MackCollier.com

by

Learn how to improve your blogging and SEO with Topic Buckets

Two of  the biggest issues that most bloggers face is how to come up with ideas for posts, and how to optimize their blog for search engines.  I think most bloggers can solve both these problems (as well as tightening your blog’s focus) with Topic Buckets.

Here’s the way Topic Buckets work: Take your blog, and find 3-5 main topic areas, or Buckets that you like to write about.  For example, on here I have three main Topic Buckets:

1 – How individuals/companies can improve their blogging efforts

2 – How companies can use social media in general

3 – How companies can better understand and connect with its brand advocates.

Occasionally I post something that doesn’t go into those buckets, but most of my posts fit into one of those categories.  Now note that if I only write one post a week for each bucket, I’m up to 3 posts a week!  This helps me structure my blog and its posts.  For example, if I look and see that last week I only wrote posts that would go into Buckets 2 and 3, it tells me that this week I need to write a post from Bucket 1.

So once you create your list of Topic Buckets, your posting schedule can naturally evolve from that.  This is also a way to help you bring clarity to your blog’s focus.  If you write down all of your blog’s Topic Buckets and you have 15, that’s a good hint that you are covering too much ground.  Try trimming the fat down to 5 buckets or less.

For example, note that yesterday’s post on Advocates would obviously go in the #3 Topic Bucket for me, and this post will go in the #1 Topic Bucket.  So if I want to get a post up tomorrow or on Friday, I know that it would be best if it came from the #2 Topic Bucket (How companies can use social media in general).

Now as for SEO; When you create your Topic Buckets, you need to also make a list of the keywords and phrases that would be associated with those Topic Buckets, and you can use those in your title and post.  Look at the title of this post, ‘Learn how to improve your blogging and SEO with Topic Buckets’.  Keywords like ‘Learn’ and ‘Improve’ associated with ‘blogging and SEO’ were chosen on purpose because I want this post to do well in search engines.

I could have just have easily made the title ‘A cool trick I learned that might help you’, but that doesn’t really give you (or search engines) any real idea of the type of content in the post.  Remember that keywords and phrases help  search engines decide what type of content is in your post, and if it will be useful to people that are searching.

So try out Topic Buckets and see if that helps your blogging efforts.  I think you’ll find that it definitely makes getting on a posting schedule easier, and should help you improve your SEO as well.

About Mack Collier

My name is Mack Collier and I am a digital marketing and content strategist located in Alabama. Since 2006 I've helped companies of all sizes from startups to global brands such as Adobe, Dell and Ingersoll-Rand, create customer-centric programs, content and experiences. A long-time internet geek, I've been online since 1988 and began using social networking sites in 1991 when I joined Prodigy. Today, I help companies understand how new technologies like web3, crypto and artificial intelligence can integrate with existing marketing strategies to lead to exceptional customer experiences.

Comments

  1. ArielDeNeyPR says

    @MackCollier Make sure you tune in to #HHSCHAT the 1st Twitter chat dedicated to Hip Hop w/ special guest @MCLyte tonight @9 p.m. EST RT

  2. TrafficColeman says

    My focus is mainly seo and being successful in life, and I’m just like you when it comes to writing other things off topic.

    “Black Seo Guy “Signing Off”

  3. thomasfrank09 says

    Keeping a list of SEO keywords along with the topics is a good idea I hadn’t thought of. We’ve got a bunch of different topic buckets – a post ideas widget in WordPress, a big list in Evernote, and a separate note in our writers’ Facebook group – I’ll need to figure out how to implement keywords in at least one.

  6. MackCollier says

    @thomasfrank09 Thomas I think the SEO keywords and phrases really help you narrow down your possible topics and get to the essence of what you are blogging about. It really helps me zero in on what I need to be writing about and not be all over the map.

  8. thomasfrank09 says

    @MackCollier I think I’ve had trouble with that ever since I’ve started blogging. When I’m writing, I really don’t want to be focusing on keywords; I’d rather just write what comes to mind. But I know focusing at least a little on keywords will help more people see what I’m writing, so it’s something I’ll work to improve on.

  9. maidoesimple says

    That looks like a fine way to shape your mind into a productive asset, and it seems true not just for blogging to be honest. Categorizing has always been a powerful way to rationalize one’s thought after all, unless you exaggerate of course.

  11. MackCollier says

    @thomasfrank09 Thomas it’s a bit of a tradeoff. You don’t want to try to ‘force’ keywords into your writing, because then you’re altering your content, style, etc. But I think if you have a list of keywords that you focus on, it can help you bring clarity to your writing. Don’t think of them as something you need to ‘stick in’, but rather as a guide that’s going to keep your writing focused. At least that’s how I try to use keywords.

  12. MackCollier says

    @maidoesimple Yes Gabriele, I really need a sense of structure, for example, I used to tell myself that I’d write ‘whenever I got inspiration’. That often lead to only 1 post a week. Now that I tell myself that I need to write every day M-F if I can, then I am blogging much more often, then if I need to take a break for a couple of days, I can afford to do so.

    And great realization that this goes beyond blogging, because it really does!

  13. MackCollier says

    @maidoesimple Yes Gabriele, I really need a sense of structure, for example, I used to tell myself that I’d write ‘whenever I got inspiration’. That often lead to only 1 post a week. Now that I tell myself that I need to write every day M-F if I can, then I am blogging much more often, then if I need to take a break for a couple of days, I can afford to do so.

    And great realization that this goes beyond blogging, because it really does!

  16. DeborahJudah says

    Hi

    Thanks for this post, it has come at a great time as I have just started my blog (having been a reluctant blogger for a while). I will try and put this advice to good use.