Nothing happens until someone reads,
hears or watches some kind of content
which is why in this episode I'm
breaking down how to write great content
and giving you some of my most proven
and effective tips on writing better
content for your blog, your website, your
ads or anything else. Let's get to it.
Hey there my name is Adam Earhart, modern
marketing strategist and welcome to
The Modern Marketing Show where we help you grow your business by making marketing
that matters. So if you're interested in
learning the latest and greatest
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We all know great content when we see it.
Content that draws you in, holds your attention maybe
even influences your decisions or your
behaviors. At least that's what I try to
do when I'm crafting up nice tasty
content for myself or for my clients.
So how do I do it? Where does all this great
content come from? and how can you create
great content of your very own? Well
after years of running a marketing
agency and creating thousands and
thousands of different campaigns I'm
happy to share 10 of my best content
writing tips with you here today in
order to immediately help you level up
your content game whether for your
website your ads your blog or anything
else you need to create content for.
But before we get to that, first a quick
shout-out to our sponsor for this episode
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charities make sure to click the link in
the descriptions below. Alright, now let's
kick this off with content writing tip
number one: What's the point.
Just like all things in writing and in marketing and in business and really in life we've
got to have a really clear idea and
understanding of what the goal is or
what the objective is or where we're
trying to get with whatever we're doing.
After all, one of the best ways to write
content that simply isn't very good or
doesn't do anything at all is to really
have no idea why you're writing it in
the first place or what you're trying to
achieve with your piece of content.
So, before you sit down to write anything
you really want to be clear about what
you're trying to achieve with this.
What's the point of this content? Is it
better search engine rankings?
Is a brand awareness? Are you writing an
ad for engagement or for traffic or for
generating leads? Whatever it is, you've
got to get really clear about why you're
doing this. Now, there really is no right
answer and different types of content
are going to justify different types but
you really have to be clear because
again, different objectives are going to
mean writing in a different way or with
a different type of content or how it's
going to be delivered in the end. For
example, let's say that you're writing an
ad, well the very first objective of this
ad may be just to get the click or if
you're writing content for a website
about page well then obviously you're
gonna want to do a little bit more, try
to build up some know like and trust
factor, hopefully lead them with some
kind of call to action or next action
step that they can take. A key thing to
keep in mind here is what do you want
your audience to do? your readers, your
listeners or your viewers. What action do
you want them to take as a result of
consuming your content? You see one of
the big differences when you're writing
really good content for a business or
marketing purpose supposed to just a fun
or fictional purpose is that
well marketing and business content
really should create some kind of action.
So, get clear about what action that is
that you want people to take so that you
can make sure that your content aligns
with it and leads them to that
conclusion.
Alright, tip number two is one of the
most important things when it comes to
content and marketing and business in
general and that is to significantly
prioritize clarity over creativity.
Now, this is probably my biggest pet peeve
when it comes to content marketing and
especially when it comes to advertising
where you're going to be putting money
behind the content that you're paying to
promote. It's also sadly a trap many
novice and experienced advertisers and
marketers in general fall into, because
again, we really tend to prioritize this
creative aspect and writing something
that's flowing and beautiful and
compelling but at the end of the day
none of the creativity really matters if
it doesn't get results and it's not
gonna get results if you don't
prioritize clarity first, because a
confused consumer doesn't act, period. You see, if nobody understands what you do,
who you do it for or how you can help
them, well then all the creativity in the
world isn't going to help your content
and when we're talking about
prioritizing clarity over creativity,
we're not just talking about the main
bulk of the content itself, but really
all of the facets around it, including
the headline. After all, we've often been
told, especially years past, that the
headline is the most
part of the ad or the most important
part of the content because this is what
at least 80% of people are gonna read
and many won't continue on to the body
content. This is why so many people went
on this totally wrong direction and
really went in the direction of
clickbait or high P and really fake and
just kind of catchy headlines that
didn't relate to the content itself.
That's a really bad idea. First of all,
once they read this headline if it's
catches their attention and then they
get to their content and there's no
congruence there, well then they're gonna
bounce, which is actually the literal
term for clicking the back button and
getting out of there. Second of all, when
you use tactics like click bait or
hyping something up or making fake
promises, well you're really not doing
any good things for your brand in the
long term, which isn't really gonna help
play out when it comes to content
marketing. Basically, when you're writing
content especially if you're new to
writing content really focus on making
it clear you can always get creative
later. Alright, tip number three is to
double down on your audience avatar. Now,
when we're talking about audience avatar
another term here could be customer
avatar or ideal target market but really
what we're talking about is a fictional
representation of that most perfect
customer or client or audience member
that you want to write your content for.
You see, before you sit down and write a
single piece of content not only do you
have to be clear about why you're
writing this content but you have to be
really clear about who you're writing
this content for, otherwise it's gonna
miss the mark. This means really diving
in and understanding their demographic
details like age, gender, income,
occupation, title, things like that
geographic details like what city, state,
province or country they live in and
psychographic details things like their
attitudes, interests, beliefs and maybe
any organizations or clubs or
affiliations they're a part of. Really
dialing exactly who it is that you're
trying to communicate with because it's
gonna make all of your writing and all
of your content that much more effective
and resonate that much more. Alright, tip
number four is to take this last step
and take it a step further by really
dialing in on their miracles and
miseries.Now, I've talked about miracles
and miseries a lot before but that's
because it's incredibly profound. You see,
when it comes to creating any kind of
content or any kind of writing or any
kind of marketing where the goal is to
create some kind of action which should
be the goal well you're gonna want to
leverage those powerful human emotions
that we all have, specifically the desire
to avoid pain or to seek pleasure. For this reason,
you want to make sure that your
content focuses on one of these two
aspects. Either helping them avoid their
miseries which could be things that
caused the pain, fear, frustration or
anything like that or help them achieve
their miracles, their dreams, their goals,
their wants and their desires. The
stronger you're able to appeal to their
emotional sides the more your content is
going to resonate and the greater effect
is gonna have. Tip number five is all
about native content and what we're
talking about here is respecting the
platform that your content is going to
be published on. For example, are you
writing content for a website if so you
want to keep in mind well who the
audience is that's going to be reading
this content on the website and are they
going to be viewing the website from a
mobile device or from a desktop computer,
because again, bass can influence text
size and length of content all those
other things that go into it.
If on the other hand you're writing
content for say social media platform,
well you need to be aware that this is
also going to influence the style and
the tone and the theme of the content,
not to mention just saying that it's
website content or social media content
well that's not differentiated enough, we
need to take it a step further and
figure out which social platform, because
for example, an Instagram caption or a
Facebook post or writing a script for a
YouTube video all of these are going to
be very very different. Probably, the most
obvious example of this is let's say
you're writing content for LinkedIn
article
well LinkedIn being a business social
media site is going to have its own
style and theme and way that the content
is going to resonate with the readers.
For this reason, you're gonna approach it
significantly different than if you were
going to make that same post on Twitter
or Instagram or even on Facebook. You
have to make sure that the content that
you're publishing looks like it belongs  there.
Yeah, the underlying message can still be
the same. In fact, you really just need to
find a different way of saying kind of
the same thing but you need to make sure
that it is formatted and styled and fits
in so that it's accepted by the readers
and is more likely to be consumed.
Alright, my next tip when it comes to
writing great content is to take things
line by line. You see, when it comes to
writing great content, the goal of the
headline is to get them to read the
first line and the goal of the first
line is to get them to read the second
line and the goal of the second line is
to get them to read the third line and
so on so forth. This is why it's so
incredibly important to hook them fast
right at the very beginning by A:
letting them know who this is for and B: letting them
know why they should care and what's in
it for them. This is so incredibly
important, especially today with so much
content out there. You really need to be
clear about exactly who it is that
you're writing this content for and why
they should care about it, because when
you do well you're more likely to really
nail that ideal target market and let
them know that this is indeed for them
and this is how it's going to help them
which is only going to further increase
the odds of them consuming your content.
You see, when you let people know who
it's for and why they should care well
it shows that you're respecting their
time and it also shows that you respect
the time of others that it may not be
for which is a win-win all around.
Tip number seven is to leverage the
power of infotainment. Some of the best
content and highest converting content
out there right now, especially if it's
marketing content that's designed to
generate more leads or eventually lead
to a sale, well some of this best content
that's out there is using a form of
content marketing called "Infotainment".
Now, the name is not that original,
essentially all you're doing is taking
information and entertainment and
slamming them together but the concepts
and the principles behind it are really
what make it such an effective strategy.
First, let's take information. Now,
essentially what we're doing here with
our content is we're educating someone
and we're teaching them something about
some area that we have skill or
knowledge or expertise in that we can
help them with. The beauty here of using
information or education as kind of your
content marketing strategy, is that it
positions you, not only as an expert and
an authority in the subject, but it also
kind of subconsciously elevates your
status as that teacher role or as that
person that's actually helping them. It's
a powerful psychological tool and one
that's kind of deeply ingrained in us as
humans. Really, we can't help but to
respect those that are helping us and
teaching us something. Not only that, it
helps to further build trust by actually
showing that you know what you're
talking about. The next side is the
entertainment, because ain´t nobody got time for boring content.
See, there's way too much content
out there already and way too much
boring content, so the last thing the
world needs is more boring content.
Fortunately, creating entertaining
content really isn't that complicated
you see you definitely don't need to go
out there and produce some kind of giant
Hollywood production around your content,
all you really need to do is be fun, be
unique and be yourself. Also, there's a
bit of a bonus tip here if someone's
truly interested in the content that you're talking about,
well they're gonna kind of naturally be
entertained anyways and if they're not
interested in the content that you're
talking about well then all the
entertainment in the world isn't gonna
get them to keep consuming your content
and this all rolls back to really
knowing your ideal customer avatar or
that audience avatar that you're
creating the content for in the first place.
The next tip I want to share with
you is to simplify. Now, this point kind
of builds off our clarity over
creativity concept but I want to take it
a step further and really encourage you
to simplify your writing. Obviously, we're
not talking about academic papers here
where sometimes the goal seems to be
just to confuse the reader but we're
talking about marketing content here for
a website or blog or ads in which case
the goal is definitely not to confuse
your reader because if you confuse them
you're gonna lose the sale. Einstein said
it best when he said if you can't
explain it simply, you don't understand
it well enough and I promise you nobody
likes a show-off who just jams a bunch
of jargon or technical words or insider
slang or industry lingo into their content.
It's bad for you, it's bad for
the reader, it's bad for business. Also,
there's a tendency you really need to be
aware of here known as the experts curse.
Essentially, out of the scale of one to
ten you've got like a level ten
knowledge about your product or your
service or your business and your
customer likely has a level of about one.
Now, the tendency here is for you don't
want to come down to about a level five,
but again it's not the customers
responsibility to come up and meet you,
rather it's yours to go all the way down
to that level one or two and meet them
at their level.
Now, once you've simplified your concepts
and your theories and the content and
message behind it, now it's time to
simplify your writing itself. You see,
there's a reason that most major
publications keep the content level or a
grade level of the content they're
creating at around the fourth grade or
11th grade or anywhere in that range
they're not doing this because they
believe that their audience is dumb or
that they can only read at a
fourth-grade level, it's not the case at
all. Rather, the reason they're doing this
is to help them further and more quickly
digest and consume the content they're
creating. Again, the goal here isn't to
confuse your readers or your audience,
it's to create some kind of action that
you're hoping to get from your content
itself. When you do this, you simplify
streamline and solidify the points
you're trying to make which makes your
content that much more effective.
Alright, tip number nine is to read it out loud. Now, this is such an incredibly powerful
tool for editing your content and making
sure that your message
clear and really saying the things that
you wanted to say in the first place.
As an example, I read every single one of
the ads that I write out loud and if I
can, I often get someone on my team to
read it out loud back to me so that I
can hear how it sounds or how it might
sound in someone that's never heard it
before and see how it's going to sound
internally when they consume it.
I promise you, way more often than not do I
add a comma or remove a word or delete
an entire paragraph entirely because it
simply doesn't flow or make sense in the
context of what I'm writing. It's really
funny how good something might sound
when you're first writing it out and how
incredibly differently it sounds when
you read it out loud to yourself or
someone reads it back to you. It can
often be night and day, so when you're
done make sure to read it out loud or
better yet have someone read it back to
you or you could always record yourself
reading it out loud and play that back.
Whatever the case, just make sure you do it.
Tip number ten is a concept I call story selling.
You see, using your content and
embedding stories into it is one of the
most powerful tools you have available
especially if your audience is other
humans, which I'm going to assume it is.
You see, we as humans, learn through
stories. It's how it's been done for
generations and generations. All you
really need to do is think back to fairy
tales are stories that you were told as
a kid or some of the more common fairy
tales we still here today that you could
probably recite either verbatim or at
least get the general theme about what
they're about. But aside from the fact
that people naturally learn through
stories and naturally resonate with
stories, one of my most favorite aspects
of using stories is simply the fact that
people can't resist a good story. In fact,
one of the most powerful terms or lines
in marketing or in creating your content
is just this: Let me tell you a story. You
see, when you start a piece of content
with that or you interject it somewhere
in the middle or even near the end in
order to kind of summarize and close it
all off well when you do that you
naturally peek and engage their interest
and they simply can't help but to keep
reading on or to keep listening just to
hear how this thing's gonna go.
Fortunately, stories are really pretty
easy.
In fact, anytime that you've ever talked
to a friend or a family member or a
colleague well odds are pretty good that
you told some kind of a story. You see,
stories really only have three parts: the
beginning, middle and the end. In the
beginning there's going to be some kind
of problem or obstacle that you need to
overcome. The middle is how you went
through this obstacle and what are some
of the things you tried, where does some
of the results and what are some stuff
that went down and the end is, well
did the problem get resolved? if so, how?
and if not well what's gonna happen
instead? Man, that's kind of yet simple
but profound. The simple truth is if you
want to write better you need to start
incorporating more and better stories.
Alright, the next thing you're going to
want to do is check out the two videos I
have linked up right here in order to
take what you've learned here today and
really expedite the process so you can
create way better content, way faster.
Check those right now. Thanks so much for
watching and I'll catch you next time on
The Modern Marketing Show.
Lots of achievement at the start it
creates an addiction. Your content is the
same way, with each paragraph the reader
gains a subconscious feeling of victory
