Writing for the Web was a course I took while in graduate school. The course’s core idea was that writing content for the internet is very different from writing for print. Although I cannot distill 18 weeks worth of coursework into one blog article, I can give some tips on formatting blog posts for readers. These tips will make it easier for both your readers and search engines to find you.

What is the importance of blog post formatting?

People have very short attention spans in today’s world. Every day , there is so much content coming at us from every direction . It would be impossible for us to consume all of it. We scan quickly to determine if the article is worth reading, watching the video, or listening to the podcast.

The format of blog posts should be easy to read and allow readers to quickly understand the content. They will then (hopefully!) decide to read the entire post. This is what formatting for readers is all a about. It doesn’t really matter how good your content is. It doesn’t matter how great your content is.

Formatting is an important part on-page SEO (search engines optimization). It’s also one of the most simple SEO techniques to master, so it’s worth paying attention to. Formatting links your SEO strategy with your content market strategy together so that you can get twice as much impact for the same work.

How to format your blog posts for readers

Your blog posts should be formatted for readers. Although search engines are important, it doesn’t mean that people will stay on your site to read your posts.

It should be easy to scan the content

You want your readers to stay engaged with the content. Make it easy for them to scan it. Your reader will be able to quickly scan your post and decide if she wants more. Headings and white spaces break up the text. This includes your headline, images, and other elements.

Use subheadings to guide your reader through the article

Subheadings make your post more manageable and help it flow. Skimmers can scroll through the post to find the parts they are interested in.

Divide up text blocks into lists

Divide tips, ideas, and so on. into lists. Depending on the context, you can use numbers or bullets. Numbers are best if the series must be in a particular order. If not, bullets will work.

These are the lists:

• Easy to understand
• Quick scan
• Your content can be easily consumed by readers.

Your posts will be easier to understand if you use short paragraphs

Online reading is more difficult on the eyes than reading a newspaper or paper book. Our attention spans have diminished dramatically as we consume so much content every day.

Write short paragraphs to make it easier for people to read your posts. This isn’t high school or college where you write long paragraphs to impress your teacher. An online text should contain no more than two to three sentences per page. It is a rule that you should not have more than five lines per paragraph.

To emphasize a point or keep things interesting, you can also add a single sentence paragraph.

Bold is a great way to highlight important concepts

Highlight the most important concepts and keywords in your post with bolding. Bolding tells readers that you are highlighting an important point.

This technique is best used sparingly, or it will lose its effectiveness.

Use graphics to break up your text

Images can be used as a way to break up long blocks of text and make your posts more appealing for readers. You can be creative if your topic isn’t suitable for photos. If you’re writing technical posts, screen shots are an option. Click To Tweet graphics can be used to break up text.

What fonts and colors should you use? Simpler is better

Use fonts that are easy-to-read. You can save the fancy calligraphy fonts and use them sparingly in your social media graphics. They are beautiful, but they can be difficult to read in large blocks of text. Remember that larger fonts are better.

Limit the amount of text color. People prefer to read dark gray text with a white background. To highlight a small portion of text, use your brand colors in the same way as you would with bold.

How to format blog posts in search engines

Let’s now talk about how to format your post for search engines.

To improve SEO, use heading tags with subheadings

We discussed subheadings as a way to increase readability. Heading tags, also known as H tags, are code that tells search engines that subheadings are used and lets them know these words are important.

Highlight the text, then click on the drop-down menu arrow in Paragraph to format your subheadings in WordPress. Next, choose the type of heading you wish to use. The title of your blog post should use Heading 1 (H1), while the other headings will be used to indicate subheadings at different levels within the post.

Consider H tags your outline for your post.

You can think of the subheadings of the H tags as the outline for your post if you don’t know which one to use. Heading 2 (H2), followed by Headings 3 (H3) and Heading 4 (H4) is the most important subheading.

Here’s an example of a blog post with H tags for each item.

1. What is the importance of blog post formatting? (H2)
2. How to format your blog posts for readers (H2)
   1. It should be easy to scan the content (H3)
      1. Use subheadings to guide your reader through your post (H4)
      2. Divide text blocks into lists (H4)
   2. Your posts will be easier to read if you use short paragraphs (H3)

Make your keywords bold

As a visual clue to readers, we discussed bold. Search engines also use the code for bold as a clue. Make bold the first time that you have used your main keyword. This should be within your first paragraph. Search engines will scan the code to determine that this text is important.

Your images can be given alt text that is keyword rich

Add text to the “alttext” field when you upload images to your blog platform. The “alt text” field should include keywords and description of the image. This will aid in search engine ranking, just like other formatting tips and tags.

Bonus tip: Adding keyword-rich alt text to your images is an important step towards optimizing them for Pinterest.

In the body of your post, include your keywords

Finally, go through your post looking for keywords. Are they repeated in your post? You need to find the right balance. Search engines will not tolerate keyword stuffing if you do it too often. Be sure to include your keyword variations and keyphrase a few times. These are some places you can include your keyword:

• The title of the article
• The url
• High up on the page, idealerweise in the first paragraph
• In one of the H2 subheadings
• Strategically placed throughout the body