If you’ve made it this far, you probably belong to the second group, and you’re thinking about working in content or already work in it, and you know that writing opens the door to a number of freelance jobs in that field. However, the fact that the advantages of working as a freelancer are attracting many people around the world (according to Freelancers Union, in 2014 at least 52 million professionals in the United States were working in this field) also means that there is more and more competition, which is why you need to prove that you have what it takes to produce the best content!
To give your freelance career a little boost, in this chapter we’ll look at the main particularities of web writing, the structuring of a blog article and writing techniques,
scannability and organization of ideas. Check it out for yourself and learn what you need to get on the right foot in the freelance writing market!
*This article is a chapter taken from the ebook: Content Production.
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Get the idea
Your first contact with content, once you job seekers data decide to become a freelancer for this market, will be the idea ebook content production. In section 2.2 we explained how the planning staff comes up with an idea. As a writer, however, it is your job to understand what the planning created and put it on paper in a way that matches
their expectations.
It may happen that you completely disagree with the approach to the topic and think that it is not the best way to deal with it. However, it is important that you follow the demands of the idea without hesitation, since they were made based on the details of the person, the client and their Content Marketing strategy, and therefore may be different from your personal opinion.
That’s why the job description itself (or pitch) will help you understand how you can deliver on the promise made in the title, understand the person better, their stage in the funnel, the relevance of the content, and what’s the best way to communicate with them.
Person
If you read section 1.1 of this e-book carefully what are the differences between stocktaking and stock checking, you understood that buyer personas are representations of a company’s target audience. So, when writing content aimed at that persona, it is advisable that you try to get to know and understand them better first, so that you can create a text that is likely to spark their interest ebook content production.
If the person’s description talks about their main problems, for example, you can mention those issues in your text to attract them and show them that you are on the same page as them. Sometimes, you will need to write for a person who has nothing to do with you, and as a writer you have to be a true chameleon to be able to put yourself in the shoes of different people and win them over with your text.
Relevance
Knowing the relevance of the content you are writing to the person is quite important so that you can meet their expectations and also pique their interest by showing that you know why they went looking for the text in the first place and how it will benefit them in some way. You should make use of that information, especially in the introduction of the text.
Funnel Stage
Is the person you’re writing to in the Attract, Consider, or Decision stage? (If you want to refresh your memory a bit about the stages of the funnel, you can go back to section 2.1.) Knowing that can really help you understand how far you can push a given topic, going deeper as the person travels through the sales funnel, and how direct you can be about the solution the company wants to sell with that post.
That way, you won’t end up saying more than you should, treating an experienced reader like a child, or scaring off a reader who’s just begun researching the topic.
Language
Finally, this part of the idea will tell you the tone you should maintain in the text to win the person over through words. Some people rely more on serious, almost academic language, while others prefer more informal and relaxed language ebook content production. Pay attention to our guide so you always hit the nail on the head!
Beyond those details, your blog post idea may also come with keywords you need to use throughout your content, terms you should avoid, instructions on how to finalize your blog post, and even a detailed index of how it should be structured. If you’re not given that much detail, don’t worry: in the next section, we’ll show you the basic skeleton that any blog post should have.
Structuring a blog post
Whether we are talking about “The Lord of the Rings,” “Jaws,” or “Finding Nemo,” any classic of literature or film has a basic structure:
- Introduction
- Knot
- Outcome.
This structure has been used by great writers, editors and journalists throughout the centuries and, obviously, by the best web content creators. The difference is that within Content Marketing it has received a few slightly different names:
- Introduction
- Development in subtitles
- Conclusion
- CTA;
The basic structure of any blog post and the holy trinity of digital copywriters! However, before you join that religion of web writing, it’s good to take a closer look at how each of those parts works and how they can help you write better content ebook content production.
Introduction
In 1975, director Steven Spielberg made history by bringing to the big screen the best-selling book “Jaws” by author Peter Benchley, which tells the story of a giant great white shark on the beaches of a small town in the interior of the United States. It’s a film that grabs our attention from the first few minutes: it begins with a young girl being attacked at night while swimming in the sea! Pretty scary, isn’t it? However, what few people know is that, by masterfully recreating the opening of the book on which the film was based, Spielberg did more than just produce one of the most memorable scenes in the history of cinema: he also taught a lesson on the importance of grabbing the audience’s attention from the start.
Just like in the movies, every web editor’s introduction must show that the content is worthwhile, and if on the big screen the rule says that a director has a maximum of ten minutes to capture the public’s interest, in our blog articles, the editors have a space equal to one page scroll. That’s right, just one mouse movement down, that is, 4 or 5 lines of text; that’s why the title of the content is so important.
It may not seem like much, but if you manage to create a really interesting opening for your content, add a striking image after the title and place a call to action such as “continue reading to find out more” at the end, it won’t be that difficult to win over your reader and make them move on to the second stage of the article: the development of subtitles ebook content production.
Development in subtitles
Did you manage to grab your reader’s attention? Great! Then it’s time to develop your idea. Pay attention: developing online content is not the same as writing a project for college or a report for your boss.
Remember that even after the introduction you have to keep the reader’s interest until the last line, so as not to run the risk of losing him or her throughout the article. One of the ways to convince the Internet user to continue reading, paragraph after paragraph, is to avoid large blocks of text, those that seem like they will take forever to finish, and to divide the ideas into parts separated by subheadings.
Take a book like “The Lord of the Rings” for example (if you don’t like it, think of another one like “Harry Potter,” “The Analyst,” or whatever else you have on your shelf) and imagine having to read the whole thing without it being divided into chapters, i.e. a text that never stops from the first page to the last. Doesn’t that feel.
Overwhelming? Well, it’s the same for your reader
However, don’t think that you can just throw subtitles at people left and right ebook content production.
In order for the development of the text to make sense, subheadings need to follow a certain logic, leading the reader through your reasoning or referencing the promise you made in the title. For example, if the title of the article was a list of “3 countries you need to visit,” each subheading would be a country (like Mexico, Brazil, or Argentina). If it was b2c fax “10 Steps to Producing a Perfect Article,” each subheading should represent a step.
This will make it much easier to lead the reader to the conclusion and the long-awaited CTA!
