7 Ways How to Hook A Reader from Start to Finish

Struggling to come up with posts for your therapy blog that would hook your readers’ interest and keep them on your page long enough to convert? You’re on the right page!

Tell me if this is you: You come across a therapy blog with a title that hooks you. It sounds like a promising article and you’re curious about the content so you go ahead and click the blog open.

You start reading the first few lines.

Read a few keywords beneath.

Then scroll down.

And as you scroll down looking for the content you were expecting, you realize . . .

There’s really nothing worth reading.

If anything, the article was simply clickbait.

And so you rush to that little X button and scoot out of the page, disappointed at having wasted those precious seconds going through something that wasn’t really worth it.

Do you feel me?

Now, what if the tables were turned? What if that was your therapy blog? I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t want that kind of scenario for your readers. Not after you’ve spent so much of your time and resources trying to put your blog post together.

But let’s be honest. Writing a blog isn’t easy. Far from it. Especially if you feel that you do not have a single creative bone in your body when it comes to making words come to life.

So how do you make sure that your efforts don’t go to waste before you even hit ‘Publish’?

Make your blog readable.

That’s it. Write your therapy blog in a way that your readers would enjoy reading it. So much that they wouldn’t even notice they’ve already gone through the entire article, hooked from start to finish.

You see, most of the time, the only reason why people decide to close your blog even before they’ve read half of it is that they found your writeup too tedious to read.

So if your blog has all the information people need and yet still fails to grab your readers’ attention, then it’s about time for you to do something about its readability.

Thankfully, there are ways for you to do just that.

Let me show you 7 expert-approved strategies guaranteed to get your readers hooked to your blog from start to finish.

How to Hook A Reader Best Tip # 1: Don’t complicate things

Life is already complicated as it is. Don’t make things worse by crafting a blog that’s too technical, wordy, and downright difficult to understand.

Unless you’re writing for just a select few, (if you’re writing for scientists, for example) it is always best to write for the general public. In other words, your blog should be written in a way that it can be understood by an 8th grader.

This is especially important for therapy blogs. As a therapist, you may be tempted to use a lot of medical jargon to get your point across. But remember, your blog is not written for a fellow therapist. It’s written for the general public.

The point? You need to keep things simple (a.k.a. write in plain English) so people will appreciate your content even better and hook them in as blog readers.

Writer’s Tip # 2: Keep your sentence structure simple.

Again, you don’t want to stress your readers out by using lengthy sentences. Too many colons, semicolons, commas, and em-dashes are enough to overwhelm the average reader.

Experts would say you need to keep your sentence length to just 30 words maximum. But if you can keep your sentences shorter than that, so much the better.

For example, are there sentences you can split? Are there words or phrases you can omit? Are there points in your blog that you can do without?

While you don’t want your blog post to be boring, you also don’t want your blog post to go around in circles. Just get to the point when you can and you can hook them in as blog readers.

Writer’s Tip # 3: Make your therapy blog conversational.

Because seriously. Who wants to read a lengthy, dreary post? No one has the time for that these days, to be honest. Unless you want your readers to fall asleep, you can’t risk writing in a monotonous tone.

But Sarah, how exactly do I make my blog conversational? My writing is as interesting as a medical textbook. Help!

Don’t worry. I hear you! The best way for you to create something interesting is to write the way your speak. Read your blog aloud and ask yourself, “Is this really how I talk?” Then edit your draft accordingly.

And please, ask questions! That’s how you can make your blog feel extra conversational.

Of course, if you’re covering something serious, you don’t want to be overly casual. Being conversational does not mean saying goodbye to being professional. You just need to keep your tone balanced throughout your writeup.

How to Hook A Reader Quick Tip # 4: Keep your paragraphs short

You probably remember your school teacher telling you that a paragraph should be around 5 sentences long. That’s true with essays. Not so with blogs.

With blogs, one-liners like this are totally ACCEPTABLE and are effective in getting blog readers hooked.

Wondering how long a typical paragraph is for blogs? Scroll up this post and check. You’ll notice that all paragraphs in this post are kept to a maximum of four (4) lines only. That’s how short it should be.

Writer’s Tip # 5: Make your font bigger

Nope, this isn’t cheating. It’s not like you’re using larger fonts to get more pages filled. What you’re doing is making sure that your readers can read your text comfortably. Without having to squint. How can you hook them in as blog readers if they have to squint to read it?

And while we’re on this subject, please minimize the use of cursive text for your blog. Rather, use at least a 16-point font to make your text extra readable. Some bloggers even go for the 18-point font.

Writer’s Tip # 6: Break things up!

People don’t want to read lengthy stuff. Period. BUT you can get them to read until the last word of a 2,500-word article as long as you don’t make them feel it’s really 2,500 words long.

But how do you do that?

Unless they copy and paste your article into a word counter, there’s no way they could tell how long your blog post is exactly.

So the best way for you to make your article seem shorter than it actually is (because Google loves posts that are at least 1,000 words long) is to use subheads and lists.

Writer’s Tip # 7: Use photos

Lots of them. Not only does a photo break the monotony of your text, but it also works to add more visual impact to your blog post.

Again, your goal here is to hook your therapy blog reader in to keep them interested in what you’re writing. And using relevant photos is a great way to do just that.

Plus, did you know that your photos can actually help you appear more on search results? Mm-hmm. Now you do. And yes, you’re welcome.