Great question, To get traffic from SEO it must be done diligently. And the best way to do that is from a well structured article. The key things to remember that will help your pages rank well:
Keyword Headings
Put your most important keywords here. They must be coherent, simple yet descriptive. If your blog allows you to insert H1 headings into your article, do so. Don't cram too much info into keywords though, Search engines are smart and recognize when someone is spamming. Maybe do a bit of research using 'Google Keyword Tool' In Google Adwords and see if your keywords are popular search terms.
Links and Back links
Include links to relevant info when you can, the more credible sources your website links to, the better appeal it has to search engines. Also include back links. Back links are links to a location somewhere that also features a link going directly back to your site, these also give your article good standing.
Duplicate Content
Try not to say anything twice, and if you do use different terminology. But the main focus here is to always write fresh content. If the content of your article has been written word for word somewhere else first how can yours possibly be more credible? Also write often, the more frequent you post articles, the more frequently your site will be "crawled" by bots. If you do this well your listing can only rise.
Be Unique and have the Best Info
This entails just doing what you do and doing it well. It might be difficult to compete with other websites if the topic your discussing is already covered in great detail.
The best position to be in is one of having information that everyone wants but cannot find anywhere else. A good tip for this is finding a specific niche that suits you well to draw in traffic to your general topic.
Hope this helps you get started. For an in depth look at SEO rankings, take a look at the 'Periodic Table of SEO Success Factors' http://searchengineland.com/seotable