Blog knowledge - The importance of titles

In the next of my series of posts about the knowledge I've acquired during the time I've been writing Digital Signals; this post is all about the value of good post/article titles.

The title is usually the first thing I start to compose as I save ideas for future posts, preserving what thoughts I have at the time around an idea. The title will often evolve as the post is written.

Titles are frequently the URL in common blog publishing platforms and are often what also appear in the h1 tags at the top of your posts.

While naming them something amusing might appeal to you, ensuring that they are relevant to the content is essential for others to find them, either by simply browsing their feed reader lists or via Google search result pages (SERP's).

My approach has gradually shifted towards giving more time to writing my blog titles as my appreciation of their value increases.

It's obvious when you think about it, but when you first start writing a blog you might be tempted to write witty or abstract titles; when in fact when you first start writing a blog is the very time when you should avoid doing this.

I only have to look at the search results that hit Digital Signals to understand the significance of titles and their ability to attract traffic to the blog.

With this is mind, when you're thinking about your titles try and put yourself in the shoes of someone searching for what you're about to write about. Then sit down and think about which aspect of the search query is appropriate to be incorporated into the title of your post.

At the same time, try and make your titles capture the imagination of possible readers browsing through SERP's. So instead of "Google's financial figures 2009", perhaps try "Google releases new jaw dropping financial figures for 2009".

All your keywords are in the title and it's a little more intriguing than the original, hopefully tempting someone to click through and find out what's so jaw dropping about the figures.

You can always tempt people further to your posts with different promotional links to your posts when encouraging people to drop in from the likes of Twitter.

Taking the above example of an exciting post about Google's financial figures you could use a tweet like "Surely Google can't be making that much profit?" or "Did you know Google's profit is now larger than a small European country's GDP?". Hopefully tempting people to investigate further without affecting your real title.

Although in my mind the benefits of promoting blog content on the likes of Twitter is still below that of having a good RSS readerships or a regular search engine hits to a specific post.

From an SEO perspective (optimising your site for search engines), search engines generally give a decreasing value to page elements, starting from the title down through the header tags (H1, H2, H3 etc) down to paragraph and alt tags.

This places a far greater importance on you getting these aspects of your content relevant with not only the specific content that you are about to publish, but also any other content/keyword driven focusses you may have on your site as a whole.

But even if you disregard all of these technical factors of attracting people to your site using search engine ranking, your title is the first content visitors get to read on your site.

The first impression you give people of the content on your site is defined by the title. Taking the time to write something that is appropriate is well worth the time.

Considering all of these factors, writing titles for a post or article is something you should spend the time perfecting, it will pay off.


Related reading:

Blog knowledge - Stockpiling blog post ideas - Digital Signals http://www.digital-constructions.com/blog/2009/05/blog-knowledge-stockpiling-blog-post.html

Blog knowledge - The power of internal links - Digital Signals http://www.digital-constructions.com/blog/2009/04/blog-knowledge-power-of-internal-link.html

Food for better blogging - Digital Signals http://www.digital-constructions.com/blog/2009/02/food-for-better-blogging.html

9 Great blogs I enjoy reading and find inspirational - Digital Signals http://www.digital-constructions.com/blog/2009/04/9-great-blogs-i-enjoy-reading-find.html

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Blog knowledge - Stockpiling blog post ideas

This has come at an appropraite time for Digital Signals; I was wondering what to blog about this week and after reviewing the list of draft posts I have lined up, I decided instead to write something that was related to this very subject.

This is now going to be the second of my blog knowledge posts that I've written. This one is going to be focussed on stockpiling/recording ideas when they occur.

Writing and maintaining a blog with good content is a commitment. There will be days were either your energies are not focussed on your blog or you simply can't seem to find what you want to write about.

I find ideas for what I'm going to write about come in fits and bursts.

Obviously there will be posts you may write that might be initiated by industry news or events, these will generally occur independently of any need for you to develop ideas.

But the majority of your blog, unless you are writing an industry "news" blog, should come from content that has taken some time to formulate. From ideas that may have been brewing for a while or trends that you've been watching develop.

They might not take you that long to write, as often posts come from ideas that have been compiling in your mind for a number of weeks, but sometimes it's getting the initial idea down as a post when it occurs, then seeing how it could take shape as blog content later.

I currently use blogger to write Digital Signals. I'm working on a new site with some colleagues that will be based on WordPress, but whatever platform/site you use, you should have some facility for saving draft content.

I will often have upwards of 15 blog posts waiting for me to finish at any one time. These are ideas that I've conceived over a period of time. Most make it to publishing at some point in the future, others get pulled into other posts and some get redeveloped into new ideas.

All of them have helped me though when devising new content for Digital Signals, either by generating new ideas or by providing the platform for a post that just needs developing.

But often I find getting the idea down somewhere initially is one of the most important tasks I do in this process. The copy that sees that idea develop from the initial seed can take sometime to mature, but without the idea in the first place that process won't begin.

Provide yourself with the tools to record these ideas as they occur. You might not always have access to your blogging platform, so you may need to record initial ideas via some other method.

I still haven't managed to acquire myself a laptop or equivalent since I wrote a similar post on Online personal development a few months back. So I make do with either brief notes on my old school Nokia 6300 or even, heaven forbid, write an idea down in my work book I usually carry with me.

Whichever method works for you best, just ensure that you can take note of an idea as it comes to mind, where ever you are at the time.

In a similar vein, if you can record any other supporting information to assist with the posts content, then carry the required tools to do that as well. The number of times I still kick myself for not having my camera with me.

It's not easy writing a blog, especially if you are the only contributor on a regular basis.

Make the process easier for yourself by improving the efficiency of your blog post writing.

• Record ideas when they happen,
• Write what you can at the time to increase the chances you have of recalling the original idea and ease the idea development
  
• Carry your tools, whatever they may be, with you
• Have a drafting facility to allow you develop ideas when you have the time
• Allow ideas to evolve as you think about the post more, you might want to change the focus
  
• Review old blog posts to see if you can expand an existing post

Not all ideas are suitable for sitting on, some need to go to press immediately. Others may take you a while to get the thoughts out of your head and on to the screen.

Either way, ideas are invaluable, record them as they happen and work out where you are going to go from there later.


Related reading:

Blog knowledge - The power of the internal link - Digital Signals http://www.digital-constructions.com/blog/2009/04/blog-knowledge-power-of-internal-link.html

The rewards of finding time - Online personal development - Digital Signals http://www.digital-constructions.com/blog/2008/11/rewards-of-finding-time.html

The perfect time to post - Digital Signals http://www.digital-constructions.com/blog/2009/02/perfect-time-to-post.html

Quality, not quantity - Digital Signals http://www.digital-constructions.com/blog/2009/02/quality-not-quantity.html

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