How to write better blog posts

This will be a somewhat relative post, as all blogs are different. They have different readers and serve different purposes. For blogs like this one though, where you are trying to offer a genuine digital service, along with sound advice, thought provoking stories, and solidarity for like-minded people, making the effort to raise the bar is – I think – a noble pursuit.

I know the title of this post is going to be treated with a healthy amount of scepticism, but considering the amount of nonsense I’ve written, and the many, many mistakes that I’ve made, I feel like I can add a few dots of wisdom to the topic.

I started blogging almost 15 years ago, and at the time it was just a way of interacting with other students at my theology college. My posts tended to be long-winded, poorly written, over detailed, badly structured, filled with reactionary content, and peppered with incendiary commenting.

Since then I’ve made a lot of effort to carefully cultivate a readership, be more specific in my focuses, and generous with my platform. For those of you who have followed me for a long time, I hope you agree that this is a far better blog that It once was.

This post has been prompted by three people who kindly emailed and specifically asked me this question over the last few weeks. I said I would write something on it, so here it is.

There are many ‘how to write better’ posts already out there, so this just contains a few ideas that I personally have had to work hard on. I hope one or two might be useful!

Take it seriously

Readers are people first. My job is to engage with them as human beings and not click numbers.

I have quite a detailed a profile in my mind of a fictional, yet believable person who I’m writing to before I begin to plan each post. This isn’t always the same person but does tend to be one of three or four that I regularly think of. At very least I remember that my reader is not me.

This means that I take great care in how I research a post, how I structure it, the language I choose, its length, and its anecdotes. I try to be person specific.

Also, because I see blogging as a genuine part of my ministry, I invest in it. I pay for a self-hosted WordPress account, domain name, and template, and I take time off in the year to properly design and renovate the site.

Know your USP

‘USP’ or unique selling point, is basically a tool to help you remember what it is that makes you distinct. Your unique voice online should flow out of your unique personality. What place does your voice have in the wider conversation? No blog can be the complete word on any subject, but it can still have a clearly recognisable voice.

YouthWorkHacks tries to be a bridge between theoretical and practical youth work. Its place is to push the boundaries of theory into real application, and to challenge practices to engage more critically with their philosophical roots.

This is why the ‘voice’ of YouthWorkHacks requires pure practitioners to reach deeper for foundations, and pure theorists to reach a wider for applications. Hence the moto: ‘reaching further in youth work.’

As I’m both a practitioner and an academic, this suits me well. Some blogs are more resource driven, and some are more abstract. What’s your USP voice in the conversation – what do you bring that’s distinct?

Critically engage

Postgraduate marking criteria always mentions critical engagement. This is the ability to look at one issue from several angles, including perspectives that you might not agree with. The best posts follow this same principle; softening highly rhetorically or reactionary language in favour of genuine discussion.

When critiquing, the critically engaged post tries to see the context in which something is framed, it looks for the extraneous threads that pull on the central idea, and it knows the best arguments against its own position.

Rather than, ‘Person A said something stupid,’ how about ‘Person A has presented this idea, which is consistent with their other works in “these” ways, but it’s probably based in “X” particular context. Person B has a slightly different approach, which contrasts with Person A in the “following ways”. I think Person B makes the more lucid argument for “these following reasons”, and I would apply that in “these ways”.’ This is longer, but it gives far more content and it outgrows our own opinions.

Provide more than just problems

Plenty of blog posts don’t go beyond an observation of something they don’t like. If you think something is missing, or ethically wrong, or dangerous, then say so, but say why, and say what you think needs to happen in response.

A blog that only focuses on problems tends to be written as an exercise in catharsis. The focus becomes the writer and not what is said. When several blogs do this, they become an echo chamber, rehashing the same problems without solutions, and reframing the same issues without acknowledging hope. A post that says, ‘I saw this and it sucks’ without any more evaluation will always leave me wanting, and will probably mean that I won’t return to that blog again.

I want my blog to be a place of positivity and kindness, but without losing the reality of genuine struggles. It’s entirely possible to do both, but you have to plan, research, reflect, and write with more care and attention that just ‘sticking up a post.’

Blogs can’t square every circle, and they shouldn’t try to fix things that should be grieved over, but they can still provide a unique view, or an abstract set of ‘maybe if’ ideas.

Write better

This is such an obvious thing to say but good content requires a working vehicle to deliver it. When I read a post that clearly hasn’t been proofread, then I feel disrespected as a reader.

You don’t have to be Shakespeare to make sure that you have full stops in the right place, or capital letters for names.

I’m not a naturally gifted writer, instead I have to work very hard at it. This is why I tend to proof read my posts the day after I write them – and obviously before I post them. I also use tools like Grammarly and PaperRater – and I write my posts first into Word, rather than the blog wizard. Personally, I’m terrible at using inconsistent tenses, run-on sentences, and using words like ‘simply’ over repetitively. I use passive voice too much, and I write too much like I talk.

If you are a writer, then you must also be an editor. This is about serving the reader. My wife explains it this way; ‘Tim, you need to take me by the hand and walk me through each point, don’t assume that I’ll just get it.’

Pray more

Pray before you post. Pray for the message, the content, the readers, and for the people those readers work with.

As a ministry, commit it to God in the same way you would anything else.

If what you actually want to do is journal, then journal instead. If, however, you are advertising a public blog and producing content that shapes and informs people’s lives in ministry, then give it that same attention you would if those people were in the room with you.

Pray like you mean it, like you respect it, and like you want it to genuinely serve.

Thanks folks. I hope you found something helpful in there. I don’t always get these right (in fact, some times I get none of these right!) but they’re all well worth the effort and the time.