How to write an article using Contentpen?

Writing a well-structured, engaging article is easier than ever with Contentpen. This all-in-one SEO and AEO platform helps you research, write, optimize, and publish content that ranks on Google and gets cited by AI engines, in just a few clicks.

Whether you’re crafting a quick blog post or a detailed guide, Contentpen streamlines the process, saving you time while maintaining quality. 

In this guide, we’ll walk you through each step to help you create, refine, and publish your content effortlessly.

So, let’s get started.

What is Contentpen?

Contentpen is an all-in-one SEO and AEO platform that helps you create, publish, and track content that ranks on Google and gets cited by AI engines like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity.

The tool comes with the following features:

• SEO scoring: Contentpen analyzes your meta title and description, content readability, and internal and external linking to provide a realistic SEO score. This scoring helps you identify the areas for improvement and take relevant action.
• Keyword research: Contentpen automatically displays keyword difficulty, search volume, and intent for keywords relevant to your niche to help you plan and write content that ranks and converts. 
• Built-in media library: The media library manages all the uploaded media in one place. You can also store all the in-article and featured images Contentpen generates for you and categorize them using tags and attributes for better searchability.
• SERP analysis: The SEO platform analyzes the top competitors for a target keyword, then builds outlines and writes content that helps you beat your rivals with confidence.
• Integrated publishing: With Contentpen, you can publish in one click to WordPress, Webflow, Shopify, Ghost, Wix, and EmDash, or bulk publish several articles at once. The ContentStudio integration shares your posts to social media.
• Website analytics: See your total clicks, impressions, CTR, and average position directly from Google Search Console in real time. The tool helps you avoid tool switching so that you can focus on the metrics that matter without compromising productivity.
• SEO opportunities: Contentpen surfaces top page changes (winners) and pages that have lost traffic (losers) so that you can take appropriate action quickly. The AI-powered suggestions also show what you need to do to regain the top SERP positions.
• AI visibility tracking: Track how often ChatGPT, Google AI, Gemini, Claude, and other AI engines mention and cite your brand, with share of voice, sentiment, and source gaps. Included in every plan, with up to seven engines depending on plan.
• Autopilot: Let Contentpen find topics your customers search for, write articles in your brand voice, and publish them on a schedule, with optional approval at each step. Available on the Growth plan and above.

Advanced features like Autopilot and SEO opportunities start on the Growth plan, and every paid plan comes with a 7-day free Contentpen trial.

Steps to write SEO and GEO-optimized articles with Contentpen

Now that you know the details about our platform, let’s discuss the flow of writing an actual article with Contentpen.

Step 1: Sign up or log in

Visit the Contentpen website and click “Sign up” if you’re a new user or “Log in” if you already have an account.

Enter your details, including first and last name, email, password, company name, and type. For first-time users, you will be asked to enter your card details, but don’t worry, you won’t be charged anything. You will gain access to our free 7-day trial, which you can cancel at any time.

After entering all the information, enter your credentials to access your main Contentpen dashboard.

Step 2: Create a new article

Once inside the dashboard, navigate to the “Planner” section. Click on the “Create Article” button in the upper right corner to start writing.

Step 3: Choose a template

Once you click this button, you’ll see the template screen. Here, you can choose between the following 5 templates:

• Generate article with AI: In this mode, Contentpen will create an article in one shot using just your content preset, focus keyword, and secondary keywords.
• Generate an article in Two Steps: This template works in a two-step process: Contentpen will first create a blog outline, which you can edit or modify according to your needs, before generating the final article.
• Refresh Existing Content: If you don’t want to start from scratch, paste the URL of a published article and choose Enhance Existing, Full Rewrite, or Research & Update (which adds current data while keeping your structure). Before saving, you can compare the original and refreshed versions side by side.
• Add internal and external links: With this template, the AI blog writer only modifies the internal and external links in your existing content. However, before choosing this option, make sure you’ve set up the sitemap in Contentpen properly.
• Start blank: If you don’t want to receive any AI-generated text and want creative control yourself, you can start blank. During your write-up, you can take help from our ‘Ask AI’ assistant to refine the clarity and delivery of content.

Step 4: Customize your article settings

Contentpen offers 6 key customization categories to make the best possible blogs for your requirements.

• Basics – Add your primary keyword, topic, and secondary keywords, or use our integrated AI for help. You can also set a Target AI Prompt, the question you want AI engines to cite this article for, and custom instructions with files and links. Then choose your preset and content folder, and click ‘Next’.

• Style – Define the tone of voice, target audience, and point of view for your article, and choose from 50+ languages and multiple target countries. You can also set paragraph length (short, medium, or long) and readability level (Basic, General, Professional, or Expert) to match your audience.

• Formatting – Choose formatting options like bold, italics, tables, quotes, and lists for your content. Select the heading letter case before moving on to the next stage.

• Structure – Set the article size (content length). Here, you can also give custom instructions for the article introduction. Finally, tick the extra sections needed in the blog, for instance, key takeaways, conclusions, and FAQs. Click ‘Next’ to proceed.

• Media – Choose how your featured image is created: AI-generated, matched to a reference image, or from your own prompt. Pick from visual styles including Realistic, Infographic, Abstract, and Cartoon, and Brand Imagery applies your logo and colors automatically. You can also embed a relevant YouTube video, and let Contentpen place your own uploaded images from the media library where they fit.

• Linking – At this screen, you can customize your internal and external links. Add your sitemap if you haven’t already to enable internal linking. Include or exclude domains that you don’t want to see as external links, or toggle them off entirely. Link Settings let you choose whether links open in a new tab and set follow, nofollow, or sponsored attributes.

Pro tip: Use the ‘Test Sitemap URL’ button to double-check if Contentpen can access your site structure for effective internal linking.

Step 5: Generate the article

After completing all the article settings, you may see the ‘Ready to create your article’ screen, where you’ll be asked to save your current settings as a preset or continue to create the article.

After you click ‘Create’, wait for a while until Contentpen is done processing your request. The time taken to complete processing depends on the type of content template and the length of the article selected.

Step 6: Review and optimize your article

If you’ve closely followed all the steps so far, you’ll now see the tool’s output: a complete SEO- and GEO-optimized article.

Once Contentpen generates your article, do a quick review before publishing.

• Check your SEO and GEO scores in the right-hand panel. Contentpen analyzes your meta title and description, keyword usage, readability, linking, and how easily AI engines can cite your content. Select any failing checks and use Fix with AI to resolve SEO and GEO issues together in one pass.

• Refine with Ask AI. If any section feels off, highlight it and use the ‘Ask AI’ assistant to rephrase, expand, or adjust it. You can also give it broader instructions like “make the introduction more conversational” or “shorten the conclusion.”
• Review SEO article settings, including its metadata, slug, target keyword, audience persona, and editorial status.
• Add comments in the blog to help your teammates understand your point of view for a particular angle and work together to further polish the article.

Want to go deeper? If you’re revisiting an article that’s already live and losing traffic, check out our step-by-step guide on how to refresh an existing article in Contentpen.

Step 7: Export and publish

Finally, it is time to export and publish your article. There are multiple things that you can do here:

• View the content outline and verify the content structure followed by the tool.

• Check SERP analysis to compare how other pages are written for the same target keyword.
• SERP knowledge to verify the data gathered by Contentpen from top pages to write the article.
• Brand knowledge implementation: how Contentpen utilized your product or services to create relevant CTAs.

Step 8: Track performance in search and AI

Once your article is live, Contentpen’s website analytics pulls clicks, impressions, CTR, and average position from Google Search Console. To see whether AI engines cite your content, add the questions your buyers ask to AI visibility tracking, and Contentpen will show whether your brand appears in the answers.

After you’re done. You can:

• Share a draft link with teammates or clients for feedback; they can view or comment without a Contentpen account
• Assign the content for editing or review. 
• Publish directly to your blog on WordPress, Webflow, Shopify, Ghost, Wix, or EmDash.
• Save your article and export it in your preferred format, as HTML, Markdown, or .docx, to your device.

Now that you know how to write, publish, and track an article with Contentpen, put it to the test and create stellar pieces today!

FAQs on article writing