Ultimate Blogger Writing Guide

There is a lot of bad content on the internet. At the moment, there is so much badly formulated content that it can become very difficult to determine between valuable sources and ones that are nothing more than fluff and filler. It can be very frustrating for internet users, but it also provides you with the opportunity to create the content that matters.

By giving your customers the content that they want, when they want it, you can turn your business into a trustworthy industry leader. If you want to create better content that will complement your brand, then here is the ultimate guide to creating the best content.

6 Important Writing Tips

Whether you’re a full-time content writer or the creation of content is merely one part of your daily work diary, there are some basic steps that you should take if you want to create the best possible work. There is a clear pathway to quality content, and it’s largely to do with the organisation of ideas. Use these steps to form the basis of your creative process and your content will be much stronger as a result. It will also work harder as the foundation of your content marketing strategy.

• Deciding on your article subject
• Committing to relevant research
• Organising your research
• Writing
• Time-out
• Editing

This roadmap will become indispensable when it comes to the creation of your original content and will ensure that the work you are producing is of the best quality.

Step One: Deciding on Your Article Subject

This is the complicated part of the writing process, but there are methods that can make this easier. Ideally, you want to have created a content schedule, where you will have made notes and put ideas regarding the content that you’d like to publish to coincide with the set company or global events. These are going to be those areas that are relevant to the business that you’re writing for. If you’re writing content for a veterinary surgery, then days like #nationalcatday are ideally suited to create an article with that in mind. Using this will allow you to tap into a targeted audience, expanding your audience easily.

• Ideas for subject selection:

  As well as trending topics, you should also do regular and relevant keywordKeywords are the words and phrases that potential customers might search for to find your business. searches as well. These can easily act as the springboard to creative ideas and titles that you may not have considered. A simple way of doing this is by typing your known industry keywords into Google (or any other search engine) and looking at the autosuggestions that come up. These alone can be a great resource, and the recommended searches that are offered at the bottom of a search page can also provide regular ideas.

• Focus your subject matter:

  Once you have a general idea of what you are going to be writing about, it’s time to do some preliminary research. Often, this will not be about the subject itself, but rather seeing what other people have written about it. There is no need to replicate the content of others. Instead, use your preliminary research to narrow down your subject focus. Ultimately, you are looking for a gap that is not represented (or not represented professionally), so that your own work will both stand out as unique, and provide a resource for those that encounter your content.

Step Two: Committing to Research

The ultimate goal of your content is going to be to inform, educate, and entertain. To cover all of these criteria, you are going to need to commit to your research. It’s very easy to assume that you know all about the subject matter, especially if you are an expert in your field. However, your research is going to be vital to establish that credibility, and the best way to do that is by making your writing as factual as possible. Look for:

• Published statistics
• Official case studies
• Quotes from recognisable people

These will add credibility to your content that mere knowledge on your part will never equal. Research is a skill that can be easily learned, but there are a number of essentials that you should always remember.

• Use Primary Sources:

  If you can avoid using secondary sources, your content will be much more impactful. This is whoever said or wrote the original conclusions or soundbites, whereas a secondary source is usually focused on discussing the primary source. Secondary sources can offer value, especially when it comes to idea generation, but they can also contain misquotes or out of context information that will make your own content considerably less accurate.

• Industry respectability:

  There are three points to consider when it comes to finding the best sources of information. You should always cite the source with the most authority, and whether that’s an industry-relevant website or entrepreneur, a recognisable author, or even a social media influencer, the more respectable and well-known your sources are, the more power they have.

Social Proof: As well as industry respectability, much headway has been made by those that are using social media as their source of authority. They do this by collecting and presenting a group of social media comments and updates as a whole. This can be particularly effective if celebrities make those tweets and Facebook comments.

• Wikipedia is not a Primary Source: For those who aren’t worried about accuracy, then Wikipedia is fine, but there’s a reason why teachers do not allow for Wikipedia citationsA citation is a mention of your company, product, or service in an online publication. Citations increase the ranking of your site on search engines. Never use Wikipedia as a source of authority. It can be used as a means of finding linksHyperlinks, also known as links, are the connection points on a webpage that take you to other webpages., but anything else is risky if you want quality content.
• Be up to date: If you’re writing about the changing social media landscape or the latest phone model, then never use out of date information. A good rule of thumb is never to use data that is more than five years old, but if you’re writing about technology, then you should dedicate time to ensuring that the information that you gather is no more than a year old.
• Check your facts: Your final step should be to do a fact check. There’s nothing worse than working on a piece of content only to publish and get told immediately that there is an incorrect fact that destroys the credibility and authority of your work.

Step Three: Organising Your Research

By this stage, you will have clarified your topic and have some research gathered together that will form the foundation of your work. That means that it is time to organise this into a structure. The good news is that all content follows a largely uniform set-up, and although there are ways to challenge this structure, it’s actually useful because it’s expected. The usual structure involves:

1. The Introduction: This is where you will grab the reader’s attention and let them know what they will get from continuing to read the article.
2. The Body: This is the bulk of your content. It is where you are going to spend the most time, so you will need to ensure that you have your notes and research in the right order. It is also where you have to deliver on the promises that you made in your introduction.
3. Closing summary: This is most commonly used as a summary and clarification of your initial starting point. It’s a good idea here to reiterate the benefit of your information to your readers.
4. The call-to-action: This will be what you want readers to do after they have digested your work. It could be something simple like voting in a survey, adding their email address to a mailing list, or even buying a product.

This structure will work no matter the length of your content. If you’re writing a 10,000-word essay, then the body of your work will be considerably longer than for those writing a 500-word listicle. Knowing how to organise your research into this structure will depend on what you are trying to say, and that’s the important element of your content planning. If you don’t know what your point is, then quite simply, you don’t have one.

Step Four: Writing the rough draft

If there’s one rule of your first draft, it’s that you should never start with your introduction. If you have divided the body of your work into subheadings, then pick one that has a good level of research and start there. This first draft is about getting your ideas on paper, so don’t worry too much about flow or continuity at this stage. This is the stage where you will start to flesh out your ideas and expand on them as required. Remember to incorporate your links and quotes as needed.

Remember that you should have a firm idea in mind as to who your reader is going to be. Consider your target audience and determine the tone of voice that you are going to use. Remember that this is the first draft, and your writing does not need to be beautiful or elegant at this point!

Once you have completed one section, move onto the next. Continue this process until you have the body of your content fleshed out and ready for the next stage.

• Writing the introduction: This can be the hardest part of a piece of content to write. You need to determine the point of the work that you have organised and fleshed out in the body, and assess the best way to hook the attention of the potential reader. Some people opt for the personal story that leads onto the body, while others prefer to use metaphors and startling statistics, but whichever you choose, your introduction remains the most important part of your completed content.
• The conclusion: All that your conclusion needs to be is a clarification of the body of the content and an expression of why your point is relevant to the reader. Follow this immediately with your chosen call to action, and the first stage of your content is completed.

Step Five: Time-Out

It’s really important that you put your first draft aside and let it rest. Concentrate on other tasks for even a few hours and then come back to your work. Some content writers leave their first draft for weeks at a time, but very often even a short break away from your work will be beneficial. If you keep reading your words over and over again without respite, you’re going to miss mistakes, and taking a time-out will allow you to take a more detached and fresh view of your content.

Step Six: Editing

This can be the hardest part of the content creation process. You need to ensure that your introduction is clear, that your point is not just obvious but backed up with data, and that there are no spelling or grammar errors. You may find that the flow of your work isn’t as smooth as you’d like, so may necessitate some reorganisation. Once this is all completed, pay close attention to your headline, your first sentence, and your closing sentence.

Headline advice

Many people work hard on their content and then just use the first headline that comes to mind. Consider how many articles are shared based on the entertainment value of the headline alone, and recognise that underestimating your headline writing is a fast way to negate the work that you have put in so far. Keep to descriptive headlines, and you will often find the best headline phrasing within the content itself.

It’s worth noting that this style of content planning is also applicable to other forms of media content. If you’re writing the script for a how-to video or a podcast interview, then commit to the same level of research and planning, and your overall content will be much more impactful. By going through these steps, you will create much more powerful content that can help with SEO rankings, online visibility, and the reach of the brand that you are writing for.