Once you’ve created your List of Chapters, or table of contents, and written a chapter-by-chapter synopsis, or Chapter Summaries, you are ready to break each chapter down into multiple blog posts. Blog posts tend to be short—about the length of one screen, which averages about 300 words.
I like to think about these blog posts in terms of subtitles. If were writing a full-length chapter, you likely would break it up with subheads. Take each one of your chapters and break it down into four or five subheads (at least). Then, rewrite them as full “headlines”—catchy titles that someone will want to read.
After the headlines, think about the content you would want to include in each of these small sections. One way to do this involves asking yourself three our four questions. You then provide the answer to these questions. You can either change the questions themselves into transition sentences that begin each paragraph, or you can write an introduction to the section itself and leave the rest as questions. (You’ll probably need an introductory paragraph for each section anyway.) I don’t prefer this approach, however, because I don’t find it interesting to read a book full of questions and answers.
Your second option entails writing “keyword sentences.” These function like transitions, but basically key the reader (and the writer—you) into the topic at hand. You’ll also be using keywords that search engines might find. (More on this later.) You begin by writing a sentence that lets you and the reader know what topic will be covered, and you then elaborate upon it. You can do this by asking yourself questions and answering them; just delete the question afterwards, and make sure all copy flows well. This makes for much more interesting writing than including the questions, as I mentioned before. If you look at this paragraph, for example, you can see that the first sentence functions as a keyword sentence. The rest of the paragraph elaborates upon it.
Tomorrow, we’ll discuss how to write great on-line copy.
By the way, this blog post is 345 words long.
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