When I was just starting out in the blogging world, I had no clue about content strategy. I’d just wait for inspiration to strike and blog about whatever seemed like a good idea at the time. It’s probably no surprise then that A LOT of those posts fell on deaf ears and didn’t get much traction at all! It really wasn’t until I started experimenting with writing different ‘kinds’ of posts that I started to see HUGE increases in engagement and traffic.

So, after a lot of trial and error (let’s be real), I’ve come to realise that there are five kinds of blog posts that perform the best. Writing these kinds of posts on the regular has SO MANY benefits, from helping to establish you as an authority in your niche, to forging strong bonds with your audience, to growing your readership…fast. Results come from having a plan so make sure you add these kinds of posts to your content calendar regularly!

P.S. If you’re ready for all the help you can get to grow your blog, doors to my signature course, Blog Boost, are opening very soon! Get on the waitlist here.

The 5 best-performing blog posts you should be writing:

1. Personal success stories

Okay, I’m going to let you in on a little secret here. People don’t just want to read your content, they also want to know about the person behind the blog. If you’ve got something to share about a recent success, your audience wants to hear about it! Your readers are truly curious about you and are craving an insight into how you have achieved what you have. They want to celebrate your wins with you so let them inside and give them the juicy details!

Also, if they see you as an inspiration, you readers will love to read any tips that could help them get to a similar position as you. So, if you’ve got any lessons to share, it’s great to share these too. Publishing these kinds of posts helps you to connect with your audience on a deeper level as you’re letting them into your world and sharing your journey, which is something quite personal.

2. Long-form posts

Long-form posts are very comprehensive articles that are between 1,500-3,000 words in length. While these kinds of posts obviously take a while to create, they will continue to work for you long after you press ‘publish’. Long-form content is jam-packed full of value, which means they are also highly shareable. These kind of posts really establish credibility and position you as an expert in this topic, which is vital for transforming one-off visitors into loyal, returning readers.

Another big plus is that Google loves this kind of content! Studies show that articles over 2,000 are consistently dominating search engine results. You want to get in on that action, trust me!

Tip: If you need an actionable, fuss-free SEO strategy, grab my Master SEO: 30-Day Action Plan. It’s a step-by-step framework to get your content ranking in search engines in the next month.

3. Controversial posts

Let’s be real, there’s nothing like a little controversy for attracting attention! Writing posts that challenge traditions or norms or that present a surprisingly different view on a topic are guaranteed to get a lot of traction. We all love a bit of controversy – it’s almost irresistible to us. One of the great things about these kinds of posts is that they’re absolute gold in terms of engagement – they spark discussion and get people sharing, leaving comments and interacting with your content on a high level. Heck, you might even find your post goes viral. Wouldn’t that be cool?

4. Expert round-ups

Expert round-ups are where you reach out to other bloggers, experts or key people relevant to the topic and pose a central question to them. You then collate their responses and post them in a blog post. These ‘experts’ are often quite happy to collaborate with you because it places them alongside other big names and establishes them as an authority in the area. In turn, they’re quite likely to share your post once it’s published. This is great for both driving traffic to your blog as well as promoting quality backlinks, which will improve your SEO and page authority.

5. ‘How to’ tutorial

You can learn just about anything on the internet these days and people are increasingly turning to blogs to learn how to do different things. ‘How to’ guides that are informative and give a step-by-step breakdown perform very well. Essentially, you’re teaching a skill in an easily digestible way, breaking it down into little steps. Equipping your readers with the knowledge and skills to make a transformation of some kind is incredibly valuable. Do this regularly and you’ll establish yourself as an authority in your niche and you quickly build trust amongst your readers.

And there you have it – five of the best-performing kinds of blog posts you should be writing. If you can start incorporating more of these into your content calendar, you’ll be setting yourself up for faster growth and a more loyal, engaged readership.

Looking for more free blogging tips? Read these next:

• QUIZ: Do you have what it takes to be a successful blogger?
• How to plan your blog’s content calendar for the year
• 9 reasons why no one is reading your blog (and how to fix it!)

Now tell me, which of these best-performing blog posts will you write next? Let me know in the comments below!