26 insights into the world of great content writing that are the foundation of any great content marketing campaign.
Audience
This is the basic building block of great content. Know your audience and you’ll know what and how you need to write. Why? Because the reason you’re writing content is for someone to read it. So that you can connect with them at a deeper level and then nudge them towards any action you want them to take or product you want them to consider..
Blogging
Blogs are the bread of content, and your writing is the butter. These are great vehicles to deliver content to your readers, so you must ensure your blogs are well-written, opinionated and add value to their lives.
Curation
Besides creating written content such as blogs, white papers, sustainability reports, presentations and even books, curation is another content marketing trick worth adopting. You can take the pressure off writing by adding videos, articles and other pieces of content created by others to your website or blog. This isn’t plagiarism, because when you share, you also give due credit to the original creator. Also, curation is an art, which is much more than simply sharing links. When you curate content, it must follow a theme and you need to give your audience a valid reason through an accompanying note explaining why this piece of content stood out to you and why you choose to share it with them.
Delivery
If content is king, then delivery is queen. Writing great content that no one reads is pointless. The internet provides you plenty of platforms to get out there and be heard. Social media, native advertising, newsletters and mailers are at your disposal to be used as effective delivery mechanisms that will enable you to reach a wider audience.
Emails
Emails are a great content marketing tool that can target a very specific audience. They are usually sent out to a mailing list of people who subscribe to them; hence you know that everyone you send an emailer to will read it. Usually taking the form of a newsletter or mailer, an email sent out periodically bearing links to your freshest content and any offers or contests you want to run, is a great way to drive traffic to your website or blog. This is an undervalued content marketing strategy and can prove immensely valuable as you will see more direct action from those you send these mailers to.
Frequency
How often should you publish? This piece of research suggests that the more frequently you do so, the greater the results: companies that published 16 or more blogs per month got 3.5 times more traffic than those publishing four or fewer.
In today’s modern world, G is, and always will be, Google. We’re not content marketing experts unless Google says we are. This directly translates into a substantial volume of high-quality, well researched, SEO content that appeals to not just your readers but also the keyword spiders responsible for page rankings. Sounds daunting? That’s where Word Hatter comes in.
Hands
Content marketing is in part, a game of volumes. To achieve a significant volume of written content, you need a proportionate number of hands churning it out. This is where people come in. Hiring the best writers and editors who are on top of their game makes publishing a breeze. However, you can also achieve the same results working with a great content marketing agency, like Word Hatter.
Insights
Great insights keep your writing fresh and interesting. Great writing makes people think. When they think, they take action and if you can combine insights with SEO, you are at the top of the digital marketing pyramid, right next to us.
Jargon
When people come across technical jargon and complex words they don’t understand, they feel inferior and might steer clear of your blog altogether. Why is why, when you’re writing you need to KISS…Keep It Simple, Stupid.
Knowledge
Writing when backed up with knowledge on the subject is truly exceptional. This is where subject matter experts (SMEs) come in. Building a network of these experts can make all the difference to your content marketing plan. If you don’t have the time to go out and look for these experts, simply tap into an existing network, like ours at Word Hatter.
Listicles
‘10 ways to do something’ or ‘20 ways to do it better’ are headlines that will always pique people’s interest and get your point across in easy to read snippets. This article is a listicle. In fact, even Google’s search ranking algorithm loves listicles and they are a sure-fire way to get on top of page rankings.
Monetisation
Can you make money from your content? Well you sure can. Well written content can not only enlighten your audience to the benefits of your product, they can also bring in ad revenue from Google. This is a fine line to tread as not all your readers might want the interruption of ads while reading your content.
Novelty
Keep researching the latest trends in content marketing and giving your readers new and exciting content. Don’t be afraid to experiment with, and adapt new and emerging forms of content for your blog or website. This is where a great content marketing agency can help and this is exactly what we do.
Outcomes
Occasionally, share the outcomes of successful content marketing campaigns with your audience, either as case studies or testimonials. People who’ve seen a change in their lives or business, either directly or indirectly, are your biggest evangelists.
Publishing Tools
Great content is nothing without a strong publishing platform for it to stand on. Platforms like WordPress allow you to create a suitable home for your content with a host of features that allow you to make your blogs more immersive. You can add pictures, videos, audio and other multimedia plugins and action buttons such as the ‘share’ button to increase their shareability. These platforms take some getting used to and it’s best to have someone manage them if you have other things to do. That is where we come in.
Quality
One third of the holy trinity, along with volume and frequency. This entails not just great writing but also engaging visuals that get the reader hooked and typesetting that makes your blog easy to read.
Review
Before anything is published in a newspaper it is seen by at least four pairs of eyes, and it is crucial that your content is thoroughly reviewed before it appears. A careful checking process ensures factually correct, engaging, readable content for your audience and avoids embarrassing corrections later on.
Social media
Writing for social media is an art and one of the latest forms of content writing to emerge with the rise of social networking. Writing for social media usually takes the form of short snappy captions and tweets. This writing is usually governed by very tight character counts such as 280 characters for Twitter including spaces and symbols. That means every word needs to be measured, impactful and thoughtfully used. That is where a great content marketing agency with content writing experts can help.
Tone
The tone of your writing dictates how seriously people take you; it also needs to match your brand’s, or your personal ideology. A successful content marketing tip is to keep the tone ‘fun and quirky’ without getting too serious or irreverent.
Unpopular Opinion
Many content marketing campaigns are swayed by public opinion without conscious thought. This creates a barrage of similar looking and sounding content that people eventually tire of. If you have an opinion that is different from the herd, express it. People will appreciate your honesty and the fact that you have a spine. However, don’t be contrarian just for the sake of it, or you risk coming across as sensationalist or a platform for online trolling.
Volume
NO, WE DON’T MEAN WRITING IN ALL CAPS SO IT LOOKS LIKE YOU’RE SHOUTING.
The volume we’re referring to is the frequency of blogs you produce. Frequency demonstrates discipline and conveys to readers that you’re consistent with your thoughts. You’d rather have 10 pieces of content read by 1000 people each than one amazing piece of content read by 5000 people. In the long run, consistency, not brilliance is required to achieve a higher SEO ranking.
White Papers
White papers are longer pieces of content and take more time to read, but they demonstrate your expertise in a particular field. White papers are also shared more than blogs as sharing them makes people appear more knowledgeable by association with you.
The beauty of white papers is that you don’t need to adhere to a rigid schedule. Which means you can devote more time to plan and craft each white paper and make it exceptional.
eXcessive use of hyperlinks
Hyperlinks are a great way to immerse readers even further into the narrative you have spun. It’s the online equivalent of pointing to something during a conversation. But how would you like it if someone kept pointing to many different things during one single conversation, distracting isn’t it. That is what too many hyperlinks do to a well written piece of content. Link only when it’s necessary and as far as possible try to link to content on your blog as opposed to content created by others.
YOU
The key to successful content marketing is to talk directly to the audience. Use ‘you’ and ‘your’ rather than ‘we’ and ‘our’ wherever you can.
Zzzzz…
You’re using content to market an exciting product that will change people’s lives for the better. You’re not writing bedtime stories. Keep it fresh and exciting, boring content will get you nowhere.
