How to Research Your Blog Post and Create Helpful Content That Converts

If you want to create blog posts that convert, don`t make assumptions. Target topics that align with people`s search queries and solve their intent.

Solving your audience`s intent builds reliability and makes it easy to convince people to act.

To know people`s needs and create helpful content, you must know how to research your blog post.

Not only does that increase the potential of making sales, but also beats writer`s block and speeds up your writing process.

The good thing is blog post research isn`t complicated,  and this content shows how to do it.

Know Your Blog Content Goals

Knowing your content goals helps create content that not only solves your audience`s problems but also enables you to achieve your marketing objectives.

Focusing your blog post on irrelevant goals drives traffic that doesn`t convert.

To achieve your objectives, align your blog post with your marketing goals.

If your goals are increasing sales, create commercial content, and if you want to increase traffic or spread brand awareness, write informative content.

Commercial content is focused on enticing people to make purchases, and it involves creating reviews, comparisons, product recommendations, etc.

Conversely, informative blog posts help people learn about a particular topic rather than directly persuading them to make purchases. This includes content like tutorials, case studies, how-to guides, etc.

Identify Your Audience`s Search Intent

People have a purpose for making searches on the internet, and to achieve your marketing goals, you must align your blog post with the readers' search intent. 

The audience`s search intent is categorized into

Informative search intent

If people want educative content, they make informative searches. This involves using words like, what, why, when, where, and how.

However, sometimes one may not type these words, but for your content to appear in this search intent, it must be in an informative context.

Examples are the titles

• How to research a blog post
• Steps to researching a blog post

All of these titles answer the question of how to do something even though one includes the word how and the other doesn`t.

Commercial search intent

This intent is made when one has the intention of buying in the future.

It involves people checking product reviews or comparisons to see how helpful the products are before deciding to buy.

For commercial search intent, people use keywords like the best products, product reviews, product A vs. B, etc.

For your blog post to suit such intent, you should use the appropriate keywords.

Transactional search intent

People who have decided to buy and are looking for where to make the purchases use transactional intent. This involves using keywords like buy, purchase, affordable, etc.

This search intent focuses on enticing people to make purchases.

To optimize your content or this intent, use the appropriate keywords, which can mean creating content with titles like

• Affordable Mercedes Benz for Sale
• Cheap Spacious Beach Houses in California

To identify the audience`s intent, research keywords to know what people type when searching for relevant content.

That`s because even though you might be experienced in your topic, if you guess what people search for, you might use the wrong keywords and create content that doesn`t drive traffic.

To do keyword research, brainstorm the keywords related to your topic and brand goals.

For instance, if you want to create content to increase sales to your t-shirt business, think of what you may type when looking for a t-shirt. That can result in keywords like

• Affordable t-shirts
• Cheap men`s t-shirts
• Women`s t-shirts for sale

You can also do Google auto-suggest/autocomplete to see more results. To do that, type a keyword in the search engines, and then put a space and you will get automatic prefixes. Those are results from recent search queries.

See what you can get when you auto-suggest the keyword affordable t-shirts.

Then take the keywords you get and put them in keyword research tools such as Ahrefs to get more suggestions, monthly search volume, and difficulty.

That will enable you to target high-volume and low-difficulty keywords, which increases rank and drives more traffic.

Here is what you can find for the keyword t-shirts for sale.

After getting the appropriate keywords, incorporate them in the title to enable search engines to understand your content and rank it.

Here is content that covers more about how to identify your audience`s intent and create content that drives income.

Research Your Blog Post Body Content

Image by Andrea Piacquadio: Pexels

No matter whether your title aligns with your audience`s search intent, if the content body doesn`t answer the topic, you will lose readers.

You should, therefore, research your blog post title to know what you need to cover and satisfy your readers.

That involves doing primary and secondary research.

Primary Research

Primary research entails finding information from first-hand sources rather than from existing resources.

You can do primary research by interviewing industry experts. For instance, if you are a digital marketer, you interview people like Neil Patel or Brian Dean.

Such people have vast experience in the industry and their insights can help you understand people`s needs.

Besides, you can conduct customer surveys. This will help you know people`s pain points and create content to solve them.

You can also join relevant social media groups on platforms like Reddit, Facebook, and LinkedIn and ask questions related to your topic.

People will give you their opinions according to their experiences, which you can gauge and apply to your content.

Primary research enables you to create original content, outdo your competitors, and drive more traffic.

Secondary Research

Secondary research implies using pre-existing resources to find information.

That includes researching relevant websites and analyzing their blog content.

To find such websites, type and search for your content topic on the internet and examine the relevant ranking results.

However, not all the ranking blog posts align with your content. You should choose the ones that answer the topic in your desired context.

An example is if you are researching content about social media marketing. You wouldn`t analyze social media marketing tips content, even if it ranks.

That`s because such content won`t provide you with sufficient information. You should go for content like social media marketing guides, how to create a social media marketing strategy, etc. Such content provides an in-depth explanation and will be appropriate for your research.

Besides, you can watch relevant YouTube videos.

The best thing about videos is that you will see in action, how the process you are searching for is carried out.

Choose Pillar and Cluster Topics

A pillar topic is your content`s main topic, and the clusters are the subtopics that support it.

For example, if your main topic is freelance writing, the clusters would be

• Choose a niche
• Create a website
• Create sample
• Start pitching

Since you have already researched your blog post`s topic, you can now find the clusters.

If you are experienced in the topic, you can use your knowledge to find subtopics to back up your content.

Alternatively, you can do competitor research, which entails searching for relevant content on the internet and analyzing their headings.

You will find relevant ones that you can tweak and use in your blog post.

You can also use content gap tools such as The Hoth.

To use this tool, type and search your keyword on the internet. Then copy the ranking content URLs and paste them into the tool.

You will find the subheadings used, monthly search volume, and difficulty so you can pick the ones that can rank and drive traffic.

Social media is also a better way to find topic clusters.

All you need is to head over to relevant social media groups and ask for help to find clusters on your particular topic. People will offer their suggestions. Pick the ones that answer your audience`s intent and use them in your blog post.

Research Your Blog Post Format

Image by Andrea Piacquadio: Pexels

Your blog post topic decides its format. A topic about email marketing tips suggests that the content is a listicle. And if you want to compare products, you will need to create a product comparison.

However, taking insights from the ranking content enables you to create content with a high chance of ranking.

An example is when you want to create an email marketing guide. Research the keyword email marketing guide and check the ranking blog post formats.

If most blog posts rank for the keyword email marketing tips, then it means that`s what people search for the most. Creating yours in that format can help you increase your rank and drive traffic.

Outline Your Blog Post

Organizing your content before writing speeds up your writing process. It also enables you to produce content that aligns with your audience`s intent and helps you achieve your brand goals.

You can achieve that if you create a content outline.

Therefore, after researching your blog post, create a draft introduction that hooks people to keep reading.

To create an intriguing introduction, cover the audience`s pain points, and show people how your content can solve them.

This content explains more about how to create intriguing introductions.

Then depending on your content format, outline your clusters in the required order. You may be required to create a sequential or no-sequential outline.

For example, if you are creating a guide on how to start freelance writing, you will have to arrange your subheadings sequentially so people easily understand. But content like tips to becoming a freelance writer wouldn`t require listing sequential clusters.

However, don`t create label-like subheadings. For instance, if your content is about how to lose weight and the subheadings are

• Eat well
• Run
• Stay positive

That doesn`t give reasons for one to read your content.

To entice people to read, create valuable subheadings that show what readers can learn. That`s how you will entice them to keep reading your content.

That can mean using action verbs to create topic clusters like

• Balance your diet
• Take exercises
• Find social support

Learn how to create attention-grabbing subheadings here.

After listing your subheadings, you will need to find points to back them up. That requires using your results found in the primary and secondary research.

Using your research, include content that answers your headings.

That requires adding expert quotes and customer testimonies to make your blog post credible. Also, include links to your sources so your readers can verify your assertions. That builds authority and increases reliability.

Later, create a conclusion.

The conclusion is a section to summarize and iterate your blog post content.

Your conclusion will be effective if you make it brief and include a call to action to persuade people to act and help you achieve your content goals, whether it`s

• Sharing your content to increase traffic and brand awareness
• Making purchases to increase sales
• Subscribing to your email list to increase your email subscribers

Moreover, don`t include new information in your conclusion. That`s because you will need to expound more about it and make it too long. That bores readers and makes them ignore your content.

See how to create a content outline and achieve your content goals here.

Start Creating Your Blog Post

When readers are satisfied, it`s easy to entice them to perform your calls to action. That is if you create content that solves their search intent.

Knowing how to research your blog post before you write helps in identifying the audiences` needs and organizing content that satisfies them.

That`s by understanding your content goals, identifying your audience`s search intent, and using the right keywords to create helpful content.

That will enable you to rank, drive quality traffic, and increase conversions.

Would you share this content and help others learn how to research their blog posts and drive conversions?