How to Make Your Blog Posts Look More Professional?
The Title Capitalization
One thing that you can look most unprofessional is by not adopting a proper capitalization to your titles. If you look at the article titles in CuteWriting, you know that each important word in the title is capitalized. This is a guideline to follow.
“How to prepare chicken 65” is a worse title than “How to Prepare Chicken 65?”.
Here, you should follow a general code. I capitalize all important words on the title, which excludes articles and two-letter prepositions. However, I capitalize words like ‘Is’, ‘Are’ etc. I don’t capitalize ‘and’ while I do ‘Not’. While these guidelines are different for different people, it is advisable that you set a standard for your blog and follow it strictly.
Examples:
How Not to Prepare a Good Meal?
Why Is Wikipedia Successful?
Title Punctuation
Another area most amateur writers fail is the proper punctuation of the title. Some believe that there is no need for a question mark when the title represents a question, merely because it is a title. No, you have to have a question mark or any other punctuation wherever appropriate on the title. It should be punctuated just as a normal sentence.
However, when the title is a sentence and requires a period at the end of it, it is advisable that you skip it. It is the only place this guideline differs. If the end punctuation is a question mark, exclamation mark, etc., we use it, but not a period.
Examples:
Is It Good to Start a Business Now?
Knol: Google’s Wikipedia!
Another Bad Incident, Truth in Danger?
Tom Cruise’s Latest Film is a Hit (A sentence, but the period is avoided).
Subtitles
In your subtitles also, a code of typography should be followed. They should be as well formatted and capitalized as the main title, and should be correctly punctuated. The size of the font in subtitles should be slightly larger than the content. Also, you can have sub-subtitles, with smaller font sizes.
Text Font and Size
Font choice is a most important decision in article preparation. The font I recommend and use is Verdana, 10 pt. Other fonts like Times New Roman, 13/14pt, Georgia 12pt, Century 12pt, Arial 12 pt, etc., are good ones as well. It is recommended that you avoid fancy fonts like Comic Sans.
A good font size is also important. Implement the facility to enlarge and reduce font sizes as in professional publications.
Grammar and Punctuation
I needn’t tell you that your articles should be perfect in terms of grammar and punctuation. Blog posts are no different. Simply because there is only you and no one else to edit doesn’t mean that you can make mistakes. Edit your articles properly and avoid mistakes.
Two days ago, an anonymous user of CuteWriting pointed me to one of my posts that contained a terrible grammar gaffe. I edited it out. Blog posts are easily prone to grammar errors. Your word processor may not always spot these errors. So, it is best that you double-check your posts before publishing.
Alignment and Formatting of Text
The text should be formatted according to the general Web formatting guidelines. This means, you have to left-justify all articles. The paragraphs should not be indented as in tangible published books. The paragraphs should be separated with a blank line in between.
Images and Videos
Images and videos should be placed according to the formatting of the text. I usually place an important image, that appears before text, floated to the left, so that the text begins at the top beside the image. Any other image within the text are centered with text above and below it. If you have image labels and titles, make sure you include them and it is good to change the image caption’s font size.
Videos also should take the same guidelines
Tables Within the Posts
Tables should be centered and aligned properly within the blog posts.
Article Readability
If you read some articles within CuteWriting, you see that most of them have text portions highlighted in bold. This is to ensure that my readers will be able to skim through the blog posts. This way they can get to the core of the posts, without reading the entire article.
Introduction and Conclusion
These are important for each post, no matter what it is about. I include an introductory paragraph, which may not explicitly be labeled ‘Introduction’. And usually there will be a concluding paragraph, which may be usually ‘Conclusion’. It is a very good thing to follow.
Conclusion
Though these guidelines are in order, I suppose implementing your unique style is the best thing to do. So, create a code of professionalism for your blog and stick to it.
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