Blogging 101: Types of Content

So you’re inspired to write, and ready to start blogging but what kind of content can you create? There’s so many different ways of writing blog posts that I thought I’d split them up into an easy to read list. Some people are better at one type of content than others, and that’s okay! Just practice when you can and aim to have a good mix, whilst focusing on what you’re good at.

Reviews

If you’ve been following my blog for a while you would know that I love a good review post. It’s pretty straight forward in that you just give your opinion on the product or service in question and make it as informative as possible. Reviews are for the readers to make an informed decision about whether or not they would also purchase the product.

Editorial Features

Features are the backbone articles of any website, magazine and blog. A feature is much more talkative and in depth than many other content mediums. Plus they can cover a wide array of topics.

Features can be education based and informative, or they can be opinion based and subjective to the writers views. Discussions and controversial content often fall under the features type of content and are used to draw readers into the conversation.

How To Posts

My blogging series could fall into ‘How to’ posts as they’re giving directions and suggestions on how to blog successfully (although they’re not perfectly set instructions!).

List Posts

List posts often provide ideas rather than education. It gives the reader an overall look but without the in depth context behind it. For example I did a list post about face masks, and then made review posts about them individually. I could also then expand on my list posts and create editorial features about the products included, which links in to getting inspired by old posts.

Q&A/AMA

If you want to share a bit more about yourself, you can create Q&A (question & answer) or AMA (ask me anything) posts. This allows you to open up your blog post to questions from people on social media, or just questions you think your audience would want to ask. This is a good format for when you’re trying to build relationships with the community as they can get to know you.

Guest Posts

Guest posts are when someone else (usually another blogger) creates a post for your website which then links back to their website. You can also do the same on other peoples blogs and get a link back. This is usually done to get different views on a topic, but still from someone within the same niche topic as you. It can also be utilised to increase SEO as external links are a factor.

Interviews

Similar to the Q&A posts, except this is where you get to know other people. This is a simple post to complete as you can think of the questions and send it off for other people to answer. The interviews are often with people of relevance to the blogs niche. For example, I interviewed L.L. McNeil  after reading and reviewing her book Moroda,

Infographics

Infographics deliver research in a visual image that is easy to understand and usually aesthetically pleasing. Since they’re typically long and narrow, they’re mostly shared and optimized for Pinterest. A lot of bloggers now use infographics to sum up their posts and drive traffic to them via social channels.

Video

Video is huge this year! Whether it’s on youtube, social or your website, some people just prefer watching a video over reading a long post. Your blog post could contain some text, but then a video could be embedded as more dynamic content.

Video content can encompass the different types of content above as well. You can create list videos, reviews and features.