D.R.I.P Post Checklist
Use this handy checklist so you can quickly create new blog content. Keep in mind that a blog post can be written, filmed (video) or audio only (podcast).
In this first phase you’re going to want to do proper research for creating your blog post. What separates first class writers from everyone else is their ability to properly research their content. This performs two specific goals. The first is that the reader get exactly what they are looking for (because you’re basing your post off of finding out what content readers like). Second, it helps your content get noticed (because you’re inserting SEO keywords into your content).
As we say in Hollywood ‘It’s all about your content’. If the idea you’re basing all your efforts on is not solid, then your ideas won’t hold up. Great content should educate and entertain. You can come up with great concepts by simply reading other content, talking to your Audience and checking out popular books on your topic on Amazon.
After you have a great concept, you’re going to want to find what keywords (and phrases) your Audience types into Google to search for these terms. The data you find might surprise you!
*Make sure you’ve signed up for a free account.
After you know your keywords, you’ll want to verify that what you think your Audience wants is really what they want. It’s too risky to invest your time making content if no one is going to care. If your concept is trending down and there is very little (if any) engagement on similar posts then find a new concept!
In this step you’ll want to map out the basic structure of your content. You should always include an intro paragraph that tells your Audience what they’re going to learn, or be entertained about. You must also include an ‘outro’ paragraph that sums up what they learned and offers a call to action. A call to action can be to ask a specific question (that your Audience should comment on) or for them to take a specific action (like downloading your ‘content Treat*’).
*A Content Treat is a free thing (PDF, Audio, Video) that compliments your content. You can give this away in order to add value to your Audience, and to help you grow your Email list so you can market your Brand.
No one will read your content if the title sucks! Therefore I suggest you come up with a great title (or 2-3 of them) before you start writing your content. Imagine that the best title you can create is a ‘Top 10’ list. That means you’d need to make a list of 10 things in your content. Keep in mind that a great title should invoke curiosity so people click.
These 2 tools suggest quirky titles that may invoke interest:
Here are 2 Headline Analyzer Tools:
Use this Tool to get proper capitalization:
Layer in Emotional Words
Use this list: http://www.thepersuasionrevolution.com/380-high-emotion-persuasive-words/
Now you’ve got a great outline based off popular content, and you’ve got an amazing headline that has the highest likelihood that it will invoke curiosity. Next you’ll want to write your content. The easiest way to do this is to outsource it. The second easiest is to record a video. Then you’d get it transcribed and have a writer polish it up. The hardest (but my favorite method) is to simply sit your ass down and write it! You’ll need focus time to do this, which is why great writers usually have a secluded sunlit office.
When writing your content, you must always think about the Audience Experience! That means keeping the content streamlined and clear, getting right to the point, making it actionable (lots of step by steps), keeping it visual (images and infographics) and making it easy to skim (small paragraphs and lots of ‘white space’ on the page).
When writing, the goal is to get through to the end. That means you should not constantly stop to rewrite the sentence before, or to fix a spelling error. Doing this will cause you to lurch forward which kills your creativity. Trust the process and get your first draft done as quickly as possible. It won’t be great! Knowing that you can let yourself off the hook so you can get that first draft done (and then fix things in the second draft).
Remember that a Content Treat is the free thing you offer that compliments your new content. If you follow our Visionary Planner training, you’ll know that you will create 3 Free Treats. Therefore you’ll want to pick which Free Treat is most aligned with your latest piece of content. In some cases, you may want to create an additional piece of free content that you can give out along with your Free Treat.
For example, your blog content might be ‘Top 10 Tips To Leash Train Your Puppy’ and your Free Treat might be ‘Puppy Training Secrets Revealed’. You might want to create a checklist of the Top 10 Leash Training Tips to further enhance your blog content and Free Treat. Since you’ve already written the 10 Tips, it takes very little additional energy to create a one page PDF cheatsheet.
It’s very important that you make your content as visual as possible! After all, us humans are mostly visual creatures. Looking at a blog post that is all text is about as much fun as going to the dentist!
Find free Stock Images here:
Want to get your ass sued off by a pissed off photographer? I didn’t think so. So why not read this legal info on using Stock Pics: http://www.stockphotorights.com/faq/
Use Canva to add text to images: Canva.com
You may have done this in the research task in Step 4. But just in case…
Your niche is full of brilliant minds. And some of the these brilliant minds have large fan followings. We call them ‘Influencers’ because they influence the lives of so many of their fans. Just like you, they’re running a business and run out of content ideas. You can use this to your advantage and help them to help you. How so? You can feature their quotes and concepts in your new content. Since they have an ego they’ll most likely want to share your content (that mentions them). This helps you get noticed by their fans which grows your list (and Authority). For this reason, I suggest you try to include the thoughts of an Influencer in your content in hopes that they might share it. Even if they don’t, you’re still adding more value to your Audience.
Top writers will finish their article then ‘sit on it’ for a day or two. This lets them come back to their article with fresh eyes and create a second draft. At this point they can clear up anything that is confusing. Because we are always our own worst enemies, great writers will then have an Editor review their work. Great Editors will help refine the content (to make it as clear and ‘to the point’ as possible. They’ll also help with formatting and editing errors.
In this Phase you’ll take your written article and post it on your blog or social media channel. Keep in mind that you can easily outsource this process.
In this step you, or a Team Member, will paste your content onto our Wordpress site (or social media channel like a Tumblr or Linkedin post). The post will also get scheduled (does it go out now, or sometime in the future.)
Once your content is posted onto your Wordpress site, you need to prepare it for maximum ‘Google-ness’. One of the ways to make Google happy (and give a great Audience Experience) is to build links. There are 2 types of links. Links from your site to other sites, and inter-links where your site’s pages interlink.
Using Wordpress? Download and use this the Yoast SEO Plugin: https://wordpress.org/plugins/wordpress-seo/ This plugin is all you need to make sure you have solid SEO on your site. Remember that SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is what allows Google to determine what your site is about. If you don’t make Googles life easier, they are not going to be able to send you traffic from search results. Doing SEO takes a little bit more time, but it’s fully necessary.
Once you have pasted your edited piece of content into Wordpress you’ll want to optimize it for SEO. Let’s be real…SEO terms sounds technical and scary (‘alt tags’, ‘metadata’,’meta description’) but they’re really very simple. Push past your comfort zone so you can see how truly easy this all is!
This step is optional, but it can get you some additional traffic if your niche has a lot of followers on Twitter. This is where you highlight specific areas of text (like a quote or statistical fact) and make it ready to tweet.
If you followed my advice, you’d know that the only way to build your email marketing list is to give them a reason to give you their email.
This is where your Content Treat and Free Treats come in (this is something free that you give people in exchange for their email). Remember that the Content Treat is a free digital asset you create that compliments your latest blog post. Your Free Treat is more broad, and it covers your topic.
Assuming you have either a Content Treat or a Free Treat (or both) you’ll want to link it up to your page so your Audience can access it. This means you’ll want to use a paid tool like Clickfunnels to create a ‘Squeeze Page’. When you do this, you’ll get a piece of code called a ‘ClickPop’. This is a short snippet of HTML that you can hyperlink to text on your page (or if you want to be fancy, you can create an image that ‘sells’ the viewer to click it). Once the viewer clicks your text or image a popup will appear that asks for their email. Once they submit it Clickfunnels will send them the Content Treat, and they’ll be added to your Autoresponder Email list that should have your Free Treat already set up to email out.
After you (or your Team Member) has done all the technical stuff, its time to do one last review of your blog post. Make sure it looks solid!
Here you will tell the world about your post. The following steps are best practice to get the word out!
Here is info about proper social media image sizes: Create an image: http://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-image-sizes-guide/
If you’re using Canva to make images, they have image sizes already programmed into their software. Just select the type of image you want to create and they’ll automatically give you that size.
For added value, I suggest you process all your links into bit.ly. bit.ly is a URL shortening service that not only makes your URLs shorter, it lets you track all clicks. This is very helpful for you to see where your site visitors are coming from. Word of caution though…using the bit.ly links doesn’t yield the highest click throughs (its as if people hate all links that start with ‘bit.ly’, so I suggest you buy a custom URL and integrate it with bit.ly. They have info on how to do this, and you can outsource setting this up to a programmer on fiverr.com. An alternative to bit.ly (that gives even better data) is running all your links through Google’s UTM parameters tool then placing those into bit.ly while using a custom link. I know it all sounds incredibly technical but its really very easy. Figure out how to do it then get your Team Members to do this for you.
I suggest you invest in Edgar. It’s a social media posting tool that will let you fill up a ‘queue’ of social media posts then automatically schedules them to be published to Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter.
If you included custom images (infographics you created, or photos you took) in your post, then you’ll definitely want to share them on Pinterest. Before you do this step we recommend you create a Pinterest board just for your blog posts.
Facebook is the king of social media, and everyone (including my mom) is on it.
I’m not sure how much longer Twitter will be around for, but they sure do give nice backlinks! For that reason, it’s best to post links to your content here.
Yes I know, no one uses Google+. But Google uses it! And Google uses it to check for backlinks. That means that even if you never use this withering social media site, you should always post links to your content.
It’s a really solid idea to always let your list know about your new Episode posting to your site. This simply means you’ll want to create weekly newsletter and write a short message about why everyone on your list will benefit by reading your latest post. You’ll want to have a great subject line (this should be your content’s headline), tell them ‘what’s in it for them’, include a graphic and have bullet points to cover the big ideas of what they can expect.
We talked about Influencers in Phase 1. If you did mention an Influencer in your content you’ll want to reach out to them here. You can email them (check their site for contact info) or hit them up on social media.
Doing this helps you build your community and make them feel important.
You will want to share your best content in upcoming months.
Check your Google Analytics each month to see which of your posts are getting you the most traffic. This should tell you what your most popular topics are.
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