Content Writing


How to Make Your Content Irresistible

Are you spending a good amount of time writing articles, blog posts, press releases, sales copies but not getting sufficient clicks? If you answered yes you must take time to give a second thought to the strategy you need to adopt while crafting your write ups! Get these prompt makeover strategies to design your articles irresistible yielding desired results.

Check Out For Current Buzz

Keeping yourself abreast with latest information in your genre will always give you an upper hand in your niche. It will make your articles coherent which the readers can relate to their lives and situations. Your articles will gain popularity, and of course more traffic, as more people will start reading it being the latest buzz in your market.

Make a Captivating and Sizzling Headline

Howsoever well researched and aptly tailored your article is if your headline is not catchy it will not catch eyeballs. Start reading more and more to gain a thorough insight into the type of headlines one can coin. Get inspired by the headlines of magazines, newspapers and other journals that really stand out. Try writing 3-4 headlines for an article and seek suggestion of others which ones stand out the most.

Induce a Reason for Readers to Read

Give your reader a genuine reason to click your articles or your website! It has to be something unique that is rarely available, excluding free reports as it us quite common now. Make your readers know how the site is going to benefit them in the long run and what instant remedies is your article going to offer! This will definitely compel them to stay glued to your site.

Do Thorough Research on the Topic

Research your topic after selecting the angle for your article. Facts and content must be virtually accurate. It is only possible if you have conducted a sincere research and spent sufficient time to its conventional edification.

Generate a Readable and Simple Content

Albeit, it is the type of readers your site and article is going to receive should be the deciding factor in terms of the standard and quality of your content, it is advisable to use simple language and short sentences to express yourself. People enjoy those write ups which did not take much of their time to understand the stuff. They avoid visiting those sites that compel them to consult other resources to understand the chunk.

Make it Hilarious and Emotional

Being a social animal, people are inclined to love humor and a tincture of emotion. It enables them to feel relaxed and spirited and in turn your stuff will become a cornerstone of your website.

Stick to Your Original Writing Style

Develop a writing style to follow when you write. Don’t try to fake your abilities by trying different writing styles. It may land you in trouble as you may not be comfortable with other writing styles hence may not be able to do justice with them.

It will also influence your rapport and readers adversely. Hence it is advisable to be in your original shell. I am not going to demoralize you by advising you not to try other patterns but not without being confident that you can do justice to that style of writing.

Proofread as Many Times as You Can

This is the biggest blunder we all do by not spending enough time to read our stuff sufficiently. Your written article may contain spelling and grammatical errors. Just don’t allow it to frustrate the very purpose of your reader visiting your site. You may lose a considerable number of readers for good. You can take the help of another person to proofread your feature as well to detect your mistakes that you might have walk passed. As it is human nature we often overlook our mistakes.

Following these simple thumb rules you can make your content irresistible for the visitors to stay tuned.

Ways to Improve Your SEO With Content

Repeatedly, Internet gurus (at amrithallan.com we don’t generally believe in such terms) have always stressed the importance of content. Whether in a website or in a blog, content can make or break your search engine optimization (SEO). Readers would not want a blog or a website without contents. Content, no matter what other Internet marketers say is still king.

Below are ways you can improve your SEO with content.

  1. Article Marketing. Article Marketing is the process where you write articles and submit the same to article directories like Ezine Articles, Go Articles or Sooper Articles, to name a few. These articles, aside from being of quality, should have a compelling resource box, where you put your name, who you are or your expertise, and a call to action through a link pointing them to your website or blog. Most article directories allow a maximum of two links, depending on the number of words your article has. Most article directories require a minimum of 300 words. This is also where you could make use of keywords. Most Internet marketers advise on using long tail keywords or Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI), to make your keyword not redundant in your articles.
  2. Pillar Content. Despite your Article Marketing process, your blog should have at least five (5) pillar articles. Pillar articles are words coined by famous blogger, Yaro Starak. Later, several bloggers coined words such as flagship content (Chris Garrett) and cornerstone content from Brian Clarke. In his article on pillar content, Yaro defines it as: “A pillar article is usually a tutorial style article aimed to teach your audience something. Generally they are longer than 500 words and have lots of very practical tips or advice.” This article you are currently reading could be considered a pillar article since it is very practical and a good “how-to” lesson (OK, we’re blowing our own horn here, but well, whatthaheck). This style of article has long term appeal, stays current (it isn’t news or time dependent) and offers real value and insight. The more pillars you have on your blog the better.
    Pillar content is also one way of creating backlinks (other sites linking to your site) because they find your article compelling and helpful. Thus, search engines will start crawling at your website or blog through those links and, in the long run will gain a good page rank. Search engines also rank websites or blogs with the number of quality links that points to it. This is how they measure the blog or website’s authority. Additionally, always remember to use keywords in your articles as this is also instrumental for search engines finding your contents and of course your sites.
  3. Guest Blog Posting. Writing for other websites or blogs, especially those that have gained authority and/or popularity is one way of gaining good search engine optimization. Your content placed on an authority blog or website will likewise create quality backlinks and links to your site. Not all are given the opportunity to guest post in other popular blogs. Usually, blog owners who already have gained popularity or very good page rank would always qualify their guest contributors.
  4. Fresh Content. Readers of your blog or website will usually like fresh content. Thus, it is necessary for blog or site owners to post a least three (3) quality articles in a week to ensure your readers that they can expect new things from you on a weekly basis. Fresh quality content means more visitors. And more readers mean more traffic. More traffic will definitely be of great help as far as search engine optimization is concerned.
  5. Reader-Centered Content. In general, all contents must be reader-centered. You must always know who the target of your articles is. When writing contents for your site, you must always focus on what would your readers like to read. Always ask yourself whether the article you are writing will help your readers, and if you think they will, are your articles simple enough to be understood by all? Make your articles simple so that they can be understood by readers from myriad backgrounds (or at least from your niche).

    6. There you go – the five basic ways by which your contents can greatly affect your SEO. Without these five basic things, you will have a hard time creating the popularity, the authority and eventually the page rank you would want to achieve. Besides, all bloggers and website owners would want their sites to be search friendly. Would you not want your site to gain the same thing?

    How to make your content more informative

    There can be various purposes for publishing content on your website or blog but when you want to generate business from your content, you need to impart the right information as clearly as possible. What’s right information depends on how your customers and clients perceive your content, not you, unless there is a parity.

    Whenever you are writing content (or working with a content writing service) for your business you should step into your customers’ shoes. This means not only presenting the greatest benefits of your product or service, but also addressing their concerns before they raise them themselves. This means highlighting even the negative aspects of your product or service. But this doesn’t mean you’re conveying something negative about your business: you are simply informing your visitor so that he or she can make the right decision. Here are a few things you can consider to make your content writing process informative:

    • List all the benefits: What do your customers gain when they purchase your product or service? Don’t go on a boasting binge. For instance, if you want to avail my content writing services it doesn’t matter much to you if I’ve done my higher studies in linguistics or if I read abstract literary classics in my spare time. You are interested in knowing whether I can consistently provide you quality content or not, and if yes, what system I have in place to ensure it. Additionally, what benefit you get by working with me and not by working with another content provider?
    • Who might benefit the most: Don’t try to sell your product to everybody under the sun (although this seems very desirable). When you are selling, you’re not selling a product or a service, you’re selling a benefit, a usage, a value. So whereas selling combs to bald men may seem quite smart, you are simply cheating people and when they realize it they’re going to have a really bad feeling about your conduct. Help people make a better purchase decision.
    • Clearly mention if there are any drawbacks: You may think, what am I talking about? Am I trying to help you increase your sales or lose your prospects. The truth is, if you think there are too many drawbacks then may be you should reconsider your offer, and if you think their are more benefits then drawbacks then your customers are going to thank you for informing them. Don’t let your customers find out what your product doesn’t do — tell them on your own and also tell them when a particular feature will be available in case it is currently missing.

    Conveying your ideas better through story-telling

    Does your content or copy tell a story? Story-telling engages your readers. When you’re reading a story, there is something in it that grips you, that exhorts you to read further. You want to know what’s going to happen next. Whether you can relate to the narrative or not (mostly you can) reading a story is always more than reading uninspiring, drab text

    Smashing Magazine has an interesting post on creating a better use experience with story-telling.

    A good story is like a journey, and when you start reading it, you join that journey. There is a beginning, there are various ups and downs, joys and conflicts, and finally there is an end that changes something inside you. The beauty of every story is that it brings about a change: significant or infinitesimal.

    Although the post mentioned above mostly talks about design, you can apply the art of story telling better on content writing. I’ll soon write about this to further elucidate my point.

    Overcoming the “So What?” problem while writing content

    Thumbsdown for published content
    Image source: Global Girl

    Don’t know what’s “So what?” problem? It’s when you write something seemingly great and your reader thinks, “So what, big deal!” Alright, there are some readers who have an insatiable penchant for being critical and they will criticize you no matter what, but you can drastically decrease the number of such reactions by devoting enough thought to what you are writing/publishing.

    Why do readers reject outright what you have written?

    • The information you have provided is of no real use
    • The same information is available on hundreds of other websites and blogs
    • People have been sharing the same “secret” since 1998, or may be since 1500 BC
    • You are drawing wrong visitors to your website or blog (you are not creating optimized, seo-focused content)

    What sort of content creates the “now this is something really great” effect?

    • Your content reaches the target audience (or vice versa)
    • You pack lots of information that can be used in the real world
    • You are providing valuable information that is not easily available
    • You are offering easily available information with an interesting twist

    Is it always about informing and educating your readers?

    Not always, but most of the times. You have to make sure your content solves your readers’ problem, that it provides a solution, that it delivers what your readers want. So what about content writing for businesses and corporate websites?

    The same thing applies. If you are providing online copywriting services then you must (ideally) be attracting visitors that are looking for (or may need in the future) a competent copywriter. So if you say you’re a great online copywriter it’s not going to make much of an impact because there are thousands of “great” online copywriters on the Internet; in fact these days anybody who can type starts calling himself or herself a content writer or an online copywriter. Rather, you should immediately address your visitor’s problem (that’s why it’s advised you should have targeted pages) and offer the most apt solution.

    Here’s a good blog post by Chris I cam across that talks about solving the “so what?” problem while publishing your content.

    The benefits of updating your existing content

    We are perpetually talking about adding new content to your website or blog but there is another way of having fresh content, as explained in this blog post titled 6 ways to give your old content new life. Personally for me it’s quite difficult to sift through my old posts and articles and update them. Although this does not increase the quantity of content, when you update your existing content, you keep it relevant, and you give the search engines a reason to re-crawl and re-index your older blog posts and articles.

    This way you don’t have to create new content each time you want to drive traffic from social networking websites. Simply update your existing content and repost the links.

    It also helps you refine your content. Frankly, we’re are constantly learning and evolving. I’m pretty sure I write better than what I used to write a year ago (although I feel my fiction writing has deteriorated considerably) and if you feel you could have done a better job with that post you wrote on providing better content writing and blogging services, you can try again and sound more convincing.

    How I have been adopting minimalism and eliminating distractions while doing my content writing work


    Image credit: MarcelGermain

    It started with using Q10 (a full-screen text editor). When you use this text editor there is nothing else on the screen: just the text you’re typing, according to your preferred column width and background and foreground. Prior to this I was already using EditPad for my writing needs. I don’t even remember when I used MS Word last. I kept using it for saving files though because clients prefer doc files.

    There were three activities I was using bloated software for: MS Word for writing, Photoshop for random graphic work and Dreamweaver for PHP coding (all pre-installed by my Laptop vendor). I remember spending hours getting the right font shape or shade. Although I used Dreamweaver just for coding, it was so resource hungry that I couldn’t run another application while working on it. Frankly, I had no problem with MS Word, it’s just that I wanted to use a text-editor rather than a word processor.

    About 4 months ago I switched to Ubuntu (a Linux version) completely and automatically stopped using all Windows software. For sending DOC files to my clients I switched to the OpenOffice writer. For doing PHP coding I started using Komodo Edit, which is lighter, and quite better than DW (although it has some problem with handling larger files). Since there is no better alternative to Photoshop (GIMP doesn’t even come near) I haven’t done a single graphic work for the past 4 months. In fact I redesigned this entire website to make the layout graphic-free. All the “cool utilities” I’d been using for years, I stopped using. I deleted 40 GB of software that I’d been downloading and backing up for years. I also deleted files and folders I haven’t used for the past 4 years.

    Primarily, I need my laptop for

    • Content writing
    • PHP coding
    • Communication
    • Managing tasks

    As you notice, I haven’t included graphics work because I was doing that simply for designing my own websites, and only I know how much time I’ve spent designing and redesigning my websites (and I regularly use just a couple of them).

    Since I couldn’t find an alternative of Q10 in Ubuntu, I had to make do with OpenOffice writer for a while. I also used the gEdit text editor that comes with Ubuntu, but it had some line break issues when I transferred the text to the word processor (for final formatting).

    For the past 3 years I’ve been using Google apps to manage my email. This means I can use the Gmail interface with my business email ID. I never configured its POP3 features and have been managing my email online from the beginning. It not only lets me manage different conversation threads, it also lets me find old emails fast. Of course I never have had to take email backups.

    My writers keep sending me attachments when I outsource my work to them. A couple of months ago I started opening the files in Googledocs instead of downloading the attachments. Whatever editing and proofreading needed to be done, I did in Googledocs, and then sent the files to my clients straightaway as doc attachments. I created folders for different writers and started sharing with them so that they could directly save the files in those folders. Eventually I started using Googledocs for working on my own documents too, and now, no documents are saved on my local drive. I don’t need many word processing features and I rarely use spell checks and thesaurus etc., or use online references.

    The only files I have to save locally are my media files and PHP files. Once I figure out how to edit PHP files online I’ll stop using Komodo Edit too. For managing my tasks I regularly use Tadalist and occasionally, Remember My Milk. To generate my invoices this month I started using Zoho. For instant messaging and voice chat I use Empathy and Skype. Since I’m not a power user when it comes to Twitter and FaceBook, using Tweetdeck was an overkill and hence I switched to Brizzly.

    So basically I’m saving no information locally and I have minimum software installed. How does it let me get less distracted?

    You get distracted when one, you can easily do the things that distract you, and two, when you spend more time trying to be productive, rather than actually being productive. Ubuntu versions of various software tools are not easily available and even if they are, it’s often tedious to make them work the way you like them to work. This encouraged me to install less and less software, and totally chuck away tools I use once in may be 3 months.

    Now each morning all I have to do is, fire up my browser and start working. Even when I’m typing this, nothing else is visible on my laptop screen. In Googledocs you can remove the upper portion by pressing CRTL SHIFT F and in FireFox you can press F11 to get full screen view. So it’s just you and your text.

    Putting everything online (in the Cloud) saves me the trouble of constant backups and a desire to do everything on my own. It also enables me to work from any machine…it means my work doesn’t depend on a single machine. It helps me focus on just the necessary.

    And what if I need some graphic work? I’ll outsource. Ever since I started outsourcing my writing projects I’ve become more eager to pay for services rather than spending my own time. It’s not that bad to pay people for services that help you save time…you can put that time to some better use.

    Result: my earnings from content writing this month so far have been the highest ever.

    Doing better networking using social media

    Networking is an exercise you have to conduct almost everyday if you’re in a business of selling — whether you work for an organization or for yourself (as a freelancer). Networking as a concept has existed since time immemorial but it has been taken to an entirely new level by social networking websites like Twitter and FaceBook.

    Networking doesn’t just mean hanging around with people, although it also doesn’t mean befriending others just for commercial gains. It basically means knowing the right people (people who have use of your products and services or who can recommend your products and services to others) and establishing a communication channel so that you can reach each other when needed. It may involve:

    • Attending the right gatherings
    • Keeping in touch and communicating on a regular basis
    • Letting people know how you can serve them

    This Mashable blog posts highlights 7 things you can do for better networking. Basically, networking takes time and effort and some people do it as a full-time job, although this is not called for if you have to run a business. For instance, being a content writer, if I post messages and updates on FaceBook and Twitter all the time and keep interacting people will soon think, “Heck, when does this guy do his work?” And this is true indeed. If you don’t strike a balance you’ll end up neglecting your core business.

    For most, keeping in touch is enough. Keep in touch, and help people if you can. Sometimes go out of your way, but you don’t have to be unreasonable. Give people an incentive/reason to remember you in good stead, and convey to them that you are available if they require a particular service, content writing and copywriting in my case, for instance.

    Does your content writing solve your reader’s problem?

    Problem solving through content writing
    Image source: arkworld

    What makes your content writing effective? When it addresses exactly the issue faced by your reader. Whether you are writing a product description, a corporate profile, a blog entry, a tourist destination description, your whole agenda should be solving a problem, because once you solve a problem, you have delivered a solution, and everybody is looking for a solution.

    But how does your content solve a problem if all you’re concerned about is help yourself or your client sell more? When you’re writing content for a website that needs to sell a product or a service, you need to take into consideration the following facts:

    1. Does your reader really need that product or service and is simply exploring various options by visiting multiple websites?
    2. Is your reader looking for a solution that can be provided by your product or service? (better anti-virus protection, or better search engine ranking)
    3. Is your reader there just to read some interesting trivia and has no intention of ever buying your product or service?
    4. Does your reader has no clue why or she is here and plans to go somewhere else within half a second?
    5. What sort of readers do you actually want to attract, and if possible, convert?

    The first thing to do is, forget about trying to provide a solution to all the categories…it’s simply not possible through a single page and on the very first visit. Your most important readers is of the second category, and then the first category? Why second category?

    Primarily we’re solution-oriented people. Even if we’re buying something just for a fad, we need to believe that that product or service actually achieves that. The reader of the second category has a problem. He or she may not be bothered about what product or service he or she is going to buy, provided his or her problem is solved. So you have a good chance of selling to that reader.

    Take for instance your reader’s need to rank higher on various search engines on a long-term basis without having to spend lots of money. An SEO company can improve his or her search engine rankings, but so can a trained content writer. So how can you sell your solution (higher search engine rankings) by offering your content writing services? Explain to your reader as clearly as possible how good content helps improve search engine rankings. You can use client testimonials, you can refer to other authoritative articles, and you can use your own skill as a communicator: the basic idea is providing a solution to your reader, a solution he or she can afford, and believe in convincingly.

    That is why you’re repeatedly told that don’t highlight features, highlight benefits. Of course some people do find features appealing (explaining the features of a RAID drive to a nerd) but basically we want to know eventually what a particular product or service is going to achieve for us.

    Here’s another post on empowering your visitors by publishing solution-oriented content.

    Is the Internet changing the way we write?

    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.