How To Write an Introduction Paragraph

Key Takeaways

hey can I pick your brain just for a few seconds I'll give you these two introductory paragraphs the main topic of these two paragraphs is best SEO books can you tell me which is ranking on the first page of Google is it a or b winner gets a free SEO audit too from us pause this video and leave a comment down below we'll review the answer in just a bit have you left your answer are you ready if your answer is B you are absolutely wrong a ranks on the first page congratulations to everyone who answered a and here's your free SEO audit too go to rankmath.com tools slash SEO analyzer place your domain here and you will get a free SEO audit oops those who answer beget as well anyway you are here to learn how to write the best introduction for your blogs or articles so let's analyze why a ranks on the first page instead of B what is the search intent when somebody searches for best SEO books it means I want to know the best SEO books available out there but as simple as that b is giving you reasons why you should read SEO books well a is telling you here's a bunch of SEO books go read them so if you want to search for best SEO books on Google which article A or B would you read further for me it is going to be a because it answers my search intent immediately without telling me a bunch of stuff that I really don't or don't want to know unless the search phrase is why should I read SEO books then B is more appropriate in this sense if you're already getting value can you smash that thumbs up button so in this video we're gonna share with you some tips formulas examples on how to write a catchy blog introduction for both humans and search engines let's go foreign math and we are all about providing you with the most cutting-edge SEO tools and knowledge so if this is your first time on our Channel consider subscribing now I'm pretty sure you already know that an introduction paragraph is super important if you don't know that yet here's a stat for you a study from sumo.com finds that 32 of site visitors left after reading only 140 words as a result of poorly optimized opening paragraphs don't believe the step that's fine just analyze your own reading pattern and you will know that while searching for something on Google you will click on the result that has the most relevant title and you'll read the first couple of paragraphs to see if the article understands you if it does you continue scrolling to the article reading only the headings and stop to read when something catches your attention but if the first few paragraphs seem boring to lengthy beat around the bush don't give a good impression and so many other reasons a typical reader will hit the back button is that how you read to high five bagged by science okay all right so what's the science behind writing a good introduction paragraph let's talk about them now hook problem expectations benefits key phrase optimization and the underlying element is deep understanding of the search intent without hitting the name on the search intent everything will go wrong so now let's talk about how to identify the search intent and then I'll give you some tips and examples on how to craft the best introduction paragraph now the best way to understand search intent is to do a search on the key phrase most search engines are already sophisticated so they know what the search intent is and they will tell you by displaying the best matching results at the top so especially if you are a beginner whenever you are targeting a key phrase and you think you know best I'll advise you to double check on the search intent before writing your content to break it down further there are four common types of search intent the informational intent which typically consists of who what how guide Etc in the search phrase for example how to bake a cake what is link building or SEO guide for beginners people who search for these types of key phrases are looking for information or knowledge then we have the transactional intent which typically consists of buy discounts coupon trial sale Etc e-commerce stores love to Target these key phrases related to their brand or product because they know people have the intent to buy their products next we have the commercial intent which affiliate marketers love such as review top best comparison Etc people who are searching for these key phrases are considering if they should buy the product they just need more information to make the decision and finally the navigational intents which typically consists of login brand name terms and conditions Etc people who search for such key phrases already know what they are looking for and they just need the search engines to direct them so with a clear understanding of the search intent we can now talk about the formula to writing an awesome introduction paragraph fundamentally the introduction is the bridge between the topic header and the rest of the content so if the hook of your introduction or simply put the first sentence of your article is not strong enough the readers will not cross the bridge to read or scroll the rest of the content truth hurts I know we spend hours and days writing the content and people just won't read it now there are a few ways to have an adequate hope for your introduction number one is to include an intriguing fact or statistic related to the topic for example in our article about optimizing podcasts for SEO we give an interesting stat at the start that relates to the topic number two answer rhetorical question that is related to the topic remember at the start of this video I ask you a question and now you're still here which means my hook works in terms of written content in this article we asked a rhetorical question to create a dramatic effect number three data triggering or controversial opinion for example in this article about 40 unique things you can do with rank math SEO we started with this triggering question number four relate with a problem this is a hook we use very often on our blog because most of our contents are how-to content and people often search for these contents when they have a problem so the best way to connect with them is to describe the problem for example do you see an error message in WordPress that says the link you followed has expired or are you wondering how to change the shop page title in woocommerce these are the four best hooks I've seen for most of the search intents of course there are other hooks but I assure you that these hooks can work on almost any search phrases for example if our Target key phrase is rank Map review the Intriguing fact hook will be major SEO blocks like ahrefs HubSpot sem Rush search engine journal and many others recommend rank math the rhetorical question will be have you tried all major SEO plugins extensively we did the triggering opinion will be rank math is the best SEO plugin I've used so far relay with a problem will be need a better SEO plugin without breaking the bank you see how it works now let's go to the next element of the formula which is introduce the problem after you have tossed out the hook you've got to reel it in with the problem there must be some problems people are facing otherwise there is no reason for them to read further unless it is news so understanding the search intent is super helpful when it comes to writing this part of the introduction you can use two to three sentences to introduce the main problem you are solving in the blog post let's see how we do it in one of our posts this article shares about how to add a search bar to Wordpress menu after the hook which is stating a fact we start to introduce the problem at hand how about this article that teaches people how to disable automatic updates in WordPress we started with a problem relation hook and then we move on to the problem you get the idea we have the hook and then we State the problem as creatively as possible and then the next element to the formula is expectations I mean if there is no outcome or solution to the problem I just painted then what's the point of writing the article right the article is long there's a solution for you in there but I want to know if you have the solution it's in there read it what should I expect what are the benefits for reading tell me read it bye yes so inform your readers what they can expect from your article and what they are gonna get out of it the benefits nowadays people are just too busy from the noise that they don't want to bother about reading if it is not worth their time if you visit any one of our blog posts you will always see that we have a paragraph to inform readers what to expect and what they can benefit from it so we have the hook the problem the expectations and benefits and now the final element of the formula is to optimize your introduction for SEO one we have done in the previous elements is to capture the attention of human readers us now you need to optimize it so that search engines will understand your content much easier yes search engines like Google are getting pretty amazing in understanding human language but it is still helpful to them if you make it easier for them to understand so the best practice for SEO optimization is to put the main focus keyframes within the first two to three sentences and then you want to put as many secondary keywords as possible in the introduction without sounding unnatural meaning you should not be forcing keywords in it but the problem is how do you know what secondary keywords you should add well use content AI if you are using rank math this too comes in tandem with it place your main focus key phrase and hit research and it will give you Smart Suggestions that include keywords you should add to your content try to add as many of these keywords as possible to your introduction naturally let's see how I include these keywords in the introduction you may want to pause this video to see how I add these keywords into the introduction without sounding unnatural you see I've added the main key phrase in the first sentence and I've added three other secondary keywords I hope you see how content AI is useful to you it will even suggest keywords to add to your headings if you want to know how to properly use content AI to write your content I recommend watching this video right here we have left the link in the description so there you have it once you have a deep understanding of the search intent you can apply the formula or sequence to your introduction to make it sexy make it cool make it enticing for people to read if you find this video helpful can you do us a little favor and smash that thumbs up button and since you are still here I want to give you an important tip this is especially helpful for sites that have been around for a couple of years if you have been using our rank map analytics module what you want to do is to visit the SEO performance Tab and figure out the contents that are not performing well you want to single them out by the number of clicks and Impressions there is a high chance that these articles are not satisfying the search intent well enough so click into the entry and now you will see what keywords your article is ranking for that way you can try to understand the search intents of those keywords and apply the introduction formula update the content to match the search intents and see how your rankings of your article improves anyway if you have not subscribed to our Channel yet what are you waiting for you'll be getting lots of helpful content to help your website rank better I hope you've enjoyed this video this is Jack from rank math stay awesome and I'll see you in the next video foreign [Music]