Lessons in structure, from the editors of The Traitors

There is no shortage of advice for those looking to start a writing project. For writers of purposeful content, I’d suggest there is one good place to start: the ending.

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If you’re producing content for a client, content that supports the client’s sales or marketing efforts, you need to know your ending. How do you establish the ending? Understand the purpose this content serves and the messaging it is intended to reinforce.

Be clear on your clients’ objectives. Become familiar with the features of the clients’ solutions.

It’s a point explained nicely in this Joel Morris piece. He references the work of the editors in The Traitors, now on series three on the BBC. For those unfamiliar with the show, the climax of each episode features a round table where contestants choose who to eliminate. This is where the drama is, so this is where the editors start. They focus on the tension of the round table. This informs the episode’s narrative. The rest of the edit, the preceding 45 minutes, builds to support the ending.

Given the show’s timelines (filmed in the summer, broadcast in the winter), no doubt the editors will be working on the story arc of the individual show and the overall 12 episodes.

For customer storytelling, starting-with-the-ending means never raising a customer challenge that cannot be addressed by the client’s solution. Never flag a benefit to the customer without linking it to a feature of the solution. Find evidence of the impact, and then gather the content that builds the stakes.

Yours, faithfully.