Increase engagement by over 20% on your How-To blog

We all know how hard you work to get visitors to your blog (or site). But what happens once they land on your site? How do you keep them browsing around—and even more challenging, how do you keep them coming back?

There are many How-To sites on the web. Some are tailored to specific topics (DIY, Computers, iOS, etc.) and some are generic. But they all share a common pattern: people find the site via a search engine, read the content, and then disappear as fast as they arrived. If you’re lucky, they might click on an ad before moving on. So, what's a blogger to do to increase engagement and get those visitors to come back?

But first, let's clarify what "engagement" means and why you would want to increase it. The situation described above is one of little or no engagement. The visitor simply reads your landing page, learns something, and moves on. There is no further interaction with your site—no clicking around—and nothing beyond your quality content or design to make your blog memorable enough for them to return. The more your visitors engage (by clicking around and returning), the higher their value to you.

So how can you increase engagement? With an Embedded Checklist on your articles. This feature summarizes your "How-To" article by highlighting the two most important parts: what to do (the steps) and what you need (the ingredients). And here’s how engagement will increase:

1. An easy summary of the article – memorable!
2. A way to take the checklist with them and bring it to life – interactive
3. A link back to your site – bonus!

When users click on the "Use List" button, they save the checklist to their personal Checklist.com account. With that checklist, they also save a link back to your article along with your branding information (so make sure your profile is up to date). This means that whenever they use the checklist again, your brand appears front and center. Not only do they have a useful tool at their fingertips, but they also remember your site and can easily return. Our stats show that over 20% of visitors click on the Checklist, creating a more "sticky" relationship with your audience!

So, what's our suggestion?

• Look for posts on your blog (or site) that can be summarized as checklists.
• Create and publish the accompanying Checklist on Checklist.com. Break the content into clear steps and ingredients.
• Embed the checklist on the page by simply copying the embed code onto your site.

Bonus

Update your public profile page on Checklist.com. You can add links to your blog, Twitter, or Facebook account. If you do not have a public GRAVATAR image associated with your email address, upload one to your Checklist profile. You can then track visitors coming back from Checklist to your site via your analytics software and measure your engagement boost.

Did you find a nice boost in your blog's engagement? Let us know in the comments below.