How to write better and faster

Writing better content is one of the goals of the creators of Content Marketing. And particularly the application of better writing skills on occasions when you don’t have enough time to maintain a blog. Plus, as you know, this is a very important part of any marketing strategy. Take a look at these statistics:

• Companies that have blogs gets 55% more visitors to its website than those that don’t have a blog.
• Blogging is responsible for the generation of 97% more inbound links to websites and 126% more potential clients.
• Moreover, blogs get 434% more pages indexed in the main search engines. In other words, they give users more chances to find you.

Do you understand why nowadays it’s so necessary to be continually creating content? A few years ago, Téa Silvestre from Story Bistro performed a survey and the data speaks volumes. More than 1000 respondents were asked what they considered to be their biggest challenge in marketing processes. And as expected, 40% agreed that it was time management.

Other studies indicated that 51% of B2B marketers agreed that a lack of time was their biggest challenge in generating content.

Clearly the problem lies in the fact that content creation requires work and persistence. And very often, we don’t have enough time to create well optimized content.
In light of that, a growing need to find quick and better alternatives has emerged. All with the aim of being aligned with the Content Marketing strategy and without compromising on quality.

Can we learn to write better? And quicker?

1. Always keep several ideas up your sleeve

There’s no better way to waste time than to sit down to write and not know what topic to write about. If a deadline is approaching, you will be glued to your chair until you feel inspired. You won’t write any better, and you´ll also waste valuable time.

There are many techniques that will help you feel inspired to create content even at the worst of times. However, we should keep a few of these techniques in mind.

• Create a list of possible topics.
• Save newsletters and possible sources of inspiration that you find in your email inbox. After that, pick out the main ideas and save some topics for consultation later on.
• Don’t hesitate to create an editorial calendar to give you a general overview of your monthly posts. This will keep you from missing the boat! Plus, it will guarantee that those special dates are covered. Like weekends or holidays.
• You can also shake up the posts you’ve created or take an idea from one of them to create a brand new post.

This is a much more effective method for writing better and quicker rather than running out of ideas.

2.- Wipe out the bad ideas

The fact that an idea is good doesn’t mean that you should write about it. Or that you’ll find it easier to write better. Particularly if you don’t completely master the topic. Therefore, before you begin to create new content, ask yourself two questions:

DO I HAVE THE RESEARCH, STUDIES AND DATA TO BACK UP WHAT I’M SAYING?

If the answer is ‘yes’, the idea stays on your list. This is probably due to the fact using studies helps you to write more easily while saving you time.

However, if the answer is ‘no’, perhaps you should park the idea for another occasion. Sometimes it is worth investigating or dedicating more time to certain topics, so you can generate optimum content. So, ideally you’d leave it until an occasion when you have more time to dedicate to it.

WHAT IS MY OPINION ON THIS TOPIC?

It’s important to ask yourself this question. Many people tend to write about what they’ve read in studies or in third-party cases. But they don’t have personal experience of the topic and therefore, they don’t have an opinion on it.

And although you don´t need to include your personal opinion to write a better blog entry, depending on the type of content, you may well need to.

3.- Batching your blog content

Keeping a blog implies a certain amount of technical work. You’ll need to find photos, upload them, write alternative tags for each one, titles for them, etc. But what if you could save yourself these tasks, and thereby spend more time writing better?

Now that you’re planning your topics in advance, you can start looking for the images that you reckon fit well with your content. Or videos. This means you can organize them in “batches” instead of searching for them one by one at the time.

Thus, when you go to write, you’ll feel great relief when your see that your post is already half-complete. So much so that you’ll feel capable of writing better, because as you already have certain support content, so more ideas will come to mind.

4.- Know your chronobiology

Each of us has a different pace at which we go about our activities. And this also impacts our individual creativity. You probably have an set schedule. There are those of us who work better in the morning; those who are more clearheaded at night; and those who make the most of the afternoons because that’s when we’re most inspired.

This is called chronobiology. In other words, you’re designed to be more naturally creative at certain times of the day. Which means you´re not quite as bright at other points. Whenever possible, try to follow this line and make the most of the hours you work best.

This will help you to write better, be more effective and complete your work in less time.

5.- Take small steps forward

One of the biggest threats to quality content production is a lack of time. In fact, you’ll have realized that if you write on the same day that you publish the post, you’ll be sacrificing one of the most powerful tools you have for writing better. We’re referring to the chance to read and review your work calmly before you click the “publish” button.

Particularly if you’re used to writing then publishing immediately, you’re effectively publishing your first draft. And one of the main tips for writing better lies in reviewing and working on your drafts.

So, instead of writing frenetically against the clock, you should just save your work. To do so, you’ll need to have a small “buffer” that allows you to get ahead with your content. It is recommended that you write your work a week in advance if possible.

From there, you’ll be able to write about your topics and if you see you need time, then you can review your work the next day. This new perspective will help you to detect any weak spots and eliminate them quickly.

6.- Make it easy for yourself! Writing better is simple if you know how!

Surely you’ve visited a blog more than once, you look at the topics you’re interested in, but you can’t find anything. You get to the middle of the post and it still hasn’t gotten to the crux of the matter.

Writing better doesn’t mean writing a lot. Instead it means being clear, concise and focusing on a single topic. Regarding this last point in particular, you need to know that content that follows the same lines or only focus on one topic don’t take as long to write.

If you come up with more ideas, you should jot them down and divide them up. But never put them all in one post about a different topic.

In addition, this will help you to gain both time and resources. And if your barrier was the lack of inspiration, you’ll be able to jot down a few ideas for the future.

And last but not least, using processes like this one really does work. Thus, you will not only be able to write better, but you’ll also create habits and save all that time that you need spend on other activities.

In fact, creating habits increases creativity.

Would you like to dig deeper into content marketing? Coobis is a Content Marketing platform where you will also find inspiration for content creation and various tips on increasing your productivity. And obviously you’ll learn how to write better, be more concise, and use your content to impact your audience. Are you up for creating better content?