Do you enjoy reading, doing wordplay, or like to put your thoughts on paper in a creative way?
Well, if you do, content writing may be a perfect job for you.
Content writing has become an essential aspect of marketing today and is dominating the industry and social media, leading to a great demand for content writers. By content, I don’t mean only the text but graphics, videos, GIFs, and all other forms of content too.
If you think you can communicate your thoughts and ideas creatively and effectively, then 2021 is the year to start your content writing career.
What is Content Writing?
In 1996, the founder of Microsoft, Bill Gates, wrote an essay titled “Content is King.” Even after 24 years, the phrase holds.
In the essay, he wrote, “Content is where I expect much of the real money will be made on the Internet, just as it was in broadcasting.”
He was right. Quality content is the backbone of any successful marketing campaign. This need for creating a successful marketing campaign has made content writing a hot-shot job profile.
So what does the term ‘content writing’ suggest?
Content writing is the way of communicating your ideas and opinions in the form of words that influence a specific section of audiences and compel them to take any action or simply provide them with some valuable information.
In terms of digital marketing, content writing is planning, writing, editing, and proofreading web content.
Content writing doesn’t mean writing articles only. It can be in any form like Video scripts, blogs, website content, podcasts scripts, YouTube descriptions, Social media posts, news articles, etc.
Content is vital for marketing. Besides creating engaging content for blogs and websites, you can develop marketing content for print ads, billboards, pamphlets, booklets, and flyers.
Why Has Content Writing Become So Important?
According to a HubSpot survey, 70% of marketers actively invest in content marketing, and 24% of marketers plan to increase their investment in content marketing in 2021.
The above statements clearly show that good content has become a primary force behind a brand’s success. But what has led to this phenomenon?
The answer is a high-quality, engaging, and compelling content, that influences the audience’s decision-making than any other practice out there. A robust content helps people to form a relationship with the brand.
As the world is seeing a transition from conventional marketing to internet marketing, content plays a vital role in helping businesses reach their targeted audience, increase website traffic, generate leads, drive sales and make a profit.
Importance of Good Content in Digital Marketing
A good quality content helps in customer retention: Make the content an asset for your brand. Good content allows a brand to create an enhanced user experience and make them come back for more. It can be a great approach to build good rapport with your customers and capture their attention.
Boost SEO Ranking
SEO ranking is the website’s position on the search engine result page. This position much depends on the content available on the website. A unique and high-quality content promotes your brand’s visibility online. The better the content, the better the SEO and better the brand authority.
Strong Social Media Presence
Social media usage is today one of the most popular online activities. In 2020, an estimated 3.6 billion people were on social media across the globe. That’s indeed a huge number. And to gain the attention of those on social media, you do have to provide content worth going through. Good and trendy content on social media helps your business gain followers and make your presence.
Generate Leads
Good content attracts the audience. E.g., you are scrolling down your Facebook page. There you saw some business page posted a video that engrossed you. You will feel compelled to visit that page or website and may end up making a purchase there or make a note in the back of your head for future reference.
This is how a well-crafted content can generate leads for your business.
Improve in Conversion Rate
Good content leads to good website traffic that helps lead generation and later lead-conversion. If the customer finds your content attractive, he is more likely to make a transaction. Good content helps your customer in making purchasing decisions.
Hallmark of a Quality Content
Before you pick up a pen and diary or sit in front of your laptop and start writing, you must know the crucial factors that will make your content superior to your competitors. Consider your audience while creating content that fulfills your purpose.
Informational Content
The content should be able to communicate the message. There is no point in generating the content if the audience doesn’t get the message it’s carrying.
Fresh and Unique Content
The Internet is full of content. Choose a topic, and you will find hundreds of articles on that. But not all those articles rank high in search engines. Only the articles with fresh and unique content set your work apart from the rest.
So, start focusing on how you can create a highly engaging yet fresh and innovative content.
Content that Provides Value
Why will anyone come back to your website or page if the information present doesn’t provide any value to him or doesn’t add anything to his knowledge base?
Before generating the content, you should find out the latest trends in your specialization. Consider the concerns of your target audience and research what kind of content will benefit them.
Interesting and Shareable Content
If you receive a WhatsApp message and find it interesting, you share it with friends and family. Same with other social media sites, you like a post, chances are relatively high that you will hit the like and share button.
Often these days, we hear the phrase, ‘post has gone viral.’ What does it mean? What is a viral post?
A viral post is nothing but a content that has been liked and shared multiple times. Create content that grabs people’s attention and make them share it.
Optimized content
As discussed earlier, SEO ranking is an important factor in placing your content high in search engine result pages. Optimized content means SEO friendly content. A content that fulfils below criteria is called an optimized content:
- Inclusion of keywords in title, meta-description, content tags, and the text below.
- A catchy, interesting title to gain the audience’s attention
- high-quality images that are optimized with alt text
- Website/mobile pages shouldn’t take more than 6 seconds to load, or else people will abandon your site and aren’t likely to return.
How to Create Quality Content
Now that you know the importance and properties of quality content, you must be thinking about how to do it yourself.
Let’s see some ways that can help you in achieving that goal.
Research, Research, and Research
First step of generating quality content is research. Research what your competitors are up to, what kind of content is already available in your niche. Research the current trends in your niche and see what content will provide value to your audience.
User-generated content
Coca-Cola did a marketing campaign ‘share-a-coke’ through social media and ads. People started sharing their pics with coke bottles, and the campaign became an instant hit. When a brand encourages its audience to generate content, it is called user-generated content. This not only engages the audience but also gives some valuable content to the brand too.
Originality of Content
The originality of content decides its value. Only original content will attract and engage your audience.
Keyword Research
Keywords play an essential role while searching for content online. Invest your time in researching keywords. It benefits your efforts in a content generation and helps in SEO ranking of your content.
Use Different Forms of Content
Pictures, videos, infographics, charts make your content more visual. So always try to include them in your content.
Measure Effectiveness and Performance of the Content
Measuring the content publishing performance afterward will give you an idea of what more you can do to make your content more useful and reachable. Measuring the site traffic, quality of leads, and onsite engagement will give you an idea of how your content is performing.
Tools to Help You Create Quality Content
Besides investing a lot of time in research content, you also have to put great effort into developing and polishing the content.
Your knowledge about the topic and hold on language gives you an edge, but you have to be well-resourced if you want to stand out in the crowd. Here tools come to your rescue and help you develop quality content.
Below is the list of a few tools that will help you boost your content quality and make it engaging.
CoSchedule Headline Analyzer
The headline is the first thing that a reader will look at. Only an interesting headline will grab his attention. CoSchedule headline analyzer helps you analyze your headline real quickly and create a suitable and SEO friendly headline.
Ubersuggest
Created by Neil Patel, Ubersuggest makes your search for keywords easy.
It works by expanding the seed keyword using suggestions from Google Suggest and Google Ads Keyword Planner.
HubSpot Blog Topic Generator
To write a blog-post, we need a unique and engaging subject. It’s not always easy; sometimes, you struggle to come up with such topics ideas.
If you are having problems in this regard, the HubSpot blog topic generator will help you.
You have to fill in the few keywords related to your writing subject, and this powerful tool will create a week’s worth of blog post titles for you. Amazing. Isn’t it?
Grammarly
Grammarly is a tool that helps you with your grammatical mistakes, sentence framing, and also checking plagiarism.
Canva
Images not only make your blog visually appealing but helps in SEO ranking too.
Canva is a tool that allows you to create custom images in less time than any other design tool. You can create social media graphics, presentations, posters, documents, and other visual content with the help of templates present on Canva.
Google Analytics
Google Analytics is a tool that provides analytics data. Such as the number of visitors on your blog or website, top keywords, top resources. But how can it help you in creating quality content?
With the help of Google Analytics, you can know which page of your website has the most traffic. This will give you an idea of what topic your target audience is interested in and create further content based on that.
Why Choose a Career as a Content Writer
Vast Opportunities
Content writers are so much in demand because businesses now understand the importance of good content.
Social media writing, news writing, SEO writing, blog writing, copyright, scriptwriting, so many options to choose to start your content writing career.
Good Salary
The average salary of a content writer in India is approximately INR 356K. With an experience of 0-2 years, you can expect somewhere between 3.5 LPA to 4 LPA.
An experience of more than five years, you can manage a team of content writers and can earn you 9 to 15 LPA.
Work from the Comfort of Your Home
If you don’t want to work in-house for any organization, you can take up freelancing work too and can work from the comfort of your home.
So many websites like Upwork, Freelancer.com, iWriter where you can provide your content writing services.
Conclusion
If you think you have those creative skills in you that can convert an idea or an opinion about a topic that has the potential to attract and engage the audience, then a bright future is awaiting you.
There is no shortage of content on the internet, but quality content and a creative content writer is always in demand.
To start your content writing career, you can take online certifications and take-up freelance writing projects can begin writing your blog. Make use of social media, post some engaging content, write as much as you can
So many content writing jobs, so many opportunities, so many mediums, now all you need is strong determination.
Good Luck!