Two Words

~ Cristian Mihai

If you take the time to read this post, you will become a better blogger, all because you learned about the two most important words when it comes to blogging, and why those words can make or break your post.

Actually, both words can be found in the opening sentence of this post…

Did you catch them?
If not, keep reading…

The Most Important Word is “You”

Was the opening sentence compelling? If so, why?

Or the better question is, who was the first sentence focused on?

Have the words “me” or “I” appeared in this post before now?

It’s ironic that a platform mostly used for self-absorbed journaling must be focused on the reader in order to be effective.

But the truth is that you only benefit when readers benefit first.

When it comes to writing engaging content, “you” is the most powerful word you can use, because people are interested in solving their own problems.

It may sound selfish, but it’s the truth.

Shift your focus toward the reader. One of the easiest ways to do that is to maximize the use of “you”, while minimizing or eliminating “I” and “me”.

Every time you finish writing a blog post, check the focus. How many times does you appear? What about I and me?

Got the count? Good. Now, adjust.

You’ll be amazed at the results.

The Other Word is “Because”

One of the most important characteristics of compelling, persuasive content is specificity. The more specific you are, the more credible your blog post.

There are many ways to be specific in your writing; one of the best is to give a reason why.

The power of because has actually been well documented by social psychologists. As a matter of fact, because is so powerful that you can even list a ridiculous reason why, and it will still make people more likely to do what you want them to do.

Be specific and always give a reason why, especially when you want people to take some form of action.

Not because I said so, but because it will work wonders for you.

46 thoughts on “Two Words”

  23. I remember writing essays back in high school and the teacher never wanted us to use the word “you” in our writing. Looking at it now, I never understood that. “You” addresses your writing directly to your readers. What a great word!

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

      1. But sometimes that’s why the blog is there. I started mine primarily as an outlet for my CD reviews (official, with links), book reviews (informal), and other music articles (informal). _You_ tell me how I’m supposed to avoid “I”/”me”/”mine,” or how I can shoehorn a “because” into such pieces!

        Like

  27. Great tips. Thanks. There are many diary-entry types of blogs and they are wildly popular and I don’t know why since they (at least the ones I’ve read) don’t really provide a “because” to me, the reader.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

      1. I know it’s not all about the numbers, but a large number of likes and follows seems to signal popularity. I just want to create and read quality content – that’s why I read and follow blogs like yours!

        Like

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Google photo

You are commenting using your Google account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.