If you’re blogging to grow your health and wellness business, you know that coming up with new content ideas and writing blog posts can feel like a marathon! It’s important to create consistent, relevant blog posts that answer the questions of your ideal clients, build authority, and establish trust. But what happens when you run out of health and wellness blog topics to write about?
Whether writing comes naturally or is more of a struggle, one way to ease your stress is to follow a formula or template that makes it easier to blog.
In this article, we’re going to share four formulas for wellness blog posts you can follow to create engaging, relevant content for your health and wellness blog. Then we’ve included some prompts to get you thinking about specific examples and wellness blog topics for your ideal clients.
Four Health Blog Post Ideas
1. Instructional Blog Post
Health coaches, personal trainers, and others in our field often find themselves in full-on instruction mode. We’re regularly advising clients (and often, family and friends) on how to take on healthy lifestyle changes. And that’s what makes an instructional or how-to post pretty perfect for us! Using an example of how to eat healthier at work, here’s an outline you can follow as you draft an instructional post:
- the desired outcome for the reader (learning how to eat healthier at work)
- benefits she could discover (weight loss or weight management, increased energy, lower calories, saving money vs. going out for lunch)
- ideas on how to do this (choose fiber-rich fruit and vegetables, a balance of protein and carbs, eat in much more often than eating out)
- action steps to follow (purchase healthy food at the store, prepare the food on Sunday, package the food for Monday-Friday lunches)
- wrap-up and conclusion (re-cap the main steps and benefits of eating healthier at work and challenge the reader to try it)
TO USE THIS STYLE: What do your ideal clients need to know how to do? What questions do they ask you most frequently? Write an instructional blog post about it.
2. Inspirational Blog Post
Because we’re trying to create change, what better way to encourage readers than with a motivational post that’s upbeat, actionable, and encouraging! Here’s how to inspire readers with a client success story (of course, don’t share the person’s name without express permission), or you could share a personal story about how you made a positive change in your attitude, diet, activity or lifestyle. If you’re writing a holistic wellness blog, the inspirational style can be especially effective.
- a particular challenge (your client wanted to get fit for a half-marathon)
- the opportunities and rewards (how you helped him set goals, the plan you developed together, how he’d feel meeting the goal)
- the journey along the way (how you worked together, your support and what he did to work toward the goal, including the ups and downs)
- the happy ending and inspiring “win” (how the client met his goal, completed the half-marathon and felt a great sense of accomplishment – and think how cool it would be to include a photo of him crossing the finish line)
TO USE THIS STYLE: What client success stories could you share? What great results or transformation have you or one of your clients experienced?
3. Informative Blog Post
Many of us in health and wellness are life-longer learners, and we love staying abreast of health and wellness topics. Avid blog- and book-readers, trend-spotters, and industry-watchers, we’re frequently bursting with news and information to share. Especially if you’re looking for nutrition blog ideas, the informative style can be a great choice to share dietary information. A blog post is a great way to inform and enlighten. And don’t forget the impact of a post supported by great images, charts, or a dominant infographic that tells the story.
- sharing a summary of the news (sourcing, quoting and linking to the new study)
- offering perspectives on what this means (how the news supports or contradicts previous schools of thought, including yours)
- providing readers with other facts (additional links or studies for those who want to learn more)
- drawing conclusions (sharing your experience or education on the topic, including your clients who benefited from eating less fat and sugar)
TO USE THIS STYLE: What facts or explanations do your ideal clients need? What questions are you asked before someone signs up to work with you? What recent research studies or other data could you share?
4. Insightful Blog Post
Perhaps the easiest post to write could be sharing a new revelation or long-held philosophy – something where you can really show your personality. For example, last night, I was reminded that just 20 minutes of walking outside could put me in a happier place than sitting on the couch catching up on Facebook. Using this experience, I could write a post about:
- what I did and how a reader might learn from my experience (I was tired after work – you’ve been there, right? – but I promised myself I’d walk every day this week, with our without my walking-partner neighbor)
- how I coached myself to better behavior and how a reader could do the same (I told myself a short walk is better than none, and I was able to use the time to clear my head without the fun distraction of walking and talking with my neighbor)
- what I’ll take away from the lesson (that even though I need to spend time on the computer and writing for this blog, I still need to make time for exercise and stress-reduction)
TO USE THIS STYLE: What personal stories could you share that would build your relationship with potential clients? What changes and transformations have you made?
If you look back over those four styles of health and wellness blog posts – is there one that feels easier to write? If so, start there. Nobody said it has to be hard to create content for your blog – go with what feels easy. Done is better than perfect!
Using that same style or formula of blog post, you can create numerous posts on different topics. So the next step is to figure out which specific topics will be most interesting to your ideal client. (Remember, you don’t need everyone to love your blog posts – just your ideal clients!)
The Importance of Blogging for Health and Wellness Professionals
When you have a health and wellness business, blogging has many advantages. Since the popularity of digital marketing, it has influenced almost every business niche, including health and wellness. To ensure success, you need to learn to adapt to these kinds of changes and use blogging and other digital marketing strategies to your advantage.
How to Start a Health and Wellness Blog
To find new clients, health and wellness businesses need to be visible on search engines. Maintaining a blog can help. When you post great blog content, it can drive organic traffic to your health and wellness business, get higher quality leads, and gain the visibility you need in the industry. But you don’t just want to write things nobody is reading, so how do you start a profitable health and wellness blog?
Your health and wellness blog is crucial for proving your authority in this niche. You’re not just writing for yourself – you’re writing to grow your business and attract more clients. It can also continue to establish you as a leader through content upgrades that include the latest trends and news in the health and wellness industry, growing your email list at the same time.
What to Include in a Health and Wellness Blog
There are many categories under the huge health and wellness niche to explore on your blog. If health and fitness are your passion, then you can come up with blog post ideas that include healthy recipes, tips for women’s health, weight loss ideas, and helpful tips and advice for men’s health.
You can narrow this down even further by including gluten-free recipes, yoga exercises, and maybe even some natural remedies you find have worked for clients in the past.
As a blogger in this industry, you can use your blog ideas to promote the health and well-being of your current clients while also attracting new clients. You can then share these blogs on your social media accounts and watch as you gain followers on Instagram and further build your credibility in the health and fitness industry.
As a health coach, you can offer inspiration and advice that can help change people’s lives. It’s perfectly fine to focus down on one topic per blog post, and always remember to keep it relevant to your ideal client.
Blog Type and Tone
Before starting your health and wellness blog, decide on the direction you want to take? Now that you have some ideas on the style and topics you can use, you need to settle on your tone. You can share the experiences you have as a health coach; you can share your knowledge after researching different topics. To get a better idea about a tone or direction, it never hurts to check out other health and wellness blogs.
Research Wellness Blog Topics
Once you decide on the tone and direction and you have narrowed down your niche, you then need to research wellness blog ideas so you know you’re writing about topics your ideal client is most interested in.
Once you have written great content, you need to post it, engage with the readers, help answer any questions they may have for you, and answer all comments and personal messages that are sent to you. Remember, one of the greatest qualities of a good health coach is the ability to listen to others.
Now you can follow through with any of the blog styles we have outlined above, and you are well on your way to creating a successful health and wellness blog for your clients to motivate them toward healthy living.
In Summary
Publishing regular blog posts for your health and wellness business can be a great content marketing strategy for growth. But it can feel difficult to continually come up with new blog topics to write about.
Instead of staring at a blank page, follow one of the four blog post styles outlined in this article. Following a formula for a blog post makes the writing much quicker and easier. You can follow the same formula for many blog posts on different topics, and they’ll still be interesting and relevant to your reader. The most important thing is to put yourself in the shoes of your ideal client and think of the topics that she will most want to read! To make your blog writing even more effective, learn how to choose a target market and get inside the head of your ideal client.
This article is a guest post by Melanie Deardorff.