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Don't forget to bookmark this post so you can read it later. Oh and make sure to share it on social media, leave a like, add a comment, subscribe to my newsletter and send me a postcard.
1. Use comments to create your next listicle without acknowledgement ✅
People will comment on your listicles and may have some great ideas. But you can't have people thinking that you listen to other people or that you don't come up with everything yourself.
Just use their suggestions without thanking or acknowledging them.
2. Makes sure you repeat at least one point from a previous listicle ✅
People won't realise if you repeat yourself, so save yourself some effort and just copy a point from a previous listicle! More content recycling!
Don't release the new article too soon. People need a few days to forget the first one so they get amazed with your new "innovative" listicle.
3. Don't actually respond in any meaningful way to comments ✅
Just make sure to thank people for reading. It takes too much time to respond properly to comments that people leave.
So "Thanks for Reading" should be your only response to all comments.
4. Don't forget the click bait title ✅
Click bait titles are essential. Make sure that the content you write has nothing to do with the title as then people might actually get an answer they are looking for!
If you need help you could use the "[PRIME NUMBER] reasons why [framework or css-feature] is awesome" format...that really seems to do well. Be careful though as you might accidentally write something useful if you do any research!
5. Overuse Emojis ✅✅✅✅✅✅
Make sure you use 100 emojis in your article. They really help with legibility. (see point 2)
6. Don't forget to beg for shares and likes straight away ✅
Notice how I opened this article with a request for likes, comments etc. We don't want to give the reader any time to actually read our article, we just want praise and acknowledgement of our work straight away!
7. Remind people to bookmark the post so they can read it later ✅
Oh yeah, listicles are such a valuable resource that people need to bookmark them. Don't let them forget to bookmark your amazing listicle as it will change their life.
Realistically nobody will actually read the article again once they bookmark it but it makes you feel better knowing people saved it and cluttered up their bookmarks so they can't find the actually useful posts they want to reference.
8. If someone spots a mistake in your article ✅
If someone spots a mistake in your article, be sure to thank them but do nothing about it. It isn't like you can edit an article once it is live to correct a mistake, you might lose your SEO rankings! Plus don't forget that a listicle isn't meant to be factually correct.
9. Be sure to release the same article again in a few weeks ✅
People forget to bookmark your page, even if you followed the advice to pester them and remind them to bookmark it I mentioned earlier.
To make sure they don't miss out, release the same article in a few weeks (with some minor amends). Your readers really like repetition and it is great for SEO!
10. Make sure to use loads of Jargon on beginner posts ✅
Beginners need to learn and you don't have time to explain things to them.
They have access to Google like everyone else so why spend the time explaining abbreviations, acronyms etc. Just get them to Google every other word as it makes reading your article super engaging and really easy to follow.
Bonus points if you use ambiguous acronyms.
For example I like to start my How To articles with "LGTBQ" - Lets Get To Building Quickly"...somebody said it was confusing for some reason?
11. If something is simple be sure to over explain it! ✅
If you are doing a top 10 movies list be sure that you write the entire synopsis for the movie under each entry, along with the life story of each actor.
In fact, you should grab a copy of the transcript and add it under the movie, you can never give people too much irrelevant information and remember that word count is all that matters.
12. Don't forget the GIFs! ✅
Your readers have short attention spans remember (or maybe you don't as your attention span didn't last that long)?
Make sure there are lots of pretty moving pictures to distract your readers. Don't worry if the GIFs are relevant or help emphasize a point, they just want something to make the page load slower so your content jumps around etc.
Aww a kitty in sunglasses - now I like this listicle
13. Make sure you post every day ✅✅✅
You don't want to actually have time to research or make sure what you are saying is true.
Spit out your listicles every day so that you can maintain a low quality level and avoid writing purposeful content.
Bonus Tip 1 💥🚀
If possible publish listicles on subjects you know nothing about. Don't find the best examples, just any example will do. Bonus points if your example is over 10 years old and reinforces a bad practice.
Bonus Tip 2 🤘🚀💥
Keyword stuffing is essential!
Google SEO hasn't SEO services updated Best SEO its Top SEO UK algorithm SEO company in SEO UK years, so SEO specialists you I need SEO can SEO my site just SEO website add Top position SEO a SEO number 1 load SEO expert of Search Engine Optimisation keywords Number 1 Goole SEO randomly SEO wizard to My SEO gain king of SEO those Beat SEO ranking amazing SEO positions.
Bonus Tip 3 🤘😎💥💥🚀🚀
Be sure to link to other articles at the end for "read more"
Don't make them relevant.
In fact just link to any random article that you want more traffic to, just so it looks like you do link to other items.
You won't believe what people are doing to make their food look like maggots
"Above all, if you are writing listicles make sure they are easy to share so people don't miss out on the amazing knowledge you have copy pasted!"
Conclusion
Read the previous article to know how to write a good conclusion.
Super secret bonus tip 😲😲😲🤯🤯🤯😲😲🤯🤯🤯😲😲🤯🤯
Get people excited about a competition.
For example if you share this article on Facebook 3 times, Twitter 8 times, email it to 20 friends, read it every day for a month, take a picture of you reading the article on a phone, a tablet, a mac, a macbook, a PC and on your TV you will be entered into the draw to win an iPhone 6.
Important never announce a winner, in fact, don't even actually buy a prize, just pretend that somebody won.
"congratulations to Leahcim Nosnikrap for winning last months competition".
Top comments (20)
actually you made a big mistake by making a series. listicle articles should have 0 relation between each other for SEO purpose and also to make it hard for people to find them.
Actually it's easy for people to bookmark only one post to find all the others (you lost reactions) or even worse, they can simply save the page of the serie (dev.to/inhuofficial/series/13332) where you cannot get any reactions at all!.
Don’t encourage any more of this madness it is your fault there is a second entry! 🤣🤣
“Thanks for reading”
it's called the "listicle syndrome". Once you start you cannot stop. It's like a drug. The more you do, the more you need to do more. Sorry for you but starting from the second listicle it's now hard to stop.
You think I am doing my 100 collection for fun! no, it's now an addiction 😬😬I just wanted to do only one collection where I will put everything but now it's too late, I am good for 1000 probably ... 😩
Somehow didn't get a notification for this comment!
Do we need to join LA (Listicles Anonymous), I will be your support partner if I get cured first!
The biggest problem I foresee is that normally they have a 12 step programme...we will end up making it 13 steps so it is a prime number and relapse!
"Thanks for Reading"
no there is no Listicles Anonymous because if you write listicles you become well known ! so we all know each other.
Crap, that logical is infallible...guess I am now doomed to listicle syndrome then.
.1. Thanks
.2. For
Bonus: Reading
I know, I know I said no more shit posts...you can blame @afif and @madsstoumann for this as they made some good suggestions on the last post.
To be clear I am not acknowledging them (point 1) for helping with this post...don't want to break my own rules now do I?
I am not even going to promise I won't release another shit post now as they just keep coming to me (perhaps that is where my talent lies...my useful posts get 0 views, my shit posts get loads!)
Some famous developer (I forgot who!), recently wrote on Twitter, that when he writes some clever stuff about JavaScript: 200 views – while a small video of his dog doing something crazy: 8000 views (can't remember the numbers, but you get the point!)!
Hence why I put the cat GIF in this one, got to get the “awww kitty” shares!
“Thanks for reading”
Bonus Tip 4: include a controversial statement or a claim that is apparently factually wrong, so that people just have to reply to correct and contradict you (also known as "trolling" 👺 or "starting a flame war" 🔥⚔️)
Oh god, I am going to end up doing another one of these...that one is great!
“Thanks for reading”
ROTFL (🤣 Rolling on the Floor Laughing)
Ingo...you explained your acronym, you need to reread my advice 😜🤣
Sorry I meant to say “thanks for reading”...I can’t follow my own advice!
IKR
Better 😉
“Thanks for reading”
Jua Jua Jua !
I am guilty !
“Thanks for reading” 😜
Where is the follow-up? FML?!
Came back to this post, and it completely made my day! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣