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How to Write Articles

Last Updated: February 20, 2024 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Janet Peischel . Janet Peischel is a Writer and Digital Media Expert and the Owner of Top of Mind Marketing. With more than 15 years of consulting experience, she develops content strategies and builds online brands for her clients. Prior to consulting, Janet spent over 15 years in the marketing industry, in positions such as the Vice President of Marketing Communications for the Bank of America. Janet holds a BA and MA from the University of Washington. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 3,276,001 times.

There are a multitude of different types of articles, including news stories, features, profiles, instructional articles, and so on. While each has specific qualities that are unique to its type, all articles share some common characteristics. From forming and researching your idea to writing and editing your work, writing articles can give you a chance to share compelling and important information with readers.

Forming Your Idea

Step 1 Get familiar with the type of article you want to write.

  • News: This type of article presents facts about something that happened recently or that will happen in the near future. It usually covers the 5 Ws and H: who, what, where, when, why and how.
  • Feature: This type of article presents information in a more creative, descriptive way than a straight news article. It can be an article about a person, a phenomenon, a place, or other subject.
  • Editorial: This article presents a writer’s opinions on a topic or debate. It is intended to persuade the reader to think a certain way about a topic. [1] X Research source
  • How-to: This article gives clear instructions and information about how to accomplish some task.
  • Profile: This article presents information about a person, using information that the writer typically gathers through interviews and background research.

Step 2 Brainstorm your topic.

  • What interests you about this topic?
  • What is a point that people usually overlook?
  • What do you want people to know about this topic?
  • For example, if you want to write about organic farming, you might say to yourself, “I think it’s important to know what organic labeling means on food packages. It can be confusing to know what it all means.”

Step 3 Choose something you’re passionate about.

  • Your goal is to convey enough passion that your readers think the issue in your article is worth caring about.

Step 4 Conduct preliminary research.

  • Enter some keywords into an online search engine. This can lead you to sources that write about your topic. These sources can also give you an idea of different approaches to the topic.
  • Read as much as you can on the topic. Visit your local library. Consult books, magazine articles, published interviews, and online features as well as news sources, blogs, and databases for information. A good place to start looking for data not apparent on the Internet is the Gale Directory of Databases, which exists in both book format (available in libraries) or online .

Step 5 Find a unique angle.

  • For example, for the organic food topic, you might focus on one grocery shopper who doesn’t understand organic food labeling. Use that opening anecdote to lead into your main argument, known as a "nut graph," which summarizes your unique idea or perspective.

Step 6 Hone your argument.

  • For example, if you are writing about how one person learns how to read organic labels, your overall argument might be that the public needs to be aware that many companies misuse organic labeling. This leads to dishonest practices in product advertising. Another topic might be: it’s important to know who owns your local media outlets. If corporate media organizations own your local newspaper, you may get very little media coverage of your area and not know much about your community.
  • Write your argument in one sentence. Post it near your computer or writing area. This will help you stay focused as you start working on your article.

Researching Your Idea

Step 1 Learn about your topic and argument.

  • Primary sources can include a transcript from a legislative hearing, lawsuit filing, county property indexes with folio numbers, discharge certificates from the military, and photos. Other primary sources could include government written records in the National Archives or special collections sections of your local or university library, insurance policies, corporate financial reports, or personal background reports.
  • Secondary sources comprise published databases, books, abstracts, articles in English and other languages, bibliographies, dissertations, and reference books.
  • You can find information on the internet or in a library. You can also conduct interviews, watch documentaries, or consult other sources.

Step 2 Gather supporting evidence.

  • You can make a longer list of evidence and examples. As you gather more evidence, you will be able to prioritize which ones are the strongest examples.

Step 3 Use reliable sources.

  • Don’t assume that one source is completely accurate. You'll need several unrelated sources to get the full picture.

Step 4 Keep track of your research sources.

  • Choose a citation style sooner rather than later, so you can compile citation information in the correct format. MLA, APA, and Chicago are some of the most common citation styles.

Step 5 Avoid plagiarism...

  • Don’t copy any text directly from another source. Paraphrase this text instead, and include a citation .

Outlining Your Idea

Step 1 Decide on the article’s length.

  • For example, if you are writing an article for a specialized academic audience, your tone, and approach will be vastly different from if you’re writing an article for a popular magazine.

Step 3 Outline your article.

  • It’s helpful to start with the five-paragraph essay outline. [4] X Research source This outline devotes one paragraph to an introduction, three paragraphs for supporting evidence, and one paragraph for a conclusion. As you start plugging in information into your outline, you may find that this structure doesn’t suit your article so well.
  • You might also find that this structure doesn’t suit certain types of articles. For example, if you’re doing a profile of a person, your article may follow a different format.

Step 4 Choose quotes and other evidence to support your points.

  • Make sure to fully attribute your quote and use quotation marks around anything that you didn’t write yourself. For example, you might write: A spokesperson for the dairy brand Milktoast says, “Our milk is labeled organic because our cows are only fed organic grass.”
  • Don’t overdo the quotes. Be selective about the quotes you do use. If you use too many quotes, your reader might think you’re using them as filler instead of coming up with your material.

Writing Your Article

Step 1 Write your introduction.

  • Telling an anecdote.
  • Using a quote from an interview subject.
  • Starting with a statistic.
  • Starting with straight facts of the story.

Step 2 Follow your outline.

  • Be flexible, however. Sometimes when you write, the flow makes sense in a way that is different from your outline. Be ready to change the direction of your piece if it seems to read better that way.

Step 3 Give proper context.

  • For example, you might write about the grocery shopper having trouble with organic food labels: “Charlie concentrated on jars of peanut butter on the shelf. The words ‘organic’ and ‘natural’ seemed to jump out at him. Every jar said something different. He felt they were shouting at him: ‘Choose me!’ ‘Buy me!’ The words started swimming in front of his eyes. He left the aisle without buying anything.”

Step 5 Include transitions.

  • For example, use words or phrases such as “however…,” “another important point is…,” or “it must be remembered that…”

Step 6 Pay attention to style, structure and voice.

  • For example, a newspaper article will need to offer information in a narrative, chronological format. It should be written with accessible and straightforward language. An academic article will be written with more formal language. A how-to article might be written in more informal language.
  • When writing your article, use a strong "anchoring" sentence at the beginning of each paragraph to move your reader forward. Moreover, vary the length of your sentences, both short and long. If you find all your sentences are about the same word length, chances are your reader will be 'lulled" into a standard rhythm and fall asleep. Sentences which are consistently choppy and short may give your reader the impression you are writing advertising copy instead of a well-thought-out article.

Step 7 Write a compelling conclusion.

  • If you started with an anecdote or statistic in your introduction, think about reconnecting to this point in your conclusion.
  • Conclusions are often strongest when they use a last, brief, concrete example that leads the reader to new insights. Conclusions should be 'forward-thinking' -- point the reader in a direction that keeps his or her "thirst" for knowledge going strong.

Step 8 Think about adding supplemental material.

  • For example, you could include photographs, charts, or infographics to illustrate some of your points.
  • You could also highlight or develop a major point more with a sidebar-type box. This is an extra bit of writing that delves more deeply into one aspect of the subject. For example, if you’re writing about your city’s film festival, you might include a sidebar write-up that highlights one of the films. These types of write-ups are usually short (50-75 words, depending on the publication outlet).
  • Remember, these materials are supplemental. This means that your article should stand on its own. Your writing needs to be understandable, clear and focused without the help of charts, photographs or other graphics.

Finalizing Your Work

Step 1 Edit your work.

  • Look closely at the central argument or point you’re trying to make. Does everything in your article serve this central argument? Do you have a unrelated paragraph? If so, this paragraph should be eliminated or reframed so that it supports the main argument.
  • Eliminate any contradictory information in the article or address the contradictions, showing how the contradictory information is relevant to readers.
  • Rewrite sections or the entire thing as necessary. Revisions like this are common for all types of articles, so don’t feel like you’ve failed or are incompetent.

Step 2 Comb through for grammatical errors.

  • It’s helpful to print out a hard copy of your article. Go through it with a pen or pencil to catch mistakes. Then go back and correct these mistakes on the computer.

Step 3 Read your article out loud to yourself.

  • It is common to be able to identify your mistakes in grammar or writing while reading aloud as well; this could cut down on the feedback that you may receive from someone else.

Step 4 Have someone else read your article.

  • This person may also catch errors and inconsistencies that you have overlooked.

Step 5 Write a headline.

  • If you want to convey slightly more information, write a sub-headline. This is a secondary sentence that builds on the headline.

Article Outline Template

how to write articles online

Expert Q&A

Janet Peischel

  • Make sure to give yourself plenty of time to write the article. If you don't, you'll be rushing at the last minute to create something that isn't representative of what you can truly do. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0
  • To find out more about using primary research tools and databases, consult the Investigative Reporters and Editors website or get a copy of The Investigative Reporter's Handbook: A Guide to Documents, Databases and Techniques, Fifth Edition. Authors: Brant Houston and Investigative Reporters and Editors Inc. (New York: Bedford/St. Martin's 2009). Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0
  • Determine whether you actually have an interest in writing. Try writing 2 paragraphs with as much creativity as possible. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

how to write articles online

  • When writing for a newspaper or magazine, do not do so free. Ask what the freelance fee is beforehand. Your pay will usually be calculated on a per-word basis or per-article basis. Your work is valuable. Writing for free makes making a living more difficult for those who depend on freelance fees to pay the bills. If you're just starting out, volunteering to do some articles for smaller community papers, student publications and trade magazines is a great way to build your portfolio. Thanks Helpful 3 Not Helpful 0

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Brainstorm

  • ↑ https://writing2.richmond.edu/writing/wweb/journalism/types.html
  • ↑ Janet Peischel. Digital Media Expert. Expert Interview. 30 March 2021.
  • ↑ https://grammar.yourdictionary.com/writing/creating-a-5-paragraph-essay-outline.html
  • ↑ https://www.masterclass.com/articles/why-is-context-important-in-writing#quiz-0
  • ↑ https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/166662

About This Article

Janet Peischel

To write an article, use both primary and secondary sources to gather information about your topic. Primary sources include photos, government records, and personal interviews, while secondary sources include books, abstracts, scholarly journals, other articles, and reference books. When you’re writing, use facts, quotes, and statistics from your sources to support your point, and explain your topic as if the reader has never heard of it before. To learn the different types of articles, including news, features, and editorials, read on! Did this summary help you? Yes No

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Writing Articles Online: Everything You Need To Know – Part 1

  • by Hannah Collins
  • September 18, 2017

Standout Books is supported by its audience, if you click and purchase from any of the links on this page, we may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. We only recommend products we have personally vetted. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.

If you love to write, there’s no greater reward than making a living from your art. While becoming an author is a great way to do that, it’s not the only path. Many writers make good money from online content, penning articles for online outlets. Even if that’s not an avenue you want to explore, you might want to create some quality online content to attract potential readers to your author website , or as a way of marketing your other work.

Thanks to the internet, people are reading more than ever, whether it’s a lengthy essay from an online magazine or a pithy, 140-character tweet. In fact, if it wasn’t for written content, the web would essentially just be filled with Real Housewives reaction GIFs, and more videos of cats than there are actual cats in the real world.

Writing articles either for your own blog or for publication elsewhere can not only be financially rewarding, it can also increase your audience’s awareness of you, as well as attract more to the flock. It’s also a great way to exercise your writing muscles on a regular basis.

Those are some of the reasons you should consider writing articles online, but how can you go about it? My two-part guide is intended to answer that question, beginning with this first installment that focuses on structure and writing techniques.

Structuring an article online

Format options.

The definition of an ‘article’ online is a lot more varied than you might think. If you’re writing for another party, whether it’s a guest post for someone’s blog or an online publication, they’ll dictate the length and format of the article they want from you. If you’re writing for your own site, you can pick the format that suits you best. Either way, it’s good to be familiar with the options.

  • Short-form – 1,000 words or less. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) experts describe short-form content as, ‘snackable’. This format is ideal for delivering breaking news, or if you just have a simple point to make. If you want to publish content daily, this might be the most realistic choice.
  • Long-form – Anything over 1,500 words. SEO buffs will tell you that long-form content ranks higher in search engines and people are more likely to share it than short-form content. However, you need to be able to sustain a reader’s attention for the extra stretch. If you only have about 500 words to say about something, needlessly stretching it out will show, as you’ll likely end up repeating yourself. If you loved writing essays in school, this might be a format you’ll enjoy.
  • Listicles – If you’re a regular BuzzFeed reader you’ll be very familiar with this list-based format, and you may have strong opinions on its literary worth. Love them or hate them, as someone who makes a living writing a lot of them, I can tell you that they’re both hugely popular to read and easier to write than the previous two formats. You can disguise what could have been a 3,000-word essay in a list with surprising ease. Why do people love lists? The same reason humans invented clocks. You can see in a quantifiable amount how much information an article contains and exactly how near you are to the end while you’re reading it. This is especially attractive to the huge audience who read listicles as a way of breaking up the workday. Choose this option if you find clearly defined structures help you to write, or if you love making to-do lists.
  • Slideshows – This format features images and/or videos with accompanying text. It’s very similar to a listicle but usually with visual content being the focal point as opposed to text, with each entry either accompanied by a title, caption, or both. Again, this may seem anti-literary, but there’s a certain satisfaction to be gained from a well-crafted witticism delivered in just one or two lines. If you’re a fan of comedic one-liners, you might want to try this one.

Visual structuring

Making an article look visually appealing includes, but is not limited to, inserting images, GIFs, and videos to break up the text. This is more necessary for online content than physical copy – the web offers endless diversions, so reading your article has to appear immediately easier than just moving on to whatever’s next. Producing something that looks hard to digest is risky, as you won’t just be putting off readers who aren’t worthy of your content, but those who intend to save it for later and end up forgetting. Remember, again, that a lot of workday readers are looking to treat themselves with content. Success lies in making it simple for them to do so.

There are a few ways you can break up a long piece of writing without adding extra content:

  • Use regular paragraph breaks,
  • Use bullet points or numbered points where relevant (like here!)
  • Split your article into sections with section headings (again, hi!)
  • Include block quotes to highlight key information to take away from the article. Bonus points if you can make them shareable (yes, us again.)

Using images, GIFs, and/or videos

Illustrating your articles with relevant and/or fun visual aids not only helps with the visual appeal of a piece of writing but should serve to enhance the points you’re making. There are a few legal issues you should be mindful of before using them, though. These are just the basics (I’m not a legal expert) so if you want to know more, here’s a more in-depth guide .

  • Material from films, TV shows, and similar media are protected under copyright law. However, you can use them under ‘Fair Use’ (to comment on or critique the work) or ‘Newsworthy’ (if the work is topical) purposes. Legally speaking, you can’t justify using them for purely illustrative reasons.
  • Any other visual material you use either has to be copyright free, paid for by you, or in the public domain. If you want to use an artist’s work you should ask them for permission first and include a link back to them once permission has been obtained. You can find free images through Google Image Search by clicking ‘Tools’ > ‘Usage Rights’, or going to Wikimedia Commons .
  • In terms of videos, if the uploader has enabled the ‘Share’ buttons, it means they’re theoretically giving permission for it to be embedded anywhere else. But, if they’ve used copyrighted content they don’t have permission to use, you shouldn’t share their content, as you’ll be using it too.

This may sound difficult, but it’s a simple skill that you can learn from reading a few guides and experimenting with your content. The deciding factor in whether you use this method is generally how much extra attention it attracts versus the effort and resources it takes to implement – something you’ll generally discover through experience. If you’re writing for another party then they’ll probably provide you with appropriate guidelines.

Techniques for writing an article online

Edutainment.

A horrible-sounding word, but the best single-word summary of this technique. It might seem like a redundant point, but lacing informative content with personality, humor, and opinion can make any subject (even the ‘drier’ ones) far more palatable. No one can really tell you exactly how to do this, as it needs to be organic and true to you, and it might take some experimentation.

Just like you would develop your voice as an author, you can develop this voice as an article writer through experience and practice. Find a style that you feel comfortable with and your audience responds to. Coming from a creative writing background can really give you an advantage here, too. I like to be as descriptive as possible when I write – metaphors, analogies, pop culture references, anecdotes, and even sarcasm (if I can get away with it.) That said, don’t stray too far into the ‘casual writing’ territory. You want to sound entertaining, not incompetent.

It’s worth noting that, if you’re writing for another party, you’ll need to adapt/moderate your own voice to suit the style/tone of their brand. Generally, outlets will want to hire someone who not only can write but also has a unique point of view to offer their audience.

Choosing titles

If you’re brand new to all this, you’ll likely be unaware of just how important article titles are. I certainly was when I first started doing this!  SEO gurus will advise that article titles need to be a ‘Goldilocks’ length (more than 8 words but less than 14. This can vary depending on how you want people to find the article, though.) The title should ideally include a keyword from the subject you’re writing about. There are a number of different techniques you can use for attracting attention to your article through its wording, including:

  • Using emotional words like ‘love’ or ‘hate’,
  • Asking a question,
  • Making the title about the reader by including ‘you’ or ‘your’,
  • If it’s a listicle, including the total number of items in the title.

Generally, challenging people’s established opinions will get you more clicks but confirming people’s established opinions will get you more shares. I’m not advocating that you purposefully create controversy-baiting headlines, though (those kinds of folk live under digital bridges.) There are SEO plugins that can help analyze the effectiveness of your headlines. I use Yoast , but others are available.

Readability and brevity

Unless you have the luxury of writing longform, critical analysis for a high-brow publication, you should be mindful of readability. Generally, you should try and stick mainly to short, concise, clear sentences. 20–25 words per sentence is considered about right for the average reading age. Personally, I follow this rule to degrees that vary from audience to audience, and you may find that works for you, too. Again, plugins can help you gauge the readability of your articles.

Don’t take too long to get to the point. I’m still guilty, sometimes, of penning long-winded introductions and dishing out oodles of contextual tidbits before getting to the nitty-gritty of a subject. You need to give your audience a taste of what the article will be about at the start, and then reiterate it again to conclude the piece. If you can hold a little something back for the end too, then all the better. Entice them at the beginning and leave them with food for thought.

Find your corner and conquer it

If you’re just starting out, don’t be afraid of a bit of trial and error when it comes to picking formats and writing techniques. Where possible, you should only use tools that work the best for you while being willing to adapt to what your audience is responding to, or what your editor wants. Be continually mindful of the readability of your articles, including their brevity, clarity, and visual appeal. But, above all, try to make them as interesting to read as a piece of fiction. This can be helped if you can find your niche – something you’re both passionate and knowledgeable about – and making that your ‘brand’ as an article writer.

Check out  part 2  for more on this key concept, along with advice on researching your content, submitting pitches, and how to find the right places to publish your articles. Please also let me know your thoughts on the above, and check out  14 Vital Questions That Will Improve Your Blog Post – Part 1 ,  15 Things You Need To Do After You Publish A Post  and How To Have Your Author Blog And Write For It, Too for more great advice on this topic.

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  • Advertising , Author blogs , Author websites , Blogging , Money , Non-fiction

how to write articles online

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Hannah Collins

Hannah Collins

6 thoughts on “writing articles online: everything you need to know – part 1”.

how to write articles online

You write in such a comprehensive way I’m mesmerised. I never felt I was getting bored (which I generally do while reading many online articles….). Where’s part 2?

how to write articles online

You can find the follow-up link below:

//www.standoutbooks.com/writing-articles-online-part-2/

Best wishes, Rob

how to write articles online

Your suggestion must helpful. But I need to know about grammar correction of an article. Have you any article on this regard?

We have quite a few articles on editing for grammar, but the below is probably the best place to start:

9 Timeless Grammar Lessons From A Strait-laced Editor

how to write articles online

I found this article very useful. Great content and the structure is easy to follow. I have been applying some of the ideas and getting more productive and better at writing craft.

how to write articles online

Thank you for this article – it was exactly what I was looking for and will be reading Part 2 next. Very helpful info for a newbie.

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How to Write an Article: A Proven Step-by-Step Guide

Tom Winter

Are you dreaming of becoming a notable writer or looking to enhance your content writing skills? Whatever your reasons for stepping into the writing world, crafting compelling articles can open numerous opportunities. Writing, when viewed as a skill rather than an innate talent, is something anyone can master with persistence, practice, and the proper guidance.

That’s precisely why I’ve created this comprehensive guide on ‘how to write an article.’ Whether you’re pursuing writing as a hobby or eyeing it as a potential career path, understanding the basics will lead you to higher levels of expertise. This step-by-step guide has been painstakingly designed based on my content creation experience. Let’s embark on this captivating journey toward becoming an accomplished article writer!

What is an Article?

what is an article

An article is more than words stitched together cohesively; it’s a carefully crafted medium expressing thoughts, presenting facts, sharing knowledge, or narrating stories. Essentially encapsulating any topic under the sun (or beyond!), an article is a versatile format meant to inform, entertain, or persuade readers.

Articles are ubiquitous; they grace your morning newspaper (or digital equivalents), illuminate blogs across various platforms, inhabit scholarly journals, and embellish magazines. Irrespective of their varying lengths and formats, which range from news reports and features to opinion pieces and how-to guides, all articles share some common objectives. Learning how to write this type of content involves mastering the ability to meet these underlying goals effectively.

Objectives of Article Writing

Objectives of Article Writing

The primary goal behind learning how to write an article is not merely putting words on paper. Instead, you’re trying to communicate ideas effectively. Each piece of writing carries unique objectives intricately tailored according to the creator’s intent and the target audience’s interests. Generally speaking, when you immerse yourself in writing an article, you should aim to achieve several fundamental goals.

First, deliver value to your readers. An engaging and informative article provides insightful information or tackles a problem your audience faces. You’re not merely filling up pages; you must offer solutions, present new perspectives, or provide educational material.

Next comes advancing knowledge within a specific field or subject matter. Especially relevant for academic or industry-focused writings, articles are often used to spread original research findings and innovative concepts that strengthen our collective understanding and drive progress.

Another vital objective for those mastering how to write an article is persuasion. This can come in various forms: convincing people about a particular viewpoint or motivating them to make a specific choice. Articles don’t always have to be neutral; they can be powerful tools for shifting public opinion.

Finally, let’s not forget entertainment – because who said only fictional work can entertain? Articles can stir our emotions or pique our interest with captivating storytelling techniques. It bridges the gap between reader and writer using shared experiences or universal truths.

Remember that high-quality content remains common across all boundaries despite these distinct objectives. No matter what type of writer you aspire to become—informative, persuasive, educational, or entertaining—strive for clarity, accuracy, and stimulation in every sentence you craft.

What is the Format of an Article?

What is the Format of an Article?

When considering how to write an article, understanding its foundation – in this case, the format – should be at the top of your list. A proper structure is like a blueprint, providing a direction for your creative construction.

First and foremost, let’s clarify one essential point: articles aren’t just homogenous chunks of text. A well-crafted article embodies different elements that merge to form an engaging, informative body of work. Here are those elements in order:

  • The Intriguing Title

At the top sits the title or heading; it’s your first chance to engage with a reader. This element requires serious consideration since it can determine whether someone will continue reading your material.

  • Engaging Introduction

Next comes the introduction, where you set expectations and hint at what’s to come. An artfully written introduction generates intrigue and gives readers a compelling reason to stick around.

  • Informative Body

The main body entails a detailed exploration of your topic, often broken down into subtopics or points for more manageable consumption and better flow of information.

  • Impactful Conclusion

Lastly, you have the conclusion, where you tie everything neatly together by revisiting key points and offering final thoughts.

While these components might appear straightforward on paper, mastering them requires practice, experimentation with writing styles, and a good understanding of your target audience. 

By putting in the work to familiarize yourself with how to create articles and how they’re structured, you’ll soon discover new ways to develop engaging content each time you put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard!). Translating complex concepts into digestible content doesn’t need to feel daunting anymore! Now that we’ve tackled the format, our focus can shift to what should be included in an article.

What Should Be in an Article?

What Should Be in an Article?

Understanding that specific items should be featured in your writing is crucial. A well-crafted article resembles a neatly packed suitcase – everything has its place and purpose.

Key Information

First and foremost, you need essential information. Start by presenting the topic plainly so readers can grasp its relevance immediately. This sets the tone of why you are writing the article. The degree of depth at this point will depend on your audience; be mindful not to overwhelm beginners with too much jargon or over-simplify things for experts.

Introduction

Secondly, every article must have an engaging introduction—this acts as the hook that reels your audience. Think of it as a movie trailer—it offers a taste of what’s to come without giving away all the details.

Third is the body, wherein you get into the crux of your argument or discussion. This is the point at which you present your ideas sequentially, along with supporting evidence or examples. Depending on the nature of your topic and personal style, this may vary from storytelling forms to more analytical breakdowns.

Lastly, you’ll need a fitting conclusion that wraps up all previously discussed points, effectively tying together every loose thread at the end. This helps cement your main ideas within the reader’s mind even after they’ve finished reading.

To summarize:  

  • Critical Information: Provides context for understanding
  • Introduction: Sheds further light on what will follow while piquing interest  
  • Body: Discusses topic intricacies using narratives or case studies
  • Conclusion: Ties up loose ends and reemphasizes important takeaways

In my experience writing articles for beginners and experts alike, I found these elements indispensable when conveying complex topics articulately and professionally. Always keep them at hand when looking to produce written material.

How should you structure an article?

How should you structure an article?

Crafting a well-structured article is akin to assembling a puzzle – every piece has its place and purpose. Let’s look at how to create the perfect skeleton for your content.

The introduction is your article’s welcome mat. It should be inviting and informative, briefly outlining what a reader can expect from your writing. Additionally, it must instantly grab the readers’ attention so they feel compelled to continue reading. To master the art of creating effective introductions, remember these key points:

  • Keep it short and precise.
  • Use compelling hooks like quotes or intriguing facts.
  • State clearly what the article will cover without revealing everything upfront.

Moving on, you encounter the body of your piece. This segment expands on the ideas outlined in the introduction while presenting fresh subtopics related to your core story. If we compare article writing to crossing a bridge, each paragraph represents a step toward the other side (the conclusion). Here are some tips for maintaining orderliness within your body:

  • Stick closely to one idea per paragraph as it enhances readability.
  • Ensure paragraphs flow logically by utilizing transitional words or sentences.
  • Offer evidence or examples supporting your claims and reinforce credibility.

As you approach the far side of our imaginary bridge, we reach an equally essential section of the article known as the conclusion. At this point, you should be looking to wrap your message up neatly while delivering on what was initially promised during the introduction. This section summarizes the main points, providing closure and ensuring readers feel satisfied.

Remember this golden rule when writing the conclusion: follow the  “Describe what you’re going to tell them (Introduction), tell them (Body), and then summarize what you told them (Conclusion).”  It’s a proven formula for delivering informative, engaging, and well-structured articles. 

One final tip before moving on: maintaining an active voice significantly enhances clarity for your readers. It makes them feel like they’re participating actively in the story unfolding within your article. In addition, it helps ensure easy readability, which is vital for keeping your audience engaged.

Tips for Writing a Good Article

Tips for Writing a Good Article

A persuasive, engaging, and insightful article requires careful thought and planning. Half the battle won is by knowing how to start writing and make content captivating. Below are vital tips that can enhance your article writing skills.

Heading or Title

An audience’s first impression hinges on the quality of your title. A good heading should be clear, attention-grabbing, and give an accurate snapshot of what’s contained in the piece’s body. Here are a few guidelines on how to create an impactful title:

  • Make it Compelling: Your title needs to spark interest and motivate readers to delve further into your work.
  • Keep it concise: You want to have a manageable heading. Aim for brevity yet inclusiveness.
  • Optimize with keywords: To boost search engine visibility, sprinkle relevant keywords naturally throughout your title.

By applying these techniques, you can increase reader engagement right from the get-go.

Body of the Article

After winning over potential readers with your catchy title, it’s time to provide substantial content in the form of the body text. Here’s how articles are typically structured:

Introduction:  Begin by providing an appealing overview that hooks your audience and baits them to read more. You can ask poignant questions or share interesting facts about your topic here.

Main Content:  Build on the groundwork set by your introduction. Lay out detailed information in a logical sequence with clear articulation.

Conclusion:  This reemphasizes the critical points discussed in the body while delivering a lasting impression of why those points matter.

Remember that clarity is critical when drafting each part because our objective here is to share information and communicate effectively. Properly understanding this approach ensures that the writing experience becomes creative and productive.

Step By Step Guide for Article Writing

Step By Step Guide for Article Writing

How do you write an article that engages your readers from the first line until the last? That’s what most writers, whether beginners or seasoned pros are trying to achieve. I’ll describe a step-by-step process for crafting such gripping articles in this guide.

Step 1: Find Your Target Audience

First and foremost, identify your target readers. Speaking directly to a specific group improves engagement and helps you craft messages that resonate deeply. To pinpoint your audience:

  • Take note of demographic attributes like age, gender, and profession.
  • Consider their preferences and needs.
  • Look into how much knowledge they are likely to possess concerning your topic.

Knowing this will help you decide what tone, language, and style best suits your readers. Remember, by understanding your audience better, you make it much easier to provide them with engaging content.

Step 2: Select a Topic and an Attractive Heading

Having understood your audience, select a relevant topic based on their interests and questions. Be sure it’s one you can competently discuss. When deciding how to start writing an article, ensure it begins with a captivating title.

A title should hint at what readers will gain from the article without revealing everything. Maintain some element of intrigue or provocation. For example, ‘6 Essentials You Probably Don’t Know About Gardening’ instead of just ‘Gardening Tips’.

Step 3: Research is Key

Good research is crucial to building credibility for beginners and experts alike. It prevents errors that could tarnish your piece immensely.

Thoroughly explore relevant books, scholarly articles, or reputable online resources. Find facts that build authenticity while debunking misconceptions that relate to your topic. Take notes on critical points discovered during this process—it’ll save you time when creating your first draft.

Step 4: Write a Comprehensive Brief

Having done your research, it’s time to write an outline or a brief—a roadmap for your article. This conveys how articles are written systematically without losing track of the main points.

Begin by starting the introduction with a punchy opener that draws readers in and a summary of what they’ll glean from reading. Section out specific points and ideas as separate headings and bullet points under each section to form the body. A conclusion rounds things up by restating key takeaways.

Step 5: Write and Proofread

Now comes the bulk of the work—writing. Respect the brief created earlier to ensure consistency and structure while drafting content. Use short, clear sentences while largely avoiding jargon unless absolutely necessary.

Post-writing, proofread ardently to check for typographical errors, inconsistent tenses, and poor sentence structures—and don’t forget factual correctness! It helps to read aloud, which can reveal awkward phrases that slipped through initial edits.

Step 6: Add Images and Infographics

To break text monotony and increase comprehension, introduce visuals such as images, infographics, or videos into your piece. They provide aesthetic relief while supporting the main ideas, increasing overall engagement.

Remember to source royalty-free images or get permission for copyrighted ones—you don’t want legal battles later!

Common Mistakes to Avoid in Article Writing

Common Mistakes to Avoid in Article Writing

Regarding article writing, a few pitfalls can compromise the quality of your content. Knowing these and how to avoid them will enhance your work’s clarity, depth, and impact.

The first mistake often made is skimping on research. An article without solid underpinnings won’t merely be bland – it might mislead readers. Therefore, prioritize comprehensive investigation before penning down anything. Understanding common misconceptions or misinterpretations about your topic will strengthen your case. 

Next, sidestep unnecessary jargon or excessively complex language. While showcasing an impressive vocabulary might seem appealing, remember that your primary objective is imparting information efficiently and effectively.

Moreover, failing to structure articles effectively represents another standard error. A structured piece aids in delivering complex ideas coherently. Maintaining a logical sequence facilitates reader comprehension, whether explaining a detailed concept or narrating an incident.

A piece lacking aesthetic allure can fail its purpose regardless of the value of its text. That’s where images come into play. Neglecting them is an all-too-common mistake among beginners. Relevant pictures inserted at appropriate junctures serve as visual breaks from texts and stimulate interest among readers.

Lastly, proofreading is vital in determining whether you can deliver a well-written article. Typos and grammatical errors can significantly undermine professional credibility while disrupting a smooth reading experience.

So, when pondering how articles are written, avoiding these mistakes goes a long way toward producing high-quality content that embodies both substance and style. Remember: practice is paramount when learning how to write excellent material!

How to Write an Article with SEOwind AI Writer?

How to Write an Article with SEOwind AI Writer

Harnessing the power of artificial intelligence has been a major step in many industries. One such significant tool is SEOwind AI Writer, which is critical for those curious about how to write an article leveraging AI. In this section, I’ll cover how you can effectively use SEOwind AI writer to create compelling articles.

Step 1: Create a Brief and Outline

The first step in writing an article revolves around understanding your audience’s interests and then articulating them in a comprehensive brief that outlines the content’s framework.

  • Decide on the topic: What ideas will you share via your article?
  • Define your audience: Knowing who will read your text significantly influences your tone, style, and content depth.
  • Establish main points: Highlight the key points or arguments you wish to exhibit in your drafted piece. This helps create a skeleton for your work and maintain a logical flow of information.

With SEOwind:

  • you get all the content and keyword research for top-performing content in one place,
  • you can generate a comprehensive AI outline with one click,
  • users can quickly create a title, description, and keywords that match the topic you’re writing about.

As insightful as it might seem, having a roadmap doubles as a guide throughout the creative process. SEOwind offers a user-friendly interface that allows the easy input of essential elements like keywords, title suggestions, content length, etc. These provide an insightful outline, saving time with an indispensable tool that demonstrates the practicality of article writing.

Step 2: Write an AI Article using SEOwind

Once you have a brief ready, you can write an AI article with a single click. It will consider all the data you provided and much more, such as copywriting and SEO best practices , to deliver content that ranks.

Step 3: Give it a Human Touch

Finally, SEOwind’s intuitive platform delivers impeccably constructed content to dispel any confusion about writing an article. The result is inevitably exceptional, with well-structured sentences and logically sequenced sections that meet your demands.

However, artificial intelligence can sometimes miss the unique personal touch that enhances relatability in communication—making articles more compelling. Let’s master adding individualistic charm to personalize articles so that they resonate with audiences.

Tailoring the AI-generated piece with personal anecdotes or custom inputs helps to break the monotony and bolster engagement rates. Always remember to tweak essential SEO elements like meta descriptions and relevant backlinks.

So, whether it’s enhancing casual language flow or eliminating robotic consistency, the slightest modifications can breathe life into the text and transform your article into a harmonious man-machine effort. Remember – it’s not just about technology making life easy but also how effectively we utilize this emerging trend!

Common Questions on how to write an article

Delving into the writing world, especially regarding articles, can often lead to a swarm of questions. Let’s tackle some common queries that newbies and seasoned writers frequently stumble upon to make your journey more comfortable and rewarding.

What is the easiest way to write an article?

The easiest way to write an article begins with a clear structure. Here are five simple steps you can follow:

  • Identify your audience: The first thing you should consider while planning your article is who will read it? Identifying your target audience helps shape the article’s content, style, and purpose.
  • Decide on a topic and outline: Determining what to write about can sometimes be a formidable task. Try to ensure you cover a topic you can cover effectively or for which you feel great passion. Next, outline the main points you want to present throughout your piece.
  • Do the research: Dig deep into resources for pertinent information regarding your topic and gather as much knowledge as possible. An informed writer paves the way for a knowledgeable reader.
  • Drafting phase: Begin with an engaging introduction followed by systematically fleshing out each point from your outline in body paragraphs before ending with conclusive remarks tying together all the earlier arguments.
  • Fine-tune through editing and proofreading: Errors happen no matter how qualified or experienced a writer may be! So make sure to edit and proofread before publishing.

Keep these keys in mind and remain patient and persistent. There’s no easier alternative for writing an article.

How can I write an article without knowing about the topic?

We sometimes need to write about less familiar subjects – but do not fret! Here’s my approach:

  • First off, start by thoroughly researching subject-centric reliable sources. The more information you have, the better poised you are to write confidently about it.
  • While researching, take notes and highlight the most essential points.
  • Create an outline by organizing these points logically – this essentially becomes your article’s backbone.
  • Start writing based on your research and outlined structure. If certain aspects remain unclear, keep investigating until clarity prevails.

Getting outside your comfort zone can be daunting, but is also a thrilling chance to expand your horizons.

What is your process for writing an article quickly?

In terms of speed versus quality in writing an article – strikingly enough, they aren’t mutually exclusive. To produce a high-quality piece swiftly, adhere to the following steps:

  • Establish purpose and audience: Before cogs start turning on phrase-spinning, be clear on why you’re writing and who will likely read it.
  • Brainstorm broadly, then refine: Cast a wide net initially regarding ideas around your topic. Then, narrow down those areas that amplify your core message or meet objectives.
  • Create a robust outline: A detailed roadmap prevents meandering during actual writing and saves time!
  • Ignore perfection in the first draft: Speed up initial drafting by prioritizing getting your thoughts on paper over perfect grammar or sentence compositions.
  • Be disciplined with edits and revisions: Try adopting a cut, shorten, and replace mantra while trimming fluff without mercy!

Writing quickly requires practice and strategic planning – but rest assured, it’s entirely possible!

Tom Winter

Seasoned SaaS and agency growth expert with deep expertise in AI, content marketing, and SEO. With SEOwind, he crafts AI-powered content that tops Google searches and magnetizes clicks. With a track record of rocketing startups to global reach and coaching teams to smash growth, Tom's all about sharing his rich arsenal of strategies through engaging podcasts and webinars. He's your go-to guy for transforming organic traffic, supercharging content creation, and driving sales through the roof.

Table of Contents

  • 1 What is an Article?
  • 2 Objectives of Article Writing
  • 3 What is the Format of an Article?
  • 4 What Should Be in an Article?
  • 5 How should you structure an article?
  • 6 Tips for Writing a Good Article
  • 7 Step By Step Guide for Article Writing
  • 8 Common Mistakes to Avoid in Article Writing
  • 9 How to Write an Article with SEOwind AI Writer?
  • 10 Common Questions on how to write an article

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  • How to Write a Web Article

how to write articles online

Dave Schools , Former Digital Strategist

Article Category: #Strategy

Posted on April 18, 2016

Follow this simple and proven framework to organize your writing for effective delivery on the web.

F o l l o w t h i s s i m p l e a n d p r o v e n f r a m e w o r k t o o r g a n i z e y o u r w r i t i n g f o r e f f e c t i v e d e l i v e r y o n t h e w e b .

how to write articles online

When I first started writing on the web, I knew nothing. I was scared of the gavel-wielding, faceless, Redditesque crowd (whom I now love). But I found my first footing when I submitted an article to a niche blog I liked and followed (more below).

Since then, I’ve been able to write several top stories on Medium, including my best one: I sat down with a millionaire who operates 10 businesses while sailing around the world with his family , which has 7.2k recommends and has been picked up by several publications including Business Insider, The Observer, Quartz, et al.

I’m not trying to be boasty (intentional new word — trying it out), I’m just saying there is a structure that works for single-topic web articles. My hope is that it will help new writers take the leap as I did.

Credit for this structure goes to Crew and to Andrea Ayres Deets , who is an amazing writer and inspired me to write several years ago.

The first time I ever freelanced, I submitted an article to the Crew Blog and Andrea replied with the loose and simple formula they use for structuring their posts — one that I still use today and the one I am about to show you now.

Let it be known, there is no perfect formula for a successful blog post . It takes more than words and pictures — a lot of which is out of our control (i.e., network algorithms, timing, audience, etc.). But sometimes you need a good framework (the one below built up a 1 million+ visitors) to get started. I did. So here it is.

how to write articles online

(Anecdote) Start with an experience from your own life. Write a story in the first person. Be vulnerable. My favorite writer, James Altucher , says to “ Bleed in the first sentence .” This builds personal connection with your reader, even if you are representing a big brand. To me, this is where the good writers distinguish themselves from average writers; the best writers can tell a short, gripping, and humorous story in less than five sentences.

(Transition) After the opening anecdote, you need to transition to the thesis. Tie the personal story to the thesis by writing a sweeping statement with broad application.

(Thesis) Answer the reader’s question: why should I read this? You’ve cast your net widely with the transition, hoping to catch as many readers as possible, now laser in to a specific and compelling case. Make the time they spend reading your article a rewarding experience.

Your thesis should be damn similar to your title. The reader clicked the title because they thought it sounded interesting; if they leave the article after reading your thesis, then it means you mistitled your post (click-baiter!). The title-to-thesis relationship should be monozygotic.

II. Main argument 1   Lose yourself here. Now that the reader has agreed to listen, quote experts, cite research, and draw from history. Do not insert your own opinion here. Rely on the authority and experience of big names. 

This needs to be a research-backed argument. Bring in science to support your claims. No one can argue with science.

[show chart or diagram graphic]

Also, its super helpful to give readers a 1–3 sentence description of the research you cite, just in case people don’t have the time to go to another link to read it themselves. 

III. Main argument 2   Continue building momentum. Except this time use case studies from various sources. You’ve stated your point and given facts to back it up, now tell a story showing it worked for someone.

[show picture of person/people in story]

Once you’ve told the story, knit argument 1 and argument 2 together. Show how the scientific proof manifested in the story. This congruence creates a neural connection between the right and left brain of the reader, resulting in the foundation of a memory .

IV. Takeaways (3–5 depending on length)

  • Use a bulleted or numerical list
  • to give the user specific and
  • actionable ways to implement the thesis

Remember, takeaways should be backed by examples and research for why these ways and methods are superior (or why these will get readers the results they desire).

V. Conclusion Circle back to your beginning anecdote. Finish the story, or mention how you would do it differently now that you know the thesis. This has a satisfying “bookend” effect on the article.

Finally, zoom out to a bird’s eye view and show the macro-impact of the thesis. The goal is to leave the reader inspired.

So there it is. I hope that makes it easier for you to write your next web article. It helped me. 

But can I be honest for a moment?  I don't always use this format. And actually, I hope you don't always use this format. How boring would that be? Use it as a guide. As Pablo Picasso said:

"Learn the rules like a pro so that you can break them like an artist."

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Improve Your Web Content

Advice and information on improving your written web content

The 6 Steps to Writing Great Online Articles

6 Steps to Writing Great Online Articles

When it comes to web article writing, creating a high quality article for online publishing may appear a fairly easy task – until you actually have to do it. Writing for an online audience is quite a bit different from writing a school term paper, a business report, or even a novel or short story. If you can learn to do it well, writing for an online audience can be a very productive pursuit. Plenty of people make a full-time living doing so. In the rest of this post, I offer 6 steps that you can utilise to create great online articles.

1. Find Great Topics to Write About

We all need some inspiration when it comes to article writing, particularly when it comes to writing web articles. We sit down with all the best intentions in the world, but once we have cracked our knuckles and are ready to start pounding upon our trusty keyboard, that great idea that we thought we had for our next article all of a sudden does not feel like such a good idea anymore. What now? Maybe the article wasn’t for a personal website or blog but for a client instead. This means that, on top of losing that great idea we had, we are now on a schedule as well! But where can we find some great ideas or topics to write about? Never fear, as there are ways and means around everything – as long as you know where to look. Below are just a few ideas to help you search for that hot topic when you most need it.

Blog Comments

If you have an idea of the general niche you are to be writing about, try visiting some blogs or websites of a similar theme. When you are on these sites, check out the comments left by visitors on the various posts. The more comments you notice on a particular post, the more popular or thought provoking you know the post must have been (spam comments notwithstanding, obviously). What is the topic of this post? What is it trying to convey? Could you take a relevant point from this post and create an insightful article from it? Indeed, was there a certain comment that tweaked your interest – did it contain something you could write about? You see, with just this tip alone, the scope is huge when it comes to unearthing those hot topics.

Are you into social media? If so, Twitter is a great place to find some really hot topics. It is a wonderful source of up-to-date information – so much so that, more often than not, you will learn the latest news happenings via Twitter before it makes it through to the rest of the internet or mainstream news media such as TV, radio, or newspapers. To this end, on the right-hand side of the Twitter screen there is a ‘trends for you’ box. This is the place that all the hottest topics currently on Twitter are located; just this little area is a goldmine of ideas.

Finally, one of the best methods of garnering ideas for an article topic is through good-old Google. Open up a Google search page and start typing in a query (your general niche). As you type, you will notice that Google starts automatically suggesting ideas as you go along. These lists can cover everything related to the particular niche topic you have queried. Try it – it is fascinating to see.

These are just a couple of pointers for you and barely scratch the surface when it comes to looking for great topics to write. It does, though, give you an idea of the sort of things you can do when stuck for a good topic to write about. Just use your imagination, and the sky is the limit.

2. Article Writing – Write for the Audience

When you set out to write an article or piece of content for your website or blog (or indeed, for a client), make sure you do so with one aim in mind – to satisfy your  human readers. What do I mean by this statement? Well, many, many article writers still make the mistake of writing their articles with just search engine optimisation (SEO) in mind. Here’s the deal though – search engine algorithms have evolved tremendously over the last few years and what once was considered the norm (i.e. writing with a specific keyword density in mind, placing keywords in specific areas of the article, etc., etc.), is now very much outdated, antiquated even. Think about it – search engines really do want to present the very best search results to their users; this means results being as related as possible to the query that was input into the search box by the user. Search engines will not present a result based solely on the keyword density of a page or whether the main keyword has been presented as near to the beginning or as near to the end of the article – results will be presented in a way that these search engines feel can benefit the user the most.

Write Naturally

Bearing the above in mind then, it would make sense to write an article as naturally as possible, letting it flow smoothly and allowing the reader to effortlessly devour the information contained therein. In other words, write an article that speaks directly to your audience, one that offers value in relation to the topic covered. At the end of the day, content that is deemed useful will engage the person reading it and will therefore meet the reader’s requirements (the reason for reading the article in the first place).

On top of all this, surely an article writer will find it much easier to write naturally rather than write something specifically with SEO in mind. When you are looking to write a piece to be proud of, the last thing you want to be doing when the creative juices are flowing is stressing over keyword placements and density and other such distractions. Any experienced content writer will tell you that they cannot produce their best work if they are weighed down with outdated SEO related issues.

So when you sit down to write an article for your blog, website, or client, focus on the topic at hand and make sure you write the article for the reader – not for some search engine bot!

3. How to Write Your First Online Article

Now you have decided to give web articles a go for the first time, you might have some additional questions about how to actually get started. Like how to write an online article, for starters. Every writer has his or her own way of doing things, but there is plenty of good advice that can help those just starting out. Once you become accustomed to online article writing, you will then find your own way of doing things. Below I have listed a couple of tips when it comes to writing your first article.

If you do not have a specific topic to write about then there is no point in starting to type – you will just waffle. Some experienced writers do this as a way of generating ideas, but this will be too slow and ineffective for the beginner writer. In the section titled Find Great Topics to Write About above, I listed some great ways to generate ideas. At least one of these methods should ensure that you write something that people will be interested in reading about. Later, when you become skilled, you can write about those topics that you feel passionate about and this will be your best writing.

First Draft

The point of a first draft is to get things down on paper. You should do this quickly and not worry about editing – correcting grammar and spelling mistakes, etc. Only when you have put all your thoughts down on paper do you need to go back and polish everything in terms of structure, tone, style, spelling, grammar, etc. The reason for doing things this way is that you do not want to interrupt the flow of ideas. Do not worry; nobody needs to see your first draft.

Use subheadings to break up the text and do not have huge blocks of text; this can be very off-putting for readers and may even cause some to abandon the article, and hence your website or blog, entirely (more on this in the below sections).

The most important thing of all though is enjoy writing and feel proud of the work you create.

4. The First Paragraph

As anyone in the business will tell you – when it comes to all things on the internet, content is definitely king. However, you cannot just throw a few words together and hope that you come up with something credible that your readers (or your client’s website visitors) will enjoy and relate to. There has to be some structure, some cohesion. Once the topic has been chosen and the research has been conducted, the time has come to start writing. You have to start somewhere, and this start is the first paragraph.

The first paragraph is most definitely king when it comes to the readers – it will either make or break the content as a whole. A badly structured first paragraph will have readers leaving your website in record time.

To start with (and this is extremely important), the first paragraph of any article has to very clearly state what the article is trying to convey. When it comes to articles for the online world, more often than not this will take the form of summarising what the problem at hand is, following that by explaining how the article is going to describe or help with how to deal with this particular problem.

If you manage to convey this as clearly and concisely as possible in your first paragraph, you are then well on your way to completing an engaging piece of content.

5. The Common Mistakes When Writing Online Articles

You do not have to search hard to find examples of bad writing on the web. I am not just talking about bad grammar and spelling here; I am talking online articles that just make no sense or are difficult to read. When this happens, it will usually be enough to drive readers away. In fact, having just one badly written piece of content on an otherwise professional website can do a lot of damage. In light of this, below we have listed some of the most common mistakes made when writing online articles.

Issues with the Title

The title is misleading . It is understandable that writers want their articles to appear exciting and interesting; this is important for attracting attention. However, many writers go to the extreme and place misleading titles at the head of their writing. This can be a source of irritation for readers who may well feel they have been ‘cheated’ into reading something that would not have otherwise interested them. Titles do need to grab attention; they should not, however, mislead.

Focus on the Reader

The focus of the writing seems to be on impressing the search engines . Most writers appreciate the need to have their content optimised in a specific way; after all, this will ensure that the content does well in the search results, yes? Well, no. The problem starts when SEO efforts start to detract from the readability of the article. As mentioned in one of my previous paragraphs, this is not the way of things anymore. You can still find many blogs and websites with content so stuffed with keywords that they are just unreadable.

Unfamiliar Topics

Writing about subjects that you do not know much about . It becomes obvious rather quickly when a writer has penned something he or she really knows nothing about or, at the very least, does not understand. Even if the reader knows nothing about the subject themselves, they can still spot when a writer has tried bluff his or her way through the subject. The availability of so much information on the internet means there is really no excuse for not researching subjects properly before writing about them.

6. Additional Mistakes You Will Want to Avoid with Article Writing

Today there is so much content available online that readers need to be discerning. It is not possible to read every article, so most tend to make their minds about a web article with just a quick glance. Only when seeing the ‘right’ things on the page will the reader be drawn into the content. Unfortunately, many who create web content do not do the right things that convince readers to investigate further; the content might be first rate but the reader will never know because he or she has been put off for some reason. Below I have listed some of the mistakes to be avoided to not drive potential readers away.

  • Go easy on the advertisements. Pop-up ads in particularly can be annoying; it is understandable that website owners may want to make a bit of money with some onsite advertisements, but moderation is the key. Unless, of course, the website owner is so famous or well known in their particular niche that readers will want the content no matter how many ads are on the page.
  • If there are just large blocks of text on a page then it can look a little intimidating to website visitors; they may conclude that it would just be too much hard work reading it to try to find the information they are looking for. Adding some images to the page not only breaks up the text making it appear more manageable, but it also acts as a hook for the text. Choosing the image carefully will pique the interest of the visitor and make them curious about what it all means.
  • Long paragraphs and sentences that go on forever do not do well in web articles. People want snappy writing and do not usually want to read every word on the page. Therefore, the article will be more appealing if it contained short paragraphs, bullet points or lists, and subheadings. Adding quotes to your text while making use of CSS elements can introduce some of the main points of the article. These really do work because they stand out from the rest of the text and can draw the attention of the reader just skimming the page.

Be careful with post titles when thinking about SEO. Writing titles is a real art and it can be difficult to get the balance right between using keywords that will ‘impress’ the search engines and titles that will appeal to human visitors. It is possible to create article titles that will help with SEO while still attracting readers; it is not easy though. Some web writers spend almost as much time fretting over the title as they do on the article itself. One thing is for sure: the wrong title will turn many folk off reading an article.

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The Top 12 Best Free Online Publishing Platforms For All New Writers

Free publishing platforms For writers to publish articles online

Are you a new writer looking to publish your articles online? It might be a little confusing at first trying to choose the right digital publishing platform to use.

Before looking for the best publishing options, you need to decide which platforms are suited to your topic or writing style. Are you interested in writing opinion pieces, sharing personal experiences, providing expert advice, or publishing on academic topics?

Every platform has its own strengths and weaknesses. It’s all about finding one that aligns best with your writing style, topics, and intended audience.

You can check the suggestions in this article to help you decide which platforms will offer you the best chance of finding new readers.

You can publish articles online right now

With digital publishing, it is easy for anyone to learn how to write and publish articles online.

There are many online publishing platforms for writers, so you can publish your writing in a matter of minutes.

What works for one writer might not work for the other. Are you writing essays or how-to guides ? It is also important to know who your audience is when choosing article publishing sites.

Do you want to reach teens, young adults, or adults? Are you trying to reach young entrepreneurs or established business owners?

Are you writing poems? There are also many free sites where you can publish your poetry .

Consider the types of articles you want to write and the audience you want to write for. Then you can go ahead and find the best online publishing platforms.

There are also plenty of free writing apps to help you write great content that readers will love. But you should always use a reliable online grammar checker to make sure your writing is as perfect as possible.

Then, you can bring your vision and ideas to the world with digital content. With so many people reading articles and online content on laptops, smartphones, and tablets, there is always an audience for new writers.

There are many online magazines and sites that accept articles for free. It’s up to you to find the best digital publishing solution to suit your needs.

To get you started, here is a list of platforms offering free article publishing.

publish you articles on medium

Medium is a very popular free publishing site where you can share your writing. You can connect with more sophisticated and dedicated readers than you might find on other social media platforms like Twitter or Facebook.

However, it is similar to a social network in its ease of connecting with other Medium users. But it is best suited to long-form writing.

It is very easy to create and set up your Medium account. Then, take a quick tour and read the FAQs. You are now ready to be published online with your first article.

The publishing tools are super easy to use with click and edit or drag and drop to move elements.

Your content on Medium should be full-length articles that are highly informative. Using original images is highly recommended.

Be aware, though, that it is not a publishing platform suited to short and obvious promotional blog posts.

You can read our how to use Medium guide for more detailed information about the submission guidelines. But they are quite straightforward.

2. Linkedin Articles

publish you articles on linkedin

You are probably already on Linkedin. So why not publish your articles there?

Follow the instructions for publishing Linkedin articles , and you are ready to go.

With so many people on the site, you are bound to find readers for professional articles.

It has to be one of the best places to easily publish your articles.

3. Publish PDF

Publish a PDF

This really is the easiest way to publish your writing online.

You don’t even need to have a website or blog.

All you need is a PDF file and your Google account.

Best of all, Google indexes PDF documents , so there’s a good chance that yours will appear on Google Search.

Read our quick tutorial on how to publish a PDF article online , and you will be ready to publish your articles online immediately.

4. Scoop.It

publish you articles on scoop.it

Scoop.It is one of the most popular free publishing platforms for new writers.

You can publish great magazines on this website, and it does what it promises.

There is a function where you can find great content to help as inspiration.

Simply use appropriate keywords, and you will be flooded with information.

publish you articles on issuu

You can find some excellent content on Issuu  and some entertaining writing as well.

It is a user-friendly platform where anyone can create digital publications.

You don’t need to use any publishing software.

You can also sell your digital magazine directly from the website, making it possible to earn some money.

Issuu is definitely one of the leading platforms for anyone who has something worthwhile to say.

With more than 15000 updates daily, you can see why it is so popular with writers who are publishing articles online.

It also gives you the opportunity to reach a lot of people with your writing. It doesn’t matter what your passion is; there is a place for you on this platform.

Your magazine can be about anything from cats to basketball, so there are no boundaries.

publish you articles on Yudo

If you are a photographer who wants to share your multimedia with the world, you might find that Yudo is for you.

On this platform, you can mix your writing, videos, photographs, and audio.

Who wouldn’t like to read a digital magazine that offers all of these features?

It makes for a more exciting read, so it could be worth a shot.

All you need to have is a passion and start working hard at it.

7. ArticleSeen

publish you articles on articleseen

ArticleSeen  prefers original content. But that is what you should do when posting your articles online.

If you want free exposure for your writing, this is a good site to help you on your way.

There is a good choice of categories, which means you are sure to find one that suits your writing topic.

8. PUB HTML5

publish you articles on pub html5

PUB HTML5 is free of charge, so you can see if it is the right digital publishing tool for you.

The design is sleek and simple, which is what you want as a beginner.

You don’t want websites that are confusing to use.

But the great thing about this platform is that your publications will appear professional on all devices.

It can be a computer or a mobile device. The results are the same.

You can publish interactive elements in magazines, catalogs, and brochures and create rich-media flipping books.

If you are trying to get your name out there as an influential writer, you might want to give this website a try.

Joomag publishing

With over 500,000 publishers using this website, you can understand why I included Joomag  in this list.

You can manage your subscribers on this platform and add more when you please.

It gives you full control over your publications.

Use might want to use a good grammar checker to help you write flawless articles. Then you can launch your own campaign.

You can use your mailing list to notify all of your subscribers when you publish a new article.

You can send emails that you write for your subscribers to make them feel part of the team.

It is an easy way to promote your work.

10. ArticleBiz

ArticleBiz logo

ArticleBiz offers you the chance to get your articles picked up by online publishers.

It’s very easy to submit your articles.

When you do, you will also complete a resource box. It is a short bio about yourself. You can include your email and website address information.

You can choose from a huge range of categories for your articles.

It has an Alexa ranking of 210,908. So it certainly gets a lot of traffic and readers.

If you are new to article writing, it is a great site to make a start with your online publishing.

11. Substack

substack logo

For writers open to a different approach in publishing, Substack is well worth investigating.

It’s a free platform you can join to publish your articles. But the big focus with Substack is on getting readers to subscribe to your writing.

Your articles will certainly be available online. But if your sole aim is to get your articles to rank high on search engines, Medium might be a better option.

However, if you want to build a loyal readership, there’s no better way than to attract email subscribers.

You can start by offering your articles for free. But if you can build some traction and your mailing list, there is an option to monetize your writing later.

There are a lot of high-profile writers already earning money from paid subscribers. But many new writers are succeeding too.

If you only want to publish one or two articles, it’s not the platform for you.

But if you want to make writing your passion and publish regular articles on your topic, Substack might be precisely the right publishing option for you.

12. Google Sites

Google Sites

When you want to have more control over your articles, you might consider using Google Sites .

It’s a simple website builder from Google. The two big advantages are that it’s free and very easy to use.

All you need is your Google account to log in and get started.

You can set up your new site in only a few minutes. Just make sure you make it available online.

Once you start adding your articles, you then have a chance of them being indexed by Google.

Like other website platforms, you can add gadgets to create interest. But they are basic.

Submitting your articles to a lot of different sites can be time-consuming and difficult to track.

But with your own site, you are in control of all your content.

Google Sites is a great option when all you want is a free, simple, and easy way to publish articles online in one place.

When you see the choices you have, there are no limits today on interactive content creation and digital publishing.

Anyone can learn to publish articles online once they decide to start. All you need to do is find new topic ideas .

With all these fantastic platforms available to you, all you have to do is get to work and start writing.

Many have native apps for iOS, Android, and Google Play. Check your App stores.

Before you know it, you are going to be writing for free article submission sites .

All you need is to use your drive and passion to get you heading toward your goals.

Give one of these websites a try, and you will be publishing your fantastic articles in no time at all.

Related reading: Where To Publish Short Stories Online

About The Author

Avatar for Derek Haines

Derek Haines

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52 thoughts on “the top 12 best free online publishing platforms for all new writers”.

Avatar for Phil Langlotz

I am a retired man with a technical background. I have written many articles on varied subjects but have never published. The subject matter includes science, religion, political and current events. The articles vary in length from one page to 20 pages. Have you ane suggestions for an appropriate posting site?

Avatar for Derek Haines

You cover a lot of topics, and different lengths, Phil.

It might be difficult to find one platform for them all.

Perhaps setting up a free blog, such as with Blogger or WordPress, might be a better move.

Thanks, I’ll look into that.

Avatar for Uma Gupta

I have written quite a few articles, most of them being inspirational. Some are in the form of messages learnt from incidents in everyday life. I also feel that as a citizen on this planet, it is my duty to share the good things I have learnt, so others can benefit too. Am wondering where would be a good place to begin publishing. Thanks.

Avatar for Ms. Anonymous

Derek, I am a decent lady, not available for romance, but just want you to know that I like your way; I just like your website & the way you make your comments and respond to questions. There’s just something about you. I like you.

Thank you. I’m happy to hear that you enjoy the content of the site.

Avatar for Rachel

I think writing story’s and publishing them and seeing how people comment, will help me when i get older and see what I want to be. I haven’t chosen yet I’ve always wanted to be a journalist or a media worker, honestly, I don’t yet…

Avatar for Dzeani

I notice that as a new writer, I have strong passion to publish. But I believe there is the need to learn to make my writing ‘clean’, mistake-free and perfect for my readers before publishing. What writing training apps would you recommend to help me ‘sanitize’ my writing?

I would suggest Prowritingaid for a new writer. It’s got everything you need to edit and improve your writing.

Avatar for Victoria

Will be paid for publishing articles on this platform listed above?

Avatar for Wycliffe Obiero

Will try this

Avatar for Michael L. Ball

I’m seventy-two and have been writing for a long time. I have a folder full of articles and I also have a folder full of science fiction stories. I have poetry and comics. I need a platform that allows me to publish as I please.

Avatar for Samuel Mathore

I’m an unpublished writer with several manuscripts. Do these platforms here publish novels?

No, Samuel. These sites are only suitable for publishing articles.

If you want to publish novels, try Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) or Draft2Digital.

Avatar for Paul Amupitan

Hello Derek, I’m new to writing articles, but I wasn’t to write articles focusing on Young People and their struggles. I would like to build some readership for my article. What site do you recommend? Thank you.

You can use any site, Paul. But before you do, make sure your writing is perfect. In your comment, I’m sure you meant, wanted to write, and not wasn’t to write. You can’t expect to find readers if you make errors like this. Always, always check your writing before you hit the button.

Avatar for Paoletta

Dear Derek, I would like to write articles about personal awareness and development. I am a new writer and I would like to reach a large odience eventually .. which platform would you recommend, please?

The best platform is always the one that you feel will work for you, Paoletta. But if you are looking at building a readership, Medium and Substack are two you might consider.

Avatar for Francis Ekongang Nzante

I’m really grateful to have stumbled on this site which I believe will greatly help me in publishing my articles. I do news articles that focus much more on culture. But I sort of publish stuff that is newsworthy so I also write on crisis in Africa.

Avatar for Anna

Be aware that on Medium your articles and you as an author won’t be searchable until you get a critical mass of readers and followers/claps. Which means that you need to actively promote your writing, for strangers to find your page on any given day (except the few first hours of the publication). Very disappointed.

Medium is no different from any other form of publishing articles. You need a certain amount of traction before it can rank in Google Search.

For a blog post, you need backlinks. On Medium, you need followers and claps.

It’s pretty standard stuff, but not disappointing if you know how to promote what you post.

There are no free rides at getting articles to rank. You still need to work on it to be successful.

Avatar for Joyce A Valley

i need to publish my story about chronic kidney disease and kidney transplants, the need for kidney donors and how this need is affected by the Covid pandemic.; and my personal need for a transplant to save my life. Where is the best place to submit my article?

Use any of the sites listed in this article. But I would try Medium first.

Avatar for Serenee Osman

I need to publish my article which are explain about lidar technology. Where can I publish my article?

Avatar for sisay kelemu

Dear sir I need to publish my paper which concerns on climate. so how can I publish it?

Avatar for Bhaswati

Really grateful to get these platforms to publish my article. Thanks to you for gifting us such information for these platforms.

Avatar for erum

how I can publish the article ??

Avatar for Tzvi

Good information but why did you not include Substack?

Avatar for mary kawira Kithinji

this is great where do i publish my scholarly articles and class modules

Avatar for Muvro

Hi Derek, Impressive Collection shared on Free Publishing Articles. Would like to know where we can share technical content.

Avatar for Emily

Ok how can I publish

Avatar for Simeone Nkosi

Hey this is Simeone here. I already participate in the Medium corporative community, it is a good platform for publishing your stories online. I only have a technical problems with the platform. I’m hoping to enjoy my writing of articles with these other platforms.

Avatar for Ishika Agrawal

According to me the best usage of time is writing. It makes an individual to think widely on every aspect. Writing enable person to do brainstorming over the topic. This improves the writing work of writer.

Avatar for Edina Back

Thank you very much! I spent about 2-3 hours and looked at these sites. Medium appears to be educational and very helpful for beginning writers! I will use it and promote it! See where I am with it by the end of the year! Thank you again! Edina Back, Executive Establishment Officer, Personnel Efficiency Foundation

Avatar for Paul Ayinbuomwan

Good morning. Please I am a prolific writer. I write on a broad range of topics and areas ranging from Marriage, Relationship, Politics, amongst others. How do I publish my articles please?

Avatar for Dinah Modipa

Fine, thank you.

Avatar for Akanshi Mittal

I want to publish my poetries. Where I can get it published?

Avatar for C R PETTY

I have 200 pages of musings and poetry in RHYMING format. Deep thoughts and shallow—-should it be published? C R Petty Col USMC Ret.

Avatar for Sizwe Mhlungu

I’m looking for free publishing platform. I want to publish an article I wrote while I was in college. This an academic article for educators (teaching profession). What is the appropriate website for that.

Avatar for Diksha kumari

Hlo sir/mam, we are the students of masters. Sir we want to publish our research article in your site. So sir please give us the details regarding publication criteria or fees. We shall be thankful to you for this kind of purpose.

Avatar for Tshepo Motlou

As they say always seek knowledge I would like to seek knowledge and become one of the best poets ever in history by explaining to people about what’s love

Avatar for Ved Vineet Gautam

Kindly please keep providing me the work related to writing . Iam hard working and dedicated.

Avatar for Maseipone Jacqueline

“Life is my teacher and living is my lesson.” I believe everyday you live, you learn alot from life. When you stop living is when the lessons stop. Article is informative and useful. Reading it has set me in motion. I now know how to proceed. The lessons are a step forward in the right direction.

Avatar for Darealprisonart

Very valuable information. Lot of secrets, thank you.

Avatar for Ubai

Hello Lisa, Great article. Thanks for bringing these tools on one platform for the world. Keep up the good work. Regards

Avatar for Nsigaye Andrew

Hello we are publishing house based in Rwanda Africa, we would like to get in touch with you for more information on the on how we can work with you in publishing working in have books for kids both fiction and non fiction kindly tell me how we can work together. Waiting from you soonest Best Regards Andrew.

Please use our site contact form if you wish to get in touch with us.

Avatar for ABRAHAM JOHNSON

I want to publish a book. What is the process ? Can I contact you ?Nearest office ?

We only offer advice articles on our site, Abraham. Sorry, but we do not offer personal support or coaching.

Avatar for Monali Elwatte

Is it possible to publish a small article regarding medical science

Avatar for Jembi Lokou

Frankly speaking, and as human beings, we always learn from one another. You may good in x and I’m good at y, for that reason I may need your help and you may need my help. It’s a mutual learning.

Hi Derek Haines, I would like to publish my short gospel articles, Where do I start?

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  • Knowledge Base
  • Research paper

How to Write a Research Paper | A Beginner's Guide

A research paper is a piece of academic writing that provides analysis, interpretation, and argument based on in-depth independent research.

Research papers are similar to academic essays , but they are usually longer and more detailed assignments, designed to assess not only your writing skills but also your skills in scholarly research. Writing a research paper requires you to demonstrate a strong knowledge of your topic, engage with a variety of sources, and make an original contribution to the debate.

This step-by-step guide takes you through the entire writing process, from understanding your assignment to proofreading your final draft.

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Table of contents

Understand the assignment, choose a research paper topic, conduct preliminary research, develop a thesis statement, create a research paper outline, write a first draft of the research paper, write the introduction, write a compelling body of text, write the conclusion, the second draft, the revision process, research paper checklist, free lecture slides.

Completing a research paper successfully means accomplishing the specific tasks set out for you. Before you start, make sure you thoroughly understanding the assignment task sheet:

  • Read it carefully, looking for anything confusing you might need to clarify with your professor.
  • Identify the assignment goal, deadline, length specifications, formatting, and submission method.
  • Make a bulleted list of the key points, then go back and cross completed items off as you’re writing.

Carefully consider your timeframe and word limit: be realistic, and plan enough time to research, write, and edit.

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There are many ways to generate an idea for a research paper, from brainstorming with pen and paper to talking it through with a fellow student or professor.

You can try free writing, which involves taking a broad topic and writing continuously for two or three minutes to identify absolutely anything relevant that could be interesting.

You can also gain inspiration from other research. The discussion or recommendations sections of research papers often include ideas for other specific topics that require further examination.

Once you have a broad subject area, narrow it down to choose a topic that interests you, m eets the criteria of your assignment, and i s possible to research. Aim for ideas that are both original and specific:

  • A paper following the chronology of World War II would not be original or specific enough.
  • A paper on the experience of Danish citizens living close to the German border during World War II would be specific and could be original enough.

Note any discussions that seem important to the topic, and try to find an issue that you can focus your paper around. Use a variety of sources , including journals, books, and reliable websites, to ensure you do not miss anything glaring.

Do not only verify the ideas you have in mind, but look for sources that contradict your point of view.

  • Is there anything people seem to overlook in the sources you research?
  • Are there any heated debates you can address?
  • Do you have a unique take on your topic?
  • Have there been some recent developments that build on the extant research?

In this stage, you might find it helpful to formulate some research questions to help guide you. To write research questions, try to finish the following sentence: “I want to know how/what/why…”

A thesis statement is a statement of your central argument — it establishes the purpose and position of your paper. If you started with a research question, the thesis statement should answer it. It should also show what evidence and reasoning you’ll use to support that answer.

The thesis statement should be concise, contentious, and coherent. That means it should briefly summarize your argument in a sentence or two, make a claim that requires further evidence or analysis, and make a coherent point that relates to every part of the paper.

You will probably revise and refine the thesis statement as you do more research, but it can serve as a guide throughout the writing process. Every paragraph should aim to support and develop this central claim.

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A research paper outline is essentially a list of the key topics, arguments, and evidence you want to include, divided into sections with headings so that you know roughly what the paper will look like before you start writing.

A structure outline can help make the writing process much more efficient, so it’s worth dedicating some time to create one.

Your first draft won’t be perfect — you can polish later on. Your priorities at this stage are as follows:

  • Maintaining forward momentum — write now, perfect later.
  • Paying attention to clear organization and logical ordering of paragraphs and sentences, which will help when you come to the second draft.
  • Expressing your ideas as clearly as possible, so you know what you were trying to say when you come back to the text.

You do not need to start by writing the introduction. Begin where it feels most natural for you — some prefer to finish the most difficult sections first, while others choose to start with the easiest part. If you created an outline, use it as a map while you work.

Do not delete large sections of text. If you begin to dislike something you have written or find it doesn’t quite fit, move it to a different document, but don’t lose it completely — you never know if it might come in useful later.

Paragraph structure

Paragraphs are the basic building blocks of research papers. Each one should focus on a single claim or idea that helps to establish the overall argument or purpose of the paper.

Example paragraph

George Orwell’s 1946 essay “Politics and the English Language” has had an enduring impact on thought about the relationship between politics and language. This impact is particularly obvious in light of the various critical review articles that have recently referenced the essay. For example, consider Mark Falcoff’s 2009 article in The National Review Online, “The Perversion of Language; or, Orwell Revisited,” in which he analyzes several common words (“activist,” “civil-rights leader,” “diversity,” and more). Falcoff’s close analysis of the ambiguity built into political language intentionally mirrors Orwell’s own point-by-point analysis of the political language of his day. Even 63 years after its publication, Orwell’s essay is emulated by contemporary thinkers.

Citing sources

It’s also important to keep track of citations at this stage to avoid accidental plagiarism . Each time you use a source, make sure to take note of where the information came from.

You can use our free citation generators to automatically create citations and save your reference list as you go.

APA Citation Generator MLA Citation Generator

The research paper introduction should address three questions: What, why, and how? After finishing the introduction, the reader should know what the paper is about, why it is worth reading, and how you’ll build your arguments.

What? Be specific about the topic of the paper, introduce the background, and define key terms or concepts.

Why? This is the most important, but also the most difficult, part of the introduction. Try to provide brief answers to the following questions: What new material or insight are you offering? What important issues does your essay help define or answer?

How? To let the reader know what to expect from the rest of the paper, the introduction should include a “map” of what will be discussed, briefly presenting the key elements of the paper in chronological order.

The major struggle faced by most writers is how to organize the information presented in the paper, which is one reason an outline is so useful. However, remember that the outline is only a guide and, when writing, you can be flexible with the order in which the information and arguments are presented.

One way to stay on track is to use your thesis statement and topic sentences . Check:

  • topic sentences against the thesis statement;
  • topic sentences against each other, for similarities and logical ordering;
  • and each sentence against the topic sentence of that paragraph.

Be aware of paragraphs that seem to cover the same things. If two paragraphs discuss something similar, they must approach that topic in different ways. Aim to create smooth transitions between sentences, paragraphs, and sections.

The research paper conclusion is designed to help your reader out of the paper’s argument, giving them a sense of finality.

Trace the course of the paper, emphasizing how it all comes together to prove your thesis statement. Give the paper a sense of finality by making sure the reader understands how you’ve settled the issues raised in the introduction.

You might also discuss the more general consequences of the argument, outline what the paper offers to future students of the topic, and suggest any questions the paper’s argument raises but cannot or does not try to answer.

You should not :

  • Offer new arguments or essential information
  • Take up any more space than necessary
  • Begin with stock phrases that signal you are ending the paper (e.g. “In conclusion”)

There are four main considerations when it comes to the second draft.

  • Check how your vision of the paper lines up with the first draft and, more importantly, that your paper still answers the assignment.
  • Identify any assumptions that might require (more substantial) justification, keeping your reader’s perspective foremost in mind. Remove these points if you cannot substantiate them further.
  • Be open to rearranging your ideas. Check whether any sections feel out of place and whether your ideas could be better organized.
  • If you find that old ideas do not fit as well as you anticipated, you should cut them out or condense them. You might also find that new and well-suited ideas occurred to you during the writing of the first draft — now is the time to make them part of the paper.

The goal during the revision and proofreading process is to ensure you have completed all the necessary tasks and that the paper is as well-articulated as possible. You can speed up the proofreading process by using the AI proofreader .

Global concerns

  • Confirm that your paper completes every task specified in your assignment sheet.
  • Check for logical organization and flow of paragraphs.
  • Check paragraphs against the introduction and thesis statement.

Fine-grained details

Check the content of each paragraph, making sure that:

  • each sentence helps support the topic sentence.
  • no unnecessary or irrelevant information is present.
  • all technical terms your audience might not know are identified.

Next, think about sentence structure , grammatical errors, and formatting . Check that you have correctly used transition words and phrases to show the connections between your ideas. Look for typos, cut unnecessary words, and check for consistency in aspects such as heading formatting and spellings .

Finally, you need to make sure your paper is correctly formatted according to the rules of the citation style you are using. For example, you might need to include an MLA heading  or create an APA title page .

Scribbr’s professional editors can help with the revision process with our award-winning proofreading services.

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Checklist: Research paper

I have followed all instructions in the assignment sheet.

My introduction presents my topic in an engaging way and provides necessary background information.

My introduction presents a clear, focused research problem and/or thesis statement .

My paper is logically organized using paragraphs and (if relevant) section headings .

Each paragraph is clearly focused on one central idea, expressed in a clear topic sentence .

Each paragraph is relevant to my research problem or thesis statement.

I have used appropriate transitions  to clarify the connections between sections, paragraphs, and sentences.

My conclusion provides a concise answer to the research question or emphasizes how the thesis has been supported.

My conclusion shows how my research has contributed to knowledge or understanding of my topic.

My conclusion does not present any new points or information essential to my argument.

I have provided an in-text citation every time I refer to ideas or information from a source.

I have included a reference list at the end of my paper, consistently formatted according to a specific citation style .

I have thoroughly revised my paper and addressed any feedback from my professor or supervisor.

I have followed all formatting guidelines (page numbers, headers, spacing, etc.).

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How to Get Started with Article Writing: A Step-by-Step Guide for Beginners

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So you've always had a way with words, and you've finally decided to dip your toes into the realm of article writing. Congratulations, my friend! Whether you're itching to express your thoughts and insights or aiming to make a career out of crafting captivating content, writing articles can unlock a world of creativity. But where do you begin? Fear not, for this step-by-step guide is here to help you embark on your journey as a budding wordsmith.

From finding your niche to perfecting your writing skills, let's dive in and uncover the secrets to kickstarting your article-writing adventure. Get ready to unleash your inner storyteller and captivate readers one word at a time!

What is Article Writing?

Article writing is the craft of creating written content for various purposes. It involves conveying information clearly and engagingly to a specific audience . Starting with a compelling introduction, an article provides valuable insights and knowledge on a given topic. It is essential to include relevant facts and examples to support your ideas. A well-structured article typically comprises of short paragraphs and uses headings and subheadings to guide readers.

Strong article writing requires good research skills, excellent grammar, and proper formatting. By mastering the art of article writing, beginners can effectively share their ideas and opinions with a broader audience.

Benefits of Article Writing for Beginners

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Article writing is an excellent starting point for beginners. It helps develop writing skills and boosts creativity. Writing articles enhances critical thinking by requiring research and analysis . It also enables the writer to share knowledge and ideas with others. The process of writing articles improves communication skills and helps build a writer's portfolio. Moreover, article writing allows beginners to explore different topics, positioning them as experts in a specific area.

Step 1: Choose a Topic

Finding a topic that interests you.

Finding a topic that interests you is crucial when starting your article writing journey. Think about subjects you enjoy or have knowledge about. Consider your hobbies, passions, or areas where you excel. It's important to choose a topic that you genuinely care about, as it will make the writing process more enjoyable and help you connect with your readers. Don't be afraid to explore different angles or niches within your chosen topic to make it more unique and engaging.

Remember, the more interested you are in your topic, the more likely it is that others will be interested too. So, choose wisely and have fun!

Researching Popular Topics

Researching popular topics is an essential step in article writing. It not only helps you stay updated with current trends but also enables you to create content that resonates with your target audience . Here are some tips to streamline your research process:

  • Identify your target audience : Define the demographic and interests of your readers to understand what topics are most likely to engage them.
  • Utilize online tools : Leverage search engines, social media platforms, and keyword research tools to identify popular topics in your niche.
  • Analyze competition : Explore articles and blogs written by competitors to gain insights into what topics have performed well for them.
  • Stay updated : Follow news websites, industry publications, and influencers in your field to keep up with the latest trends and topics that are gaining traction.
  • Engage with your audience : Pay attention to comments, feedback, and questions from your readers to identify what they're interested in and shape your content accordingly.

By conducting thorough research, you can ensure that your articles are relevant, engaging, and resonate with your target audience.

Narrowing Down Your Topic

When choosing a topic for your article, it's important to narrow it down to something specific. Start by brainstorming all the potential ideas and then consider which ones interest you the most. Once you have a general idea, try to make it more focused by asking yourself questions like "Who is my target audience?" or "What aspect of this topic do I want to explore?" This will help you create a clear and concise angle for your article, making it easier to write and more engaging for your readers.

Remember, specificity is key!

Step 2: Understand Your Audience

Identifying your target audience.

Identifying your target audience is crucial when writing an article. Who are you trying to reach? Start by defining their demographics - age, gender, location. Dive deeper to understand their interests, needs, and pain points. Are they tech-savvy or more traditional? What challenges do they face? Consider their motivations and desires. By analyzing their behavior and preferences, you can tailor your content to resonate with them.

This will help you engage and connect with your readers on a morepersonal level. Remember, understanding your target audience is the key to creating impactful articles. So, take the time to do your research and get to know them well.

Understanding Audience's Needs and Preferences

In order to be an effective article writer, it is crucial to understand the needs and preferences of your audience. This means taking the time to research and analyze your target readers, their interests, and what they are searching for. By doing so, you can tailor your content to meet their expectations, making it more engaging and relevant.

Whether it’s providing informative guides or entertaining stories, remember to keep your writing concise, easy to understand, and free of unnecessary fluff. By doing this, you will attract and retain your audience's attention, building a loyal readership over time.

Step 3: Conduct Thorough Research

Gathering information from reliable sources.

When writing an article, it is crucial to gather information from reliable sources. This ensures that your content is accurate and trustworthy. Start by identifying reputable sources, such as reputable websites, academic journals, or expert interviews. Use multiple sources to get a well-rounded perspective on the topic. Check for citations and references in the sources you find, as this indicates the information has been substantiated by other experts.

Avoid using sources that lack credibility or have a biased agenda. By gathering information from reliable sources, you can provide valuable and accurate content to your readers.

Organizing Your Research Findings

When it comes to organizing your research findings, it's crucial to have a systematic approach. Here are some tips to help you make sense of all the information you've gathered:

  • Create a clear and logical structure for your article, outlining the main points you want to cover.
  • Determine the most relevant and valuable findings from your research and highlight key data or evidence to support your claims.
  • Categorize your findings into different sections or subheadings, making it easier for readers to navigate through your article.
  • Use bullet points or numbered lists to present concise information or important details.
  • Consider creating an annotated bibliography or reference list to keep track of your sources and ensure correct citations.

By organizing your research findings effectively, you'll be able to present your ideas in a coherent and structured manner, enhancing the clarity and impact of your article.

Step 4: Create an Outline

Structuring your article.

Structuring your article is essential for effective communication. Start with a compelling title that grabs attention. Divide your article into clear sections using subheadings to guide the reader. In the introduction, present the main idea and provide context. Keep paragraphs short and focused, each discussing one key point. Use bullet points or numbered lists for easy comprehension. In the conclusion, summarize the main points and conclude with a thought-provoking statement.

Remember to edit and proofread for clarity and coherence. A well-structured article enhances readability and ensures your message is conveyed effectively.

Outlining Main Points and Subtopics

When starting an article, it is crucial to outline the main points and subtopics you want to cover. This helps you maintain focus and structure throughout your writing. Begin by identifying the main idea or argument you want to convey. Then, list the key points that support or elaborate on this idea. Make sure each point flows logically and sequentially.

Next, break down these key points into subtopics that provide further details or examples. This way, you can organize your thoughts in a clear and coherent manner, ensuring your readers will easily follow your train of thought.

Step 5: Start Writing

Developing a strong body.

Developing a Strong Body is essential for article writing beginners. Regular exercise is key. Start with simple activities like walking or jogging to improve stamina and overall fitness. Include strength training exercises to build muscle and boost metabolism. Focus on workouts that target different body areas such as squats for legs, push-ups for upper body, and planks for core. Consistency is crucial, so aim for at least 3-4 times a week.

Alongside exercise, eat a balanced diet rich in proteins, vegetables, and whole grains to fuel your body and aid in muscle recovery. Hydrate adequately to stay focused and energized during writing sessions. Prioritize self-care and get enough rest for optimal physical and mental performance. With a strong body, writing will become effortless.

Creating an Engaging Conclusion

In order to create an engaging conclusion for your article, consider leaving the reader with something to think about or a call to action. A thought-provoking question or a compelling statement can keep your readers engaged and encourage them to explore the topic further.

Additionally, you can summarize your main points briefly and end on a strong note. Remember, a good conclusion should leave a lasting impression and leave the reader wanting more.

Step 6: Edit and Revise

Checking for grammar and spelling errors.

When you finish writing your article, take a moment to check for grammar and spelling errors. Read it aloud or use a spell-check tool to catch any mistakes. Pay attention to punctuation, capitalization, and word choice. Double-check names, dates, and statistics to ensure accuracy. If possible, ask someone else to proofread your work. Give yourself time between writing and proofreading to identify errors more effectively.

Taking these simple steps can greatly improve the quality of your article and make it more professional.

Improving Sentence Structure and Clarity

To enhance your article writing, focus on sentence structure and clarity. Keep your sentences short and to the point. Avoid lengthy, convoluted sentences that confuse readers. Use active verbs to make your writing more engaging and dynamic. Break up long paragraphs into smaller chunks to improve readability. Use transition words to create smooth transitions between ideas. Lastly, always proofread your work to eliminate any grammatical errors and ensure clarity. By improving sentence structure and clarity, you can make your article more concise, engaging, and enjoyable for your readers.

Ensuring Coherence and Flow

Ensuring coherence and flow in your article is crucial for keeping the reader engaged. Start by using clear and concise language to express your ideas. Break your article into short paragraphs and vary their lengths to maintain a smooth flow. Use transition words and phrases to connect your ideas and guide the reader through the article.

Additionally, make sure each paragraph focuses on a single point to avoid confusion.

Finally, read your article aloud or ask someone to read it to ensure it flows naturally and is easy to understand. Remember, coherence and flow are keys to effective article writing.

Step 7: Proofread and Finalize

Reading and re-reading your article.

Once you finish writing your article, take a moment to step back and give it a read. Look for any typos, grammatical errors, or awkward phrasing. This initial read-through allows you to catch any obvious mistakes or areas that need improvement.

After this first pass, take a break. Give yourself some distance from the article before coming back to it for a second read. This time, focus on the overall flow and structure of your piece. Does it make sense? Is the information organized logically? Take note of any areas that feel disjointed or confusing.

When you're satisfied with the structure, read it through one final time, paying attention to the details. Check for consistency in verb tenses, formatting, and citation styles. Ensure that your article flows smoothly and that each sentence serves a purpose.

By actively reading and re-reading your article, you can catch errors, improve clarity, and deliver a polished final piece that engages and informs your readers.

Formatting and Styling

Formatting and styling is crucial when it comes to writing an article. A well-structured article enhances readability and grabs the reader's attention. Start with a catchy headline that summarizes your content. Use subheadings to break up the text and make it more scannable. Keep your paragraphs short and to the point. Bullet points and numbered lists are great for conveying information concisely. Incorporate relevant images to engage your readers visually.

Lastly, proofread your article for grammar and spelling errors. Taking the time to format and style your article properly will greatly improve its impact and readability.

Reflecting on Your Article Writing Journey

As you near the end of your article writing journey, take a moment to reflect on how far you've come. Think about the skills you've acquired, the topics you've delved into, and the challenges you've conquered. Remember the moments of frustration and the triumphs that followed. Embrace the growth you've experienced and the knowledge you've gained along the way. Appreciate the progress, no matter how small, and use it as fuel to continue honing your craft. Remember, every step counts and every article is an opportunity to improve. Keep writing, keep learning, and keep pushing yourself to new heights.

Taking Next Steps to Improve as a Writer

Now that you've taken your first steps into article writing, it's time to take the next ones in order to improve as a writer. One way to do this is by reading extensively. Pick up different genres and styles of writing to broaden your horizons. Another crucial step is to write consistently. Make a writing schedule and stick to it, even if it's just for a few minutes each day.

Additionally, seek feedback from others. Join writing groups or ask friends to read your work and provide constructive criticism. Remember, practice, exposure to different writing styles, and feedback are key to becoming a better writer.

Wrapping up

Writing articles can be a daunting task for beginners, but with this step-by-step guide, you'll be well on your way to becoming a proficient article writer.

First, choose a topic that interests you and conduct thorough research to gather all the necessary information. Then, create an outline to organize your thoughts and ensure a logical flow in your writing. When crafting the introduction, aim to grab your readers' attention with a compelling hook. In the body of the article, present your ideas clearly, providing evidence and examples to support your claims. Use subheadings and bullet points to enhance readability. Once the main points are covered, wrap up your article with a conclusion that summarizes your key takeaways and leaves a lasting impression on the reader. Remember to proofread and edit your work to eliminate any errors or inconsistencies. With practice and perseverance, you'll develop your own unique writing style and become an accomplished article writer.

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how to write articles online

How to Write an Amazing Article In 10 Simple Steps

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Writing articles is like waving a magic wand to create ripples in a vast ocean. With each stroke of your pen, you conjure waves of inspiration that reach shores far and wide, touching the hearts and minds of people worldwide. Whether you’re just starting out or enhancing your writing skills, mastering the art of article writing can open doors to endless possibilities. 

Make your mark on the web. Create on WordPress.com

In this guide, we’ll cover the essential steps and techniques to help beginner bloggers, journalists, and freelance writers craft compelling articles. You’ll learn:

  • The basics of article writing
  • Structuring your content effectively
  • Refining your writing style
  • Polishing your work through editing and proofreading

With these tips and templates in your toolset, you’ll be ready to showcase your work to a vast audience, connect with like-minded individuals and establish a professional online presence. We’ll show you how WordPress.com’s user-friendly platform makes the process seamless.

Ready to get started?

In this article:

Informative Articles

Opinion pieces, how-to guides, feature articles, news articles, interview articles, 1. how to identify your target audience , 2. how to choose a topic, 3. how to write a headline, 4. how to conduct quantitative and qualitative research, 5. how to craft an angle , 6. how to write an outline, 7. how to write an intro, 8. how to write the body section , 9. how to write a conclusion , 10. how to edit the article , web writing best practices , best tools for writing articles, 1. the problem-solution template, 2. the listicle template, 3. the step-by-step guide template, 4. the comparative analysis template, write amazing articles and publish them on wordpress.com, types of articles .

Articles can be of different types that serve different purposes and cater to various reader interests. Let’s look at some of the most common types of articles: 

These aim to provide readers with valuable information, facts, or explanations on a particular topic. They focus on educating the audience and are typically well-researched.

Example: WordPress.com vs WordPress.org: What’s the Difference?

how to write articles online

These express the writer’s personal viewpoint or perspective on a specific subject. These articles allow writers to share their thoughts, insights, and arguments while encouraging readers to think critically and engage in discussions.

Example: define: Brand

how to write articles online

These provide step-by-step instructions to help readers accomplish a specific task or learn a new skill. They break down complex processes into easy-to-follow steps, enabling readers to achieve their goals.

Example: How to Choose a Domain Name for Your Website

how to write articles online

These are presented in a list format, featuring a series of items or points related to a specific theme. They offer readers a convenient and organized way to consume information. Listicles are often used to highlight top items, tips, or recommendations.

Example: Best Small Website Builder: The Top Options Compared (2020)

how to write articles online

These are in-depth and extensively researched pieces that explore a topic or profile of a person or event. They go beyond basic facts and delve into the nuances and details, providing readers with a comprehensive understanding.

Example: Meals for One

how to write articles online

These report on recent events, developments, or noteworthy stories. They aim to provide readers with factual information objectively and concisely. News articles typically adhere to journalistic principles.

Example: ‘Breakthrough’ geothermal tech produces 3.5 megawatts of carbon-free power

how to write articles online

These feature conversations or discussions with individuals of interest or expertise in a particular field. These articles often include quotes or insights from the interviewee, providing readers with unique perspectives and valuable insights.

Example: Automattic Women: Selena Jackson

how to write articles online

Depending on your goals, target audience, and subject matter – you can choose the appropriate type of article to communicate your message and engage readers effectively.

How to write an article in 10 steps 

The basic structure of an article contains 4 parts:

  • Opening paragraphs (introduction)
  • The main discussion (body section)
  • Closing paragraphs (conclusion) 

how to write articles online

However, there are more than just 4 steps to writing an amazing article. Doesn’t matter if you’re a beginner or a pro; following a structured approach can help you create better articles faster. You can follow this proven 10-step process for that. 

  • Identify target audience
  • Choose a topic 
  • Write a headline 
  • Conduct quantitative and qualitative research
  • Craft an angle 
  • Write an outline
  • Write an introduction
  • Write body section
  • Write conclusion 
  • Finish editing 

Let’s discuss each step briefly. 

how to write articles online

Target audience refers to the person or group you are writing for. If you’re writing for everyone, you’re writing for no one. You need to identify who you are writing for to ensure you effectively communicate your message to the audience. 

Understanding your target audience is crucial for creating content that resonates with them. Consider their demographics, interests, and needs. Research their preferences, pain points, and what they expect from your article. This knowledge will help you tailor your writing style, tone, and content to appeal directly to your intended readers.

Once you’ve researched the audience, create a user persona with common traits and then write for that one person.  Creating a user persona is not just a list of data points. It’s like an imaginary person with a name and specific characteristics that help you understand their needs.     

By focusing on your target audience, your content will speak directly to them, which will help you increase engagement and build a loyal readership base.

Before you embark on the exciting journey of article writing, you must first conquer the challenge of finding the perfect topic. The topic you choose sets the foundation for your entire piece, influencing its success and impact.

First, select a topic that interests you and aligns with your goal of writing. You don’t want to write about everything and anything. Start by considering something that aligns with your knowledge and expertise. Writing about something you’re passionate about or have expertise in makes the process more enjoyable and lets you provide valuable insights to your readers. 

Or you can also focus on solving specific or common problems in your niche. Identifying common challenges or problems and providing practical tips, step-by-step guides, or sharing personal experiences can make your content highly valuable and relevant to readers.

Researching trending topics is another easy way to find a suitable topic. Stay updated with the latest trends and discussions in your industry or niche. Explore popular blogs, news sites, and social media platforms to identify topics currently gaining traction. This ensures your article addresses timely issues and captures readers’ attention.

Lastly, take a data-driven approach through keyword research. Use keyword research tools like keyword planner or SEMrush to look for keywords with decent search volume and low competition. It ensures organic traffic.

how to write articles online

“On the average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy.” David Ogilvy, copywriting legend

The headline is the first component someone reads. One single word can attract or repel them.

The first step in crafting a great headline is to analyze every word. Is every word necessary? If you remove a word, will the headline still make sense? No removable word in the headline is considered a tight headline, with nothing extra to distract from the meaning. So, keep a headline direct and persuasive so the reader is engaged.

Next, aim to craft headlines that are:

  • Ultra-specific

Including all these elements in one headline might not be possible, so aim for at least one or two. Doing so will strengthen the headline and encourage readers to read on.

Here are a few more insights on keeping your readers engaged:

  • Use proven headline formulas to upgrade your headline to a better level
  • Keep the main idea and the keywords of the headlines relevant
  • Focus on benefits. Benefit-driven headlines get more clicks
  • Inject power words to command attention
  • Trim unnecessary words

Solid research strengthens the credibility of your article. When you use the right data, it makes your article stronger and more convincing. 

What is quantitative data?

Quantitative data is objective data that can be measured and assigned a numerical value.

What is qualitative data?

Qualitative data cannot be measured or assigned a numerical value. Instead, it is information that is referenced not by numbers but by concepts, feelings, characteristics, and emotions. Qualitative data is subjective.

For quantitative research, you can use Google to dig out data, statistics, and surveys to support your claims and add credibility.

For qualitative research, you can conduct interviews, gather anecdotes, or explore case studies to provide valuable insights and real-life examples.

To stand out against multiple articles on a similar topic, find a unique angle that sets your piece apart. Consider what makes your article different or special. It could be a fresh perspective, a unique approach, or new insights. Determine your article’s unique selling point and emphasize it throughout your writing. Maybe it’s an expert opinion, an authentic recipe, a top-secret method, or a completely new discovery. 

For example, instead of writing a generic article on “how to deal with depression,” – write:

how to write articles online

By offering something distinct, you’ll capture readers’ attention and give them a reason to choose your article over others.

An article outline is a structure that guides your writing process and ensures your article stays focused and well-structured. Once you start using outlines, you’ll find writing articles become much easier.

Start by listing the main points or sections you want to cover based on your research and angle. Then, under each section, jot down the sub-points or supporting details. Don’t hesitate to revise and refine your outline as you progress. Whenever you find something new, add it in its respective position. 

Google Docs is great for creating an outline for your article. Or you can also use Workflowy to organize your ideas into sections and subsections. 

Here’s an example outline I made for my article on ‘how to write an amazing article.’

how to write articles online

Click for more tips and templates for creating outlines .

The introduction sets the tone for the entire article by grabbing the reader’s attention. The introduction is your opportunity to hook the readers and provide them with a clear understanding of what your article is about. 

Begin with a compelling opening sentence that grabs attention and sparks curiosity. Then, give a bit of background information and context to set the stage for your topic. Finally, conclude the introduction by stating your article’s main objective or thesis, giving readers a preview of what they can expect.

Example: “Did you know that humans can actually hold their breath for more than 20 minutes underwater? By following some techniques and enough practice, you, too, can extend your underwater breathing time. This article will equip you with seven expert tips to enhance your underwater breathing and unlock the wonders beneath.”

When structuring your article, it’s important to divide it into well-organized sections or paragraphs that delve deeper into the key points you want to convey. By using subheadings, you can break up the text and provide readers with a clear roadmap, making it easier for them to navigate and understand the content.

Each section should begin with a concise topic sentence that introduces the main idea or focus of that particular section. This is a signpost for readers, helping them anticipate what they will learn or explore next. 

For instance, if you’re writing an article about the benefits of exercise, one section could be titled “Improved Mental Health,” with a topic sentence like: “Engaging in regular exercise has been shown to have profound effects on our mental well-being.”

Support your statements with evidence, examples, and relevant data to ensure credibility and engagement. This adds depth and persuasion to your article. For instance, if you claim that exercise reduces stress levels, cite scientific studies or share personal anecdotes that illustrate how exercise has helped individuals manage their stress effectively.

To maintain a seamless flow of ideas, use smooth transitions between paragraphs. This allows readers to easily follow your train of thought as you progress from one point to another. Transitions can be achieved through the use of transitional words or phrases, such as “in addition,” “furthermore,” or “on the other hand.” These help establish connections and guide readers through the logical progression of your article.

This is where you end your article. A good conclusion can leave a lasting impression on the readers. Avoid introducing new information in the conclusion and summarize the key points discussed in the body of your article, emphasizing their significance and relevance. Avoid naming their conclusion “Conclusion.” 

Avoid generic headings for your conclusion heading. Be specific like:

  • Learn more about [topic]
  • Why is [topic] important?
  • Does [topic] make sense for your business?

If you must be generic in the conclusion’s heading, then go for:

  • Closing Thoughts
  • Final Words
  • To Sum It Up
  • To Wrap It Up

Recapping the whole article helps the reader remember the list of tips. After the recap, tell them what to do next. If someone reads your whole piece, chances are, they’re invested and will take action on your Call to Action ( CTA ). Don’t let that power and impact go to waste. Guiding them to bookmark the page or follow a link to another relevant article is 100x better than stopping at the recap.

The conclusion should be short and should give the reader a clear sense of finality. Ensure you don’t leave the reader confused about the information presented or your stance on a particular topic. 

Once the draft is finished, you’re well on your way, but there’s still a bit more to do – editing. It’s a vital part of good writing. It shapes a piece of raw coal into a glittering diamond.

No matter how good you are, the first draft is always full of mistakes, and there is usually room for improvement.  

When you have the draft, take a break from writing so you can start editing with fresh eyes again. You’ll see a lot of things that you missed earlier. Review your article for clarity, coherence, grammar, and spelling errors. Ensure your writing flows smoothly and effectively communicates your ideas. To make things easier, use some tools to help you edit; I’ll discuss those in a later section.

Next, remove anything unnecessary from your article. Anything that doesn’t add any value to your article shouldn’t be there. Then, check to see if you’ve missed any necessary information. Add statistics and relevant information to solidify your writing. 

If you have the option, have a friend read the draft. A new perspective can usually detect problems. Make necessary revisions and proofread multiple times until you are confident in the quality of your final piece.

By following these ten steps, you can create a well-crafted and engaging article that captivates your audience from start to finish. 

  • Stay true to your unique perspective:   As a writer, your unique perspective and voice are your most valuable assets. Embrace your individuality and bring your authentic self into your writing. Avoid replicating existing content or mimicking other writers. Instead, focus on expressing your thoughts, opinions, and experiences. Your distinctive viewpoint will set your article apart from others and create a personal connection with your readers. Be confident in your voice and don’t be afraid to let your personality shine through.
  • Offer valuable insights: To engage your audience and leave a lasting impression, your article must provide genuine value. Research your topic thoroughly to unearth valuable insights, fresh data, or unique angles that haven’t been extensively covered before. Share your expertise, research findings, or personal experiences to enrich the reader’s understanding. Offering something new and valuable establishes you as a reliable source of information and keeps readers coming back for more of your content.
  • Strive for clarity and coherence in your writing: Clear and coherent writing is the hallmark of an effective article. Ensure your ideas flow logically and smoothly from one paragraph to another. Use clear and concise language to convey your message without ambiguity. Avoid using jargon or overly complex terms that might confuse your readers. Utilize transition words and phrases to create seamless connections between sentences and paragraphs. When your writing is clear and coherent, readers can easily follow your train of thought, making the reading experience enjoyable and memorable. 
  • Keep it short and simple: Use simple and easily understandable words to communicate your ideas effectively. Break down complex concepts into smaller, digestible chunks. Short sentences are easier to read and comprehend, allowing readers to grasp your message quickly. Also, don’t stretch your paragraphs too much. A paragraph should contain 3 to 4 lines maximum. Longer paragraphs create a wall of text that discourage readers from continuing.
  • Do not copy/plagiarize: Originality is key when creating web content. Plagiarism is unethical and can have severe consequences. Always credit and properly cite any sources or references you use in your article. Provide your unique insights and perspectives to add value to the reader’s experience. Plagiarism damages your credibility and hinders your growth as a writer.
  • Use subheadings and make it scannable: Web readers often skim through articles rather than reading them word by word. Help them navigate and grasp your content easily by using informative subheadings. Subheadings break up the text, making it scannable and allowing readers to find the information they are interested in quickly. Use clear and descriptive subheadings that accurately represent the content of each section.
  • Use pictures and tables: Visual elements such as pictures, infographics, and tables can enhance the overall reader experience. Images can help illustrate your points, make your article visually appealing, and provide a welcome break from the text. Tables are useful for presenting data or comparisons in a structured and organized manner. Ensure that your visuals are relevant, high-quality, and appropriately sourced.

There are many tools out there to help your writing journey. Let’s introduce you to some of the most useful tools you can get for free to take your article writing to the next level. 

how to write articles online

  • ChatGPT:   ChatGPT is an AI-powered writing tool that helps writers generate ideas, write sections, conduct research, and fix grammar. AI stands for Artificial Intelligence, a technology that allows machines like ChatGPT to understand human language and respond with natural-sounding text. While AI is powerful, it’s essential to fact-check its outputs since it can sometimes make mistakes in providing accurate information. Use ChatGPT wisely, and it can be your helpful writing companion!
  • Grammarly: It’s a popular writing tool that helps writers improve their grammar, spelling, and punctuation. It works as an automated proofreader and editor, checking your text for errors and offering suggestions for improvements. The pro version also has a built-in plagiarism checker. 
  • Wordtune: It’s an AI-powered writing tool that assists in rephrasing and improving your sentences. It offers alternative wordings and suggestions for stronger vocabulary and can even rewrite entire sentences to improve readability and style. Wordtune can be especially useful when you want to convey your message more engagingly and concisely. 

These tools can greatly support your writing and editing process, making it easier to produce high-quality articles. However, it’s important to note that while AI tools like ChatGPT, Grammarly, and Wordtune offer valuable assistance, they are not substitutes for human creativity and critical thinking. Reviewing and revising your work personally is essential to ensure that it aligns with your unique voice and meets your intended goals for the article.

Article templates 

Templates can serve as a helpful starting point to structure your content effectively. Here are four commonly used article templates:

This template is ideal for addressing a specific problem or challenge and providing a solution to your readers. It consists of the following sections:

  • Introduction: Present the problem or challenge, and explain its significance or impact.
  • Problem Analysis: Dive deeper into the issue, providing relevant facts, statistics, or examples to support your claims.
  • Solution Presentation: Introduce your proposed solution(s), explaining how they can address the problem effectively.
  • Implementation and Benefits: Discuss how readers can implement the solution and the potential benefits they can expect to achieve.
  • Conclusion: Summarize the problem, restate the solution, and leave readers with a call to action or a final thought.

Listicles are popular for their easy-to-read and scannable format. This template organizes content into a numbered or bulleted list, providing concise information or tips. It typically includes the following sections:

  • Introduction: Present the topic and explain its relevance or importance.
  • List Items: Present each point on the list, with a brief description or explanation for each.
  • Elaboration: Provide further details, examples, or insights for each list item.
  • Conclusion: Recap the main points covered in the list and offer a closing thought or a call to action.

This template is useful for providing a detailed process or instructions on how to accomplish a specific task. It follows a sequential structure and includes the following sections:

  • Introduction: Introduce the task or process and explain its significance or benefits.
  • Step 1: Describe the first step of the process, including any necessary background information.
  • Step 2: Detail the second step, and continue with subsequent steps until the process is complete.
  • Tips and Considerations: Offer additional tips, tricks, or important considerations to enhance the reader’s understanding or success in following the steps.
  • Conclusion: Recap the steps covered, emphasize key takeaways, and provide a closing remark or call to action.

This template is suitable when comparing and contrasting two or more subjects, products, or ideas. It follows a structured approach and consists of the following sections:

  • Introduction: Present the subjects being compared and explain the purpose or context of the analysis.
  • Comparison Criteria: Identify the specific criteria or factors used to evaluate and compare the subjects.
  • Comparison Sections: Dedicate separate sections to each criterion, providing a detailed analysis and comparison of the subjects based on that criterion.
  • Overall Assessment: Summarize the main findings and provide an overall assessment or conclusion based on the comparisons made.
  • Conclusion: Reinforce the main points, highlight any recommendations or conclusions, and encourage readers to share their thoughts or experiences.

Other than these short templates, you can find millions of examples online. Simply search for a similar article you want to write, and click on the first few links to see the structure they’ve used. 

Congratulations! You’ve now gained a comprehensive understanding of how to write amazing articles. By following the steps and techniques in this guide, you are well-equipped to embark on your writing journey and captivate your target audience.

Remember, writing articles is not only about conveying information; it is also about connecting with readers on a deeper level, inspiring them, and sparking meaningful conversations. 

The next step is to find a good place to publish your amazing articles now that you have the tools to get started. You can easily get started with a website from WordPress.com. It’s quite simple to get started once you follow some super simple guidelines from WordPress.com support.    

So, what are you waiting for? Start creating your WordPress.com account today, unleash your writing prowess, and let the world discover your remarkable talent!

Happy writing!

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About the author, mehedi hasan shoab.

Mehedi is a freelance writer for SaaS, marketing and finance businesses. He's the founder of PowerhouseBlogger.com. Mehedi is growing businesses with sizzling writing, one piece at a time.

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Sociology Group: Welcome to Social Sciences Blog

How to Write Article Online and Get it Published Online

How do you get an article published? Are you an aspiring writer or someone who has a flair for writing? Writing articles is essential to mastering writing skills. Today, there are various opportunities that you can grab to express your views and thoughts. In the era of digital publishing, there are a number of online platforms that seek your contributions and bridge across a broad audience. With these platforms enabling you to express your views, you can write as much as you want.

How-to-publish-article-online-free

If you think that you need a lot of noise to compete against other pieces of writing on the internet, you are wrong. Generally, there are two remarkably simple elements that make a good article: good style/technique and good content. Anyone with these two components in their article, coupled with originality, can write. Everyone, at some point, has interesting things to say and can create relatively good content, but getting the knack of good technique is harder than it seems. Content gets credited more than it deserves, but it is the style that makes or breaks an article.

SOME COMMON TIPS FOR WRITING A GOOD ARTICLE: 

  • Apart from being unjust to the original writers, plagiarism is illegal in the first place. The best way to avoid plagiarism is to express the main ideas using your own words and if you need help from other’s work try to paraphrase or rephrase other authors’ thoughts.
  • Read Multiple Sources and avoid using just one source as the basis for your work. By reading from different sources, you will get a holistic idea of the topic as well as you will be able to combine all the information into the content you are writing.
  • Usage of quotations and definitions is not considered to be plagiarism but do cite their work after using the same in your article.

Read: How to Avoid Plagiarism 

The process of writing an article 

Step 1: Choose a topic of your interest  

Choose a topic that interests you enough to focus on it. After topic selection, ask your teacher for guidelines that might help you draft the article in a better way. It is the responsibility of the author to think about their audience too while choosing the topic for their article. Following this, make a list of ideas or write a rough draft of everything you can think of. This will help you understand what is important and what must be addressed in your article.

Step 2: Research – The basis for your article 

Detailed research on the topic is required before attempting to comment on, review, or appreciate it and a few topics might require additional research than what is usually done. The research includes reading old articles and books about the topic, references from the media, taking good notes and recording quotations of well-known personalities from the field, anecdotes, interviews, expert’s opinions, and updated and reliable sources of statistics and definitions. Make a chronological outline of all the information gathered, which will make it easy for you to access once you start writing.

Step 3: Start working on your rough draft 

After gathering all the information, start working on your article. To draw your audience easily, keep it clean, simple, and understandable. Opening your article with a chunk of long paragraphs will make it difficult for your audience to understand. Keep your entry short, creative, and fierce by making a lead with one or two sentences that are easy to comprehend for even elementary readers. It is difficult to understand all the ideas in just one reading, so break down your ideas. The first few lines must primarily keep the audience engaged while also being able to deliver the crux of the article at the same time.

Step 4: Storytelling – Keeping your audience connected 

Imagine yourself as the reader of the article and switch sides to see different perspectives on the same issue. We respond better to stories than just plain theory. The art of storytelling is unique, and people just love stories. Trying to convince your audience with stories can keep them drawn to your work for a longer duration than those articles that do not use human examples. Stories capture the reader’s attention faster than anything else. Avoid dry writing. This is by far the best technique to illustrate your idea.

Step 5: Read, Revise, Proofread, Rewrite 

Grammarly, Ginger, ProWritingAid, and Hemingway are some popular tools can be used to automatically check your writing for errors and can also proofread everything you write. These tools will help you correct grammar, autocorrect spelling errors, and even help you make your sentences unique and easy to read. But how do we find out about these errors? To correct flaws and mistakes, read the article multiple times. Read your work aloud, rewrite it, hire a proofreader, and enlist the assistance of a friend or family member. If you get positive feedback from them, it boosts your confidence. After you are done getting feedback, make any necessary changes before publishing your article.

HOW TO GET ARTICLES PUBLISHED? 

Everyone wants to get their piece of work published but there are certain criteria based on which an article is accepted or rejected. Some general guidelines to be kept in mind to help your articles get approved are as follows:

  • Submissions must have original content . Some websites insist not to republish the articles submitted to them on third-party sites.
  • To get your article published, the content has to  meet the guidelines of the editorial team . Only if your submission matches with the scope of their topic and has relevance  will be published.
  • There are certain requirements that each content creator or editor except their writers. For example: Mentioning subheadings, using bullets to empathize on points for the reader’s convenience, prescribed length of the article (minimum number of words that are required to be used), and so on. This keeps changing from one website or another.
  • Avoid bias, comparisons, product-specific/promotional articles. 
  • Citations must be included which  may help the editors of the website in further clarification of the source you used to write the article. The author needs to seek permission from any outside source when they decide to use his/her images in their content.
  • Any website has complete rights to reject any submission based on their discretion
  • Once your article is accepted, thank the editor/website owner who has published your piece of work

CONTACTING BLOGGERS/WEBSITE OWNERS

  • One of the easiest ways to contact your favourite blogger or website holder is to  Leave a comment  on their account or site. It takes only a few seconds to do this as it is a pretty simple thing to do. This way you also have an option can keep your identity anonymous.
  • When you are on the blogsite or going through a lot of websites, they have a series of columns that you can find some of this will say “About Us” or something similar to “Contact Us”.
  •   Things get a bit tricky when the contact page is not obvious.  In that case, social media can help you to get in touch with the blogger/website owner. You can try searching for them on Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin
  •   Some websites and blogs come with a profile page or a home page  which makes it easier for viewers and this helps you to get in touch with them easily. In here you can check for an email address or an account on another site.

How to converse with them:

  • Try to  keep your conversation casual – do not expect them to accept your articles, ideas, or thoughts just because you read their blog or follow their website.
  • Twitter and email are the best ways to get in touch with a website owner.
  • Try and avoid leaving an anonymous message, comment or content which is unlikely to be replied to. After all, would you feel good to reply to such anonymous messages?
  • Commenting on blogs is the most convenient and safe way of chatting with a blogger

Publish Article, Essays, and Research Paper here

Sociology Group is a youth-led e-learning platform started by students with a mission to bring about a paradigm shift in the field of social sciences. We are highly motivated, and have a hardworking team committed to making our viewers master the subject of social sciences. We are happy to provide you with an opportunity to learn and grow. With Sociology Group, you can publish your articles for free, and here we give our authors full credit for their work even if these articles are just guest posts. Your opinions and ideas matter to us, and we encourage you to write for us on any topic relevant to any social science that you are interested in. We seek your contributions to this website that might help our audience. Your hard work and ideas are always welcome, and submissions must be original content. Your submissions must make the audience understand what your take on the topic is and what is important. Here is the page you can click on to publish your articles online.

how to write articles online

Sociology Group

The Sociology Group is an organization dedicated to creating social awareness through thoughtful initiatives like "social stories" and the "Meet the Professor" insightful interview series. Recognized for our book reviews, author interviews, and social sciences articles, we also host annual social sciences writing competition. Interested in joining us? Email [email protected] . We are a dedicated team of social scientists on a mission to simplify complex theories, conduct enlightening interviews, and offer academic assistance, making Social Science accessible and practical for all curious minds.

Marketing

How to Write a How-to Article Step-by-Step (+Free Template)

How to Write a How-to Article Step-by-Step (+Free Template)

Have you ever had to explain how Zoom video calls work to family-members or how to get from point A to point B to someone visiting your neighborhood?

If so, you’re already halfway to being able to write a helpful how-to article. But to get that extra bit of structure, flair, and inspiration you’ll need to hold your reader’s attention, keep reading.

Below, I’ve put together an eight-step guide to writing the perfect how-to article online, along with some additional tips on writing and optimizing ​eye-catching Informational articles for search engines and readers alike.

I’ve even included a free-to-download how-to article template – the end result of years of testing and trials using Similarweb Digital Marketing Intelligence – to get you started.

Remember, you can skip around this article to the parts that are most useful from your point of view. First, we’re starting with the what behind the how.

What is a how-to article?

Refreshingly, the name doesn’t leave much to the imagination.

A how-to article lays out exactly how to do something. A how-to ​blogger might walk readers through how to buy, use, or troubleshoot a product, or focus on a wider, more general topic instead, like how to bake a chocolate cake.

What sets a how-to ​article apart from the rest of the content on the internet is user intent . People clicking on how-to guides aren’t necessarily looking for info around what a topic is, or why they should be interested. They already know, and they already are – your job is to show them how.

How to write a how-to article in 8 simple steps

A good article should provide practical and clear takeaways that the reader can put into practice. They should avoid jargon, and be made up of a list with easy-to-follow steps and bullet points in chronological order.

  • Choose a Topic
  • Put yourself in the audience’s shoes
  • Research keywords
  • Plan your article’s structure
  • Keep your steps snappy and straightforward
  • Give your guide a unique selling point
  • Set your page up for SEO success
  • Monitor your page’s metrics – and keep optimizing

Let’s start with step one.

1. Choose a topic

The logic’s infallible – you can’t begin writing a how-to article if you don’t know what you’re going to be writing about. So first, you’ll need to select a topic .

The topic you pick will depend on what you want to achieve, your industry, and target audience .

You might, for instance, be a company that sells a fairly technical product, so you’d want to publish an article that offers honed, specific advice as to how to use it. In this case, the how-to guide services a specific business need – educating the customer. In this case, the topic will be dictated by your product catalog, for example:

  • How to Assemble an IKEA Kallax
  • How to Set Up a Samsung Neo TV
  • How to Use an Amazon Echo

At the opposite end of the spectrum, you could be publishing a how-to content offering additional tips around a more general subject, such as:

  • How to Blow Up a Balloon
  • How to Defrost a Chicken
  • How to Change a Lightbulb

In the case of these examples, you’re probably writing the content either to build your brand, or make money via display ads or affiliate marketing .

But still – that doesn’t mean your choice of topic for your how-to article should be random. Y ou should always pick topics that fit within your particular niche or industry. ‘How to Blow Up a Balloon,’ for instance, is a great choice of topic for a party supplies website – but not for one specializing in digital marketing.

So, think carefully about what you want to write about. If it ties into your brand’s sector and niche, it’s good. If it addresses a direct business or customer need, it’s great. And if you have experience with the topic – and are passionate about writing it – it’s even better! Tweet this

2. Put yourself in the audience’s shoes

Now you’ve chosen what you’re going to write about, you’ll need to figure out who you’re writing for . You’ll have to start thinking like your target audience – that is, the people who will read your how-to guide – and tailor the content accordingly.

To craft quality content, ask yourself a few questions:

  • What are their pain points?
  • What do they already know?
  • What new information can I offer?
  • What knowledge gaps are they expecting this article to plug?

Even better, you can use audience analysis tools, like Similarweb Research Intelligence to dig into the data. On this foundation, you can start building up a comprehensive ‘user profile’ of your article’s intended audience. This’ll then lead to more advanced considerations, like:

  • What other sites do they frequent?
  • What topics or products do they search for online?
  • What is the best channel to promote this content for my audience? (i.e. social media, email, PPC, organic, etc .)
  • What demographics are my readers (location, age, etc.)

Knowing your audience is crucial for striking the right balance when it comes to your article’s tone, content, and technicality.

An article entitled ‘How to Build a Model Airplane,’ for instance, shouldn’t alienate the beginners among its readership with overly complicated terminology. Similarly, ‘How to Deal With a Breakup’ should adopt a more compassionate, conciliatory tone.

3. Research keywords

Now that you know your topic and your audience, you’ll need to find the right keywords – particularly if you have any aspirations to get said audience’s eyes on your how-to article organically.

Keywords are words and phrases that people enter into search engines like Google and YouTube to find what they’re looking for online. Here’s an example, using Similarweb Keyword Research Tool  found related keywords to ‘How to blow up a balloon’:

Similarweb Keyword Generator shows the top related keywords to “how to blow up a balloon”.

Now you can see what are the related keywords and questions to get more ideas while brainstorming the sections to include in your piece. You can also select secondary keywords to rank using the “Trending” keywords filter.

In this case, the root keyword “Balloons” shows that “birthday balloons” and “balloons online” are both very strong terms to include.

Similarweb Keyword Generator shows the top trending keywords related to the term “balloons”.

Once you’ve identified the primary and secondary keywords you’re hoping to rank for, you are ready to create your outline.

4. Plan your article structure

The order in which you write your article is completely up to you. You can start with the first paragraph, or fill out your steps and main points before tackling the introduction and FAQs.

But whichever angle you come at your how-to article from, there’s one thing you’ll need in place before your first draft – a structure!

Here’s what we recommend:

Similarweb template detailing how to plan your article structure

For a more detailed deep dive into what content, headings, tips, FAQs, and CTAs you need to include in your piece, I recommend downloading our how-to article template.

It’s free to download, and will get you on the fast-track to how-to article success.

Pro tip : To take your how-to article to the next level, create a short video covering the main steps you go over. Not only can this increase engagement with your article, but it can help more people find you on YouTube.

5. Keep your steps snappy and straightforward

Remember, no one’s here for an essay. So make sure that each step of your article says what it needs to, without ever becoming overlong or bogged down in detail. Less is more, being clear and concise and engaging is key to keeping your target audience engaged (and coming back for more). Moving on…

6. Give your how-to guide a unique selling point

Remember, people learn in different ways. Some will be readers, while others will prefer to absorb information via watching, listening, or engaging in hands-on interaction.

With that in mind, be sure not to load your how-to article up with too much copy. Break up those text walls with videos, infographics, tables, music, or quizzes, instead. Trust us – it’s not just the visual learners in your audience that’ll thank us.

Plus, there are plenty of other ways to bestow a unique selling point upon your content. You can, for instance, give your article a special angle, or hook. For instance:

  • Is your guide ‘step-by-step’ or ‘no-nonsense’?
  • Does it offer ‘everything you need to know,’ or is it simply the ‘ultimate guide’ to the subject matter?
  • Would you brand it for beginners, or for those with a more advanced understanding?

Case studies, ‘top tips,’ and expert comments – which you can source from PR databases such as Response Source or Help a Reporter Out – are also great ways of infusing your how-to article with unique, value-adding (and original!) quality content.

7. Set your page up for SEO success

You wouldn’t spend a night out on the snowy tundras of Alaska without bundling up warm.

So before you push your article out into the unforgiving wilderness of Google’s search engine results pages (SERPs) , you’ll need to arm it with all the gear it needs to survive – and thrive – in an online environment.

Now, you already started equipping your how-to article for SEO survival when you researched relevant SEO keywords using our keyword research tool and integrated them naturally into your copy. But before you hit ‘Publish,’ you’ll want to make sure you’ve got the rest of the basics downpat, too:

  • Include the keywords you found in the page content
  • Ensure your page has value-driven titles and meta descriptions (with the right character count – about 60 for the title and 160 for the description)
  • Link to other, thematically relevant pages on your site, as well as external sources that will elevate user experience
  • Compress any images on your page to reduce their file size, and drive down the amount of time your how-to article takes to load

And that’s just the on-page stuff. There are so many more factors – from the layout and speed of your website to its linking structure and backlink profile – that’ll affect how your page performs.

For more SEO tips, skip down to the dedicated section on it below, or check out our comprehensive guide to creating an SEO strategy .

And please don’t forget to proofread before you press publish.

8. Monitor your page metrics – and keep optimizing

Congratulations – your page is live. All that planning, research, penmanship, and SEO-ing has furnished you with a how-to article worthy of top-tier SERP real estate.

But alas – the work doesn’t stop there.

Now begins the perpetual process of study, evaluation, and iteration that comes with being the proud author of web content.

Among the metrics you’ll want to keep tabs on are:

  • Session duration (can you increase this with a video or infographic?)
  • Bounce rate (can you reduce this with a more engaging introduction?)
  • Page views (can you boost these organically , or with paid advertising?)

Ultimately, there’s always something you can do to make a page better. So test, tinker, and never be afraid to experiment – that’s how breakthroughs are made.

How to optimize your how-to page for SEO

We touched on the basics in Step 7, but – for your how-to article to really get a tune out of Google’s rankings – you’ll want to dabble in the following:

Marking up your page with how-to schema

In the words of Google, “structured data is a standardized format for providing information about a page and classifying the page content.”

In the words of the layman: it’s code that makes it explicitly clear to Google that your article is a how-to guide, specifically – and not some other piece of content with a contrasting intent.

Adding this schema to your page will also help optimize it for voice searches – such as those made through Apple Siri or Amazon Alexa – and assist Google in extracting your article’s rich media and showcasing it in the SERPs (pictured).

An image showing the page schema and related video content for the term “how to blow up a balloon”.

Structured data can be added with code or a programming language, such as JavaScript, or – if you use a content management system – via a plugin. Head to Google’s guide to adding structured data for more info.

Write conversationally

This piece of advice is to help you avoid one of the most common mistakes: too much jargon. You won’t find the key to writing good web copy in the thesaurus – so drop the big words, the long sentences, and the unnecessary wordiness.

Instead, write conversationally – that is, in a way that reflects how you actually speak, and how your readers will read and interpret your content. Address your readers as “you,” ask questions, use the active voice, and use analogies and storytelling to forge a connection with your audience.

In addition to helping your reader empathize with you – and understand your content – conversational copy and specifically copy that is readable is thought to be preferred by users (and Google), and will also help your article rank for voice searches. After all, when people are saying their inquiries to Google – rather than typing them out – they tend to search as they’d speak.

E-A-T: Why the author matters

E-A-T stands for Expertise, Authority, and Trustworthiness. It’s one of the factors Google uses to rate the overall quality of a how-to article and is tied specifically to the content’s creator – in this case, you!

E-A-T content is a high level of expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness.

Here, Google’s looking to understand three core elements about you as an author:

  • Expertise : Are you an established expert in the topic? What kind of experience do you have in the field?
  • Authority : Do you – and the site you’re publishing on – have recognized authority in the space? Is the content you’re writing original?
  • Trustworthiness: Are you trustworthy? Have you checked your sources? Do you rely on expert knowledge? Why should Google rank your content?

So if you have all the right credentials to be talking about your topic, don’t hold back. Include a bio of yourself with your how-to article, explaining your experience and motivations, and reaffirming why Joe Public and Google alike should trust you.

Equally – if you don’t have that standing just yet – don’t fret. You can build up your E-A-T by:

  • Accruing (and responding to) user reviews
  • Collecting quotes from expert sources (see Step 6 above for more!), then getting those expert sources to mention you
  • Regularly reviewing and updating your content
  • Building up your website’s backlink profile

How to write a how-to article: conclusion

“ Share your knowledge. It’s a way to achieve immortality”

The Dalai Lama

With these eight steps, you have everything you need to share your knowledge with the world; to turn an idea into a fully-fledged how-to article, and achieve SERP immortality.

Now, all that’s left is to… get started. To commit to an idea, use your expertise to develop it, and – through your passion for the content and subject matter – share it with the world.

So go show ‘em how it’s done!

Enjoy 360 Visibility 24/7

Get the data you need to adapt to market changes and industry trends in an instant.

A how-to article explains exactly how to do something and assumes they already know the what.

How should I structure my how-to article?

Always try to format your how-to article in a step-by-step format (Google loves it, as will your reader), with an introduction, conclusion, and FAQ section. If you have room, you can also include additional content – such as a ‘What Is,’ or ‘Top Tips for’ sections – to add value.

How can I download a free how-to article template?

Simply download Similarweb’s free, no-strings-attached template to walk you through structuring and formatting your how-to guide, with helpful hints around writing CTAs and FAQs, too.

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Wondering what similarweb can do for you.

Here are two ways you can get started with Similarweb today!

how to write articles online

Wallet Squirrel

Get Paid To Write Articles: 20+ Websites That Pay You For Writing

Getting paid to write articles is one of our favorite ways to earn extra money, so much so that we made a list of websites that will actually pay you to submit articles for their publications. This is a great way to earn extra money while building your writing brand. #earnextramoney #sidehustle

20+ Websites That Pay You For Writing

Get Paid To Write on Listverse - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Anything with a Top 10 Tagline How Much Can You Make : $100 per 1,800 word article (via PayPal) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb): 8.02M monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here Listverse is full of (you guessed it) lists! Top 10 lists and such are a great attention grabber for readers and Listverse pays for articles with at least 10 list points. They will easily shell out $100 for good quality list articles. If you have a great idea for an attention-grabbing list, submit your list idea to Listverse for consideration. It may be a quick way to get paid to write articles, making $100 per article on our list of websites that pay you for writing. Just make sure that you do your research on your lists, avoid easy grammar issues and create a really attention-grabbing headline.

Smithsonian Magazine (online)

Get Paid To Write on Smithsonian - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : History, Science, Innovation, Arts & Culture, etc. (Smithsonian stuff) How Much Can You Make : $1,000 per article Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb): 9.81M monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here How ambitious are you? The Smithsonian is a big deal and one of the more prestegious websites that pay you fro writing. So you may be surprised to hear they do accept submissions from freelance writers. Although you need to provide at least 3 links to previous writing examples, and if you don’t have good ones, you should move on. If you do have all of that, you should “pitch” an idea for an article you have. Don’t worry about having crazy good photographs, they’ll provide the photography your article needs, you just need to supply the 250-300 worded idea and eventually final article if approved.

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Get Paid To Write on HubPages- Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Anything How Much Can You Make : Pennies Per Page View (via ads) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb): 3.18M monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here HubPages is an online community that writes about anything and everything. Once you sign up for free, you can write about whatever your passionate about. Your article will have ads on them and you’ll receive a portion of that revenue while you get paid to write articles. The more popular your articles are, the more money you’ll make. This is similar to having your own blog , but HubPages host your articles for you in return for a small portion of the ad revenue your articles produce.

Get Paid To Write on iWriter - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Topics They Ask For How Much Can You Make : Up to $40 for a 500 word article (depending on writing level) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb): 591.52K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here How iWriter works is that people pay iWriter to write articles for them. So a client will pay iWriter to write an article on “Baking Bread”, for example. Then iWriter will send the request to its army of writers (you) and you’ll take the job. The client will pay iWriter and iWriter will pay you in return. The more great articles you write, the more you’ll earn from iWriter based on their 4 tier (Standard, Premium, Elite & Elite Plus) writer levels. Once you receive Elite Plus level, you’ll be paid $40 for a 500-word article. You’ll pay will depend on the level of writer you are and the number of articles you write. What’s nice is you can accept/decline as many articles as you can write from the comfort of your own home. This is nice because the email request will come in with different topics where you can get paid to write articles.

Get Paid To Write on Tuts - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : How To Articles for coding, web design, Adobe Products, anything graphic How Much Can You Make : $200 per tutorial (increases the more you submit) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb): 19.74M monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here Tuts+ is a site I used to visit all the time when learning Photoshop. They have some great tutorials by some awesome teachers, so this probably isn’t for new writers, but people who can prove they’ve written similar tutorials for well-known websites. This makes them one of the top websites that pay you for writing, paying around $200 (starting out) for How-To’s. There are opportunities to create written and video how-to-tutorials. Just make sure you have the depth of experience to back up what you’re teaching. Here is a list of tutorials they’re looking for people to teach .

Income Diary

Get Paid To Write on Income Diary - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Tips to help out bloggers (blogs, social media, making money online) How Much Can You Make : $100 – $200 per article Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb): 303.49K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here The Income Diary is a website focused on helping new bloggers to set up their site, write content and monetize it for future revenue. Since this is a specific niche, there is much similar content that currently exists on the site. While you may be able to earn $200, it is a very difficult way to get paid to write articles and get your content accepted. However if you have an idea that you think fits well with their audience, submit your idea and they’ll tell you if it’s worthy. Otherwise don’t bother writing an entire article until your idea is accepted. If you do get your article idea accepted, you should jump for joy because they are one of the top paying websites that pay you for writing.

Travel + Leisure

Get Paid To Write on Travel and Leisure - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Trip Ideas, Destinations, Hotels (travel stuff) How Much Can You Make : $1 a word (articles range from 400 – 2,000 words) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb): 6.03M monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here With an audience of 1 million viewers per month, Travel + Leisure receives many writer submissions so they’re looking for high-quality articles from writers with previous writing experience. If you’re interested in writing for them, go over their website and understand what type of articles are published. Then go over to their contact page and email them a short email with your “pitch”, don’t bother writing your full article. If they like your idea, they’ll email you back with the guidelines they want. About 95% of the articles on their site are from freelance writers so you may have a shot. They’re one of the few proven websites that pay you for writing.

Transitions Abroad

Get Paid To Write on Transitions Abroad - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Volunteering, Work, Living and Studying Abroad How Much Can You Make : $50 – $150 (for a 1,250-2,000 word article) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb): 422.94K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here While not the most aesthetically pleasing website, these guys have tons of articles submitted by people around the world relating to volunteering, working and living abroad. So much so that their “Travel Writer Guidelines for Submissions” page is heavily detailed on what they’re looking from their writers. Overall this is a great place to share that amazing study abroad adventure you had in college and share all those little secrets you learned along the way like don’t buy cheap outlet plug converts or how to use hotel key cards as knives for your PBJ sandwiches . If you have any of those wacky travel stories, consider this one of the first websites that pay you for writing that you try.

Back To College

Get Paid To Write on Back To College - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Things important to adults going back to college How Much Can You Make : $55+ (for a 1,000-1,500 word article) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb) : 386.82k monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here This is an old-school website but maintains high popularity for people interested in going back to college later in life. This site makes money by ads and selling leads to college recruiters. So articles about sharing your personal story about going back to college or how your thinking about going back to college may be ideal. This may be a great place to get paid to write articles if you’ve ever considered going back to school.

The Travel Writers Life

Get Paid To Write on Travel Writers - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Getting paid to travel whether it’s writing, photography, tours, etc. How Much Can You Make : $50 – $200 (for a 300-600 word article) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb) : less than 10K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here This is an interesting writing topic because The Travel Writers Life showcases popular ways people are making money while traveling. So you won’t find any fluffy travel stories here. It’s more about how you paid for your study abroad apartment by working at your landlords banana stand. If you have any stories where you made a little money while traveling, this is a great place to share your story on one of the few websites that pay yforfro writing.

The Matador

Get Paid To Write on Matador - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Wide range of topics from life style, culture to family and night-life How Much Can You Make : $20 – $60 Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb) : 3.35M monthly visitors Since this is such a popular website they receive numerous writing solicitations and thus don’t have to offer much money for people looking to get paid to write articles. While they don’t pay much, this may be a good place to start if you’re a beginner writer. If you’re looking to try it out, you’ll have to create a profile on their contributor page and send them your article idea. It’ll take them a month or two to review it and if you don’t hear back, don’t take it personally they get a lot of ideas. Try submiting another idea. When it comes to larger websites like this, it’s a numbers game. Luckily you have the option to write about a wide range of topics on their websites that pay you for writing.

A List Apart

Get Paid To Write on A List Apart - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Web development related to code, content, design, process, business, etc. How Much Can You Make : $50 – $200 (1,500 word articles avg.) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb) : 543.71K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here This is a very niche website related to website development. If this topic interests you, send their team your pitch idea (ideally in a Google Doc) for review. They review all ideas once a week and rarely accept pitches on the first draft. However they’ll likely help you develop your idea further making it worthy of their website. They’re currently looking for new writers so if you have a story to share regarding web development or user experience, shoot them an email.

Flywheel – The Layout

Get Paid To Write on Flywheel Layout - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : All things WordPress Website related How Much Can You Make : $50 (They give you a list of topics with prices) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb) : 712.64K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here These guys have one of the most efficient ways to get new writers. Beyond their super easy sign-up page where you submit your credentials, they give you a list of topics to write about and how much they’ll pay for each one. It looks like someone on their team realized keywords they want to rank for and added that list for potential writers to write about. Most of the articles they currently have posted only pay $50 per article, but they claim up to $150. Keep in mind, most of the articles they are looking for are related to how to code WordPress websites, so it may be a little niche for most people. If you have the WordPress knowlege though, it’s one of first websites that pay you for writing you should consider.

Get Paid To Write on BootsNAll - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Trip Ideas, Destinations, Travel Adventures (travel stuff) How Much Can You Make : $50 per article (articles range from 1,200 – 2,000 words) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb): 160.98K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here This is a site I really enjoyed right after researching. It’s a very indie type travel site where it encourages really exploring your travel destinations over high-end resorts. If you have a travel story/idea that you want to pitch, send it to them after you check out their article guidelines to get paid to write articles. Most of is it pretty basic, but something to keep in mind. If you’re not sure your work is good enough to submit, try their “Guest Post” guide where your article won’t be paid for, but you can submit it in front of their audience. It’s a great way to gain travel writing exposure without much pressure on our list of websites that pay you for writing.

International Living

Get Paid To Write on International Living - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : All things related to retiring overseas (cost, living, places, etc.) How Much Can You Make : $75 – $400 Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb) : 712.64K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here International Living has both a blog/newsletter (they call it a Postcard) and monthly magazine that they’re looking for contributing writers to get paid to write articles. If your article gets accepted to the Postcard, it’s worth around $75 while the monthly magazine is worth $250 for 840 words and $400 for 1,400 words. If you’re curious what to write about, they love inspirational stories about retiring abroad in your dream location ( use SEMrush for popular keyword ideas ). They want to know how your money will stretch longer in other countries and how that affects healthcare and other lifestyles. If you’ve ever been thinking about retiring in a small tropical country or somewhere cooler, maybe this is one of the websites that pay you for writing for you.

Get Paid To Write on Cracked - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Anything Pop Culture with a funny twist How Much Can You Make : $100 – $200 Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb) : 19.24M monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here While most websites actively look for experienced writers, Cracked is all about encouraging new writers to submit ideas with lots of different ways to contribute and get paid to write articles. You can write the long lists they’re known for like “ 26 Sexy Halloween Costumes That Shouldn’t Exist ” or creating funny graphics they can use on their social media accounts. They are heavily reliant on content writers like you can contribute to their online publication. If you think you have a sarcastic or satire writing personality, definitely register as a writer for them and jump into the hilarious world of Cracked. This is one of the most popular websites that pay you for writing on our list.

Get Paid To Write on Photodoto - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Articles About Great Photography How Much Can You Make : Likely Around $50, not listed Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb) : 151.96K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here This is a really open category, photography. Everyone has tried photography at some point in their life. It’s pretty easy to point and click to great a great image. Either to sell via stock photography , share with your friends or hang up in a gallery. The point is, most people have a photography lesson learned or story to share and Photodoto is the perfect place for topics such as Photography Inspiration, Tips, Gear or post-production. Take a shot at this website to write a guest post, they seem to be very excited to hear about pitch ideas.

The Dollar Stretcher

Get Paid To Write on Dollar Stretcher - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Anything to help people save time and money (stretch your dollar) How Much Can You Make : $0.10 per word (Most articles 500-700 words) Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb) : 151.96K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here Now, this is a site we can get behind, another personal finance website! If you have some great ways to save money/time this is the place but keep in mind, The Dollar Stretcher has been in circulation since January 1998. They have TONS of articles on how to save money so if you’re going to pitch them you need to be creative, inventive and very specific. They ask you don’t pitch them “ 7 ways to save on groceries “, but rather “7 ways to save money on ground beef”. If you email them your pitch and don’t hear anything, they likely already have similar content and didn’t bother responding. Try pitching again being more creative, everyone does something cool to save money. It’s a great way to get paid to write articles if you’re able to niche down into specific money saving ideas.

Get Paid To Write on Curbly - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : DIY Home Improvement / Interior Design Projects How Much Can You Make : Likely Around $50, you set your price. Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb) : 271.60K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here Yay I’ve been looking for a good DIY site where I can get paid to write articles. Curby started as one man’s journey doing home improvement projects and grew into a vibrate community of 271 thousand visits a month focusing on cool home improvement and interior design projects inspiring people. Now they’re one of the top websites that pay you for writing about home improvement projects. If you have a home improvement project that all your friends just rave about, consider pitching Curby to see if it’s a good idea for their site and get paid!

Get Paid To Write on Blog Paws - Websites That Pay You For Writing

What To Write About : Life of a Pet Owner (tips, hacks, pet stories, etc.) How Much Can You Make : $75 per article Monthly Visitors (SimilarWeb) : less than 10K monthly visitors How To Become A Writer : Sign Up Here Many websites that pay writers are related to web development or travel so it’s great to see sites like this that pay for articles that most people have experience with, like pets. This site focuses on connecting pet owners through their site and social media. More importantly, they help animal shelters and rescues connect with a wide range of pet owners for possible adoption. Blog Paws really tries to capture the reality of life with pets and can use writers that can help others navigate that world. If you’re a pet owner that can’t stop talking about how great it is to be a pet owner, this may be a perfect place to get paid to write articles on our list of websites that pay you for writing in 2018.

Consider Writing For Your Own Blog

How To Start Your Own Blog That Makes Money on Day 1

Writing for others is a quick way to get paid writing and build up your own portfolio. However, you’re working for other people and making THEM money. Consider using our guide to Starting Your Own Blog That Makes Money on Day 1 ! This is a nice alternative utilizing your writing creativity. Having your own website allows you to display a portfolio of your writing work and earn money for yourself from the awesome content you create!

Get Paid To Write Articles – Our Thoughts

Hope you like our blueprint for starting to get paid to write articles! We absolutely love websites that pay you for writing, helping fellow freelance writers and side-hustlers. While writing this and looking at the criteria these websites are looking for in contributing writers, it’s actually a really easy way to earn extra money . Most of these websites paying between $50 – $150 per article even for beginners, you could write an article every day for a month (30 days) and make $3,000.

how to write articles online

Wallet Squirrel is a personal finance blog by best friends Andrew & Adam on how money works, building side-hustles, and the benefits of cleverly investing the profits. Featured on MSN Money, AOL Finance, and more!

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This is a very beautiful thing to know that money is everywhere online. In fact, content is and always will be king on the world wide web. Thank you for sharing this beautiful information with us. DrewryNewsNetwork is in your corner as a solid supporter of WalletSquirrel! 🙂

I had to double back to this post and say that I never knew Smithsonian paid everyday people to write content for them. I’m completely blindsided knowing this now. I’m wondering how many links are you allowed to include in a Smithsonian post linking back to your blog or website before submitting content to them.

They would not only be excellent for promoting WalletSquirrel, but also help improve your long term SEO and side hustle income potential.

Hayes @ Absolute Budget

Wow, thanks for doing all the dirty work and getting this awesome list out there for us! I can’t wait to dig into some of these!

Good morning Andrew and Adam,

This is beautiful news to know that websites pay writers for organic content marketing. This goes to show that there’s more money online in job security then traditionally working for the man on a regular day job in America. You gotta invest in yourself I tell people instead of making your employer rich without a pay raise!

Rosalyn

Heya exceptional blog! Does running a blog like this take a large amount of work? I’ve no expertise in computer programming but I was hoping to start my own blog in the near future. Anyhow, should you have any ideas or techniques for new blog owners please share. I understand this is off subject nevertheless I simply had to ask. Cheers!

Wallet Squirrel

Hi Rosalyn! It really doesn’t cost much to run a blog. We share all our blog costs in our monthly reports and provide screenshots on how to start a blog . Let me know if you have any other questions!

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What to Know About the Supreme Court Arguments on Social Media Laws

Both Florida and Texas passed laws regulating how social media companies moderate speech online. The laws, if upheld, could fundamentally alter how the platforms police their sites.

  • Share full article

A view of the Supreme Court building.

By David McCabe

McCabe reported from Washington.

Social media companies are bracing for Supreme Court arguments on Monday that could fundamentally alter the way they police their sites.

After Facebook, Twitter and YouTube barred President Donald J. Trump in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021, riots at the Capitol, Florida made it illegal for technology companies to ban from their sites a candidate for office in the state. Texas later passed its own law prohibiting platforms from taking down political content.

Two tech industry groups, NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Association, sued to block the laws from taking effect. They argued that the companies have the right to make decisions about their own platforms under the First Amendment, much as a newspaper gets to decide what runs in its pages.

So what’s at stake?

The Supreme Court’s decision in those cases — Moody v. NetChoice and NetChoice v. Paxton — is a big test of the power of social media companies, potentially reshaping millions of social media feeds by giving the government influence over how and what stays online.

“What’s at stake is whether they can be forced to carry content they don’t want to,” said Daphne Keller, a lecturer at Stanford Law School who filed a brief with the Supreme Court supporting the tech groups’ challenge to the Texas and Florida laws. “And, maybe more to the point, whether the government can force them to carry content they don’t want to.”

If the Supreme Court says the Texas and Florida laws are constitutional and they take effect, some legal experts speculate that the companies could create versions of their feeds specifically for those states. Still, such a ruling could usher in similar laws in other states, and it is technically complicated to accurately restrict access to a website based on location.

Critics of the laws say the feeds to the two states could include extremist content — from neo-Nazis, for example — that the platforms previously would have taken down for violating their standards. Or, the critics say, the platforms could ban discussion of anything remotely political by barring posts about many contentious issues.

What are the Florida and Texas social media laws?

The Texas law prohibits social media platforms from taking down content based on the “viewpoint” of the user or expressed in the post. The law gives individuals and the state’s attorney general the right to file lawsuits against the platforms for violations.

The Florida law fines platforms if they permanently ban from their sites a candidate for office in the state. It also forbids the platforms from taking down content from a “journalistic enterprise” and requires the companies to be upfront about their rules for moderating content.

Proponents of the Texas and Florida laws, which were passed in 2021, say that they will protect conservatives from the liberal bias that they say pervades the platforms, which are based in California.

“People the world over use Facebook, YouTube, and X (the social-media platform formerly known as Twitter) to communicate with friends, family, politicians, reporters, and the broader public,” Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general, said in one legal brief. “And like the telegraph companies of yore, the social media giants of today use their control over the mechanics of this ‘modern public square’ to direct — and often stifle — public discourse.”

Chase Sizemore, a spokesman for the Florida attorney general, said the state looked “forward to defending our social media law that protects Floridians.” A spokeswoman for the Texas attorney general did not provide a comment.

What are the current rights of social media platforms?

They now decide what does and doesn’t stay online.

Companies including Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, TikTok, Snap, YouTube and X have long policed themselves, setting their own rules for what users are allowed to say while the government has taken a hands-off approach.

In 1997, the Supreme Court ruled that a law regulating indecent speech online was unconstitutional, differentiating the internet from mediums where the government regulates content. The government, for instance, enforces decency standards on broadcast television and radio.

For years, bad actors have flooded social media with misleading information , hate speech and harassment, prompting the companies to come up with new rules over the last decade that include forbidding false information about elections and the pandemic. Platforms have banned figures like the influencer Andrew Tate for violating their rules, including against hate speech.

But there has been a right-wing backlash to these measures, with some conservatives accusing the platforms of censoring their views — and even prompting Elon Musk to say he wanted to buy Twitter in 2022 to help ensure users’ freedom of speech.

What are the social media platforms arguing?

The tech groups say that the First Amendment gives the companies the right to take down content as they see fit, because it protects their ability to make editorial choices about the content of their products.

In their lawsuit against the Texas law, the groups said that just like a magazine’s publishing decision, “a platform’s decision about what content to host and what to exclude is intended to convey a message about the type of community that the platform hopes to foster.”

Still, some legal scholars are worried about the implications of allowing the social media companies unlimited power under the First Amendment, which is intended to protect the freedom of speech as well as the freedom of the press.

“I do worry about a world in which these companies invoke the First Amendment to protect what many of us believe are commercial activities and conduct that is not expressive,” said Olivier Sylvain, a professor at Fordham Law School who until recently was a senior adviser to the Federal Trade Commission chair, Lina Khan.

How does this affect Big Tech’s liability for content?

A federal law known as Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act shields the platforms from lawsuits over most user content. It also protects them from legal liability for how they choose to moderate that content.

That law has been criticized in recent years for making it impossible to hold the platforms accountable for real-world harm that flows from posts they carry, including online drug sales and terrorist videos.

The cases being argued on Monday do not challenge that law head-on. But the Section 230 protections could play a role in the broader arguments over whether the court should uphold the Texas and Florida laws. And the state laws would indeed create new legal liability for the platforms if they take down certain content or ban certain accounts.

Last year, the Supreme Court considered two cases, directed at Google’s YouTube and Twitter, that sought to limit the reach of the Section 230 protections. The justices declined to hold the tech platforms legally liable for the content in question.

What comes next?

The court will hear arguments from both sides on Monday. A decision is expected by June.

Legal experts say the court may rule that the laws are unconstitutional, but provide a road map on how to fix them. Or it may uphold the companies’ First Amendment rights completely.

Carl Szabo, the general counsel of NetChoice, which represents companies including Google and Meta and lobbies against tech regulations, said that if the group’s challenge to the laws fails, “Americans across the country would be required to see lawful but awful content” that could be construed as political and therefore covered by the laws.

“There’s a lot of stuff that gets couched as political content,” he said. “Terrorist recruitment is arguably political content.”

But if the Supreme Court rules that the laws violate the Constitution, it will entrench the status quo: Platforms, not anybody else, will determine what speech gets to stay online.

Adam Liptak contributed reporting.

David McCabe covers tech policy. He joined The Times from Axios in 2019. More about David McCabe

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