How to write an article that ranks on the first page of Google
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This week I noticed something interesting when I looked at the traffic logs for my personal website. There was one article I wrote a year ago that was getting a lot of visits. In fact, I was surprised to see that last month alone it was read by more than 100 people.
Digging a bit deeper I figured out why it was getting so much traffic. It turns out that the article has somehow made its way to the first page of Google’s search results for its topic. The article is entitled English is a language, not a measure of intelligence. If you Google things like “English is not a…” then the search engine will autocomplete with “…measure of intelligence”. And low and behold, there is my little article in 4th spot.
I would be lying if I said this is not exciting. Anyone who writes regularly would love to write something that people find interesting or helpful in some way. Considering how much content is out there, for an amateur writer like myself to hit the front page for the topic I wrote about feels great.
But consider this: I have now written a total of 336 articles. It took me a year and a half and over 70,000 words – the length of a book – to produce one article that is getting read regularly and widely. I wonder how many people stop doing whatever they are doing before they make a breakthrough? Especially in areas where luck and pure tonnage matters so much.
Wayne Gretzky – arguably the greatest ice hockey player of all time – famously said that you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take. He was very right. I was never going to get the puck into the top corner of that lucrative Google first page goal by endlessly scrolling through Twitter and Facebook. My only chance was to put my phone down and start writing. Taking shot after shot after shot.
Of course, I’m hopefully getting better over time too. Taking better “shots” each day. But ultimately, writing something that people from around the world read daily is not going to happen without lots and lots of shots. So, to all of you out there still taking shots like me. I salute you. Keep going.
Those of us that keep going have a chance of experiencing what outside observers will inevitable call overnight success. But we will know that overnight success was 10 years in the making. How do we get an article to rank of the first page of Google? Easy. Writes lots of articles. Keep going and keep getting better.