Content Creation Secrets

If you’ve been reading up on writers and writers, you would have come across this Hemingway technique.

Hemingway discusses it in his book, A Moveable Feast, among his other sketches on life in Paris.

The technique is to stop writing when the going is good. Hemingway advises you to stop at the point where you know what’s coming next.

The whole idea of stopping thus is to provide you with the momentum for your writing the next day.

If you have trouble starting writing every day, this technique could come in handy. Instead of having to rack your brains wondering what to write, you’ll just have to jump in and continue with the flow.

To make this technique work, you would probably have to stop your writing in mid-sentence or stop at a point where you’re asking a question.

For example, you can stop at a point where a character is asking another, “How did you escape from the robbers?”

You know what the other character is going to say. You stop there although you’re tempted to write on.

The next day, you can be rest assured to jump straight into the writing and continue.

Now, Hemingway used this technique to write his novels. Can this technique be applied to short story or article writing or even blogging?

Check this article out.

If you have been blogging for a while, you would have learnt about your blog’s strengths and weaknesses.

Your weaknesses may include lack of writing prowess, plain language and even typos.

You should correct these weaknesses as much as possible. The one thing you should not do is fuss and worry over them. If you give much time and energy, you’ll end up with a no-win situation, Why, you may even end up giving up on blogging.

Instead, outline a strategy on how you will be attacking these weaknesses. Follow and refine this strategy and you’ll certainly see results over time. Patience and persistence is the name of the game.

While devoting time to rectify your weaknesses, you would want to also focus on your strengths. Which category in your blog draws the most response in terms of comments?
Do you see a jump in traffic when you blog on a certain topic?

Which topic do you find yourself writing eloquently about?
You may have started your blog on a general theme, but over time you can identify the area that generates reader interest.

Focus on this area and generate more fresh content.
Blogging is all about learning to identify your strengths and weaknesses.

Ask yourself what you are doing to overcome the weaknesses.

Ask also what you’re doing to reinforce your strengths.

Have you written some good content so that you could generate search engine traffic?

Traffic to your site or blog depends on your ranking in the search engine pages. Does good content rank highly in such pages?

We learn that search engine robots are getting smarter by the day. We are told they can easily differentiate between valuable content and spam.

Is this true? Are search engine robots that smart?

If you don’t get a good ranking because there are better content pages you’ll have to accept defeat graciously.
What if it’s spam or not-so-valuable page that ranks higher than your content page?

I’ve come across sales pages and product order pages that are ranked higher (first page)than good content pages, which are consigned to the third or fourth pages.

You and I know searchers don’t go beyond the second or third page in normal circumstances.

So, what can we do when a sales page or product order page ranks above your content page?

You will have to write more content on the same keywords and submit to article directories like ezinearticles. Search engines rank content from article directories highly and you can still drive traffic to your content pages in a roundabout way.

The other method would be to create a Youtube video on your keyword and leave a link to your content page in the video description section. Search engines rank Youtube videos highly and your video may end up on the first page for your chosen keyword.

Do these methods appeal to you? Do you have any other methods?

If you’re brimming with ideas for blog posts, you may find it tempting to discuss them with friends or family members instead of writing them down.

Is this a wise thing to do?

Yes and no.

Of course talking it out is much, much easier than writing it down. You may find yourself waxing lyrical about your ideas. If you’re going to discussing your content in depth then you run the risk of running out of steam when it comes to writing the content.

Yes, you may feel what’s there to write when you’ve already talked it all out.

If you really have to discuss your blogging ideas, just talk briefly on the topic without going into the details of the content.

You don’t want to end up emotionally spent even before you sit down to write your content.

Talking about your content, however, comes useful if you’re having trouble getting started writing your blog post.

In this instance, you may want to use your friend or family member as a springboard for a smooth flow of ideas.

You may even want to do an audio recording of the discussion so that you could use it to refresh your memory when it comes to writing your blog post.

Here are some sentence starters you could use if you have trouble getting your blog post written.

• The one thing I like about ________________.
Example: The one thing I like about making daily blog posts is the opportunity it provides to cultivate writing discipline. (You can then go on to write about how your writing discipline has improved as a result of making daily blog posts).

• I thought it would be exciting to share my experience of ___________________.
Example: I thought it would be exciting to share my experience of writing an ebook. (You can explain the process and how you managed or failed to write the ebook).

• Do you face this problem when it comes to ______________________?
Example: Do you face this problem when it comes to monetizing your blog? (You can also use this sentence starter as your blog post headline or title. You just go on to define the problem and propose a solution to it.)

• How do you___________________?
Example: How do you get more readers for your blog? (Can be used as a title. You explain the steps to be taken to achieve the desired goal.)

• One of the best ways to ______________ is _________.
Example: One of the best ways to earn an income from your blog is by joining a blogging network. (You choose one among the many ways to do something).

What are your favorite sentence starters? Would you like to share them?

The one secret to having regular traffic to your blog is having timeless content – content that is relevant now and will be valuable in the future.

While some niches automatically qualify for timeless content, there are others which do not easily lend themselves to timeless or evergreen content. That doesn’t mean you’ll be helpless in the latter case.

If you’re blogging about brainstorming or writer’s block, rest assured that your content will be timeless. Your content will still be read ten years from now.

What if your content is about something topical like Obama’s presidential campaign or the Beijing Olympics? Your blog is not likely to generate much interest after Obama becomes the President or after the Olympics is over.

Also you’ll be struggling to have fresh content for your blog on a regular basis.

Of course I don’t advise you to set out choosing a timeless subject to blog on if that subject is not your passion.

But then with a little thought and creativity, you could find a timeless angle to any topical subject. Take for instance your blog on Obama’s presidential campaign.

You can have a post about motivation tips anyone can pick up from the campaign. Or there could be a post about how Obama’s campaign planning strategies could be used by company executives.

While you should not set out to consciously write timeless content in a topical niche, you could always ask yourself , “How can I make this topical post timeless? What angle should I use?”

Then you could probably set out to write another related post that’s timeless.

If you have a healthy dose of timeless content in a topical blog, you could still keep your blog going even past the event.

Just keep looking for fresh angles.

You may have visited some top-performing blogs and come away with a bitter taste in your mouth.

Why a bitter taste when you can learn so much from these blogs?

It’s because you compare your blog with these `giants’.

Firstly, you may find that your blog doesn’t sound as glib as these top dogs.

I think this is always a perennial issue even with experienced content creators.

The other bloke’s voice always sounds more melodious.
In this area, what you think doesn’t matter. Yes, it does not matter how flat your blog sounds to you. What matters is how it sounds to your readers.

If you write in a voice which comes naturally to you, chances are it will impress your readers.

So, stop dreaming of acquiring a `super’ voice. Use the voice you already have and you’ll be alright.

If you can’t trust your voice, you can’t go far in blogging.
You may also reckon your blog sounds flat because of your language. Who is ever satisfied with his language? Again, it’s always the other bloke who’s using better language.

Beginners worry about their language as if an English teacher will be grading their blog posts.

This is an unnecessary worry. It’s a complete waste of time figuring out the best language for your blog posts.
Use the language you already have and don’t fuss over what you’ve written. Move on to the next blog post. One thing is certain. The more blog posts you write, the better will be your language.

Leave voice and language to the poets and novelists and just concentrate on what you’ve to say in your blog.

Do you find yourself struggling to write the opening paragraph of your blog post? Do you keep crossing out the sentences you write?

If you find yourself facing this problem, it’s because you’ve skipped an important stage of the content creation process.

What do sportsmen do before they participate in a game or event?

They spent some time warming up, to loosen their muscles and get into the mood for participation.

Bloggers can borrow the technique from sportsmen to loosen their mental muscles to help them kick start their blog posts.

It works.

Say you have a subject for your blog post. You also have figured out how to approach the subject. However, when you start writing it, you’re stuck. You try to restart it without much success.

Well, before you throw in the towel out of frustration, why don’t you try the warm up trick first?

Forget about your blog post first. Set aside five or ten minutes for a warm up session.

In this session you write about what you’ll be writing about in your blog post.

Take out a clean sheet of paper and write: I’m going to write about _______________________

Write on without worrying about content or language. Write without any inhibition telling yourself that this is only a warm up session.

If you find yourself worrying about what you’re writing, remind yourself that this not a real piece of writing. Tell yourself it’s something you’re doing for fun to loosen up.

You can even go to the extent of telling yourself that you’ll be throwing away the piece because it’s just a warm up piece.

Through my experience, the warm up session doesn’t usually give you throw-away material. More often than not, you’ll end up discovering your opening paragraph for your blog post.

You will also experience writing flow which you’ll be itching to transfer to your blog post.

So, when you’re stuck writing your blog post, don’t give up.

Start your warm up session immediately and start writing away about what you’ll be writing about.

Isn’t that better than giving up? At least you’ll have a chance of catching something useful.

So, you’ve finally started a blog?

You must certainly be raring to go, waiting to unleash your thoughts, ideas and know-how.

In the beginning, chances are you’ll be absorbed in your blog, writing away and planning future posts.

Friends and family will come to know about your new life as a blogger. You may, if you’re lucky, receive comments from your readers. Since you’re now a blogger, you would be looking at other related blogs to gauge your own.

Al of the above may provide you with blogging inspiration. But, my friend, if you’re not careful, they may work against you and impede your blogging progress.

Friends may not appreciate your blog for lack of interest or knowledge in your subject matter. Comments may point out an oversight on your blog post or a shortcoming there. Worse still, there may be no comments at all after weeks. And when you study other blogs, you may learn that they are far more superior to yours, with their traffic, positive comments, page rank and so on.

If you’re a beginner or someone weak in spirit, you can’t help but feel disheartened.

You begin to wonder whether you should go on with your blog, whether what you’re doing is worthwhile.

When this doubt creeps into your mind, you’re in Danger Zone, my friend.

If you allow yourself to be weakened by these external elements, which you have no control over, you’ll find yourself crumbling.

If you’re not sure what to do in this instance, just write IGNORE in large capital letters on a sheet of paper and put it before you.

Then put this thought into your mind: “No matter what the external elements say or imply, I’ll be the blogger I am. Nobody can upgrade or downgrade me. Only I can.”

Then go into the frog-in the-well mode and start blogging away, blind and deaf to everything else, as far as your blog is concerned.

The blog post got me interested.

It was discussing how you could have ideas for blog posts all the time.

Among the methods suggested was to have an ideas file. You’re encouraged drop ideas from your notebook, pages torn off magazines, newspaper clippings and even brochures into this file. Anything that you think can spark off ideas for blog posts.

You’re then also encouraged to also have a folder in your computer. This is where you keep ideas jotted in your notepad and it’s recommended that you transfer ideas from your offline file to it.

The post elicited several comments, mostly thanking and praising the blogger for the suggestion. Some even said they’ll follow the suggestions at once. One said he had been looking for such a solution for a long, long time.

However, there was one comment that was a little unusual. The writer said he was already following the suggestion of throwing into his folder anything he can use as inspiration for his blog posts.

His folder is now full and his desk is now full to overflowing with newspaper clippings, pages from his notebooks, materials printed from the web and so on.
With so many ideas around him, he had a problem – writer’s block. He often finds it difficult to get started writing a blog post.

At once I sensed that this chap is suffering from the Idea Overload Syndrome. He has too many ideas fighting for his attention that he isn’t quite sure which to choose and write on.

The decision-making process is simply too painful that he abandons any attempt to get started. But the thing is he keeps on collecting blog ideas and throws them into his folder or on his overcrowded desk.

I have a confession to make.

I used to maintain an ideas folder in my early days as a writer. I soon learnt that they were practically of no use to me. I never relied on them when I’m looking for ideas to write on.

Many ideas are lying in the folder for fifteen years and more and I hardly look at them. I stumble upon them when cleaning my studio, but they don’t spur me to expand on them and write.

Now I consider it a waste of time collecting ideas. They’re time consuming and they don’t bring me returns. Also, I don’t want all these ideas to crowd my mind and give rise to the Idea Overload Syndrome.

For the Content Creation Secrets, I’ve never worked on more than two or three ideas at a time. Out of a possible three I choose only one and discard the rest. There have been times when I’ve yet to settle on an idea for the next day’s post. That’s alright. I can always come up with a single idea hours before making a post.

At the time of writing this post, I have two more post ideas, but I’m not sure whether I’ll be working on them. I’m not going to worry about them until I start writing tomorrow’s blog post. I may discard both and come up with something fresh, hours before posting.

The one thing I told promised myself when I started this blog is I want to enjoy writing the blog posts here. So, keeping an ideas file has the potential of defeating my purpose and even put me in the position of the bloke who’s struggling with writer’s block despite being swamped with ideas.

I need no more than two ideas at a time, just in case I can’t come up with something fresh and good before making a blog post.

So, if you’ve been suffering from the Idea Overload Syndrome, chuck your ideas folder aside and have no more than two or three ideas to work on at any one time.

Too much preparation can put additional strain on your mind and prevent your from achieving the results you desire.