Bill Gates once said, ‘content is king.’ And he’s right. In a survey by the Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs, researchers found that 80 percent of B2B marketers have a strategy for content marketing, among these, 32 percent are documented while 48 percent are not documented.

Content marketing really is in the forefront of online marketing that a Curata study found that by 2017, about 51 percent of all businesses will have an executive who will be directly responsible for an inclusive strategy to content marketing.

1. Create an editorial plan.

Content marketing needs a strategy, especially blogs. Business blogging isn’t just about writing what’s new or what’s hot right now. A good content editorial plan will help you write SEO-friendly blogs for your audience. An editorial plan usually consists of at least two or three blog posts per week, published in intervals. What usually happens is that whenever a hot topic pops up, bloggers can write a special content about it and publish immediately to hitch on the trending topic and then push back the other scheduled posts.

2. Create a blog post structure.

Depending on your brand or industry, there are many blog post structures you can come up with. But the goal here is to standardize your blog entries. A clear blog structure consists of an introduction, a body and a conclusion. Having a clear and standard structure will help you write better and more effectively.

3. Use keywords. And use them well.

Before you even start writing, you have to search and decide on your keywords. These can be one-word keywords or long-tail keywords that people use to find the information they need online. However, inserting keywords everywhere will make your piece sound awkward so it’s importance to put keywords where they best fit. It is also important not to overdo it. A good place to start is to insert keywords in the introduction. There are also hidden places where you can place your keywords. For example, you can place them in image captions and meta tags.

4. Maximize your headings.

Headings not just help make your entries more readable, they are also good for SEO. Headings with keywords help search engines grasp the key topics of a long blog post, which can help increase your search engine ranking. Subheadings will also help people scan your long post faster and better.

5. Watch the length of your articles.

While Google likes long articles, users might be turned away. That’s the dilemma. Online articles should at least have 400 words. For readability purposes, try not to go beyond the 1000-word count for regular blog content. Every now and then, however, experiment on blog posts that are 2,000 to 4,000 words long. Not everyone will read posts this long, but search engine ranks them very well.

6. Add links to the previous blog post.

If your new piece is related to an old post, do link bank. It helps increase your authority on the subject and it will also help in your search engine ranking. Moreover, it will give the reader a reason to visit an old blog post on your website.

7. Publish regularly.

If you ever decide to start a blog, remember that you have to be clear about your objectives, committed and consistent. Publishing one piece will not guarantee you the page hits you want or the large following you aim for. You have to build and keep the momentum so you can create a following. Make sure you are also publishing good quality content and not just about any blog topic just for the sake of publishing regularly. You have to become an expert on your own topic.

Article Written by Rhiza Oyos of Business 2 Community