We’ve all done, found ourselves stumped by a task and headed straight to Google for answers. The humble how to guide has been the saving grace of so many people, whether you need to brush up your culinary skills or conquer a DIY task. According to Google Trends, the use of how to guides is only increasing, rising by 140% in the last 13 years.
From an online marketing perspective, how to guides still reign supreme as a format favourite, with the evergreen content within not only demonstrating the expertise we have but directing tons of traffic our way from people who are interested in our industry sector. But how can you ensure your ‘how to’ gets the attention it deserves? Here we take a look at the most popular how to searches and reveal the top tips that could make your guide an instant hit.
The world’s top how to queries
Thanks to Google Trends’ new How to Fix a Toilet site, the most up to date data regarding the nation’s, and even the world’s, favourite how to queries can be visualised. As well as searching via the most popular categories, data can be broken down by location to reveal which how tos are the most popular and where. In the US for example, how to fix a toilet was the most popular query, whilst those in warmer climates rate fixing their fridge as a more important task. A little closer to home fixing a light bulb is popular among Northern and Eastern Europeans.
Here however are the most popular how to queries worldwide:
- How to tie a tie
- How to kiss
- How to get pregnant
- How to lose weight
- How to draw
- How to make money
- How to make pancakes
- How to write a cover letter
- How to make French toast
- How to lose belly fat
Writing your own how to?
Writing how to guides for use on your own on-site blog is an excellent tactic, and one that can easily engage visitors as well as reach out to potential customers. Creating this tried and tested online marketing must all starts with finding the right topic to write about. Using your area of expertise and answering questions that your target audience may have is vital here, whilst tapping into current trends will help you refine your topic further.
Make sure you complete plenty of research before you begin. It’s not just research into your subject matter that will be integral here, finding out more about the structure of the best rated guides is important. Generally using language that your readers connect with, breaking up content with sub heads and incorporating call to actions without being over promotional within the body text works well.
