Sharpening Your Content Creation Saw

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“Imagine if you learned 1% more today. That doesn’t seem like very much, right? Now, imagine you learned 1% more every day, 365 days a year. You would have increased your knowledge 365%,” estate planning attorney Brian Eagle wrote in honor of the March 2nd Read Across America Day, emphasizing that reading can keep your mind sharp and creative..

At Say It For You, we couldn’t agree more. Reasons our content writers make “reading around” such an important part of our daily routine include:

  • We need to keep up with what others are saying on the topic we’re handling. What’s in the news? What problems and questions have been surfacing that relate to the industries/professions of our clients?
  • We need a constant flow of ideas, and those ideas can come from unexpected sources.
  • We improve our own writing skills by reading books and articles about good writing.
  • By reading, we uncover little-known facts that we can use to explain our clients’ products, services, and “corporate culture”.
  • Since we’re in the business of selling and marketing, books and articles on those topics are interesting to us and important to our work.

Not only does “reading around” itself sharpen our skills and broaden our horizons, we often both collate and “curate” others’ material for the benefit of our own readers.

Collating is one important way in which content marketers can bring value to readers. Using content from our own former blog posts, newsletters, or even emails, then adding material from other people’s blogs and articles, from magazine content, or from books, we “collate”, or sort, that material into new categories, summarizing the main ideas we think our clients’ readers will find useful. When we curate content, on the other hand, we are giving credit to the authors of an article or post, but then adding our own “take” on that topic.

The term “sharpen the saw”, spica.com explains, comes from a story about two foresters. Competing to see who could cut down trees faster. While the younger man kept hard at work, the older of the two took a break during which he sharpened his saw. Although he had worked less time, he ended up winning the contest.

For us content marketers at Say It For You, reading around is our way of sharpening our saws!

 

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Allow Me to Introduce New Terminology

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Before browsing through a magazine handout at the grocery store called alive.com, I’d never heard the term “immunity debt”, and curiosity led me through an entire article by Dr. Gillian Flower. The thesis – our immune systems need exposure to viruses to protect us from infection, and lower exposure to others through the pandemic may have decreased our resistance, creating an “immunity debt”.

Apparently, not everyone agrees. “Immunity debt is a misguided and dangerous concept,” Anjana Ahuja writes in Financial Times. “There is no evidence that an individual is worse off for having avoided earlier infection.”

While I am certainly not qualified to weigh in on this medical discussion, as a content writer I was impressed by the fact that by simply introducing me to a new term, the author had the power to engage my curiosity about the subject.

In blog marketing, once you’ve established common ground, reinforcing to readers that they’ve come to the right place, it’s important to add lesser-known bits of information on your subject, which might take the form of arming readers with new terminology, serving several purposes:

  • positioning the business owner or professional practitioner as an expert in the field
  • adding value to the “visit” for the reader
  • increasing readers’ sense of being part of an “in-the-know” group

As content writers, part of our challenge is to educate both prospects and clients on the issues relating to their decisions to choose between one business’ products and services and those of its competitors.  Introducing a curiosity-stimulating new term is one possible way to do just that. At Say it For You, we believe in empowering readers by teaching them the correct use of the terms that apply in the blog sponsor’s field of interest and expertise. Any hint of controversy only adds to the mystique of the terminology.

Most important, buyers feel empowered to make a decision when they feel “in on” the “lingo”.

 

 

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To Be Original, Be Well-Versed

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“Originality is important for publication, and to be as original as possible, you have to be well versed in what has already been done,” Ran Walker, author of 28 books, tells writers in a Writer’s Digest piece. With millions of people working in the horror novel genre, for example, “it’s easy to go for the easy scares or gross-outs. It’s good to be inspired by other writers, he admits, but that inspiration needs to guide you into new and uncharted territory.

When it comes to online content marketing, Camille Allegrucci has a slightly divergent view, citing “the myth of originality”. Your voice, Allegrucci says, is more important than new ideas, and no “original” idea is truly original, anyway. (Would anyone seriously contend that Anna Karenina lacks originality or is not worth reading because of the plot points it shares with Madame Bovary?) The question to ask yourself is not “How can I say something that has never been said before?” but rather “How can I express myself in the best way that my voice allows?”

It helps to bring in less well-known facts about familiar things and processes, and even more when you suggest new ways of thinking about things readers already know. New ideas may not be “a thing”, but new insights and opinions can be. At Say It For You, our advice to business owners and their content writers is that you must offer an opinion, a slant, on the information you’re serving up to readers. No, it’s not “new information”, and you’re not re-inventing the proverbial wheel. What’s “new is the clarity of your views on the subject.

There may, in fact, be “millions of people” working in the horror novel genre, as Ran Walker points out, but there are 4.4 million new blog posts being published every DAY! So, as Allegrucci claims, it may not be about “originality” after all, but more about “un-packaging” information already out there, proactively interpreting content in ways that are not only understandable, but usable by readers.

The other “piece” of being well-versed to be original involves the research into emotive power responsiveness. Researchers at the University of Bath, working with Nielson, came up with two ways to score ads.

1. Information Power Score – measures what the consumer perceives as the value of the message
2. Emotive Power Score – measures if the emotion is going to change feelings about the brand

The “originality” of effective blog posts, I teach at Say It For You, consists of offering the business owner’s (or the professional’s, or the organizational executive’s) unique perspective on issues related to the search topic and their unique experiences and insights gained.

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Master Chefs and Master Content Writers Stay Up on Current Things

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After winning the “Beat Bobby Flay” cooking competition in 2017, Indianapolis restaurateur Steve Oakley explained that what keeps him inspired after twenty years in the restaurant business is – reading a lot. Looking at a book is inspirational to him, along with “just talking with customers about experiences they have”, Oakley explains. Dean Sample, a former employee of Oakley’s (now a head chef in his own right) had this to say of his former mentor: “To be doing it as long as he has and still have that interest and still trying and experimenting with different things all the time, it’s pretty impressive. He stays up on all kinds of current things in the world of chefs and restaurants.” The other part of being a chef, Oakley now tells IndyStar reporter Cheryl Jackson, is that “if you want to be recognized, you have to get out there in different ways. You can’t just limit yourself to cooking in your restaurants…you’ve got to get out, meet the people, and shake their hands”.

Blog content writers can do no better than follow the Oakley “playbook”. In fact, “reading around”, we often stress at Say It For You, is a crucial habit. You need to keep up with what others are saying on your topic. What’s in the news? What problems and questions have been surfacing that relate to your industry or profession (or that of your client?). Not only do you need a constant flow of ideas, but you can improve your own writing skills by reading books about writing. And, in the business of blog marketing, books about selling and marketing help keep your skills sharp.

Notice that Steve Oakley’s “content” is refreshed by more than reading. Getting out and meeting the people, talking with customers about experiences they have is crucial when it comes to keeping blog content relevant. In Journalism 101, I was taught to “put a face on the issue” by beginning articles with a human example . A case study takes that personalization even further, chronicling a customer or client who had a certain problem or need, taking readers through the various stages of how the product or service was used to solve that problem. What were some of the issues that arose along the way? What new insights were gained through that experience, on the part of both the business and the customer?

Master chefs and master content writers stay up on current things!

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One By One Problem-Solve in Blogging for Business

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This week, our Say It For You blog is sharing insights gained from the book The Writer’s Resource , by Day and McMahan….

“Analysis is always a part of effective problem solving,” the authors assert. Take any topic, isolate the parts, and think about them one by one, they advise. Why is it so hard to study English? Think of the component parts: a) You have not bought the textbook. b) The light bulb in your desk lamp has been burned out. c) You turn on the TV the moment you come home from school. Tackle each of those three, then think up three more rationalizations and deal with those, the authors say. Eventually, you’ll get to the heart of the problem, and the breakthrough will be due to your growing analytical prowess.

At Say It For You, we realize that our clients’ blog readers are not their students, and it’s going to be up to us content writers to “solve” readers’ issues, answering their questions, engaging their interest, and moving them to take action. The secret may lie in the story Day and McMahan tell about the composition teacher who told her students: “If, after writing the opening paragraph of your paper, you find you’ve run out of ideas of what to say next, begin the second paragraph with the words ‘for example'”. Even if you’re not writing about something difficult or abstract, the authors say, you still need examples to prove your point, as well as “to add verve and interest”. All good writing, the authors conclude, uses examples and illustrations.

But, in order to follow that opening-paragraph-followed-by-examples format, it’s important to first isolate one small aspect of your topic, focusing on just one idea in each blog post. Not only will that add more “punch”, but it allows the content writer – and the reader – to focus on that one central point. Remember, that opening paragraph is there to make clear not only what need, issue, or problem is to be discussed, but also what “slant” the business or practice owner has on the issue.

Then, the “for example” content might be based on real customer experiences, an issue with which the founders had wrestled before discovering the solution.

In blogging for business, it’s a good idea to tackle problems one by one!

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