Follow these simple rules and gain entrance to content heaven.
1. Thou shalt make it interesting, always
If your copy, formed in a blog post or white paper, fails to shine then few people will read it. But to make things worse, your audience is less likely to link to your work and may even decide to avoid future posts you create. The net effect of writing something poor could be disastrous.
2. Thou shalt make content searchable
The narrative of search in recent times has been one of Google, Bing and Yahoo! making it all about content; the sites it ranks high in search results do so because they contain high-quality content. True, but these search engines still respond to keyword phrases, so keep them in mind. For more on how to do keyword research, read this excellent guide by Moz.
3. Thou shalt make copy concise
It doesn’t matter whether you take this medicine in the form of Occam’s Razor, George Orwell’s ‘Politics and the English Language’ or the Hemingway app. Keep your copy short and get to the point.
4. Thou shalt not steal…
but it’s still OK to find inspiration. Cutting and pasting someone else’s content is clearly wrong – and for that matter damaging to your SEO score – but the iniquity of plagiarism shouldn’t stop you from borrowing ideas and expressing them in your own language. This is especially true of blogging. There will be times when you see content so good it would be disheartening to try to eclipse, so simply write a summary for your readers and provide links to the original work.
5. Thou shalt do your research
Speaking with confidence on a topic is not easy, and if yours is an audience that appreciates well-argued, evidence-based copy, you’ll have your work cut out reading the latest white papers, books and magazines, as well as engaging in workshops, trade fairs and seminars.
6. Thou shalt not talk about yourself
Good content marketing is about building an intelligent relationship with your audience, where you guide them through various issues in which you speak as an expert. So don’t exploit your readers by recommending the products your company sells. You’ll destroy the trust you have built up and will lose your audience in droves. By all means supply a call to action at the end of your content that links to your sales team, but don’t endorse your company directly.
7. Thou shalt write clear headlines*
Take John Cleese’s three rules for comedy and apply it to your headlines: no puns, no puns, no puns. That’s right, what works well in print can fail disastrously online, and clever double entendres are the prime example. Read more about the differences between online and print headlines here.
8. Thou shalt avoid pictures of calculators
Cliché’s in photography and illustration are a bêtte noire for Content Desk. Read why, here and here.
9. Thou shalt aim for consistency
If you lack the resources to hire a copy editor, use an online style instead. The virtues of sticking to a house style when formatting numbers, italicising film titles etc., might seem trivial, but it is commonplace in mainstream media for a reason – you’ll look unprofessional if you are inconsistent, and your audience may even question the ideas in your content if they think it comes from an iffy source.
10. Thou shalt tweet. A shedload
There is no getting around the engagement issue. Try to discover whether your audience uses Twitter, Google+, Facebook, etc. and engage with them. This doesn’t simply mean pushing the content you create. Rather, use social media to reinforce your authority on a subject by participating in relevant discussions, re-tweeting links you have read and endorse, and keeping track of new or hot issues.
* Subheads can be as convoluted as you like
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