A How to Guide Template You Can Use for Blogging

Most publishers treat how-to content as filler. They crank out step lists, skip the research, and wonder why traffic flatlines. The operators who win treat tutorials as infrastructure. A clear how-to guide template turns one-off posts into a repeatable system that builds trust, ranks in search, and converts readers who actually need help.

If you are teaching something that requires chronological steps, a how-to guide is the right format. This post gives you a simple template you can reuse to speed up production without sacrificing quality.

Updated 2026.

1What Should a “How to Guide” Include?

Most how-to posts follow the same framework regardless of niche or audience. Use the template below when you write your next tutorial.

At its core, a how-to guide teaches someone to do something.

Whether you call it a user guide, instruction manual, or technical document, the goal is identical.

You can create one on virtually any topic:

• How to change a tire

• How to dress fashionably in winter

• How to become a social media maven

Whatever your topic, the easier it is to follow your step-by-step guide, the more likely readers return to your site.

How-to guides, when done well:

• Build trust

• Help people achieve a desired outcome

Once you finish writing, walk through each step as if you are the student. That is the perfect place to close informational gaps your visitors might hit.

If you need help understanding how to do it, your readers will too.

Further reading: 13 Blog Title Examples That’ll Win You Clicks

A Short, Punchy Intro

Get your reader nodding in agreement immediately by:

• Showing you understand the problem

• Stating what your guide will teach them

You can do it in one paragraph with the PSP Formula. PSP stands for Problem, Solution, Preview.

Here is an example:

Trying to increase your website’s engagement with readers? (Problem)

Using trigger words that pique curiosity should fix that. (Solution)

This post explains what trigger words are, why they matter, and 11 helpful examples you can start using immediately. (Preview)

Another helpful tactic:

• Mention the problem

• Provide a solution

• Show proof

• Preview what they will learn

Adding proof builds credibility. Here is what that looks like in action:

Tip: Adding screenshots, visuals, photos, infographics, or other helpful media builds trust.

List Your Items Numerically

Walk readers through your process step by step, using H2s as subheadings. Then get more detailed with H3s and H4s to explain your ideas.

A numbered list of steps is:

• Easy to follow

• Skimmable (anyone considering your how-to guide will skim first to see whether it fits)

• Provides a clear hierarchical structure

Header elements also help search engines understand what your post covers. From an HTML perspective, that matters.

Properly formatted H2s and H3s also rank for featured snippets.

That is when Google pulls your post’s data into a bulleted or numbered list and displays it at the top of the search results.

Example of a “How-to” post earning a featured snippet that appears at the top of the SERP as a series of bullet points.

A Semrush study found that “question keywords” (specifically, questions starting with the word “how”) triggered featured snippets 65% of the time.

Tip: Optimize your how-to guide to rank for featured snippets by making it well-organized and easy to follow for both search engines and people. Paragraphs, lists, tables, and videos are the featured snippet types you can rank for.

Formatting your guide as a numbered list of steps makes it easy to follow. When more people stick around to read it, that is a positive UX signal indicating your content is popular.

One tip to keep eyeballs on your page is to have your subheadings:

• Show benefits

• Include a timeframe

It might not make sense on every H2, but these tactics encourage people to stick around.

Examples:

• (Good) Step #1: Go to the app store and download the table for free -> (for free) = benefit

• (Bad) Step #1: Go to the app store and download the table

• (Good) Step #4: Run your car’s engine for five minutes -> (for five minutes) = timeframe

• (Bad) Step #4: Run your car’s engine

Additionally, consider including GIFs or interactive elements that hold your reader’s attention longer.

The fact is, people are:

• Busy

• Selfish

The quicker you answer your reader’s What’s In It For Me (WIIFM) or show them how fast they can do something, the better.

Further reading: Beat Writer’s Block & Create Content That Ranks with A Blog Outline Template

Verbs encourage action, make clear what you want readers to do, and kill decision fatigue.

Step-by-step instructions are the meat of your post. Subheadings that start with verbs accomplish this.

Include “Nice-to-Know” Information

Creating a guide that hits the main reason readers landed on your post is the first step. Your blogging efforts do not need to stop there.

If you want to cast a wider net, include additional information outside your post’s table of contents outline that relates to what you are teaching.

These are usually FAQs found in the SERPs (e.g., People Also Ask).

Sidenote: You may capture a larger pool of searchers landing on your post for a relevant term. This information is not vital to your article but would be “nice to know.”

Here are a few ways to find it.

Google is telling you what people want to know.

So there is already demand. This is the first place to go for additional relevant subheadings.

For example, say you wrote a post titled “How to get clients.”

Depending on your article’s angle, you could try answering the following:

• How do I find new clients?

• How can I get clients easily?

• How do I find high-paying clients?

Or in the Related Searches field at the bottom of the SERP:

Related searches have modifiers like:

• Get clients “on” Facebook

• Get clients “as a” freelancer

• How to get clients fast “for” Yahoo

Modifiers are a great way to tailor your search to a specific sector.

At their core, modifiers are prepositions. You could include one of these with your search. For example:

Or copy and paste a list of prepositions into a keyword research tool like Ahrefs using the “Include” filter along with your keyword phrase:

Include an asterisk* after the words “as a*” to act as a wild card and see what other words it generates.

Tip: Select the “Any Word” filter to pull up searches with those terms appearing in any combination.

You can find additional subtopics using the Content Gap report on Ahrefs.

• Enter 2-3 top-ranking posts covering your keyword.

• See their ranking keywords for more ideas.

For example, if you were targeting the keyword “paleo flour substitute,” pull three top-ranking posts from the SERPs and plug them into Ahrefs.

Tick the “At least one of the targets should rank in the top 10.”

Hit “Show Keywords”

The report will show you all the keywords those URLs rank for, with at least one post ranking in the top 10.

For a broader keyword list, untick the “At least one of the targets should rank in the top 10” toggle.

Experiment with the filters to mine for long-tail keywords and questions people ask (similar to Google’s People Also Ask but with more usable data).

SearchResponse scrapes the People Also Ask data and displays it in one place. This saves you time from going down rabbit holes.

Here is what I get typing in the keyword “blogging”:

Tip: It is best to keep your keyword broad. It will find more ideas this way.

Answer the Public is similar and pulls all related queries based on a seed keyword.

For this example, I typed in the word “snowboard,” and it produced this list:

Pay attention to the top navbar. It lists search terms by:

• Related

• Questions

• Prepositions

• Comparisons

• Alphabeticals

Conclusion

Tie your article together with a summary of your main points. It can be a paragraph or two.

Offer a word of encouragement and let your reader know they have got this. Reassure them that all they need to do is follow your steps, and they will be fine.

25 “How to Guide” Writing Mistakes

Here are a few things to watch out for.

1. Not Monetizing Your How-to Guide

Just because you are not writing a product comparison or best-of list does not mean you cannot monetize it.

You absolutely should.

If you have affiliate relationships with any brands you recommend, display them in your how-to guide.

Using a tool like Lasso, you can showcase your affiliate links in custom displays, grids, lists, or galleries.

For example, if you were writing a guide about how to use Grammarly, you could use a Lasso display to showcase your affiliate link like this:

You can add displays to your posts from inside your WordPress editor.

1. Click the Cactus icon.

2. Choose your display type.

(Lasso automatically adds a piece of shortcode to your post).

3. Done!

See how our displays convert better (tested against millions of impressions and revenue).

Before you publish, run an Opportunities Scan on content already live on your site. Most operators find product mentions sitting unmonetized in posts that rank. Fixing those placements takes less time than writing from scratch.

2. Not Writing for Your Target Audience

Your reader came to you for help solving a problem.

A good content marketing strategy positions your brand as THE solution. That is why people visit your website. Be sure there is search demand, and people need help before creating your guide.

Sidenote: Creating content (e.g., a how-to guide) that nobody searches for is wasted time and effort. That is why a good keyword research strategy will help you go further and reach more people.

Further reading: 11 Common Problems Bloggers Face & How to Avoid Them

3. You Don’t Know How to Do the Thing You Are Supposed to Know How to Do

It sounds like a no-brainer, but worth saying here.

It will show if you are unclear on what you are trying to explain. Some affiliate marketers make the mistake of creating content for a quick cash grab.

Do not be that person. Your audience will know, and your content will not be high-quality.

4. Relying on Paid Ads to Rank

Paid ads are fleeting.

Eventually, you will run out of money. When that happens, your number one spot on the SERP disappears.

Getting organic traffic via SEO compounds over time with little effort once you have created an evergreen piece of content.

Here is the thing:

When you compare organic traffic to what you would have to pay monthly for, it is mind-blowing. Here is what we would need to spend on paid ads if we wanted to get the same amount of monthly traffic:

It would cost us over $15,000 per month to match our organic traffic. That is bananas.

5. Not Enough Visuals

Staring down a giant wall of text makes for a boring read.

Instead, break up your post with screenshots, tables, infographics, photos, videos, bullet points, or other valuable visuals to support your tutorial while giving your reader a positive user experience.

3Create Your How-to Guide Now

Using a template should simplify and speed up your writing process, even if it is your first time creating a how-to guide. Put the model above in place, and you will do fine.

At Lasso, we see the same pattern across affiliate sites we work with. Publishers who structure tutorials consistently ship faster, rank longer, and monetize better. The posts that stall are rarely bad ideas. They are ideas without scaffolding.

How-to guides are not just content. They are the infrastructure layer between traffic and revenue. Structure them well, monetize them intentionally, and they compound.

Ready to turn structured tutorials into revenue? Get started with Lasso today.

Sean Brison

Lasso Team

Sean Brison is a dad, writer, business owner, and Content Lead at Lasso. He's spent the past several years in cahoots with Lasso's founder, Andrew, creating awesome things for people. He's also addicted to perfectly-balanced cocktails, the outdoors, and John…