10 Tips For Formatting Your Blog Posts

We are super excited to share this guest post from Gina Caro at Gypsy Soul today.   We reached out to Gina specifically to see if she could share some of her insight on formatting blog posts because we've had fantastic feedback from clients about the work she has done for us! 


Gina Caro is an award-winning blogger, freelance writer & editor for Mumsnet Devon. She currently lives in Devon with her partner, two kids and a crazy dog.

She runs two blogs Gypsy Soul. A bohemian lifestyle and simple living blog & Water Gypsy A travel, lifestyle & family blog.


Over to Gina! 

There is no doubt that running your own blog takes a lot of time and effort. To start with you need to think of ideas for content. Then there's the writing and sometimes researching involved for the post.

The next step is to get people to actually read it. One thing that can make or break whether a person sticks around to read your blog is how you format your post.

Here are 10 tips for formatting your blog post.

Use Subheadings

Subheadings are great for breaking up your post into more manageable chunks. People these days are short on time, they want information fast. If they're confronted with a big block of text they are likely to skip your post for someone else's.

Use your subheadings to break up your writing. Readers should be able to to get an idea of what your post includes by your sub headings.

As a general rule headings work in the following way...

• Heading 1 (H1) - post or page title
• Heading 2 (H2) - sub headings and sub-subheadings
• Heading 3 (H3) - sub headings and sub-subheadings
• HEADING 4 (H4) - your blogs name, related widgets
• HEADING 5 (H5) - same as above and sidebars
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Adding your keywords into subheadings will also help with your SEO. For further help with SEO, I'd recommend installing the YoastSEO plugin.

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Using Bullet Points & Numbered Lists

Another good way to break up your text is by using bullet points and number list. These are great for skim readers as they can take in the information in short bursts.

Length of Paragraphs

It's good practice to keep your sentences short. Use the white space to your advantage. If you struggle with this then try the Hemingway App. It's free to download and highlights where your sentences are hard to read.

Alignment of Text 

How you present your text is also very important. You should always align your text to the left or justify it.

Font Style & Colour

​The font style should be easy to read and not too small. It's best to avoid script fonts as these can be difficult to read.

The font colour is another important factor to consider. The most common set up is black text on a white background. If you want to add some colour to your text you can always colour your sub headings.

Font Size

The size of your font is also an important factor in formatting your post. If the font is too small some readers may not be able to see it.

Highlight Important Text in BoldIf you have a particular point or message then highlighting text in bold makes it stand out from the rest.

Grammar

To avoid the grammar police make sure your spellings and punctuation are correct. There are various apps and programs that can help you with this. One that is particularly good is Grammarly.

Keep Columns Short

Some blog themes have wide content columns. This can put readers off. To rectify this either choose a new blog theme or adjust your column width. Generally, 80 characters or less is ideal.

Images

It's good practice to include images within your blog posts. Not only does it help to break up text but it adds a visual element to your post.

All your images should be good quality and as big as possible for your blog theme. Try to have at least one image per post.

It's always best to use your own images or you can source royalty free images online. Check out sites like Pixabay and Unsplash for this.

Hopefully, you have found this post useful. If it seems like a lot to remember then why not create a tick list. Use if for every post you write and tick each section as you complete it.

Here's a summary for you...
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1. Use sub headings
2. Use bullet points and numbered lists
3. Check length of paragraphs
4. Align your text
5. Font style & colour
6. Font size
7. Highlight important text in bold
8. Check your grammar
9. Short columns
10. Use images​

As usual we'd love to know your thoughts! Have you got any tips about formatting blog posts to add?

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This post was proofread by Grammarly*

* This symbol indicates an affiliate link, we only recommend products & services that we personally use ourselves & deem to be of high value.

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