10 Top Tips for Writing Content In 2022

reating content in the form of blogs and articles is an effective way to attract and expand an audience for your brand and business. Through blog writing one can also effectively fabricate brand voice and identity, improving viewer reach. A well-written and organised blog attracts customers through a brand story and develops customers loyalty.

Creating?organic search content?associated with a brand or business is becoming more important in the digital age of internet users. According to a recent study as much as?77% of internet users?read blogs, making it an important marketing aspect for any business. But how does one create an interesting, effective and well-written blog to create the desired attention of viewers?

In this article we will discuss 10 tips to consider and include when writing blog posts.

1. Establish and Understand Your Viewers

A primary consideration when building a blog is giving thought to your audience or the target market you’d like to direct your writing towards. Who will read your blog posts? What characteristics of individuals will find what you’re writing about interesting and enticing? Imagine yourself as a reader of your content and use this as the basis of creating your brand through the topics you write about.

2. Setting Goals and Direction

Establish clear goals and a vision before starting. Consider what message you would like to have as a constant link between all your blog posts. Write down goals, research and brainstorm how you will achieve these goals through writing. Define the message you want to resonate with your readers and most importantly decide how you will use your voice to share your views and opinions with your readers.

Save yourself time by having a clear purpose of the goals and direction you want to have for your online presence and brand image. If you are confused by the direction and intention of your writing, it’s likely your viewers will be too.

3. Creating Your Own Unique Content

Creating a niche in the market can differentiate your brand and business from others that may otherwise seem similar. There are more than?600 million blogs?circling the internet at the moment, meaning the competition for gaining readers is increasing, along with the importance of having unique content to distinguish yourself in the online blog readers market.

If you know exactly what you want to create with blogging but are not sure how to do it, outsourcing to writing experts could be an avenue to invest in. Writing authentic, credible and enticing content requires writers who are creative, passionate and widely knowledgeable about the subject.

Write a list about topics you’re interested in writing about, brainstorm themes and messages you want to convey through your writing. Don’t create blog posts that are too broad in content, as this will likely lose viewers focus and they are less likely to invest time in following your writing.

4. Develop a Voice through Quality Content

The importance of developing one's own voice, character and style of writing is one often overlooked. Readers are more interested in how you say something as opposed to what you say. Consistency and credibility of your voice throughout all posts and reinforcing the brand voice is important for authenticity. Regular blog readers state that the most important attribute to any blog’s success is the quality of the content.

5. Be Consistent

Loyal blog follows as well as wanting to resonate with the person behind the blog more than the writing itself, value consistency. Consistent and regular blogging (more than once a week) effectively leads to?twice the speed of subscriber growth?than bloggers posting less frequently.

6. Value your Existing Readers

It’s important not to direct your focus completely towards attracting new viewers or followers. It is also important to balance your focus towards keeping existing?followers?satisfied as well as attracting and gaining new readers.

Don’t be shy to communicate with your audience, research their trends, interests and ask for feedback with regard to the content you provide. Establish ways to create value for them, ultimately your viewers are always interested in what they can gain from following your writing topics and blog posts.

7. More is Better

Frequent articles and blog posts with?more than 2000 words?are more likely to have strong results. The length of blog posts has?increased by 53%?when compared with the average length in 2013.?Add value and credible content by including?video content?and organic pictures rather than stock photographs.

If your content is reliable and authentic your readers are more likely to share your posts. If your content is shared on other websites and citations link back to your blogs, it will expand your reach and broaden your reader’s market. Businesses with a blog presence receive?97% more links?to their websites.

8. Blogging platform

LinkedIn is the most effective social media platform?for delivering content and securing audience engagement. Carefully selecting the platform you use to share your content with the world will affect your rate of subscribers and followers.?97% of bloggers?use social media to promote their content. The platform you use to communicate with your audience and promote your writing has a direct impact on the success of your blog reaching the right readers.

9. Prioritise Your Email Contacts

Even in the start up stages of a blog it's important to gain the email contacts for your viewers. Understanding and valuing your viewers is an ongoing process in writing, comparing blog posts and reading reviews are ways writers can better get to know their audience preferences and the value they gain from following your blogs.

Once a following for your writing is established it’s important to maintain communication with your readers, ask them questions to gain insight into their expectations of your writing and the value they hope to gain from it. Emailing is a reliable channel for communication.

10.?Invest in Blogging

Blogging, although can be a marketing avenue for improving brand quality and image in a short time, is better to be seen as a long term investment. The internet is filled with businesses trying to make their mark on society via media platforms.

Your online brand presence is more important than ever.

Download our?Ultimate Social Media Guide?and whitepaper.

Your online brand presence is more important than ever.From setting up the right social accounts for your business, to creating high performing marketing content, learn how to effectively manage your community and reap the benefits of social media.

Looking for support from a?social-first digital agency? Get in touch with?123 Internet Group!

Bonus Tips: Proofreading checklist

Proofing your own work can be tricky, one of the best ways to review and spot mistakes or potential changes is to print it out! It’s far easier to spot errors on paper. If you are creating a lot of content you can also take advantage of apps and software like Grammarly

Spelling - are there any typos?

• US spellings - (e.g. organization, color, realize) – switch for UK versions

Grammar - check carefully!

• Read the words out loud – does it flow? Are the pauses falling in the right places??
• Does every sentence end with a piece of punctuation??
• Are brand names in title case? (e.g. 123 Internet Group)

Word variations – are they correct? (your/you’re, there/their, its/it’s)

Apostrophes - should only be used when a letter is missing (e.g. it is = it’s) or in these cases when referring to possession:

• Singular = his grandma’s raincoat (the raincoat belongs to the grandma, and so does the apostrophe)
• Plural = global organisations’ needs (the needs of multiple organisations, so the apostrophe belongs to them all, as a group)

Hashtags - double check, are they all spelt correctly? (Remember that any symbols or punctuation will break hashtags, so remove if present)

Consistency - make sure everything matches up, e.g:

• Same voice throughout – e.g: ‘we are’ vs. ‘the company is’
• Bullets/lists – do the points follow the same structure?
• Use regular sentence case throughout, unless calling out proper nouns (e.g. Queen Elizabeth, Africa, Nando’s, iPhone)

Numbers - good for catching the eye, use to highlight statistics?

Measurements - double check how these are written on Google

Terminology and quotations

• Single ‘ marks for unusual terms – e.g. ‘Big data’ refers to…
• Double “ for quotes – e.g. “Lovely copywriting”, said Becky.

Sense checking / context - does it make sense to you??

• Could you explain the post content to a friend who has no knowledge of it?
• Without Googling, do you understand what the post is referring to, particularly where products are mentioned??
• If not, what needs adding to make sense of the post?
• Take caution when lifting copy from client sites. In 99.9% of cases, your writing will be better. Proof carefully, simplify where needed.

Repetition - look out for repeated words that could bore the reader, or points that repeat what has already been mentioned. Less is more!

Call to action (CTA)

• Has a CTA been included??
• Does it inspire you to take action??
• Is it clear what the next step is and where you’ll end up if you click? (E.g. Learn more / Take a look / See the range)

Scott Jones is the CEO of?123 Internet Group, a full service digital marketing agency with a head office in Milton Keynes and further locations in Northampton and London we support a national audience with?web design and development,?search engine marketing,?social media management,?hosting and email services.

For more information about our services or advice on how to improve your online marketing activities please reach out and connect with us via our?website?or our social media channels.