Writing good content is one of the most important things you can do as a marketer. It's also one of the most challenging aspects of marketing because it requires you to be skilled in many different areas—from copywriting and editing to marketing strategy and research. In this article, we'll walk through an eight-step framework for writing great content that we've developed based on our experience working with some of the world's top brands like Google, Facebook, PepsiCo and more.
Understand the purpose of your content
Understanding the purpose of your content is crucial to creating a framework that works. The purpose of any piece of content should be clear to both you and the reader, so that they know exactly what they're getting when they click through.
The best way to understand this is by asking yourself: "What do I want people who read this piece of content to feel?" Or even better, "What would make my ideal reader happy?" There are three main purposes for writing blog posts (and all other forms of marketing communication): informing, educating and entertaining. Each has a different goal in mind and will require slightly different strategies in order to achieve it successfully.
Determine the audience for your content.
The first step in creating content that works is to know your audience.
When you think about the people who will be reading and viewing your website, blog or social media pages, consider the following:
Who are they? Are they men or women? What age range do they fall into? How many years of education have they completed? Do they come from a particular geographic location (e.g., rural vs urban)?
What are their needs and problems? What keeps them up at night--what keeps them awake at 2am worrying about where their next meal is coming from or how much money is still owed on those student loans from college 15 years ago? These are questions we should be asking ourselves before diving into writing our first draft because knowing what's on someone else's mind can help us create content that resonates with them more easily than if we had no idea what matters most in their life right now!
Create an outline for your content.
When you're writing content, you need to know what you're going to say before you start. An outline helps keep your topic focused and keeps readers from getting bored or confused by too much information at once.
An outline is simply a list of points that will be included in your piece; it can include bullet points or paragraphs outlining each point, depending on how much detail is needed for each point. For example:
The first step to creating an effective content writing framework is creating an outline for the piece of content that will help guide the writing process from start to finish. This ensures that all important elements are covered and provides consistency throughout the document (or article).
In order for this approach
Study the best examples of your type of content (e.g., blog posts, whitepapers).
In order to create a framework that will work for you, it's important to study the best examples of your type of content (e.g., blog posts, whitepapers). This is where you'll get inspiration and learn what works well.
In particular:
Look at how the content is structured - Does the author use subheadings? What kind of language do they use? How do they present their ideas and arguments?
Note how the author organizes information in their piece - Are there sections within each chapter or section? If so, how many are there and what are they called (e.g., introduction vs conclusion)?
Plan out how you'll organize and develop each section of your content (including citations).
To begin, you'll need to create an outline of your content. Here are some tools that can help you do this:
A mind map. This tool allows you to visually organize your ideas and make them easier for others to understand. It's also a great way for writers who aren't very visual thinkers (like me!) to get their thoughts down on paper. If this sounds like something your team would enjoy using, I highly recommend taking a look at MindJet's free product called MindManager (which also has paid versions).
A table of contents or TOC generator if creating one manually isn't feasible due to time constraints/etc., but having one available as reference material would be helpful during writing sessions because sometimes we forget where we left off when writing long pieces like these! Plus it makes it easier when someone else needs access too since they can easily find what they're looking for without having read through everything beforehand."
Get feedback on your work from someone other than yourself.
Get feedback on your work from someone other than yourself.
It's important to get a second opinion on the writing you've created, especially if it's for an audience of people who are not writers and therefore have no idea how to critique written content. In order for this feedback process to be effective, make sure that the person giving it is knowledgeable about what they're reading (in this case: content). They should also not be working on the project with you or even know much about its subject matter--their opinions will be more objective if their knowledge base is limited.
Check for grammar, punctuation and spelling errors before you publish it.
Once you're happy with the content, it's time to review it for grammar and spelling errors. There are a number of tools you can use to check for these, including:
Grammarly (https://www.grammarly.com/) - This is a web-based tool that will automatically check your writing for common mistakes as well as suggest improvements where necessary. It also has an extension for Chrome that will highlight mistakes in real time as you type them into your document or webpage editor.
Microsoft Word's spellchecker - This basic feature has been around since Word 1 (and probably before), but it remains one of the most important tools in any writer's arsenal because even high school students can benefit from having their work checked by this reliable program.
Writing good content is hard but not impossible
Writing good content is hard but not impossible. It's a skill that can be learned, and there are many ways to improve your writing as you go along.
One of the most important things to remember when designing your content writing framework is that good content has value--to your business, at least. Good content can be used to build your brand, generate leads and sales or both, attract new customers and increase loyalty among existing ones.
Conclusion
Good content is one of the most important things you can do to help your business. It's also one of the hardest things to get right, so don't be afraid to ask for help or advice on how best to approach this task. If you follow these steps and keep at it over time, I promise your writing will improve dramatically!
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