After hearing from everyone that content marketing is one of the best ways to promote your business online, now you have decided to try your hand at writing content. Even if you are a successful writer in other mediums, you will come to know that content writing guidelines are much different as you are writing for Google and your audience. If you are new to content writing, you may feel it to be a daunting task, so here we have 10 content writing tips for beginners to help you start.
Writing content is a dream for many. Some write newspaper content whereas some write content for social media, and some become great authors. But, no matter how much hard work you put in, some content writers are always better than others. What makes these writers good at what they do is the way they function and research.
During this digital era, where there is so much content available online, just writing is not enough. Pairing your unique talent with the right method of processing is what makes the writing remarkably good.
There are certain things that successful content writers do differently. Let us see the top 10 content writing tips for beginners that can help you. But before that let us first understand what content writing is.
What is Content Writing?
Content writing is the procedure of planning, writing, and editing web content, mainly for digital marketing purposes. It includes writing content on blog topics, articles, scripts for videos, and podcasts. It also includes writing content for certain platforms, like tweetstorms on Twitter or text posts on Reddit.
Why is Content Writing Important?
When most people hear about “content writing”, they think it is just about “writing articles.” However, content writing is not important for blog posts. In fact, it plays an important role in all kinds of various content formats including email newsletters, video scripts, podcast titles, keynote speeches, web copy, social media posts, Whitepapers, and much more.
10 Content Writing Tips for Beginners
- Start with research
To keep your content ideas flowing, you must do research often. Research must not be followed by writing and planning. In fact, spare a moment. As soon as you find the idea on which you are going to write, research more. But now, you must research, specifically on the topic. While researching, make a note of the pointers that you want to include in your content.
- Write a catchy headline
The headline of your content should serve three purposes. It must grab the attention of readers, offer a perfect summation of the information, and meet search guidelines to help Google assign a high rank in the search results. Your headline must include your focus keyphrase. It should be between 55 to 70 characters and must contain 6 to 7 words. Headlines in the form of a list, a guide, how-to, or a question tend to rank the highest.
- Do keyword research for SEO
Before you start writing content, you must know about what you are writing. You can kill two birds in one shot if you mix search engine optimization with your content writing planning. Digital marketing experts consider keyword research as the most important part of online marketing. SEO keyword research helps you to identify which are the topics that Google finds relevant. It illuminates your competitor’s content strategy and focuses on the strengths and weaknesses. Keyword research also allows you to optimize articles and your content strategy to attract more traffic.
- Make your content readable
Your content must be formatted so that it becomes easy for the readers and Google to read and understand. Long pages are difficult to read online, mainly on small smartphone screens. Rather than using three to four sentences in one para, try to break your writing into small paragraphs of one or two sentences. so that it becomes easy for the readers to read. Content with numbered lists and bullet points are popular formats as they make a story readable.
- Focus on a topic, rather than keyword stuffing
Keywords make content readable, search-friendly, and valuable. But, when you begin cramming in keywords, the results are different. A web content stuffed with keyword looks untrustworthy and dubious- to both human readers and Google. Your conversion rate and SERPs rankings go down, along with the page views. Readers start to consider it as a low-quality page and leave the page.
Search engines are smart. No need to work in grammatically incorrect keyword phrases just because the searchers use it. Also, there is no need to work on every keyword variation of a search term for Google to understand what the page is about.
- Word Count plays a significant role
There is a rule which says that longer the content, better the results. It has been noted that longer content always achieves a high search rank. To get the highest rank in search results, the content must be a minimum of 1000 words and typically between 1500 and 2500. However, if you are a beginner, no need to create content that is so long. The content of 500 words is enough for Google to index and assign a positive rank in the search engine results.
- Write an attractive Title and First Paragraph
Writing a killer headline plays a major role in content writing. Just imagine you are scrolling your Facebook page. While scrolling you come across an article that says, “How to Start Content Writing”. You also come across another article with the title, “6 Amazing Tips to Start Content Writing.” Both these may contain the same type of info, but the latter seems to be more interesting. In the same way, your users will decide whether they want to read your article or not just by reading the title and the first para. Therefore, both the headline and the first para should be the best.
- A catchy conclusion
Conclude your writing with a powerful note. Let the end-thought stick in the minds of your readers. The key is to cover all the things that you have explained in the article and still leave an impression on your readers’ minds.
- Give importance to feedback
Not many people will suggest you take feedback seriously. However, there is no better way to improve your writing than listening to critics. Whatever feedback you get, try to make improvements on it. There are times when people exaggerate things to make you feel low. But, when a client gives negative feedback, cross-check what have you done. Take advice from fellow writers to know how to create content and understand the issue.
If you want to learn content writing basics and want to learn how to write good content, then focus on what users and clients say about your work.
- Keep practicing
Like any other skill, content writing also needs practice. The more you do, the easier it becomes. You can also find several content writing samples online that can help you. Also, you can look at content writing tutorials to learn how to improve your content writing skills.
Not every professional writer is good. Incorporate these 10 content writing tips for beginners and improve your writing. Try these tips and you will start writing like a pro!