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11 Essential Ingredients Every Blog Post Needs [Infographic]

written by Demian Farnworth
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11 Essential Ingredients Every Blog Post Needs [Infographic]

So. You think you’ve got yourself a good blog post.

You chose your writing style. You knocked out the first draft. You allowed it to sit for an hour or a day.

Now it’s time to edit that bad dog — ruthlessly. So that it has a fighting chance in the trenches.

You’ll want to pay attention to the details like avoiding goofy, but common, grammar mistakes. You’ll want to choose your words carefully so you say what you mean.

This will allow you to shed excess copy so that you have a lean, muscular article.

But you’re not done. You also must ensure that your blog post has all of the essential ingredients it needs.

Ingredients like these, as presented in this infographic by our lead designer Rafal Tomal. Print it, pin it, but whatever you do … use it.

Infographic 11 Essential Ingredients Every Blog Post Needs

Want to publish this infographic on your own site?

Copy and paste this code into your blog post or web page:

Click to download a one-page PDF of these rules, suitable for printing and hanging near your workspace when you need to see it most.

Want more information on any of the 11 essential blog post ingredients? Use these links:

  1. Craft a magnetic headline.
  2. Open with a bang.
  3. Use persuasive words.
  4. Write damn good sentences.
  5. Insert killer bullet points.
  6. Create exquisite subheads.
  7. Tell a seductive story.
  8. Keep attention with internal cliffhangers.
  9. Choose an arresting image.
  10. Close with style.
  11. Be authentic.

This checklist of essential elements is to make your life simple because creating great content on a regular basis is hard work.

With each blog post you look at this list and say “Did I craft a magnetic headline? Did I open with a bang?” And so on.

The last thing you need is to wonder whether your article has everything it needs to satisfy your readers. Now you can evaluate your content at a glance and be sure it has every element it needs to deliver the results you need.

P.S. – Whenever you’re ready, here are 4 ways we can help you:
  1. Copyblogger Academy - Our community gives you 9 full-length marketing courses (over 30 hours of education total), ongoing education, expert Q&A, and more. Join 1500+ members inside.
  2. Content Coaching - If you want hands-on assistance with your content, SEO, social media, or personal brand, we’d be happy to help. Hit that link and enter your information to learn more.
  3. Newsletter Sponsorship - We'll put your product, service, or lead magnet in front of at least 30,000 people. We'll also help you write persuasive copy for it. Fill out the form to see if we're a good fit.
  4. Digital Commerce Partners - If you want us to fully manage your blog and SEO, you can hire our agency partner, who applies our exact methodology. Fill out this form to apply for our program.

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Reader Comments (67)

  1. Thank you so much for sharing this infographic and allowing us to use it on our blogs! I love writing but don’t do it professionally – just for my blog, which I hope will someday be professional. And I don’t usually put enough thought into creating a great post.

    Using these essential ingredients when I’m creating a blog post will definitely help me come up with posts my readers will want to read. At least that’s my plan.

    There is so much information on this site about writing! I can’t wait to read it all. I’m so glad I found it! Thanks again.

  5. Thanks, Demian, for highlighting the checklist in your response. Somehow my eyes glossed over that link. Maybe I was blinded by the box of code. Nevertheless, I’ve now printed the checklist and also created a desktop stickie. Such an excellent and *useful* summary of top writing tips.

  7. I love design and that is one of the most beautiful infographics I have seen yet!

    Congrats to the designer and to the one who wrote it.

    I couldn’t stress enough that your writing needs to be your best and as professional as possible.

    It’s like slamming the door in their face, that made mu chuckle a little bit. Introductions are important than most writers make it out to be.

    For my part, I need to add more bullet points within my content since I like seeing that within the other content I read.

    Thank you!

    – Samuel

  8. Thanks for providing this infographic for people to use.

    We still have a lot of work ahead to obliterate these mistakes. I see “Loose vs. Lose” almost every single day somewhere online.

    *shaking head*

  9. Demian,
    My first bookmark of the year is this one. This post is not just about the essential ingredients of a blog post, it also says how catchy an infographic should be. A great job by Rafal, he should probably put a post on the Essentials of an Infographic over here ;-). Thanks for sharing.

  10. Demian,

    Thank you so much for the powerful blogging tools. I enjoy the fact that you include such a variety of formats for different uses and learners. While I already try to employ many of these, others could use some work. I need some work on my cliffhangers and closing with a bang. It’s a good time to get the information and make goals for the coming year. You are awesome.

    Darin L. Hammond

  12. Hey Demian,

    thanks for the article. I have been reading copyblogger for a while and its really inspired me to write my new blog this year about how I really feel about things – how to help others blog etc,

    I started blogging about blogging to remind myself in check with myself and I picked a catchy but weird domain as well “url title” – hehe

    I totally also like the list that links to all of the other articles.

    Happy New Year!

    Joseph Tamargo

  13. Great infographic and points to follow when crafting blog content. I love using original images for my posts but sometimes they can be hard to find. How much of an advantage do original images in blog content have over free use images?

    • Allison, more often than not you will find better quality when you invest in premium image sources. BUT, do not underestimate the potential of places like Wikimedia Commons or Flickr for finding images that you can use with proper attribution but without paying. So long as you are willing to put in the time to do the search, you may surprised what you can find.

  14. It’s so hard to craft a good headline and open with a bang! That’s honestly what I struggle with most: the start. Headlines are tough because you want to be original, yet descriptive and not boring. But this infographic does a great job of simplifying what the headline should do first: promise benefit.

    • Headlines and openings are the hardest part … it takes me forever to write them. Hours, if not days sometimes. Don’t worry. You are not alone. Great headlines and openings take hard work.

  16. Wow, thanks Demian. That’s a hell of an infographic. I’ll share it on my blog but also print it out as a daily reminder. It’s sometimes easy to forget we’re writing for an audience, not ourselves. Great checklist. Thank you for sharing!

  18. I always try to think of my blog posts in the design sense, by maybe putting an important sentence in large font, or bullet pointing a list, or adding interesting media to the post like a relevant video etc. This article really proves that it’s more worthwhile to blog this way.

  22. Honestly I was thinking I’ve setup one of the most perfect blog post in these days but than after reading this post I’ve rethink my blog still need more reconstruction to become perfect. Thank for letting know about these effective ingredients and I’m looking forward to use such essential ways to make blog good. That infographic in fact convinced me a lot to use these ways.

  23. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I’ll be sharing this with my class of teen travel bloggers – it’s very useful, and the links are (as usual with you!) pure gold.

  24. Great post, Demian! I think my most difficult tactic about that infographic is sentencing. I often dislike my sentences after I write them whether they are too long or just don’t provide enough information. One of my 2014 goals is to improve my sentences, as a matter of fact. I think I need to ‘give something away’ to the reader in each sentence I write for my blog articles. That alone would likely keep a reader reading a blog post. Thanks for sharing this great article and these awesome tips! 🙂

  25. Hi Demian, love the design and content. Thank you for this fantastic post. Looking forward to adding these essential ingredients in my posts. Happy to share it in my blog 🙂

  26. This is superb infographic. Though I am online marketer with more than a decade of experience, I am newbie in blogging. I’ve started blogging just 2 years ago and for sure there is still a lot more to learn.

  27. I’ve just recently discovered this site from /r/blogging and I have to say the work you put into those infographics and the way you present your content is brilliant!

    Did you use Photoshop or was this the work of another software?

    Cheers!

  30. Printing this out in the next 5 minutes. Great advice, because it is clear, simple and to the point.
    I just finished reading the Magnetic Headlines eBook and this article is great follow up.
    Bookmarked and tweeted.
    Happy Sunday

  31. “11 Essential Ingredients Every Blog Post Needs” or say, 11 Essential Ingredients Every Blog Post Shouldn’t Forget for VIRAL content! 🙂

  32. All the ingredients you have provided here to make a blog post are truly amazing. It’s a nice blog. Keep it up.

  33. great list of actionable items. but “write damn good sentences” really doesn’t say a lot, it’s like “write epic shit” or “do your best”.

  34. Hi Damien,

    Thanks for all the useful stuff! I have this on my wall and it’s great to refer to when I’m writing my posts. Writing content takes practice, practice and more practice, and I definitely feel that getting into the habit of routinely making sure that all the important elements are covered (easier said than done…) is good professional development.

    My blog is in the health niche, so I also try to do my research thoroughly beforehand so readers can rely on me having authority on the topic I’m writing about. There’s nothing worse than adding in a fact only to be corrected after hitting publish!

    Keep posting more great stuff, it keeps me motivated to be better and raise the bar.

  36. Great idea. I find this very interesting and up-to-date. So simple message and yet provide a very solid advice.

  37. These tips all hang in my office around my screen. All within eye-shot for about 10 hours a day.

    They will, hopefully, be burnt into my subconscious soon.

    Great stuff as always!

  39. Dude what a killer post man, best post i have read so far this year. Being a tennis blogger myself, I need to step up my game about now after reading this, when did things start to click for you? I mean when did you find your voice as a writer?

    Happy New Year from kobe, japan!

  43. Pretty approachable visualization of the core idea, demonstrating simplicity in a quite powerful way, excellent!
    I just discovered your site yesterday and it already made it to my Feedly. The design & layout are fantastic and I’m keen to dig a bit deeper when it comes to the content as well. Very promising indeed! 🙂
    Not sure if it would make sense to come up with a visual countertpart as well, summarizing the most common content traps!? One thing I could think of straight away would be the “overuse” of specific words…

  44. Don’t offend the locales!__
    You haven’t started at the start. The first thing is to realise your web words may reach many different countries and cultures and to make sure your spelling is accurate and your grammar and other conventions are accurate. Also be aware that the words you use may mean something else to another culture or geographical loaction. This is not so much about accurarcy but showing that you care and have at least made an attempt to integrate and be submissive to others. Once you have courted or earnt/earned respect, you can then lever far more power. You will switch people right from the start/get go unless you do this.
    A pet hate of mine is the ignorance or arrogance of date convention. British English is not American English. British English date convention is day/month/year so if you want to blog or post in American English, and you don’t make it very clear you are using American English, and then use 7/11/14, you will be saying 7th of November 2014 not the 11th of July 2014 to anyone who speaks, reads and thinks in British English.
    Once you know that you have done the most basic and important thing of Ingratiation and show willing to integrate into other cultures and languages, you will find all your other actions (calls to action etc) will be much more affective.

  47. Damian-

    Preparing to launch our blog and found your post. Very insightful in organizing standards and expectations with creativity and engagement.

    Thank you!

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