Inbound Marketing Blog

I’m often asked how I come up with so much material on mortgages. At AmeriFirst Home Mortgage we generate 2-to-4 articles Monday through Friday. We’ve been doing this for about
18 months. That adds up to hundreds of tiny SEO magnets. That’s the point of inbound marketing, after all. Every article is meant to solve a home buyer’s problem. So how do I come up with all of this material? It’s all part of a powerful keyword strategy.

Here’s my secret: a blog title worksheet. One of the major keys to inbound marketing is consistent, constant creative content (yes, I like alliteration). It must be purposeful. Blogging for a couple weeks then tapering off or quitting altogether will not generate views and leads for your business. In fact, many leads will read a blog article (or multiple articles) before converting from a view to a lead. You can see in the picture below that blog articles generate hundreds of leads for our company.

Now that you’ve seen the numbers, it’s time to talk specifics. HubSpot offers a great blogging keyword worksheet that I modified. One idea for this is to change it to 6 specific long tail keywords you want to optimize for each month. Once you have the keyword phrases, come up with 5 titles for each one. This is where creativity comes into play. Here’s a look at 5 ideas to help defeat writer’s block:

1. Look at the calendar. Are there any holidays coming up?
2. If the keyword is about a product or service, use a “versus” title. For example a great article on pool comparisons is Fiberglass Pools vs Vinyl Liner Pools vs Concrete Pools.
3. Use the current year to hone in on a long tail keyword phrase. Adding the year can help direct people in an urgent manner. Sometimes people want to know if the solution to their problem can happen this year.
4. Answer the cost question. Googlers will search for how much something costs all day long. By answering the question (even without using the exact number) you will become a relevant destination.
5. People love lists. Top 10 lists, 7 easy steps, 6 reasons...when all else fails use lists.

On the blog title worksheet, be sure to track your progress. Include search rank and how many searches are done on those terms each month. Analyze your progress when it’s time to come up with new titles. 6 titles for 5 keyword terms adds up to 30 blog titles. If you publish once a day, that’s 30 days worth of ideas. Of course, as other ideas pop up you can always insert them. With the keyword worksheet you simply have the ammunition to attack your keyword targets. It’s great for on-page SEO.

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How do you come up with blog titles? Tell us in the comments below.

Dan Moyle is a Certified Inbound Marketing Specialist who spends his time creating content for AmeriFirst Home Mortgage. Writing, producing videos and managing the AmeriFirst brand fall under his daily duties. He’s also a Twitter addict who loves dark beer and motorcycles.