Is the Internet changing the way we write?
Jan 04, 2010 Comments
Writing is constantly in the process of evolution, as everything else is in this world. Almost 100 new words — taken from new worldly developments and the inter-mixing of various cultures — have been added to the English dictionary in 2009. How much impact has the Internet had on the way we write? This GigaOm blog post cites many instances, for instance the way people write online articles, blog posts, comments, Facebook updates, Tweets, and even text messages. But is that writing? Some of it, yes, most, no. One thing is clear, more and more people are writing, especially with the advent of Facebook and Twitter, but that’s not writing: they simply communicate.
Writing has certainly changed over the years. You read Charles Dickens, Dostoyevsky, and then you read Martin Amis or any other contemporary writers — you notice a big difference. There is less word-play and more communicating of ideas. Readers have less patience of intricate expressions and this is more true on the Internet. But let me not digress into literary writing.
As a content writer and a professional copywriter my primary concern is writing in such a manner that the central idea is conveyed sans obscurity and the reader is prompted to perform an action whether that action is buying something, contacting the business owner, forwarding a link or subscribing to a newsletter. My only concern is that the readers (prospective clients and customers) don’t leave the website just because the copy is too verbose, too long, or too brief.
Considering this, the Internet has definitely made us into better communicators and that’s what writing means: communicating the right ideas to cause the desired effect.
Posted by Amrit | Tags: Content Writing, Thoughts On Writing
10 ways of generating interest in your readers
Nov 11, 2009 Comments
If both the roads are safe and the drive smooth, would you take the shorter way or the longer one? Time is short and sweet, definitely the shorter one, most of us would agree. Longer distances are good if you are on a vacation, you want to tune yourself with the nature and spend some quality time driving. Now, think your reader is the driver of the car and the roads the writing. If you are penning down something for the daily news, columns about technology, climate, retail etc, reports, etc – your reader will like the short road. For novel, thesis, poetry, stories or sometimes elaborate literature articles – the longer route with minute details, flowery language is the key. It’s as simple as GIVE WHAT THEY WANT. So, here we go, giving you what you are looking for – 10 ways of generating interest in your readers:
- Identify your reader – If you know your reader well, you can work in that direction.
- Interesting headlines – If you have a nice headline in tune with your article half the battle is won. Headlines should be appealing and innovative.
- Opening batsman is important – A good start is as important as the opening batsman to his team. A good start will ensure that the reader begins to read your work.
- KISS – Keep it short and simple. We all know about this golden rule, but do we always follow it? This is the key to the shorter route.
- Avoid jargon – Only when absolutely necessary use jargons and technical terms.
- Visual appeal – Break your article into short paragraphs and use a readable font. Readers, usually lose interest in long winding paragraphs.
- Flowery language – Again, if this is what your article and reader demands, put it to good use.
- Give facts – State facts and numbers as much as you can; as it gives your reader the real picture.
- Examples – Oh, my personal favorite. Give examples and try to relate the subject with the reader. Examples help them to identify with the topic and generate curiosity and interest.
- Closing paragraph – It is the general tendency to read the start and end; and glance through the middle of the article. Write an impressive closing paragraph, which will the hearts of your audience.
Use these golden rules as per your need, just to correct as per the need of your reader and you sure have a winning piece.
Posted by Esha Dani | Tags: Thoughts On Writing, Writers
10 Reasons NOT to become a writer
Nov 10, 2009 Comments
Yes you read correctly. The word “NOT” is too clear to go unnoticed. Scanning random articles on the internet, on ‘writing’, I came across lots of pieces wherein I was being goaded into ‘101′ ways to write effectively or being told about its top ‘25′ benefits and sometimes also being reminded about the ‘few’ essentials to keep in mind if I was to build a profitable writing career for myself. While all of that was very good advice( I also love sharing my own experiences with “how-to” articles like these), I think first and foremost, an aspiring write MUST answer the most fundamental question – “WHY DO I WANT TO WRITE?”
I thought of and listed below a few reasons why many budding writers take up writing in the first place and if you answer ‘yes’ to any of these, then either re-think your answers, choose not to answer the questions, lie to yourself or re-visit the whole writing business idea. I’m not exaggerating.
- I LOVE Shakespeare and want to be like him someday: Heady goal! And good to know that you aim high, but if becoming a splitting image of the famous bard is the ONLY reason driving you to take up writing as a career, think again! It takes a LOT of natural talent to be like William S and also, he lived in a time when there was only the pen (although that has trials of its own)! No TV’s no radios, not as much competition as one would have to face these days (not undermining his capabilities in any way…I’m a BIG Shakespeare fan myself). But you have to be realistic. Morphing into a modern day Shakespeare is possible, but very difficult and you have got to have a reason stronger than that.
- I want to be famous: A stylized version of the above mentioned point with many more connotations and possibilities. And a high probability of the same end result. There is a famous spiritual concept which essentially says that one must not be attached to the fruit of one’s actions, but only perform the action (to the best of his abilities). All aspiring writers should make this the mantra of their lives. And this applies to basically everything in life. Whatever you do, if you do it just for the sake of attaining fame, you probably won’t get famous at all and even if you do, it won’t last and even if it does last, there will be a part of you which will always know that you didn’t do justice to your work.
- I want to get rich: A subset of point number 2. And equally disastrous. I would be wrong in saying that writers don’t get rich. Dan Brown and JK Rowling among others would raise their legendary eyebrows if they heard me make an absurd statement like that. It is a known fact that lots of novelists, short story writers, biographers and even freelance writers have made plenty of money, thanks to lots of efforts, time, luck, more time and a lot more effort. But I doubt they started out with that aim in mind. I firmly believe they began writing because of sheer love for the art. If you want to make money, get a high paying IT job, become an investment banker, go to a French culinary school and become a world famous chef, but do not get into writing solely because you want to get rich. For most writers, writing is a time consuming, low paying (at least in the initial years) and sometimes heart breaking affair. So think again.
- I used to write in school: Yeah? So? If you really think that having written a few poems in school and a handful of funny short stories in college are enough to make you a published writer overnight, I’m sorry to burst your little bubble. It doesn’t work. Writing is a skill that has to be honed and sharpened each and every day. It doesn’t just “come” to you overnight. It takes a LOT of hard work, a LOT of time, MANY rejection letters and a good many years of patience and undying faith in your abilities and aspirations. To those who go through these trials by fire, and still emerge victorious with a stronger determination, I wish you all the luck! You are on your way to becoming successful writers.
- I’m fed up of my day job: Woah! That sounds like something that 90% of the world’s working population is saying at this very moment. If everyone with a boring job quit their work to retreat into the solitude of their homes to become writers, not only would the world become a much quieter place, but at the same time, there’d be chaos on every level of the global economy! Most people who currently hold a day job, but WANT to write, are usually advised to continue writing on the side and I must say, that is VERY sound advice. To such budding writers, I would say, “Get a foothold in the business, get your bearings and when you feel financially stable and emotionally independent, quit your job and take up writing full time-but until then have a steady source of income to feed your dreams of becoming a writer.” To the rest of you guys who want to write because you hate your jobs, I’d say, “Don’t do it! You’re making the biggest mistake of your life.”
- I want to make my family proud: Neil Armstrong’s family was proud! But he wasn’t a writer; he just helped mankind take the metaphorical giant leap. My family’s proud of me and I’ve never even set foot in a rocket ship-neither am I another Chetan Bhagat (yet). If you want to make your family and friends proud of you, then do fantastically well at something you’re really good at or alternatively something that you are passionate about. Don’t use writing as an excuse to sort your life at every turn. Do what you want to do. And the pride will emerge unhindered.
- I like to express myself this way: This is one of the most common reasons people want to spend their time writing. And I agree, it’s one of the best ways to let one self go. There are few mediums of expression that work as well as writing does. However, I staunchly believe that this alone is not a reason to turn to writing as a career. It may be a good reason for some people, but on an average a freelance writer has to spend hours researching markets and stories, structuring, editing etc. For the daily grind in a freelancer’s life, there is usually little space for expression. However, with creative writing it does help, but to reach a stage where creative writing is profitable for you and where you are known well enough, it takes time. So if you want to write simply for expression, do it as a hobby. If you want to turn it into a full-fledged career option, rethink, revise and review the strategy.
- I want to see my name in print: Lots of people don’t really want to get famous, but they harbor a dominant fascination to see their names in print-either under an article in a newspaper, a filler in a magazine or on the back portion of a hard cover novel with one of those pictures of the author in a philosophical pose, finger on the chin and a faraway look in the eyes. Lovely thought. Very romantic idea. But not the right way to go about doing it. Wanting to see your name in black and white may be the motivation and the drive you need to keep working at it and churning out material in bundles. But very often in such a case, where ambition alone fuels work, the quality of the work suffers. And once the trained eye of your audience (or editor as may be the case) begins to see the difference, you literally fall in popularity and may find it very difficult to pick yourself up again. My advice would be to write as well as you can. And again, the name in print will follow.
- I have a luxurious ‘work from home’ dream: Ah! The age old desire for the perfect job. Flexible work hours, wake up when you want to and sleep whenever you wish, go to work in your pajamas, be your own boss, have a beautiful study with a mahogany/oak desk, a little green lamp on the side, surrounded by carved wooden cabinets stuffed with books, glass window overlooking a lake…watching the swans while you type. It’s amazing how Hollywood movies imprint themselves on our minds and weave their ways into our dreams. The scenario I painted for you is the average dream of just about every second writer you’ll ever hope to come across. It’s the Universal Dream of writers worldwide (I dream of the oak desk too!) However it takes significant accomplishment to get the desk and even more efforts to get a room big enough to hold the humongous quantities of books. Don’t even get me started on the amount of work you’ll have to put in to get the swans! There are hundreds of thousands of writers worldwide and each one has to put in his fair share of struggles and strife to earn a comfortable living. You will too, in all probability, so keep your goals realistic.
- I love books and I love to read: That’s wonderful! Devour as much as you can get. But I have to tell you, that just loving the smell of a new hard cover book, or the rustic look of an antique one, loving to read or being fascinated with libraries and book collections, are indeed pre-requisites to becoming a good writer, but not reason enough to decide to be one in the first place. Every writer must read. He/she must incorporate as much of reading into his/her lifestyle as the writing. But if you drop everything to write, just because you visit your local library every two seconds, you may find out along the way that you’re either not good at writing or you just don’t like it as much as reading books. So if you love to read, do so by all means. Just don’t let that motivate you into switching to a full-time writing career. It may do you more harm than good.
I know that by now, I must have deflated your enthusiasm for the writing arena almost completely and my sincerest apologies if I did. That was not the intention. My aim in sharing these thoughts with you was to enable you to get a clearer picture of what YOU want from a writing career. For me it boils down to just one simple truth. I LOVE TO WRITE. And that’s why I’m doing it. And NOTHING compares with the satisfaction I feel after I’ve completed a well rounded article, poem or story.
I firmly believe that if one is passionate about something, one should go after it as if one’s life depended on it. If writing is your passion, if your head is exploding with ideas, if you see alphabets doing little jigs in front of your eyes, if you dream at night about things that you immediately turn into possible storylines, then by all means go ahead and write! If you want to become a writer simply because you LOVE to write and have even a smidgen of faith in your capabilities, go for it! I wish you luck!
Posted by Shreyasi Majumdar | Tags: Thoughts On Writing, Writers
Stupid writing mistakes to be avoided
Oct 16, 2009 Comments
Language, I believe, is not as inflexible as it is made out to be by the so-called purists and impurists. Anything forced sounds unnatural. A sentence can be interpreted in thousands of ways, and you can convey the same thing in thousands of different sentences. So unless there are some glaring grammatical or spelling mistakes, I don’t think there is right writing or wrong writing — the underlying objective is to convey in the most compelling and comprehensive manner.
Here is a nice blog post on stupidest writing mistakes. I won’t say that all the mistakes listed there are stupidest, but you can certainly learn a few things in this blog post. Take for instance the difference between affect and effect. It amazes me that there are many people who don’t know the difference between the two. The writer aptly explains that an effect is a noun and an affect is a verb: your dramatics don’t affect me; your dramatics have no effect on me.
In some instances the writer plainly seems to have a difference of opinion and seems to stupidize (my word) people for having a different view. I’m not very snooty about using commas before "and" because it does not depend on the rule, but the voice and the feeling. I know it’s difficult to understand, but that’s why some people are writers ;-).
Do read the post though, some good pointers.
Posted by Amrit | Tags: Thoughts On Writing
Why your website or blog needs unique content
Sep 04, 2009 Comments
There are basically two reasons why your website or blog needs unique, fresh content: the search engines prefer unique content compared to commonly and easily found content, and people who are active on various social media and networking websites prefer to promote something unique, something highly useful and something that attracts immediate attention.
Search engines looking for unique content
Various search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo! are constantly competing with each other. Just because they get millions of visitors daily don’t assume they have it easy. Even a small fluctuation means millions of ad dollars lost. So they are constantly trying to improve their ranking algorithms and trying to find and index content that is unique.
The uniqueness and the usefulness of the content they find for their users keep those users from switching over to another search engine. Why would the users use a search engine that finds the same stuff that can be found on scores of other websites? Hence, in order to get higher rankings you have to make sure that the content published on your website or blog is unique as well as highly relevant.
Social media users want to promote unique content
Nobody likes to promote content that is being promoted by 500 other users. Social media websites can bring you tons of traffic if you can lure their users to your website by providing highly interesting, topical and relevant content that they cannot find anywhere else. But do they promote your links just for altruistic reasons? Not at all.
Take for instance Twitter and Facebook. Why do people keep posting interesting links on these websites? They want to show that they can locate and share interesting stuff. They want to be useful to their followers and fans. This way, if they are posting 10 useful links from other websites and blogs, they can also post a few from their own website without looking spammy. Besides, on Twitter, interesting tweets get retweeted and this is beneficial both to the owner of the link and the one who tweets it because both gain exposure.
Then there is conventional logic too. When you publish useful content on your website it tells your visitors that you take pains to keep them informed. If you share important information with them you establish yourself as an authority, and in more than 99% cases authority brings respect and trust, and respect and trust leads to loyal customers and clients.
Posted by Amrit | Tags: Content Writing, Copywriting and Content Writing Tips, Social Media Marketing, Thoughts On Writing, Web Content
Educational content helps you sell more
Aug 14, 2009 Comments
These days I’m writing for a client who wants to put up lots of educational content on his website and then wants to leave it on his visitors whether they want to buy his product or not. Of course we’ve mentioned on every prominent web page – again, without pushing the visitors to buy – that he intends to sell the product he’s talking about on his website and they can buy it as and when they feel like. He believes that educating his visitors is better form of selling compared to writing traditional sales copy. I agree with him.
But while writing educational content for him I’m taking care that the phrases and the keywords that I’m using get him the right sort of traffic. After all it’s a business website and not a reference website. Along with getting "how to do this" and "how to sort out that" kind of traffic he should also get "I want to buy this" kind of traffic and in fact such traffic holds more value for him. Striking a balance is difficult but that’s how an experienced content writer comes handy.
Benefits of educational content
I had lots of "educational" stuff on my website when I was designing and developing websites; in fact people had started suggesting that I should publish an e-book teaching how to become a web designer and start selling it. The downside of it was, most of my visitors wanted to learn web designing and very few wanted me to work for them. This shouldn’t happen when you are publishing lots of educational content on your website. They should definitely learn and get more informed, but they should also be interested in buying from you. Once you’ve figured out how to achieve that, here are a few benefits of publishing lots of educational content on your website/blog:
- Educational content gets you more search engine traffic. Search engines are more interested in finding the right information for their users and somehow the guys working at the major search engines think educational content should get priority over commercial content.
- It helps you establish your authority. When people know that you know your stuff, they develop a respect for you, especially when you share your knowledge again and again and they find that knowledge useful. I’m not regretting that I published lots of educational content on my website, it’s just that my targeting was misplaced. Share your knowledge and experience consistently – if I’m consistently sharing my thoughts on copywriting and content writing on my blog or website people will prefer to hire me rather than the person who merely has 12 drab pages from where he or she urges his or her visitors to hire him or her.
- It familiarizes your prospective customers with your product or service. Many people don’t do business with you because they don’t know enough about your product. When they read lots of material on your website or blog they get to know about the benefits of your offer and then they are in a better position to make up their minds. In fact after reading your educational content people who aren’t even thinking of buying your product or using your service may decide to do so.
- It helps you in establishing a social networking and social media presence. Most of the content promoted on Twitter, Facebook and Digg is educational or newsworthy. Sales copy rarely makes it there because why would people promote your links where you simply urge people to hire you or buy from you, what is there in it for them? Educational content on the other hand deserves to be promoted because it helps others and increases the goodwill of people promoting it.
- You open yourself for challenge and hence broaden your growth prospects. When you share your ideas, your knowledge, your wisdom openly and then invite people to share their thoughts, you expose yourself to criticism and counter arguments. This either earns you critics or admirers, and it’s definitely better than having none.
Can you come up with more benefits of publishing educational content on your website? Please do share them in the comments section.
Posted by Amrit | Tags: Content Writing, Copywriting and Content Writing Tips, Thoughts On Writing
Branding with a customized content
Apr 17, 2009 Comments
The American Marketing Association (AMA) defines a brand as a “name, term, sign, symbol or design, or a combination of them intended to identify the goods and services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate them from those of other sellers.”
Over the Internet branding acquires a unique importance because often your presence, product and services are existing in a virtual world – people, your prospective customers, can view the images of your products or services, or even attain some digital samples if possible, but they cannot do more than that. They cannot touch or feel your offerings. If they want to purchase a pair of trousers from you, they cannot try it before buying it.
So to inspire confidence among your consumers branding becomes more important. Branding convinces them that yes, whatever they buy from you is going to be up to the mark, and buying from you doesn’t involve more risk than, say, buying from a brick-and-mortar store.
How do you establish such a brand presence on the Internet? Testimonials, recommendations and affirmations from existing customers and clients surely help. But what also helps is the way you communicate, the content on your website, your blog, and your social profile.
We operate in a conversation economy these days: what you say, and how you say it, can have immediate repercussions. Your latest blog post or article can reach the farthest corners of the planet within a few seconds with a couple of tweets or a few hundred diggs. Your content can go a long way to help you establish your brand on the Internet.
Useful, relevant and well-meaning content helps you generate a community around your presence. There are many entrepreneurs who did nothing but nurture a community around their blogs or websites. They spent more than a year generating awesome content and establishing their loyalty, and consequently, their brands. Eventually there came a time when their visitors themselves started saying that they would buy or subscribe to anything recommended or promoted by those blog or website publishers. So when these content publishers started selling on their blogs and websites, they had a ready-made market that was eagerly waiting to do business with them.
Customized content means generating content your audience can relate to. A person who publishes a blog on SEO and whose advise benefits his or her audience has a greater chance of succeeding when he or she decides to provide professional SEO services. Many among his or her current readers will eagerly become his or her clients because they are aware of the fact that he or she can really help improve their search engine rankings. Similarly, a person who writes authoritative material on management consulting has a greater chance of converting his or her visitors into his or her clients.
You can apply this branded content technique to any business.
Posted by Amrit | Tags: Content Writing, Thoughts On Writing, Web Content
How Online writing services can increase your website’s conversion rate
Mar 18, 2009 Comments
Few weeks back I read an interesting article where Amrit, who is an online writer explained how online seo content writing can prove to be beneficial to website owners and webmasters. I have been into online writing services since past 3 years, but it’s been few articles that prompted me connote “Wow! I like it. Let me save the url and bookmark the site.” I experienced two things out of this which I want to share with my readers;
- I found an informative article to express my views.
- The site found another DAILY reader (which is me) and eventually traffic because I will definitely share Amrit’s work with my readers, SEO Clients, my friends and contacts.
Well I think now you are able to understand how great and unique content can fetch good traffic. You don’t need to use exquisite vocabulary or ‘hard English’. It’s only simple words, explained in a very thoughtful manner. With SEO Copywriting, you should be able to make your potential clients visualize lots of traffic which will increase by time and Amrit’s site is a real good example of this.
How important is SEO Copywriting?
SEO Copywriting Analysis is very important for your site. Creating search engine friendly content is one of the priorities to pace for higher rankings. If you want your site to EXIST in this tough internet marketing world, you must go for professional online writing services. It is very important to build search engines friendly website that search engine robots/spiders will crawl and index. SEO Online Copywriter finds out the loopholes in your content and confirms that the content and keywords are evenly poised. SEO Copywriting helps your site to compatible in both ways i.e both from viewers and search engines point of view.
How experienced online writing services can tremendously help improve a site’s conversion rate?
We classify visitors as good or bad visitor. The trick is to drive the right kind of traffic in. Getting the right people on your websites are more important. Here are few points to be kept in mind:
- SEO Online writing services is a compulsory for your site(s) because QUALITY matters. SEO Copywriting provides high-profile quality search engine optimized content that improves the conversion rates of a site. SEO Content provides an edge over the other existing non-optimized sites.
- How to build search engines friendly website that search engine robots/spiders will crawl and index it? Well SEO webpage writer shows you how to find the right keywords using keywords research to improve sales and traffic generation. Researching and Selecting Keywords, Keyword Density and Keyword Optimization are vital parts of the entire content. So without a knowledgeable SEO Writer, you will not be able to embed such things in your webpage content.
- Links are also indispensable part when we speak about website, traffic, content etc.; SEO Copywriting facilitates to create inbound links to your website and guides on how to link your page both internally and externally to gain higher traffic and greater sales leads.
- Experienced online SEO writer develops an understanding of your target audience and about what drives them to buy. A good SEO Copywriter handles objections of your potential customers may have from their purchasing decisions. regarding your website like best and specific info on choosing best key phrases, creating great keyword rich marketing copy, ideas for best Titles and Meta tags suiting your domain’s content and keywords
An online writing service is essential for your dream project.SEO expert makes in-depth analysis regarding your website. Choosing best key phrases, creating great keyword rich marketing copy, ideas for best Titles and Meta tags suiting your domain’s content and keywords are the core working areas of the SEO Copywriter’s and that’s BANG ON target!
Higher Traffic + Higher Conversion rates = Excellent SEO Copywriting+ Strategic internet marketing+ Quality website design
That’s the key!
Posted by Sharmistha | Tags: Copywriting and Content Writing Tips, Thoughts On Writing, Writers
What’s in a Typo Anyway?
Mar 10, 2009 Comments
Believe it or not, we used to write letters by hand to one another using an instrument called a pen. Today we use mobile phone texting, social networking, email, internet blogging, chat rooms and anything else electronically ‘plugged in’, to copiously communicate.
And what about the infamous spell checker, huh? But there isn’t anything wrong with that though, is there? No, of course not, I for one embrace technology. As Jack Aubrey of the Surprise said, “What a wonderful modern age we live in!”
However, in my online writing, lecturing, design, and research ventures I do see one continually, rather disheartening element present. Too often I see evidence that we seem to be writing as though we are less educated than the millennium we live in would represent, and much less sophisticated than the technology we use to communicate with. Typo’s, misspellings, and bad grammar seem to have become an everyday occurrence!
It is not at all unusual for someone to ask a friend if this outfit or that tie looks alright, or to proudly show off ones new mobile phone, or boast about your latest computer upgrade. Chances are pretty good that today or yesterday you talked to, texted, or emailed someone about the latest blog you wrote or read, but when was the last time you asked someone to proof read something for you? When was the last time you took a moment to check if that email you just wrote really made good sense? Eh?
You are most likely here at Amrit’s online writing website because you are interested in professional web content and writing services, whether you are a potential customer or a writer yourself seeking to learn more about SEO content, blog writing, or professional online writing of any sort, no matter which side of the proverbial fence you are on, I think we all agree that good spelling and grammar are important, no matter how stuffy it might feel to say it out loud.
By now you might be asking, “Gosh, what kind of people does this person associate with anyway?” Well I’ll tell you that just yesterday I received an email from an esteemed, university educated colleague who erroneously used the word ‘right’ for ‘write’. Need I say any more?
Posted by Carolyn Adlam | Tags: Thoughts On Writing, Writers
How to make more people read what you write
Feb 19, 2009 Comments
You can significantly increase the number of people who read and understand your content by answering the following questions:
- Why you publish?
- For whom you publish?
- How can your content be accessed/found?
Recently I read somewhere that more than 90% people don’t read 80% of what you have written on your website. Why does this happen, and why in the first place you post your content — blog posts for instance — online?
You publish content to inform people — sometimes for the sake of being helpful in an altruistic manner (publishing informative content during natural or man made calamities), to showcase your talent and promote your skills (as a writer, for example), to earn revenue through advertising and affiliate programs, or to convince them to do business with you. You also publish content to improve search engine rankings but that content doesn’t matter much if it brings you redundant traffic.
Once you have figured out why you publish content on your blog or website, the next two important questions are, why people must read your content and how they can access/find your content. You can exceptionally increasing the number of people reading your content if you can sort out these three questions.
So why must people read your content?
They must need your content, whatever may that need be. They may need it to solve a problem (programming problem, technical problem, psychological problem…whatever). They may need it to make a buying decision; the sales pitch on your website or your blog post describing the benefits of your product or service. They may need it for entertainment. Unfortunately, they may also need it in the times of crisis and disaster.
For your content to be highly readable, it has to be needed, needed desperately if possible. If you can provide such content, it hardly matters how you present it (as long as it is readable). When your content satisfies a need, people read it hungrily and they wait for it in great anticipation. In fact they employ all the means available to them to make sure that they never miss what you publish. This is a great state to accomplish as a publisher.
For whom should you publish?
As it is famously said somewhere every writer has an audience. You just need to find your audience or figure out who your audience is. It is very easy to be read if you have got an eager audience. Being your audience means they already need your content and that is why they are part of the audience in the first place.
If you publish elementary computer tips on your website or blog then your audience constitutes of people who are not very well-versed with computers and they are looking for basic operational guidance. Similarly, if you are writing copy for a website that sells winter garments then your audience are people who are looking for winter clothes, have lots of choice at their hands, and need to be convinced that they must buy the clothes at this particular website. When you know your audience you can specifically write for them, and they are extremely receptive.
How can your content be accessed/found
It’s just not enough to publish great content for the right audience — your audience must be made aware of the existence of your content. Here are a few methods you can employ to make the right people find your content:
- Search engines: Search engines are the best source of quality audience for your content because when people come from search engines they are already looking for something like what you can offer. To achieve this you should create your content according to the language used by your audience. Optimize your content for the right keywords and expressions that fundamentally define your content.
- Blogs and websites: Quality content in itself attracts incoming links from other web sites and blogs and this in turn gets you the right audience. You can make other blogs and websites aware of your content by either directly writing to the owners or by interacting in the comment sections.
- Social bookmarking and networking websites: Websites like Digg, Delicious, Twitter and Facebook can get thousands of interested readers to your website provided you have built a following on these websites.
Success content implementation involves continuously creating quality content and promoting it using all the avenues available to you. It may seem daunting to a person who is interested in performing just one task, writing content or promoting it. Nothing wrong in that. You can hire somebody for the job you don’t like doing. The basic point is, creation and promotion must happen at the same time for the most effective implementation of your content and copywriting strategy.
