What Is A Pillar Post On A Blog?

A Pillar post on your blog is often a longer piece of text that describes a key element of what your blog is about. This can be anywhere up to a few thousand words long and should be useful/definitive enough that others will want to link to it.

The goal is to have a piece of text that will draw people in and make them want to explore your blog more. It should link to your other pillar posts and other sections on your blog/site.

As it is something that is meant to draw people in over an extended period of time a question you should ask yourself is will this article be useful to people in 6 months or a years time? If the answer is no then perhaps you should not expend the effort of creating a longer post and instead go for a short post.

Pillar posts are are the corner stone of many blogs and are certainly something you should consider writing early in your blogs life and then continue add more if possible.

How To Get Ideas For Your Blog Posts

Often people start a blog and then fail to keep it updated even thought they are motivated as after the initial surge they struggle to come up with ideas for things to blog about.

Here are some techniques I use to generate ideas for posts.

1. Read up on your subject area, if there is anything new in the area blog about it
2. Follow blogs and use twitter to find like minded writers, respond to their posts via you blog when you feel you can add to their thought/problems/ideas. Of course it is nice to link to the blog article that your are building on.
3. Keep a blog post list. When you get an idea, not matter how silly, write it done. I use google docs to store my list as I can access it from anywhere. If I am not near a computer I just note it down on a piece of paper and add it to the list next time I log on. Having a list means you can pick from there when you are struggling for ideas.
4. If you topic is a doable sort of thing, get out there and do it. Any problems or interesting things you come across just note them down and use them for the idea for a blog post.

Using these 4 techniques should mean you can come up with enough ideas to keep you blog alive.

Should A Blog Post Focus On One Topic.

As a general rule the answer is yes you should focus on one topic. Staying focused on one topic at a time mean the search engines can make more sense of your post and you readers know that you are not about of go off on another topic.

Of course there are exceptions to this. Often people will do update posts or "How I am doing posts" as I like to call them. These tend to wonder across topics but are useful as they often reveal more about yourself to your readers. This helps them get to know you and encourages them to return to your blog or start to follow you on twitter so these can be worthwhile posts.

What Is The Perfect Size Of A Blog Post

This question of the perfect size of a blog post comes up time and time again for new bloggers. Many suggest that 250 to 500 words is a good size. Personally I say let you topic decide. If you have written a short (say 100 words) post about something and that is all you have to say then stop.

There is no point trying to  expand it to 250 words if you are finished. You are better off publishing your current one and starting a new blog post. 

Equally if you have picked a topic  that is slightly complex or needs some background information explained then going over 500 words is fine. There are many top bloggers that post entries that are more than 1000 words and they seem to be doing just fine.

Personally I tend to find many of my post fall in at around 250 words but I don't worry about it too much. It really is just a case of what feels right.