As an online marketer, you would love to write an “epic” blog post. Unlike normal human beings, you dream at night of creating that single post that gets shared thousands of times, liked, re-tweeted and pinned, and single-handedly makes you set-and-forget, repetitive income, while also exploding your email list for eternity and making you the dominant authority figure in your niche.

Unfortunately, all your efforts to date in this regard have resulted in… zero epic blog posts.

What’s the problem? What are you doing wrong? Is there some formula you can follow to make sure your posts are truly worthy of the “epic” tag? The honest answer is, there is no simple formula that anyone can follow to guarantee their posts are going to go viral.

However, there are some things you can do to drastically improve your chances of having your post defined as epic.

Thesaurus.com lists plenty of synonyms for epic as an adjective:

Celebrated, astronomical, heroic, noble, courageous, massive, glorious, storied, imminent and considerable are just a few words that relate to epic qualities.

When it comes right down to it, what you want from your blog post is to be memorable. You want it to help people on such a level that your readers simply can’t help but take the action you recommend. They are so blown away by the problems you solve in their life, or the value you give them, they share it on every social platform, and the one blog post you took so much time and care to create becomes a revenue stream and email list builder that rivals anything you have done in your business.

That’s what comes from an epic blog post, and here’s how you write one.

How to Come Up with Epic Blog Post Ideas

Sometimes the little gray cells just aren’t working. You find it hard to come up with even a basic blog post topic, much less one that is memorable. What can you do to get your brain firing on all pistons again? Use the following ideas to help you come up with epic blog post topics that are sure to get your content shared, favored and acted upon.

  • Check the magazine rack at your local bookstore or supermarket (on topics relevant to your niche).
  • Make a Top 10 list of favorite/best/most valuable resources or ideas from the biggest authority blogs in your market.
  • Create a “Top 25” list of people to follow on Twitter that are influencers in your industry.
  • Ask your email list what they want.
  • Interview a guru or expert.
  • Create an exhaustive list of resources, tips or strategies.
  • Write a case study that tells a happy customer story.
  • Review a popular info product or service.
  • Repurpose your favorite posts.
  • Create a giveaway or competition.
  • Think about the biggest myth or misconception in your market. Destroy it.
  • Make an “A to Z” post relevant to your needs.
  • Publish a “Why I Failed, and What You Can Learn About It” post.
  • Take a poll or survey, rewarding action takers with a valuable product or service.
  • Troll question and answer sites like Quora and Yahoo Answers for ideas.
  • Create a valuable and authoritative white paper.
  • Make a list of the best books in your niche.
  • Hi-jack a news-breaking event, and tie that story into your market, products or services.

These are just a few ideas which can get your brain pumping. They are all based on types of blog posts that tend to perform better than others. These are by no means the only epic blog post types, so put on your thinking cap and get brainstorming.

10 Types of Epic Blog Posts

Some types of posts are more inclined to perform better than others. Sure, you may create an awesome piece of content that does not fall under the following categories. However, when the most successful bloggers have a hard time trying to structure their content, they employ the following methods time and time again, to much success.

1 – How to Guides and Tutorials

You can even include “how-to” in your title, which has been proven to increase readership.

2 – Latest News and Current Events

Incredibly, some people still care about what Kim Kardashian is doing.

3 – Checklists, Lists

These are simple to format, easy to read, and they practically write themselves when you know a lot about a particular topic or field.

4 – Case Studies, Customer Success Stories

Social proof sells. Your readers are more inclined to believe someone just like themselves, than they are a marketing message.

5 – Guru Interview, Advice from Experts

You may not yet be the top expert in your field. However, you can interview that person. Make the interview in-depth, revealing something your guru has not shared before.

6 – Lists of Valuable Resources

If you were a copywriter, and you discovered a blog post which listed the top 123 copywriters of the 21st century, you would feel as if you stumbled across a gold mine. Lists of valuable resources relative to your niche are easy to compile, and when you make them evergreen, you have a good chance of becoming epic and long-lasting.

7 – Frequently Asked Questions

Your prospects and readers are asking questions which have already been asked and answered. Create a lengthy, valuable frequently asked questions (FAQs) post and you serve your audience well.

8 – Top Takeaways From _____

If you have attended a seminar or taken an online course, this type of post is easy. Write down the top 10, 15 or 21 valuable takeaways you experienced and share them in the form of a blog post.

9 – Beginner’s Guides

You have probably downloaded, read and/or purchased beginner’s guides in the past. Written on the correct topic, these can be evergreen in nature.

10 – Additional Resource

No product or service is perfect. Take a best-selling info product, course or service and make it better. Purchase the course, take it, and note where it is lacking. Add the pieces that are missing and provide them in a free blog post, linking back to the info product or course for an affiliate marketing bonus.

6 Key Elements of an Epic Blog Post

We spoke earlier about the characteristics of an epic blog post. These include longer length, evergreen in nature, providing the ultimate solution and other important points. You should also understand special formatting and design elements that help your post improve on your valuable content.

1 – Social Share Buttons

This element of an epic blog post was mentioned earlier, but it bears repeating. The social share plug-ins for WordPress and other blogging platforms are too valuable, and easy to implement, to ignore.

2 – Formatting

Make sure your image, alt, H1 and all other tags have been included. This helps your search engine rankings, which helps with traffic.

3 – Bulleted Lists

Bullet points …

  • Make your content easier to read
  • Appeal to the human inclination for lists
  • Allow you to focus on important points
  • Help break up large blocks of text

4 – Sub-Headers

Think of these as subtitles. They should serve as standalone, attention-grabbing titles for each of the subsections throughout your blog post. They help the eye travel easily down through your content, and should be able to function on their own if you use them as blog post titles themselves.

5 – Images and Video

As mentioned earlier, video, graphics, photographs and images drive engagement.

6 – Call to Action

Anytime you produce any type of content, you need a strong call to action. Why are you writing this blog post? What do you want your readers to do? Tell them exactly what action to take, say it in as few words as possible, and place your call to action throughout your post.

8 Step Guide to Writing an Epic Blog

Now it is time for a little structure. A massive piece of epic content cannot be created by just winging it. Use the following formula below to polish your creation so that it is as good as it possibly can be when you hit publish.

1 – Brainstorm

Before you can publish any kind of content online, awesome or horrible, you need to have a topic! Refer to the section earlier on how to come up with blog post ideas. Remember the more innovative, unique, challenging or valuable your blog topic is, the better it will perform.

2 – Rough Outline

Sketch together a rough outline. If you don’t usually use outlines, don’t worry, this can be very rough and “by the seat of your pants”. Any blog post worth 1,500 words or more is going to have a lot of individual pieces, and this is where your outline helps.

3 – Fill Outline Sections with Ideas

Now make a rough outline for each section of your rough outline. In other words, jot down some ideas, data, problems, solutions, subsections and information that will fill each section of your outline. Again, don’t worry about grammar or structure here. This is just to give you some direction when you create your first draft. Speaking of which, now it is time for your…

4 – … First Draft

Take all the information contained in your rough outline and write the first draft of your post.

5 – Format

Add bullet points, lists, bold and underlined text, italics, graphics, videos and different fonts and text size. Break up your text, and make it easy to read.

6 – Edit, And Write Your 2nd Draft

Only do this after walking away from your project for at least 24 hours. You’ll be amazed at the errors and opportunities you will find.

7 – Read Out Loud, and Ask for Help

This is a professional copywriter’s trick that works wonders for your copy. Read your post out loud. You will find problems with the flow of your content that are not always revealed when you read it silently. Also, get a friend or family member to read the post, and ask them for their honest input.

8 – Final Edit and Rewrite, Then Publish

Make a final edit. Take out every word or sentence that doesn’t belong. Perform your final rewrite, then click publish.

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