{"id":65820,"date":"2011-12-06T09:00:01","date_gmt":"2011-12-06T14:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wpmu.org\/?p=65820"},"modified":"2011-12-06T11:27:46","modified_gmt":"2011-12-06T16:27:46","slug":"how-to-pull-more-readers-into-your-content-with-one-simple-trick","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/how-to-pull-more-readers-into-your-content-with-one-simple-trick\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Pull More Readers into Your Content with One Simple Trick"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Post<\/a><\/p>\n

Pulling Them In<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Headlines are pretty much the most valuable string of text for any blog post. The job of your headline, more than anything else, is to pull readers into the body of the post.<\/p>\n

If a post doesn\u2019t have a good headline, then most people aren\u2019t going give it a chance. It\u2019s as simple as that.<\/p>\n

So headlines are #1. That\u2019s pretty much a given.<\/p>\n

But there is another string of text that also has the power to pull your readers deeper into your posts<\/strong>. This string of text, however, is completely ignored by 99.9 % of bloggers. (This figure is completely made up. However, I’m quite sure it\u2019s still correct.)<\/p>\n

Most bloggers know it exists, but most also completely forget about it. And even those who don\u2019t forget about it don\u2019t use it effectively.<\/p>\n\n

What is this Magical String of Text?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The magical string of text is your \u201cmore tag.\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n

The more tag is a tag that you can insert in your content so that it links from an excerpt on your front page to the full post.<\/p>\n

When the more tag<\/em> is inserted, the link typically looks like this.<\/p>\n

\"Post<\/a><\/p>\n

A More Effective More Tag<\/strong><\/h2>\n

\u201cContinue reading,\u201d or something along those lines is pretty basic and does the job, but did you know that you can easily customize that link to be more descriptive and enticing<\/strong>?<\/p>\n

You can easily make that link say anything you like. So why not use it to your advantage?<\/p>\n

When people land on a site, they scan. They scan headlines, images, text, and even links<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

In a way, a link is a promise. \u201cContinue reading\u201d does nothing unless they\u2019re already convinced that they want to read more. A customized more tag<\/em> gives you another opportunity to pull visitors deeper into your content<\/strong> by promising yet again, in a slightly different way, what they will be getting by continuing.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

How To Insert and Change a More Tag<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The easiest way to insert a more tag<\/em> is to use the button for it on the visual editor.<\/p>\n

\"Post<\/a><\/p>\n

In order to customize the text of the link, you will then need to switch to the HTML editor mode.<\/p>\n

You will see the code of the more tag:<\/p>\n

<!--more--><\/pre>\n
 <\/p>\n
\"Post<\/a><\/p>\n\n
Change that code by adding whatever text you\u2019d like, hopefully something that will entice your readers.<\/p>\n
NOTE: <\/strong>Leave the original word \u201cmore\u201d in the code. Just add your extra text after it.<\/p>\n
\"Post<\/a><\/p>\n
You can see that the default \u201cContinue reading\u201d has now changed to your custom text.<\/p>\n
\"Post<\/a><\/p>\n
Why Most Bloggers Don\u2019t Use It<\/strong><\/h2>\n
The reason why most bloggers don\u2019t use the more tag<\/em> is because they either choose to put their full posts on their home pages, or they use \u201cexcerpts\u201d on their home pages, thereby letting WordPress automatically cut off their posts for them.<\/p>\n
Excerpts vs. Full Posts
\n<\/strong><\/h2>\n
If you\u2019re someone who likes full posts on your homepage and can’t be swayed otherwise, then this isn\u2019t really for you. But if you use excerpts, then this little trick may help you get more engagement.<\/p>\n
Different people have different philosophies about using excerpts or full posts on the home page. The arguments for excerpts are that they allow visitors to easily scan down your page to find what interests them most, and excerpts may (at least a little) also help with the problem of duplicate content (having the same post appear on more than one URL \u2013 in this case on the actual post page, as well as on the home page and possibly other archive pages that don\u2019t use excerpts–pages such as a category page or a tag page).<\/p>\n
Using the More Tag<\/strong><\/h2>\n
If you would like to use customized more tags <\/em>in this fashion, then you will need to make sure that your theme is NOT<\/strong> using excerpts. WordPress automatically handles excerpts, and so if you insert a more tag<\/em> when using excerpts, nothing will happen.<\/p>\n
How to Control Using Excerpts or Full Posts<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Using excerpts or full posts is controlled by your theme. If your theme uses excerpts on your home page, then you will need to change that so that it uses full posts.<\/p>\n
Each theme is different, but in general, you will want to look in your index.php file for<\/p>\n
the_excerpt<\/pre>\n
and change that to<\/p>\n
the_content<\/pre>\n
or<\/p>\n
the_post<\/pre>\n\n
 <\/p>\n
Photo: Group of friends at the beach pulling a rope<\/a> from BigStock<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
99.9% of bloggers completely ignore this simple trick. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84404,"featured_media":65831,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"blog_reading_time":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_tutorials_categories":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[263],"tags":[],"tutorials_categories":[],"class_list":["post-65820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tutorials"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65820","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/84404"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65820"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65820\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":216177,"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65820\/revisions\/216177"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65831"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65820"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65820"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65820"},{"taxonomy":"tutorials_categories","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpmudev.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tutorials_categories?post=65820"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}