea is NOT to repeat the same few topics over and over; that’s not what “related” means. Instead, you should be coming up with topics that share key elements with your most popular posts. If your readers gravitate to posts that contain recipes, you might want to consider writing about cooking techniques, or what food to keep on hand to throw something together quickly.

Monitor these new posts, and see if they’re as popular as the old ones. The more related blogs you post and monitor, the better grasp you’ll have of exactly which elements appeal to your core group of readers. Again, it may seem like a no-brainer, but people are engaged by content that appeals to them. It’s not rocket science. You just need to figure out what your readers find appealing and give it to them.

2. Always ask questions.

One of the simplest ways to get your readers engaging with your content and one another is to ask for their opinion. You never want your posts to be purely informational, even if the purpose of your site is to inform on your chosen topic. Informing people is all very well and good, but it won’t build a community and it won’t create engagement. Your goal should be to inform your visitors but also to ask for their thoughts. Given that you already know whatever your site is about is interesting to your visitors, it’s reasonable to assume that they have their own opinions on the subject, and often all it takes to get someone to share their opinions is to ask for them.

The great thing about this technique is that it builds an entire feedback cycle of extra interesting content, which is a draw in and of itself. For each visitor who offers their take on what you’ve written, there is at least one person reading with an opinion about the first opinion. With many of the most popular blogs, the bulk of the most interesting content is in the comments, and all of that interesting (passive!) content can be yours with a single question mark.

3. Be a little controversial.

This tip is something of an enhancement to the previous one. Asking people for their opinions on any topic you write about is good and will spur engagement, absolutely. But you’ll spur even more engagement by addressing a topic that people have strong feelings about. This isn’t to say that you need to focus on politics or religion to get people invested in your blog, but rather that you need to either choose topics that have at least two sides, or choose topics that you know your readers are emotionally invested in. To continue our earlier example, if you’re writing about food-related topics, there are some things that are pretty straightforward: brownies are delicious, chicken is good in pretty much any recipe, etc. People will have opinions about those things, and will offer them if you ask, and that’s great. It’s just that it’s hard to get heated about brownies.

But it’s easy to get heated about the topic of weight loss, or healthy eating, or gluten free diets, or veganism. These are issues that different sides, issues that have emotional investment, and these are issues that will spur the most engagement. You can either dedicate entire posts to these more controversial topics, or just include aspects of controversy in your regular posts. If you’re writing about chicken recipes, you might mention that you don’t think any vegan meat substitutes live up to the real thing. It’s not about picking a fight with your readers, it’s about getting them thinking and getting them talking. “None of the vegan meat substitutes I’ve tried are as good as the real thing, and I’m not convinced I’ll ever find one that is. What do you guys think?” is much more likely to get people engaged than “Chicken is good, it tastes like everything!”. By challenging people a little on a topic you know they feel strongly about, and then asking them to help change your mind, you’re setting the stage for an interesting exchange of information that everyone can get involved in.

4. Add more elements of interaction.

Engagement isn’t only about comments and debate. At its most basic level, engagement is about interaction: your readers interacting with you and interacting with one another. In your blogs, don’t just ask your readers for their opinions. Ask for their pictures. Ask for their versions of your recipes. Ask for their favorite videos and music recommendations and anything you can make relevant to your site, and they will respond. By exchanging more than just opinions, you encourage your readers to form friendships and a community, and that more than anything will keep them coming back!

What are some of the best tactics you’ve used to spur engagement? (See what I did there?)

Courtney Holmes is a Sacramento marketing company that specializes in content marketing. She has her masters degree from University of South Florida in Mass Communication with an emphasis on multimedia journalism. She has worked for some of the best media companies in the nation – The Tampa Bay Times and local National Public Radio stations in both Tampa, Florida and Sacramento, California.