4 Steps to Writing Articles that People Read

There are over 180 million blogs online right now, with tens of thousands of blogs in your niche, competing for the same audience as you.

The question is, how do you stand out among a sea of other blogs? How do you get your content read?

There are a few things that differentiate articles that get read from articles that are ignored, and there are a few steps I take when writing an article.

Following these steps can guarantee your success as a blogger, ignoring them can be dangerous to you.

1. Research Your Article

This is the first step, and it looks so simple until it isn’t.

The first step you should take when writing an article that people will read is to research.

By researching, I’m not just talking about reading an article on another blog and then paraphrasing what you just read, and I’m not talking about cramming what you read on Wikipedia either.

I’m talking about researching qualitative articles, data, and facts, and I’m talking about looking for the best ways to blend them into your article.

Depending on the subject you’re writing for, real research takes hours, and you should also be able to back up your facts when necessary.

Research is the one secret that separates mediocre writers from the professional ones, and it is the secret behind the success of expert freelance writers.

The more research you can do, and the more accurately you can do it, the higher the chances of your article getting read.

2. Outline Your Article

Most people believe that it is natural to just start writing once you know what you want to write about, and some people will suggest that you just come up with an headline, but my advice will be contrary.

Don’t just get started writing, and don’t write your headline first; that is reserved for the next step.

The next thing you should do after researching your article is to outline; you should come up with a heading, a sub heading, and additional points that give you an insight into what you want to write about.

The idea is to create a “framework” for your article, so that all you need to do is just write; the major part of your writing will then be based on what you learned from your research.

3. Start Writing without Interruption

Once you’ve outlined your content, and once you already have an idea of what to write, the next step is to start writing.

Focus only on writing, and invest all your efforts into it. Don’t just write for a few minutes and edit it. In fact, don’t even bother about editing your article at this point in time, and don’t proofread at all.

Make sure nothing interrupts your writing, since it is the most important thing at the moment. Write first, write rubbish, write anything that could be a part of your article without interruption.

This doesn’t mean what you write will be your final draft, but you should write it anyway!

4. “Edit” Your Article

Once you’re done with writing your article, the next step is to edit it.

If you take a look at my points alone, you will notice that I quoted the “Edit” part of it to give it more emphasis. My point is that you aren’t proofreading the article, but you’re editing it.

Proofreading it means checking it for mistakes, and editing it means rewriting certain parts of it if necessary.

Editing will require you to write some parts over and over again, while proofreading the whole article several times.

This isn’t easy, but it is the key to writing real articles that people read.

5. Come Up with a Headline

The final step is to come up with a headline.

I know a lot of people would have expected me to write about this point as the first, but that isn’t what it really is.

Your headline should be the last thing you should write, and it should take as much time as it took you to write your article if possible.

Don’t just write the first headline that comes to your mind and forget it; spend minutes and hours crafting your headline, come up with several headlines you can choose from, and dedicate minutes of your time to deleting those that won’t work.

You have to come up with several headlines, and only go with the one that works best.

This post is written by Paul T, a freelance writer and 4g expert.