Here is a Blog Post.

This is my sub-head, which tries to make sense of my pithy title and show you there’s some thought here.

I’m not going to teach you anything in this blog post. 

I'll start with that bold but puzzling statement to get your attention. Then I’ll continue with a pivoting statement that both backtracks from my initial meaning and explains it in a way that compels you to read further. Like… I’m not going to teach you, I will show you. And if you’re still here in 3 minutes you may just learn a lot about the vital parts of a compelling post.

Time for a Section Header

That breaks up the page visually. Scan that. Easy to read. No monolithic bricks of text here.

Maybe a quote would work here. Seth Godin, perhaps? Or a salty senior creative director from an agency named after a weather pattern, or perky adjective, or pretend animal? Or who’s that white-haired guy, Mark Twain? 

So anyway… 

“A great quote, or even a quirky one, can really sound cool. And if it’s pulled out visually to make some sort of statement that way, all the better!”
- Someone saying something useful. 

Now I’m diving in to the substance of my post. I’m going to lay down what’s been rattling in my head since I saw this insightful speaker (whose Twitter feed I’ll link to) at that Conference in the Bay Area (also linkable) last month, about this emerging trend, and maybe that other dying trend, in digital marketing or performance metrics or attribution models or super delegates.

Isn’t this a cute little caption? You’re a cute little caption, yes you are. And God willing, you even complement the gist of an adjacent paragraph.

Ooh – already 273 words (including title and header – so sue me). This is already half of the length needed for a decent blog post these days, or at least one that might get read from start to finish. So we’re really humming along. Time to add a neat stat that supports the intuition-based claims I’m making. Were you aware that 8.1% of the words in this paragraph contain the letter “o”? That’s worth italicizing. No? Maybe not. Let’s not quibble. The point is that finding a good stat will only help your cause and make people want to keep reading, and maybe even share your post to enlighten others.

And… Next Section Header

Here’s an insightful little tip I bet you haven’t heard before about your favorite [social network/millennial work habit/sure-fire interview question/mojito recipe]. Seriously, I’m hoping you haven’t heard it before. I might base it on something I’ve personally experienced at my workplace, wrap it in a dramatic setting like exit interview, and exaggerate the action to make a point. Another tantalizing statistic to underscore the point, methinks?

Is this coherent at all? Not a bad time to ask the question. If so, I’m feeling good about entering the home stretch. I want to finish strong. If not, I’d hopefully have the inner strumph (italicize Latin) to trash it and rework until it’s ready for prime time. Here’s why:

•    Ooh, talk bullets to me. 
•    Who doesn’t like bullets?
•    They’re great for talking short – no full sentences needed!
•    And hello, variety, anyone??

Last Header and We’re Home

I’m going to wrap myself in the warm Mr. Rogers sweater of a tidy conclusion. Sky blue maybe; I’ll see what I feel like. (And there’s my one semicolon for the piece.) By this time you’ve hopefully learned, er, been shown, the vital parts of a blog post. I brought it back to the beginning, see. And I’ll end with a some sort of clever last line that tries to be not too smarmy, and tops you off with a good feeling about not totally wasting these last three minutes of your time.

That line, of course, deserves its own paragraph.