Blog Marketing Tips #1: How to Optimize Blog Post Titles
Monday, March 31st, 2008;
-- Andy Beal |
>>Need help with blog marketing? Hire Andy today! <<
How many times have you visited one of the many “professional” blog advice sites, and left with little more advice than the ubiquitous (and unhelpful) “build great content?”
If building a great blog was as simple as writing quality posts, we’d all be tied for number one on the Technorati Top 100 blog list. I’m not about to start my own ProBloggingPilgrim.com web site, but I did want to start sharing tips that I’ve personally found valuable when building the traffic to Marketing Pilgrim.
It’s possible that these tips have been shared before–perhaps they were lost among all of the “great content” on the web–but I’m pretty sure these will be fresh ideas. I initially thought I could fit half a dozen tips in a single blog post, but as I started writing, I realized that each tip easily fills a single post. So instead, I’ll start with Tip #1 and see what you think. Leave a comment if you’d like to see more tips in the future.
Tip 1: Your Blog Post Titles Have Two Audiences
You’ve no doubt read that you need to make your blog post titles “search engine friendly,” but doing so often kills the creativity and initial appeal of your writing. Instead of trying to appeal to your loyal readers and Google at the outset, approach the two difference audiences in separate stages.
Stage One - Your initial blog readers
Your initial audience is likely going to be those that have already subscribed to your blog’s RSS feed–or happen to check your blog every day. They want to be thrilled, excited, and given a reason to not only read your post, but also share and link to it.
When you first publish your blog post, follow this advice:
- Make your post title interesting - it could be that you ask a question, share a scoop, or offer a cryptic title that peeks your reader’s curiosity. I’ll often use a blog title that sounds like a scandal/scoop, but is really just a question. For example, “Microsoft Buying Yahoo?” I ran that headline last year–before Microsoft made its bid. It generated a lot of traffic then and even more so now.
- Keep it short and sweet - if you make your initial post title too long, you run the risk that you’ll either confuse a reader or give them so much information, tthere’s no need to read the post itself. Back to my example, “Microsoft Buying Yahoo?” leaves a lot of unanswered questions that just beg the reader to click through to view the entire post. If I had used “Rumors that Microsoft May Buy Yahoo, but No Confirmation Yet,” how many of you would have clicked through to read the entire post? Not many.
- Appeal to keyword scanners - When you read posts in your RSS reader, do you sometimes scan the titles looking for keywords that you know will interest you? Apple, Google, Wii, and Blue-Ray are all examples of keywords that might appeal to your specific audience. This is not the same as keywords for SEO–that comes later–at this stage, you’re simply looking to include words that will make your post stand out to your readers. Use popular keywords in your post titles and your post will have a greater chance of standing out among all of the other posts in your reader’s RSS aggregator.
In stage one, your goal is to appeal to the initial readers that will likely view the post on the day that you publish it. But what happens after your post is relegated to the archives? It’s unlikely someone will spend hours just wondering through your archived posts. Instead, they’ll likely discover your “great content” via one of the search engines. OK, only one search engine: Google.
With this in mind, you need to massage your post’s title so that it can go to work for you in Google’s search results.
Stage Two - Your Google readers
That cryptic, enticing post title you used to attract your initial readers isn’t going to cut-it when it comes to attracting Google search engine users. Sure, you want your post title to entice a click from the SERP (search engine results page) but if your post is sitting on page 10–and not page 1–it doesn’t matter how engaging your post title. In stage two, you need to give your post title the Google-juice it needs to make the first SERP.
- Add keywords to your title - you should have already included a relevant keyword that appeals to the human “keyword scanners.” Now that it’s Googleblot scanning your post title, it’s time to pump-up your keyword count. Now, don’t go overboard and add half a dozen keywords to your post titles–you want the title to remain targeted and enticing–but you should look for opportunities to include additional keywords. Compare this before, and after post title. Before: “Ten Ways to Avoid a Google Reputation Management Nightmare.” After: “Ten Ways to Fix Your Google Reputation & Remove Negative Results.” Both are engaging, both convey the same meaning. Yet, the revised title removes keywords that are not likely to be Googled such as “avoid” and “nightmare,” while adding keywords that are searched often, such as “fix” and “remove negative results.”
- Change the word order - I always try to take into consideration my potential Google ranking, when writing my post titles. However, there are many times when I see my post sitting at #11 on Google, because the word order I used–while appealing to my initial audience–isn’t doing me any favors in the SERPs. So, like a good optimizer, I go back and change the word order so that the beneficial keywords are closer to the beginning of the title (which is where Google prefers to see them). Here’s a before: “26 Free Tools for Buzz Monitoring.” And after: “Buzz Monitoring: 26 Free Buzz Tracking Tools.” (Notice I also added the keyword “buzz tracking” to the title).
- Optimize your TITLE - When you first publish your blog posts, you’ll likely want your TITLE (aka title tag) to match your actual post title. Once you start focusing on your Google audience, it might make sense to tweak your page TITLE so that it’s even more optimized than your post title (side note: most blog software will simply match your page TITLE to your post title). If you’re using WordPress, consider installing the SEO Title Tag plugin to do just that! I don’t use it on Marketing Pilgrim, but on other blogs, I’ve found it a great way to further optimize my TITLE–which is what is displayed in Google’s SERP.
- Don’t play with slugs - I’ll write more on the topic of page “slugs” (aka permalinks) but I’d be negligent if I didn’t warn here that, while you should change your post title, changing the actual page slug is to be avoided.
I hope you’ll find the above tactics to be fruitful in your quest to increase both initial, and Google-referred, visitors to your blog. I’ve got plenty more tips I can share, so let me know what you think and if you’d like to read more blog promotion tips.
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March 31st, 2008 at 1:30 pm
This is why I have never kicked you out of my feed reader. You actually give advice that works. Thanks Andy.
Sorry for the sort comment, I am buried but I had to show my gratitude.
March 31st, 2008 at 1:50 pm
An interesting idea, but what about Google caching the old page? Just wondering if you had run any tests to determine the best interval between the original post and changing it for SEO purposes. Also, how long before the changes you’ve made, replace the cached version of the page? Thanks for the idea and I’m looking forward to more tips.
March 31st, 2008 at 1:56 pm
Excellent tip Andy and I appreciate the linear-ness of your thinking and writing. The before and afters are great as well. This is a great training example as well as blog post!
March 31st, 2008 at 2:09 pm
[…] You’ve no doubt read that you need to make your blog post titles “search engine friendly,” but doing so often kills the creativity and initial appeal of your writing. Instead of trying to appeal to your loyal readers and Google at the outset, approach the two difference audiences in separate stages. - MarketingPilgrim […]
March 31st, 2008 at 2:28 pm
This is great! I am looking forward to the next ones.
Thanks,
CK
March 31st, 2008 at 4:44 pm
@Landon - thanks for the confidence in me!
@Michael - just use the “cache:http://…” in Google to see when Google last cached the page.
@Roxanne - you doth flatter me with your kind words.
@CK - glad you like it. The more comments I get, the more I’ll know to write more tips.
March 31st, 2008 at 5:41 pm
Jumping up and down for joy and greedily begging for more. Thank you so much! After scouring the net searching for blog marketing tips, a honest to goodness real and usable tip arrives via Twitter. Thank you so much for gifting the clueless with info that can be used
March 31st, 2008 at 5:43 pm
@Karen - I’m glad it found you via Twitter. Maybe you could subscribe to our RSS feed, so you don’t miss the next tip.
March 31st, 2008 at 5:53 pm
[…] Beal today to kicked off his Blog Marketing Tips For Probloggers series with an interesting look at post […]
March 31st, 2008 at 6:17 pm
Andy, way ahead of you. You had me hello.
March 31st, 2008 at 10:53 pm
[…] Blog Marketing Tips Even the Professional Bloggers Won’t Share - Tip #1 - Andy Beal. […]
March 31st, 2008 at 11:47 pm
I have a question about the line “Don’t play with slugs… while you should change your post title, changing the actual page slug is to be avoided”
As long as the old URL has a 301 redirect to the new URL, changing the URL should be fine. You only need to worry about changing the URL if your blog software does not automatically redirect the old article URL, right?
March 31st, 2008 at 11:53 pm
Nice tips Andy! A lot of useful information to use. I look forward to reading your next tips
April 1st, 2008 at 3:36 am
Excellent tips! I´m looking forward for more information like this.(Post stumbled)
April 1st, 2008 at 9:05 am
@Mike - yes, if you 301 you should be fine, but not guaranteed. There’s more I want to discuss on slugs, so for now I’m simply advising not to change them.
April 1st, 2008 at 9:58 am
It is also useful to have long titles.
80 characters - begin with a keyword phrase followed by keywords.
Like this blog post “Blog Marketing Tips” as a phrase and “Professional” & “Bloggers” as the keywords in a title that is 71 characters long.
April 1st, 2008 at 6:09 pm
@Mike (and Andy)—I use a plugin that automatically 301 redirects a post if I change the slug. It can also handle URL canonicalization (well, the www issue, anyway) and other fun things: Redirection by Urban Giraffe.
April 1st, 2008 at 6:18 pm
Nice tip Andy, please keep them coming! While the tip itself may not have been new material, your perspective on the tip is new and well worth the read.
As Roxanne noted, the before and after examples were great. I’ve always been a fan of Brian Clark’s headline writing ability and love his posts that dissect headlines with clear examples, just as you have done.
Looking forward to more tips.
April 1st, 2008 at 6:22 pm
@Jordan - Cool. Our HubSpot blog software does that too, it is really convenient. I can change article titles and not worry about the URLs changing and not redirecting, etc.
April 1st, 2008 at 7:18 pm
@Jordan - I use the same plugin (actually Jordan, you referred me to it).
I’m not against redirecting slugs, changing them without careful thought about redirection is a problem. I’ll have another post that discusses slugs and redirects, etc.
April 1st, 2008 at 10:47 pm
Great post, looking forward to more about slugs.
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:20 am
Great post Andy. The two stage approach to title writing is something I know I need to do more so this is post serves as a reminder in addition to the great examples and explanations.
April 2nd, 2008 at 4:34 am
Urban Giraffe has another great plugin ( I prefer it over the SEO title tag plugin) which allow you to modify the tiles & descriptions of posts, categories,etc –> headspace plugin.
Dave
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:27 pm
Thanks for the very helpful advice. Keep em coming! (please haha)
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:50 pm
Andy thanks for the “Change the word order” tip! Great idea!
April 2nd, 2008 at 3:01 pm
Hi Andy,
Thanks a lot for the post. It was very informative. I hope you post the rest of your tips.
Thanks,
Don
April 2nd, 2008 at 7:14 pm
Nice to see some fresh ideas for blogging Andy, I’ll be following this series closely
April 3rd, 2008 at 3:38 am
Great Posts i found here. i will be thankful to you if you post some more information about INTERNET MARKETING STRATEGIES & TOOLS
Thanx
April 3rd, 2008 at 8:02 am
Practical tips that work. Will stay tuned for the rest of the series.
April 3rd, 2008 at 3:02 pm
[…] que aparece en las SERPS, entoncés podemos ir y modificarlo, para obtener un mejor ranking. Marketing Pilgrim, recomienda utilizar plugin seo title tags si se está utilizando wordpress, aunque yo por mi parte […]
April 4th, 2008 at 10:31 am
[…] forget to Optimize Your Blog Post Titles. Andy Beal gives a good rationale for doing so, and my recent post on Problogger on re-optimizing […]
April 4th, 2008 at 11:17 am
Thanks so much for the unique tips, I can’t wait for the rest of the series. I’ve been looking for a good breakdown on how to SEO my blog post titles for a while, this is a great help. Thanks!
Susan
April 6th, 2008 at 6:40 pm
Awesome post and often overlooked. Older blog posts are often forgotten but never should be.
April 7th, 2008 at 12:32 am
Wow that is great practical advice. It is good to keep tips like this in mind when writing every post. Thanks!
April 8th, 2008 at 4:07 pm
Just what I needed! I was actually wondering about this earlier as I posted. Love the examples you shared to show how the titles were optimized.
April 9th, 2008 at 7:33 am
Very useful information. Thanks, Andy!
April 14th, 2008 at 9:23 pm
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