Our 5-Step Guide for How To Write an Effective and Engaging Therapist Blog

How do you attract visitors to your website? And once you have, how do you get them to stick around, read your posts and pages, engage with you and, hopefully, book a consultation?

Blogging is the answer to building a thriving client base for your private practice. By creating and sharing engaging content, you set yourself apart from the competition, get noticed by the search engines, and distinguish yourself as the expert. But it takes time and practice to master the art of content creation that will educate, inspire, and prompt action — whether that takes the form of subscribing to your email list, downloading a free gift, messaging for more information, or flat out booking an appointment.

Consistent blogging will also help your website’s ranking to soar. Search engines love engaging, relevant content because it gives their clients — the internet users — what they want; great content that answers their questions and fulfills their needs.

In this article we’ll share five tried and true steps to help you write and share posts that elicit interest, persuade, and build rapport quickly. We’ll also share a powerful “cheat” to make this process incredibly easy and efficient so you can get results while focusing on what matters most — client care.

1. It’s all about the reader

Consider your current clients, or those you’d love to work with…

Who are they? What’s on their mind? What do they need? What questions do they ask? What problems do they have?

Choose topics that are focused here; the problems that your existing client base, and ideal clients, are dealing with. Then, narrow your focus to provide meaningful content with sufficient detail. In short, think like your clients. Your posts should, in some way, have a positive impact on your reader’s life. If not, why write it?

Topics to write on might include causes, symptoms, common experiences, self-help strategies, treatment options and, of course, how you can help.

While writing, try to maintain a casual, accessible tone, as if you were speaking directly to the reader in a one-on-one conversation. This will help your readers get to know you and your style, in turn building the foundation for a solid, trusting therapist-client relationship.

2. Write accurate, attention-grabbing headlines

After entering a search query, internet users will scan the list of search engine results, reading only the page’s title. Giving your blog post a captivating title will increase the chance that they will click through to your website. In order to do so:

• Be descriptive and compelling: Make the reader want — need — to know what you have to say
• Be concise and digestible: Opt for easy-to-understand language and remember, overwhelm is a buzz — and click — killer
• Be authentic and accurate: Avoid clickbait at all costs; no-one benefits
• Use colons or numbers: For example, “Managing Stress: How to…” or “Five Tips for Managing Your Workday Anxiety”

If you’re struggling to uncover your headline mojo, there are tools to help. Try CapitalizeMyTitle, AMInstitute, ContentRow.

Like any skill, creating effective headlines takes practice. Spend time writing a dozen (or more) each time you create an article. The more you write, the easier it’ll become.

3. Structure your blog for easy reading

A blog post is not a tome. It is a message that should be easy to follow, that distills its points clearly. Lengthy text blocks are difficult for readers to digest and may deter them from even attempting to read the article from the get-go. They also damage your SEO. Just like people scan texts in a certain way, so does Google.

To break up text blocks, bear these tips in mind:

• Use sub-headlines. Many people scan, searching for only the points they need. Sub-headlines help them find this content fast. Use them!
• Include bulleted and numbered lists to distill important points with brevity.
• Add images, infographics, calls to action (CTAs) or video throughout the post to improve clarity and readability and increase engagement. As they say, “A picture is worth a thousand words” (and a video even more).
• Include expert citations, links to studies, and hyper links to other pages and posts on your website. This will build credibility and boost your SEO score by increasing dwell time and internal click-through rates, while reducing your bounce rate.

4. Share your blog posts widely

Once you’ve spent time creating compelling content, don’t hide your light under a bushel. No piece is effective or engaging if it remains unread!

Make sure you get noticed by sharing your post widely throughout your network and consider how you might also reach a new audience.

1. 1. Post on your social accounts
   2. Send a dedicated email blast to your following
   3. Ask other professionals to share (many will be happy to repost a value-packed piece)
   4. Turn your post into a video or audio recording and upload to different streaming platforms, like YouTube
   5. If your article is topical, reach out to local media (they’re always looking for great talent and timely news) or turn it into a press release
   6. Add the headline and a hyperlink to your email signature

5. Post regularly

Publishing a blog once and then going dark for months won’t cut it. You must blog regularly to build rapport position yourself as an industry expert. This will build trust with your audience and immediately establish your practice as a reliable resource for new visitors.

It’s helpful to build a content calendar to plan out your posts weeks, even months, in advance. Maybe you start each week by posting a new article, or can manage two posts a month. The frequency of which you post will depend on the size of your practice and your bandwidth, but keeping a consistent schedule when blogging builds organic traffic and helps with brand awareness.

Using a tool like Social Genie, which Brighter Vision designed especially for therapists, can help. Social Genie has a library of thousands of social media and blog posts that you can edit, customize, and schedule across all platforms in a matter of minutes, making content creation and social media sharing a cinch.

If you’re struggling to keep up with fresh blog content, check out our recent blog posts, Out With The Old, In With The Reused: Repurposing Evergreen Content For Your Therapist Blog and If I Build (And Maintain It) They Will Come: 5 Tips for Keeping Your Therapist Website From Going Stale, for more guidance.

Want the beautiful therapist website you deserve? Then you’re in the perfect place.

Brighter Vision is the ultimate marketing package for therapists, centered around the best therapist website you’ve ever had. Fill out the form below to learn more about our team of professionals who can’t wait to help your practice grow like never before 🙂

About Jocelyn Van Saun

Jocelyn is a Marketing Manager at Brighter Vision. When she's not creating and sharing content for our network of therapists, she loves spending time outdoors - rock climbing, trail running, hiking, camping, mountain biking, and skiing!