Content is king. You’ve already heard it hundreds of times. Great content is what it takes to get noticed on the internet.

So, how do you produce great content that is loved by Google and readers?

Well, aside from being (or hiring) a good writer with something valuable or interesting to share, you need to know which keywords to target and when and how to post your content.

How do you know how to do all that and create successful blog posts that dominate Google rankings?

As a StoryBrand Guide, my job is to help businesses clarify their marketing and help them attract their ideal customers. 

From my experience, the following tools are essential for any business serious about taking their content marketing strategy to the next level and attracting more customers to their site.

1. Clearscope

Clearscope is a genius tool that uses an AI-powered platform to examine and offer optimization suggestions for your content.

The tool examines your piece of content and compares it to similar top-ranking pieces of content on Google. Then it offers suggestions for length, what keywords and phrases to include (as well as how many times), and scores your readability according to the grade level of the piece.

Finally, your piece receives a grade (A+, A, A-, B+, B, B-, etc.) which is a measure of the quality of the piece for SEO purposes. The tool also offers a minimum grade for the keywords you are trying to rank for.

This is one of the top recommended tools by SEO Professionals today.

2. Ahrefs

Ahrefs is a powerful content marketing tool that can help you take your content marketing campaign to the next level.

First, run a site audit to learn how to better optimize your entire site. Then, use the site explorer to evaluate your competitors’ strengths and weaknesses. The keywords explorer help you figure out what your target audience is looking for. And the content explorer helps you learn from the top-performing content in your industry. Finally, the rank tracker makes it easy to track your ranking progress.

The only downside to Ahrefs is that all this power comes with a hefty monthly subscription.

3. ContentFly

What if you’re not a good writer? Or what if you don’t have time to sit down and write out the content that you want to use? The good news is there are plenty of other amazing writers out there who are ready and waiting to write your content.

Connect with them on ContentFly an online platform that employs native English-speaking freelance writers. Simply put in a request for the type of content that you would like and you’ll get a polished, professionally-written piece to post on your website, blog, or use for a social media campaign.

4. Grammarly

English is weird right? Just that word right there “weird” goes against the oft-repeated “i before e except after c” grammar rule. 

Grammarly makes writing easier by catching most of those weird instances and offering suggestions for how to fix it. By tracking the context of the sentence, it can even catch misspelled homophones such as “flour” and “flower”.

You’ll still need to have a basic understanding of grammar and spelling as it’s suggestions aren’t always correct, but it sure makes your writing a whole lot more professional without any effort on your part.

5. Exploding Topics

What are people talking about? What is the next viral topic that will hit the Internet? What if you could be one of the frontrunners instead of being slightly behind the trend and playing catch up once everyone else has already written some great pieces of content?

Exploding Topics can help you do that.

This tool scours the Internet to find out what is trending. The algorithm examines millions of searches to identify a topic that is about to explode in popularity. Then, they curate a list of the best topics, making it easy for you to choose what you want to write about — before everyone else does.

6. CoSchedule’s Headline Analyzer

Headlines are the most important piece of your content. Let’s face it, we’re a nation of goldfish and something has got to be really good to capture and keep our attention for longer than a few seconds.

That’s where headlines come in. They are the short snippets that jump out of the page at the reader and suck them in.

How do you write a killer headline? Allow CoSchedule’s free Headline Analyzer to help. It uses factors such as word count and balance, skimmability, and the sentiment your headline conveys to grade your headline and offer suggestions for improvement.

7. Buzzsumo

Buzzsumo helps you find the content in your niche that is already doing well — so you can do it even better. You start by discovering high-performing content and move to research that analyzes billions of data points to help improve your content.

Buzzsumo also helps you discover influencers in your niche that you can reach out to and connect with to give your brand a boost. Finally, it allows you to monitor comments and trends so you can stay engaged with your audience

8. Portent

Wondering how to turn your topic into content that sells? Simply type your topic into Portent’s Idea Generator and you’ll instantly get a title suggestion backed by research.

What if it doesn’t quite fit your goal with your content? Click to see another title and keep going until you get one that you like. Or, use the tool’s suggestions to give you compelling ideas for how to tweak the generated title to better fit your objective.

Amaze Your Audience with Captivating Content

So, how do you write blog posts loved by Google and readers? These content marketing tools can help you elevate your content to the next level.

Also, keep the following writing guiding principles in mind:

1. 100% original content only, never publish content you published elsewhere
2. Aim for long from Minimum 1500 words
3. Do your research and link to supporting sites and studies. Every claim needs to be backed up with a link to a research or case study confirming it. 
4. Break up your copy into readable/scannable chunks. This means, use subheadings, bullet points, and numbers lists when possible, and break up paragraphs that are longer than 5-6 lines. 
5. Include images where applicable
6. Write short sentences

Learn to use these tools to your advantage and you can be confident that your business will see a significant boost in traffic.

Bonus: The StoryBrand Framework

Looking for content marketing made even more simple? Let’s turn to the StoryBrand Marketing Framework, developed by Donald Miller. 

When setting out to write a blog post, use the following template to help you outline your points. 

See this helpful template.

You’ll want to start with this template to ensure your content adds the most value to your intended readers. 

Controlling Idea
What is the purpose of your message? What is the one point you are trying to prove?

Story Question
What is the obvious and clear question you want your audience to be asking themselves as they engage with your message?

Agitate the Problem
What is the problem that you are trying to overcome? Remember: there can only be one problem.

Stakes
What can be won or lost if action is not taken?

Guide
Position yourself as a guide with empathy and authority. Ie. write an empathetic statement ‘we get it’.

The Plan
Outline the steps people can take to accomplish the objective. This is the meat of your piece.

The Call to Action
What do you want the audience to do after reading your blog post?

Foreshadow the Stakes
What will success look like?

Conclusion

Be persistent. Writing great articles takes work, but the payoff is huge. 

To help you get started, focus on the following:

1. Use the StoryBrand content marketing template provided above
2. Use Buzzsumo or Ahrefs to find a gap that your article can fill 
3. Do your research. 
4. Write. Write. Write. Edit. (alternatively use ContentFly)
5. Use Clearscope to optimize your content
6. Use the Headline Analyzer to optimize your blog post title 

Remember, there’s a lot of noise in every space. You’ll want to generate content that people will find valuable two years from now and will help them just as much. 

To your success.

Author Bio 

Moses Mehraban

Moses Mehraban is a StoryBrand Certified Guide who helps businesses clarify their message and create a marketing plan that grows their revenue. If you have any questions about this process, you can schedule a free consultation.