The ultimate guide for writing the perfect article

One of the most complicated aspects of content marketing is creating relevant but optimized texts for SEO.

We would all like to create the “perfect” article, and if we could do it over and over, much better; we would like to create the perfect content to offer relevant information to our visitors.

However, you should understand that not all articles can be similar and that different types of content should be published to create a site optimized for SEO, but with relevant content for your readers.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that you can’t create the “perfect article” for search engines, and that’s what we’re going to talk about today.

Since I created ismaelruizg.com, my blog where I publish content related to my project, I discovered that all webmasters have to work hard to improve our texts, optimize our pages, and attract more traffic.

We always try to optimize our articles, as we want people to read our content and if you want to do that, you will have to work with inbound Marketing to increase sales and attract qualified leads.

This is because Google crawlers are always checking our content to determine if it is relevant for users, in addition to taking into account many factors such as the use of keywords, structure or format of the articles published in our website.

All this, together with other more advanced aspects, such as the use of longtails, among other factors that we will understand later, is fundamental for writing a relevant article.

Today we will describe what a perfect article is when we are talking about SEO and what are the mistakes we should avoid making when we are writing the content of our site.

I will also give you some tips that will be useful when creating the content of your page and that will help you take your content marketing strategy to the next level.

How to start planning your perfect article?

A perfect article should start with a unique title and an optimized URL

This seems obvious, but what is the first thing Google will see when checking your article? The search engines will see the title, the URL, and also the subtitles that you use, that is, the H2, H3 tags.

We could say that these are your business cards, and you should make sure they were used correctly if you want to create the perfect content.

This is not only important to your SEO strategy, Your article’s title is key to attracting visitors to your site. It is the first thing they will see, and it will be vital to convince them to click and access the page.

The H2 and H3 tags are the ones that help you structure your article, making it easy to understanding and reading the text so your visitors will quickly find the information they are looking for.

The URL, on the other hand, is not that important to visitors, but it is vital for Google; even so, it is important that you understand how to choose it.

Start taking notes!

·  7 tips for creating the perfect article for your personal or corporate blog

1. Title, what should we consider when choosing it?

First, you need to know that the title is a kind of cover letter that will introduce readers to your perfect article, it should explain as concisely as possible the theme of your article, what you are going to talk about and more subtly, insinuate to Google that your article will offer relevant information to your visitors.

It sounds complicated, but you’ll find that, with the right words, you can get the results you want to achieve.

For example, if you want to write an article on “motorcycling,” you could use several titles, depending on what you want to talk about on your post.

If your article is about motorcycles in general, you can choose a title similar to the following ones:

“Everything you should know about motorcycles, which is the best kind of bikes, how to choose my first bike.”

If we break the title, we will realize that it covers many relevant points on motorcycles, and of course, this will also be relevant to Google.

1. “All About Motorcycles” will tell Google that your article covers a lot of information on motorcycles.
2. “Types of bikes.” This post would offer more specific information to Google users looking for information about bikes, which informs Google that the content is relevant for visitors looking for information on this topic.
3. “How to choose my first bike” would offer extra content for users who would like to buy their first bike and need general information about the options available and the main advantages of each one of them.

If possible, the title of the article should reflect the content that the reader will find. In addition to that, it would be better to use a keyword and a longtail; that would be critical to your SEO  strategy.

1. URL or “Slug” of a perfect article. Should we leave it by default or change it?

If you work with WordPress or the vast majority of content managers being used today, you have certainly heard that the URL or “Slug” of the page should be as similar as possible to the title of the content.

Many people believe that we should do this for our SEO strategy, but is this true?

The truth is that it is not right. Yes, it is always recommended to use the keyword in the URL, but it is not mandatory to include the full title.

There are also cases where some people decide to remove some words that don’t relate to the keyword that they want to promote because these words are used to give semantic meaning to the URL.

These words are known as “stop words” and are irrelevant, so many SEO experts recommend removing them.

Whether you decide to remove stop words or prefer to leave them, the main point is to include your keyword in the URL when possible.

I’ll give you some examples:

If you are writing a very generic article, as in the previous case, the keyword you will rank for is likely very competitive, since many other websites have published content using it. In this situation, the best thing is to simplify, using a short URL with the primary keyword.

For example:

“http://www.yourdomain.com/all-about-bikes”

Now if your goal is to work with a smaller sector of your main keyword, you can use a longtail, of course, this will depend on the content of your article and the keyword that you want to promote.

An example could be:

“http://www.yourdomain.com/types-of-mottos”

2. Subtitles, what would we do without them?

Do you want to write the perfect article? If so, you should use subtitles, or tags H2, H3, etc.

These tags are vital, not just for your SEO strategy, but also for your readers. Never make the mistake of thinking that you should only worry about ranking your content; if your readers are happy with your pages, Google will be even more so.

And as a result, your site will be considered more relevant than pages with content similar to yours. After all, we all know that Google “thinks” about users above everything else.

It is essential to use H2 and H3 tags if you want to write the perfect article because when your content is structured on clear topics, your visitors can more quickly find the information they are looking for without having to read the whole text.

Another advantage of using these tags is that they will help to highlight your main topics. Search engines use these tags to determine the relevancy of pages for each keyword.

When creating these tags or subtitles, you should do your best to use the primary or secondary keyword, as long as you do that correctly.

What do I mean by that?

You should use keywords naturally. You can’t change the sentence to include the keyword, because this could change the meaning of the phrase.

In short, if you want to create the perfect article, never use disconnected keywords. However, you should include keywords in the H2 and H3 tags.

As for the number of H2 and H3 tags you should use, the truth is that there isn’t a fixed number, you could include only a few or hundreds of tags.

Everything will depend on the type of content you are creating, the size of your text, and how you want to structure it.

The important thing is that your article can’t have more than a thousand words with a single subtitle, because reading will not only be irritating, but you will be confused when writing it.

3. A perfect article needs a catchy introduction

We have explained earlier about the importance of the title of your article, as that will help you to attract readers organically, but it is not the part of the article that will help to retain them; you’ll need to write an interesting introduction to get them hooked.

A perfect article has to have the correct introduction. But how do we know what we have to do to create the right presentation for my text?

If you want to write the introduction for a perfect article, you should follow at least the following criteria:

►  1. Show concern for your readers

An introduction has to express possible doubts, concerns or problems that visitors may have; at the same time, you should show them that you have the perfect solution and that you could help them.

This is the best way to get them to stay on your page and not leave your site to search elsewhere for the information that you promised to give them in the article they are reading.

If you are creating an article about homemade medicine, you can start by making a brief mention of the disease, the main symptoms, and demonstrating that this medicine could help cure it.

After all, your readers are on your site because they are looking for a “solution” to their “problems.”

This is one of the best ways to build engagement from the first paragraphs and convince your visitors to keep reading your article.

►  2. Mention your main keyword a few times and a few longtails

It is the introduction of your post, and you don’t need to just summarise your content, but you should also include your primary keyword. If possible, you should add the main keyword in the first paragraph of your text.

It is advisable that throughout the introduction, you use your keyword once or twice, and if possible, also a few longtails.

Of course, remember that you shouldn’t include the same keywords several times, because if you saturate your introduction with your keyword, that won’t look natural and Google doesn’t like that kind of behavior.

Learning how to include keywords naturally is fundamental, because when this is not done correctly, search engines will distrust your content, and that could damage your SEO strategy.

3.It should be a brief reflection of the main topic to create expectations in your readers

A good introduction briefly and concisely addresses the main topic of your article.

Going back to the example of a homemade medicine, in the introduction you also can briefly mention some of the aspects that you will discuss about the remedy, or give a brief description of its main advantages.

The important thing is that the introduction should encourage visitors to keep reading your text because they are eager to discover what you can offer them.

If you have considered the points as mentioned earlier when creating the intro, congratulations, you’re on the right path.

As a final recommendation, you should avoid placing external links in the introduction of the post, so as not to lose visitors too early. If you have to add links, it would be better to direct visitors to other pages with relevant content on your site.

If you include links, the content of the other article should be related to the text that the user has accessed. This is important to keep the reader on your site, but also for your link building strategy.

4. Don’t just use your primary keyword; you should also include derived keywords and synonyms

Reading the same term over and over again can become tiring, you certainly learned in school that you shouldn’t repeat words constantly. To avoid repeating yourself, you will have to take advantage of the synonyms to write more readable texts.

Avoid using the same terms many times in a row; It doesn’t matter how much you would like to highlight a concept, repeating a keyword constantly will not improve the content, it will only affect the quality of your writing.

It is vital to vary the words to improve your SEO strategy because not all readers look for the same information in the same way. Therefore, the more variations of phrases you use in your texts, the easier it will be for users to find your content.

You need to take advantage of their behavior to attract traffic from different keywords. As an example, two people could look for information related to motorcycles, but while an user search for “cheap bikes,” another person could search for “bikes for beginners.” Both searches are related to bikes, but the results will be different depending on how users are looking for the same information.

If you are editing a relevant article, you should include the primary keyword and several secondary terms.

You will find many tools that will help you create lists of related keywords automatically on the Internet. This will help you save hours of research and open up a range of possibilities when you need to write a new article.

You can also use synonyms and secondary keywords in the subtitles.

★   Tip: Be careful about keyword density

It doesn’t matter if it’s the main keyword or the derivative keywords; you should always review the keyword density. What do we mean by this?

What you should avoid is to supersaturate your article with your keyword. Adding the primary or secondary keyword 30 times in a 400 words article is a mistake.

When Google realizes that the keyword density reaches a certain percentage, it automatically considers that the article is not so relevant to users and that the webmaster is only interested in using keywords to direct traffic to the site.

Doing that would affect your SEO strategy as Google would prefer to offer more relevant content to users who searched for that keyword.

Never use your keywords too many times.

5. Organize your content

You should organize your content to facilitate understanding of the text. Do you remember that we talked about the use of H2 and H3 tags?

Well, use them to organize your content in different sections. Of course, although every H2 and H3 tag should separate your content, the whole article should be cohesive, and you need to be careful to not mix the information.

By this, we mean that your article can’t start with a tag H2 on the history of bikes and another H2 tag related to another subject without first making a connection between the two topics.

If you’re going to do that, your text needs to make sense.

An example of a logical order of subtitles, in this case, could be the following:

All about motorcycles (title)> History of motorcycles (H2)> Types of motorcycles (H2)> Bikes for beginners (H3)

This would be a simple example of how to connect the history of motorcycles with bikes for beginners.

There must always be a connection between subtitles, whether direct or indirect; otherwise, your article would not make sense, and your readers would have trouble understanding what you are trying to explain.

6. Tips for writing your article

Continuing to talk about the content of your article, you should not only format it correctly, but you should also add relevant information and show Google that your purpose is to help or inform users about a particular topic and that your content adds value to the niche in which you are working.

Basically, we want to give reasons for Google to take us into account and rank the page faster.

To do that, I’ll give you some tips you should consider before you start writing your articles.

●    Use data and statistics.

Whenever possible, you should use data and statistics to illustrate and back up the information you are adding to the text.

This will not only help you publish quality content, but users will rely more on your content when you can prove what you’re saying with real facts.

It’s not something you have to do, but believe me when I say that this adds a lot of value to your content and will help you stand out in your niche.

●    Use audio-visual resources

Nowadays you can find a multitude of audiovisual resources that you can include in your articles.

Adding audiovisual content will not only help you explain your content, but it will also improve your domain reputation, as search engines consider and value this type of content.

Also, it doesn’t cost anything, there are many ways to add all kinds of audiovisual content in your articles; and better yet, you can use YouTube on your site to embed videos in your texts.

Add an extra touch to your articles.

●    Use high-quality images

You should never use low-quality images on your site. Poor quality images are not pleasing to the eye, and this will affect your text.

This is why you should make sure that the images you use are of the best possible quality.

On the other hand, I recommend that you use images that are not protected by copyright unless you have paid for the use of the photographs. If you are not allowed to use these images, you are violating  the property of other people or companies, and this could bring you serious problems.

This doesn’t always happen, but the possibility exists. Another option would be to slightly modify the images you plan to use so that it is not so obvious that you are using the file without permission, or at least so that Google would not notice it so easily. However, it is always important to think carefully about this kind of strategy.

● Try to write texts using a friendlier language.

Many writers use a very formal technical language to try to demonstrate that they know what they are talking about. That’s good, yes, but it’s still better when you speak to your readers as if they were your friends.

This will help you gain points with your community and will also help when users are reading your texts. Don’t be afraid of using simple expressions or adding a more personal touch to the topics; this will create engagement with your visitors, increasing the time spent on your site.

● Quality is more important than quantity

When writing the content of your perfect article, you need to pay more attention to the quality of the text than to the number of words you already typed.

With that, we specifically want to say that it is better to write a short article with relevant content than a long text, but with inconsistent, confusing or incorrect information.

Google wants more quality and relevant content than long, but worthless articles.

7. Always post original content, you should not plagiarize other sites

If you want to create content that visitors will want to read, you should write original articles, using your own words and not just texts copied from other pages. After all, if the content was published  first on another site, why should visitors stay on your site when they can find the original text elsewhere?

Create unique content with added value and a personal touch; don’t paraphrase other articles or translate posts published on other websites; this could have severe consequences for your SEO strategy. If you want to write the perfect piece, you can’t plagiarize other pages.

You can rely on free or paid tools to detect plagiarism like check-plagiarism or editpad and help you ensure that the content you are creating is original and doesn’t have similar sentences or paragraphs published on other websites.

●    Apply a link building strategy on your articles

You can work with link building in your SEO strategy Off-Page and SEO On-Page, either in your articles or on your static pages.

No matter if you will work with Backlinks or Interlinking, the important thing is to structure your content to naturally include URLs in your text.

● You need a conclusion that will motivate your readers to participate.

There are many ways to end an article; it will depend on the type of content you are publishing; however, it is advisable to always end with a conclusion that will motivate your readers to participate by either commenting or sharing your post with their friends.

This is not only a way to keep visitors engaged, but also to optimize your SEO strategy, because these interactions show to Google that your content was useful to them.

Conclusions

Now that you know what aspects you should consider for writing the perfect post, what are you waiting for to start?

It’s time to review your articles and optimize your content both for your readers and to help you improve your SEO strategy.

If you have any questions, you can leave a comment and we’ll try to help you with more recommendations.