This week I’m going to outline some resources that may make it easier to produce clear, readable blog posts. All of these are free. I hope you find them useful.
1. Blog Topics
If you’re stuck for ideas for your next blog posts take a look at Hubspot’s Blog Topic Generator. Enter some nouns that best describe the information you want to convey and the software will produce a list of five post ideas.
For example I entered the words “Facebook” “privacy” and “Europe” and received these suggestions:
15 best blogs to follow about Facebook
10 Signs You Should Invest in privacy
The Ultimate Cheat Sheet on Europe
14 Common Misconceptions About Facebook
5 Tools Everyone in the privacy Industry Should Be Using
Okay, in my opinion some suggestions are better than others, but it gives you a place to start.
You can also get a year’s worth of suggestions in exchange for some details (email address, etc.). Take a look if you’re frequently short of ideas.
2. Content Ideas
Another resource that might help with content ideas is Portent’s Content Idea Generator.
Put in a keyword and you’ll get a title that may be instantly useable or one that suggests others.
Having written your blog post it’s time to edit. Here are a couple of resources that will help you improve your first draft.
3. Clear writing
Go to Hemmingway and you’ll see an explanation of how it works. Essentially the text is colour coded to highlight where you could use a shorter word, a verb instead of an adverb, and how easy sentences are to read. There’s a key at the side of the page to explain what you should be aiming for and there’s also a colour bar to indicate the readability of your text. Get a grade less than ten and you’ve produced a piece of bold, clear writing.
Select the Write button on the page and you can paste onto the page or type in your text. Then click the Edit button and your text is evaluated. Alternatively a desktop version is available.
4. Readability
If you want to check the readability of a post you’ve already published go to The Readability Test Tool. Here you can enter a web address and get an analysis of the content. At first the results seem a bit too technical to understand, but scroll down and you’ll get an explanation. Essentially anything given a green colour is easy to read.
You can also enter your own text as with Hemmingway, but this time the tool strips out any HTML coding that is included.
2 responses to “4 Resources for Clear, Readable Blog Posts”
David, I found your post on resources for clear, readable blogs very informative. I appreciate the resources that you listed, and I am looking forward to using them. I will definitely be coming back for more useful information.
Thanks Roy, I hope you find the resources useful.