The 3 Types of Posts that Are Proven to Be Popular (And How to Write Them)

So you want to create more content that gets traffic.

You see other popular bloggers whose posts nearly have the same structures, and they get constant stream of traffic every time they publish a new post.

Bloggers still use these structures over and over again, and they still generate more traffic than usual.

Wouldn’t you like to put your hands on the 3 posts structures that are proven to always be popular, and how to nail them right to be ahead of 90% of your competitors?

If you answered yes, then you’re at the right place, so continue reading.

The Secret Truth About Building A Popular Blog In Any Niche

Wondering what it is?

Well, here’s the secret truth:

Find what works for others, emulate it and keep doing it. Don’t ever try to be original.

Why do you risk wasting your time on things that are not proven to work.

When you finish doing what works, and you have a popular blog running, that’s when you start experimenting with new things to hasten the growth of your business.

So from now on, see what headlines work for your competitors and emulate them for your post.

See what topics tend to be popular and write about those on your blog with different angles.

See what strategy they use to promote their posts, and use it to promote yours.

See what post structures they use, and emulate those for your next posts. No problem using them over and over again as they work, so keep doing it.

In this post I’ll save you hours of research, and you’ll discover the 3 types of posts that are proven to be popular and how to write them better than 95% of your competitors.

And before we continue, I want to let you know that I won’t cover infographics, 0r personal story posts. Yes, they tend to go popular, but that is not what I’m going to cover.

Are you ready?

Let’s go.

First type…

How-to articles

You weren’t surprised, right?

Posts that become popular are those which teach people how to do something.

People have a pain, you write an article that solves it for them, why won’t people love to share it?

Or people have a desire for something and they want to know to get it, you share how in an article, won’t they be happy to share it with others?

Of course, yes. That’s the beauty of how-to articles, but when you can nail them right.

Here are some examples:

• How I Learned To Fall Asleep In Under 1 Minute
• How To Ruin Your Life (Without Even Noticing That You Are)
• How to Learn Any Language in Record Time and Never Forget It

Here’s how you could nail how-to articles right:

1. Write a quick how-to headline, so that you don’t go off-topic.
2. Write an intro that hooks your readers in.
3. Outline your post. You could use this structure by Danny Iny.
4. Start writing.
5. Write the conclusion of the post. Make it inspiring for people to take action.
6. Re edit the introduction and the whole post.
7. Write different variations for the headlines. Then choose the one you’ll go with.
8. Publish the post.

Don’t forget these 3 points to ensure that your post will get more popular:

1. Offer fresh and surprising advice.
2. Killer headline. Yes, it’s really important.
3. Go beyond the obvious advice.

That’s what you need to write a how-to post.

Here’s the second post type…

#2: Gigantic list posts

The second type of posts that is proven to go viral is gigantic list posts.

I’m not talking about 3-tips list post here. I’m talking about long list posts. I mean 35, 50, 100 or even 200 list posts.

If you search for popular content on most of the big blogs, you’ll find that they’re long list posts.

Here are great examples:

• 37 Tips for Writing Emails that Get Opened, Read, and Clicked (Most shared post on Copyblogger)
• 202 Bite-Sized Tips To Insanely Increase Your Blog Traffic (One of the cornerstone content that build Traffic Generation Cafe)
• 106 Excuses That Prevent You From Ever Becoming Great

• 77 Resources That’ll Get You More Traffic Than Naked Pictures of Kim Kardashian

All these posts generated a lot of traffic to the blogs they’re hosted on.

You could also do so for your blog.

Here is exactly how you could write a winning list post:

1. Brainstorm a long list of ideas.
2. Follow the steps shared above to write a great post. Make sure that you craft headings well in each post.
3. Share your strongest ideas at the beginning and at the end of the posts. Many scroll to the end, so you need to make them return again to the top to read the full list.

After you follow the above steps, you’ll have a great list post that could do you wonders. With the right promotion, it could be one of the most popular posts on your sites, if not the most popular.

#3: Case Study

This is my favorite kind of posts.

I love to read these posts. They’re full of insights that you could apply directly.

A good example that came to my mind is Pat’s series on building niche sites. People loved the first series of posts that he did it again last year.

He shared exactly what he does in building his new niche site. The most commented post is from the first series, and the second most commented one is from the second series.

• THE BACKLINKING STRATEGY THAT WORKS
• NICHE SITE DUEL 2.0 – CRITERIA AND THOUGHTS FOR KEYWORD AND NICHE SELECTION

The reason why these posts go popular is because they see you accomplished what they want to get, and they see how you accomplished it.

Awesome, right?

Here are another few posts that shows the power of case studies:

• Viral Marketing Case Study: How a Brand New Blog Generated 17,584 Visitors In One Day

Here is what you need to write a great post:

• Detailed information.
• Willing to share it.
• Power of telling a great story.

The one that you should be worried about is the last one. If you can’t tell a story right, your post won’t do you any good.

But here’s a great strategy you could follow. Check out how these posts structured their case studies. Pick one and try to emulate the same style for your post.

If their post went popular, your post could do so.

Which Type to Try First?

There is no one rule that fits all. All these types are proven to be popular.

But here is one thing you could try to help you decide what to do.

Do a research and find out the popular blog posts in your topic. Find out there type and try to write a better post in other type.

Here is how you could find the popular posts:

1. Go to Ahrefs Content Explorer
2. Enter your topic and click search. You could also set date range. You’ll see the most popular posts by the number of shares.

Here is an example choosing Facebook ads as my topic.

The truth about building a popular blog

To be able to build a popular blog, you need to write posts on topics that are proven to be popular, structure it as popular posts.

You now know the 3 types of posts that are proven to be popular.

Apply them to your next post.

And if you’re wondering how to promote it, I’ve created a video series for BBT readers on the only promotion strategy to follow, and how to apply it the right way. Go check it out.