Tag Archives: Content Writing Tips

Call-to-action tips for your day-to-day content writing and copywriting

Call-to-action tips

Call-to-action is a statement that you make to prompt people to take an action when they are reading your blog post, web page, landing page, or an email. It is also called CTA.

Think it in this manner: why do people come to your website? Why do you want them to come to your website?

If you run a business website (provide app development services) you obviously want people to contact you if they want to develop a mobile app. Almost every page has a Call-to-action button such as “Call us” or “Contact now”.

But simply telling people to contact you isn’t going to make them contact you. Your entire copy must fuel your Call-to-action statement.

Call-to-action can be straightforward (buy my book right now), or it can be subtle – the narrative of your writing moving in such a manner that people want to take an action.

Content Marketing Institute has compiled a list of call-to-action tips to help you supercharge your writing. Some of these tips include

Clearly define your call-to-action goal

You’re CTA isn’t always about making a sale, although, that would be the ultimate goal. Before a sale happens, you need to generate leads. You generate leads by establishing communication channels. How do you establish those channels?

You can ask your visitors to download your white paper or case study. You can ask them to download your e-book. You can encourage them to subscribe to your updates. You can also ask them to visit other portions of your website for further action.

If you define your CTA, it helps you write your content accordingly.

Make contextually relevant offers

Call-to-action must be relevant to the document or the visual your viewer is currently viewing. Suppose I’m writing a blog post on how to write compelling copy and then in the middle of the copy I ask them to download an SEO book. Vaguely they are connected, but directly they are not. Instead, if I ask them to download a small PDF on how to write a compelling copy with more details and data, they will be more eager to download it.

You also need to keep in your mind the intent, both for the content and for the reader/viewer. Is the reader looking for information or is she ready to buy? If she is looking for more information it is better to direct her to the relevant document and if she wants to buy, then it is better to prompt her to buy.

Keep your CTA straightforward

Call-to-action must be an active verb. Use expressions like “Download our White Paper” or “Subscribe to our newsletter” or “Download our mobile app”. These are very clear actions. Avoid using something like “Learn more” because it is very vague and doesn’t tell much what it leads to.

Create a sense of urgency and importance

Instead of saying “Download our mobile app” it is better to say “Download our mobile app now”. Also, use “Call us today” instead of simply “Call us”. Also, something like “Download our custom catalogue specifically for you”. This makes the reader feel unique and special. There is also a sense of urgency.

Avoid using multiple Call-to-action prompts

If you choose too many call-to-action prompts readers begin to ignore them or their eyes get used to them. Use CTA only where you think now is the right time for them to click and do the needful.

Also, keep your CTA brief if you are using a button, because people prefer clicking buttons that are of small size.

Be transparent in your CTA prompts

Don’t needlessly send people to other locations of your website because you want them to stick around. The Call-to-action must be transparent. If it prompts them to download an e-book, they should be able to download it without much fuss. If they need to fill up a form, no matter how small it is, quickly mention that. Avoid using words like “Sign up” or “register” if they need to fill up a form before downloading.

Why should people click?

Can they get a 25% discount – “Avail 25% discount instantly”? Are they going to generate ideas for their blog posts? Is the software going to help them generate quality content? Is it a toolkit they can use to manage their customers and clients? There needs to be a great benefit that your call-to-action offers. Solve a problem. Help them get unstuck. Help them save money.

Do I have writer’s block as a professional content writer?

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Do content writers have writer’s block

My clients pay me to write. They set deadlines. In most of the cases they are like, “Oh, I needed that blog post yesterday.” And then accordingly I need to write.

Although I am at a stage when most of my clients allow me to follow my own pace (because of the quality that I deliver) I need to write everyday. I need to write for my clients. I need to write for my blog. I can’t afford to have a writer’s block.

Does it mean I don’t have it? I’d be lying if I say that I don’t suffer from writer’s block.

Here are a few things I do when I suffer from writer’s block

Accept that I have writer’s block

Once you know you have a problem, you can look for a solution. Sometimes you don’t know you have writer’s block, and you feel quite frustrated. You wonder why you can’t write even a single sentence. Even raising your arm to type on the keyboard seems like a Herculean task.

Over the years I have come to recognize writer’s block. It doesn’t overwhelm me. It doesn’t disturb me. This is because I have gone through multiple instances of writer’s block, and I know that sooner or later I overcome.

This immediately relaxes me.

Get a reality check

The client doesn’t understand your block. This is more so when he or she has made to the advance payment. If he or she expects a blog post on Wednesday, the document must be delivered on Wednesday.

This gets your creative juices flowing. You know that despite writer’s block you need to deliver your document by Wednesday. You begin to look for solutions.

Just start writing

This always works. Write the first sentence. Write the second sentence. Write the third sentence. The sentences don’t have to be complete. You can write in monosyllables. You can even write single words.

Don’t tell yourself that you have to write 1000 words. Tell yourself to write just 20 or 50 words. This does the magic. Once you have written those initial 20-50 words, you don’t even realize when you have written 1000 words.

Don’t procrastinate

Procrastination can be dangerous. I have learned this at the cost of thousands of lost hours. Procrastination means doing other things than doing the actual work. You may look for interesting blog posts to read. You may want to read a book when you should be writing. You may want to sing songs. You may want to get into political arguments on social media. The moment such a tendency raises its head, squash it. Follow the advice in the above heading: just start writing the first and the second sentences.

Go through previous work

Often writer’s block manifests through self-doubt. When this happens, I go through my previous work. I have also saved some words of appreciation from my clients. There are many clients who insist that I write for them. I also have superstitious clients who think that if I don’t work for them, their business won’t do well. These are quite encouraging facts. Go through your old documents. Visit websites for which you have attracted praise. Go through your best blog posts.

Writer’s block is basically a state of mind. There can be many reasons for such a state of mind. You may be simply feeling lethargic or are suffering from malnutrition. Sometimes you may be dehydrated so try drinking lots of water.

When you write professionally writer’s block is just a simple annoyance you need to deal with there and then, and then move on. Unlike established and famous writers, professional content writers cannot afford to wallow in the luxury of having a writer’s block.

13 tips for writing thought leadership content

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How to write thought leadership content

What do you mean by thought leadership? Thought leadership is the way you express yourself to demonstrate you have expertise in a particular field or a topic. For example, if I write lots of advice on content writing and copywriting, I display thought leadership.

Thought leaders not just have a command over their subject area, they are also passionate about their subjects. They may even be evangelists for a new way of, for example, writing effective content.

Benefits of thought leadership

Your potential customers and clients trust you more when you establish yourself as an expert in your industry.

One of the biggest benefits of being a thought leader is that you become recognizable.

Isn’t it easier to do business with people whom you know what people who are recognizable, compared to people who are totally unknown?

People are more receptive to your thoughts. Bloggers and news reporters more eagerly cover what you want to communicate. People respect you. They listen to you attentively. Your content is shared more on other blogs and social networking platforms. You are quoted more often. Your visibility increases. You seem more credible and trustworthy compared to people who haven’t worked on their thought leadership.

All these collectively help you grow your business.

How to build thought leadership through writing content?

The Rolling Stone magazine https://credible-content.com has compiled suggestions from 13 thought leaders on how to write content to build your thought leadership. Although the advice is not out of the ordinary, it is always better to revisit the age-old concepts so that you don’t forget them. Some of the advice include

Understand what your audience wants

Publish content that satisfies some pressing need of your audience. Everyone is looking for a solution. When people find the needed solutions through your writing, they respect you and trust you. They begin to believe in your thought leadership.

Write for human beings

When you are writing on the Internet there is often a tendency to write for search engine algorithms and robots. Although it is important to improve your search engine rankings even to build your thought leadership, don’t obsess. Remember that your primary target are human beings. Do whatever it takes to improve your SEO but ultimately, keep the primary focus on your human readers.

Keep an eye on the future

Everyone is worried about the future. Thought leaders don’t worry, but they are constantly thinking about the future of their field. For example, in the field of content writing, what is going to change five years down the line? Understanding the future helps people prepare for it.

Use personal anecdotes and examples

Being a thought leader is all about you. How you are achieving great feats. How you are discovering new things. How you form opinions. How you are discovering new insights. Share your experiences. Tell your unique stories from within the industry. How you are constantly solving problems for people who work with you.

Always be relevant

Well, this goes without saying. If your content is not relevant, it is not going to be valued, and if it is not valued, you cannot build your thought leadership.

Deliver a clear value

Always be aware of what you are delivering and what impact your content is making. There must always be a purpose. Your readers must be able to experience tangible results when they access your thought leadership content. For that, you will need to understand what drives your audience, what makes an impact on them, and what they truly value.

Have a unique perspective

Express original thoughts. Have the courage to say something that is right and valid, but the others don’t have the courage to say it. Take risks. Make predictions even if there is a risk of being proven wrong in future. As a leader you must lead. Things that people haven’t yet thought of, you should be able to think.

Improve your specialization

One of the best aspects of building a thought leadership is that it motivates you to constantly improve yourself. If you don’t increase your treasure of knowledge, how are you going to share that knowledge? If you don’t gain experience by taking risks and doing things that others don’t do, how are you going to share that experience?

Act on your own advice

Words are easier, action is difficult. People are not looking for a preacher, they are looking for a leader who acts. Come up with new ideas, implement those ideas, face the results, and then share those ideas, whether they succeed or fail, with your readers through your thought leadership content writing.

Have a consistent set of values

Values are ideas and ways of thinking you believe are important and you must adhere to them. They render a sense of clarity to your thought and purpose. They define your identity. People begin to recognize you by the values that you have on display. Therefore, as a thought leader, you must be consistent with your values. Of course, in the beginning it will take some time to define your values, but once you are clear about them, stick to them.

From Me, make a shift to You

A leader is always thinking of the others. A leader is selfless. When you are writing content, no matter how much effort you need to make, no matter how much pain you need to go through, always have in mind how your content can help your readers. You need to be at the forefront of action and leadership.

Make your advice practical

As a thought leader you may apply many unconventional methods to your field of profession, but for your readers, keep things practical. Before sharing your thoughts, think how you would like to implement your own advice to your own work. People should be able to implement your advice, if not easily, then at least, in terms of manageability.

Be authentic

When you are authentic and unique, people can easily recognize you. You stand out for your opinions and for your voice. You can be authentic in the manner you write your content, you can be authentic about your ideas, and you can be authentic about how you help people who follow you. Don’t tread the already beaten

How to generate more leads with strategic content writing?

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Strategic content writing to generate hot leads.

You publish content to generate new leads.

Leads can manifest in multiple forms. There are hot leads and cold leads.

Hot leads are those people who contact you for the purpose of buying from you or hiring you.

For example, if someone submits my contact form for the purpose of hiring my content writing services, that person is a hot lead.

But if someone subscribes to my newsletter, he or she is a cold lead. Or if someone shows interest in my content writing services on a social media platform but right now doesn’t hire me, he or she is a cold lead.

When you are writing and publishing content to generate more leads, you need to be careful of what type of content you are publishing.

When I had a web design website – in my previous life – I ended up attracting the wrong traffic because although I was writing and publishing lots of content and consequently, generating lots of traffic, the traffic never converted. I was not generating the right leads.

Back then I was smitten by educational content. I didn’t put my energies into explaining my services as a web designer. All my content writing consisted of teaching people how to achieve things using HTML, ASP and JavaScript (back then I didn’t know PHP, which I know now).

How to strategize content writing to generate hot leads?

You need to find out why people are searching for you, when they are searching for you.

Obviously, people who are looking to buy something, or hire someone, or use a software service, are not looking for educational content, at least not knowingly.

For example, if you are looking for someone who can help you improve your search engine rankings and you are not aware that optimized content writing can help you improve your SEO, my blog post titled 5 reasons why content writing is important for SEO can reveal something that you don’t know.

For that matter, even a blog post like 10 SEO content writing tips for your small business can be quite helpful.

You may ask, if all I am doing is teaching people why content writing is important for SEO or how you can write content for your small business to improve your SEO by yourself, how am I generating hot leads for my own business?

Even if your writing is seemingly instructional content, you need to write in such a manner that the central message – your open for business – shouldn’t be lost.

To generate hot leads, you need to create precise web pages, landing pages and blog posts. There shouldn’t be any ambiguity. You shouldn’t club multiple messages under the same web page. When you club multiple messages, the central objective of your content is diluted and people end up getting confused.

Seriously consider search intent to generate hot leads

Not all type of search intent gets you hot leads but writing and publishing content keeping search intent in mind can definitely improve the number of hot leads your content generates.

What is search intent? You may like to read What is search intent and how knowing it improves your SEO.

Most of the information about search intent that I have published on my website and blog is about improving your search engine rankings, but writing your content centered around the appropriate search intent can also help you generate more leads.

Writing content for searcher intent helps you be with your customers and clients throughout their buyer journey.

Again I will give you my own example.

Someone is researching for ways to improve search engine rankings and comes across my blog that talks about how content writing can help you improve your search engine rankings. The person has been informed.

The search intent here is informational. The person isn’t looking for someone to hire. He or she simply needs information that can help him or her improve his or her search engine rankings.

Once a person has read my blog post on how content writing can help improve search engine rankings, he or she finds out that I provide such content writing services, through another web page or blog post. The other web page or blog post has been written keeping “commercial intent” in mind.

These days I’m getting lots of traffic for “content writer for accounting services” or “content writer for life coaching services”. These searches are carried out with commercial intent.

Accountants or accounting companies are looking for a content writer. People providing life coaching services are looking for a content writer. The intent is clear. Search traffic generates hot leads for me

On a related note: do hot leads always convert?

Not necessarily. Hot leads are people who are ready to do business with you but they haven’t yet committed.

Maybe they won’t like my samples. Maybe they won’t find my rates acceptable. Maybe after contacting me, they come across someone else who they think is a better match. There are multiple reasons why even a hot lead may not convert, but that’s a different matter.

Can you publish high quality content on a shoestring budget?

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How to write high-quality content on a shoestring budget.

Yes, you can.

When it comes to publishing high quality content on shoestring budgets, I have experienced two types of clients:

Those who have a genuine problem with cash and right now, really cannot spend much money on my content writing services.
Those who think that spending money on content writing is not worth it, and they must squeeze as much content as possible with as little money as possible.

The focus of the current blog post are the clients of the first category – who really need to publish high-quality content on a shoestring budget.

Frankly, if you want to publish a 2500-word blog post that is well researched, you will need to spend money on a content writer.

It is like, when you go to the Domino’s and you want to order a large pizza, you are going to have to pay for it. Cannot pay? Too bad. Find alternatives. Go for another fast food that may be equally yummy and appetizing.

When my clients do not have enough money, I don’t cut corners.

I either don’t take the assignment because sometimes even I cannot afford to work on lesser paying assignments, or I offer an alternative.

The trick is, publish as much high-quality content as possible. Do not, do not compromise on quality even if you get to publish less content. Less content does not mean bad content. It simply means less content. There is nothing wrong in that.

This is how you can publish high-quality content on a shoestring budget

Publish small blog posts and web pages

In my previous blog post titled How to start blogging right now I have written that most of the clients think that if they need to publish their blogs, they need to publish at least 1000 words.

Yes, there are definitely benefits of publishing longer pieces of content. The advantages of long form content are well proven. Long form content enjoys better search engine rankings, and it also gets shared more compared to shorter pieces of content.

But right now, in the beginning, when you are working on a shoestring budget, do not worry about publishing long form content. You cannot afford it and you don’t want to compromise on the quality of your content.

The benefits of publishing small blog posts and web pages is that you can publish them almost immediately. Instead of worrying about the number of words, you focus on the message and the quality of your content.

Deliver the central message and then be done with that.

Even if you need to pay your content writer, since your content writer will be writing smaller pieces of content, he or she will not charge much, and you will be able to collaborate with him or her within your shoestring budget.

It is not like once you have published web pages and blog posts you cannot come back to them and expand them. You can go on adding new content as and when you can afford.

For example, in the beginning you publish a blog post of just 200 words. You publish it and then submit it to the Google Search Console. It will get crawled and indexed. One important job is done.

After a month, you can add another 400 words and then resubmit your link to the Google Search Console. Now you have 600 words, and the content is crawled again.

Publish content iteratively

I have covered this topic in the above-mentioned point. Publishing content iteratively means publishing it in stages. You publish the bare-bones version for the first time and submit your link to Google.

Then you can go on visiting the link and keep on adding new content to it.

Please remember that the problem is not with how much content you have, the problem in the beginning is the lack of it.

If you keep on waiting for the time when you will be able to publish blog posts and web pages of thousands of words, you will either compromise on quality or you will go on waiting, and this will cause harm to your business.

Instead, publish module, smaller chunks of content and then let them grow over time.

Re-purpose existing content

Have you already got a few web pages and blog posts? Maybe you can take out some chunks and reuse them?

These days when I don’t get time to add new content to my blog, I randomly pick up (relevant & useful) paragraphs and sentences, make them into a quotable image, and then share the image on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Curate useful content

This was the initial essence of blogging I remember. Someone posted something, and then scores of people linked to the original piece and shared their own opinion on it. This is how blogging grew and millions of blog posts got interconnected.

There are many content segregation platforms and apps you can use to gather useful links in your industry.

I use them for gathering high-quality updates on content marketing, content writing and SEO from other blogs and websites.

I choose a link, link to it from a new blog post, and then write a few paragraphs either explaining the contents of the original link, or expressing my own opinion.

You do not always have to agree to the link that you have found. You can also disagree. For example, recently I found a link extolling the benefits of long form content and according to my experience, sometimes you can achieve the same results by publishing shorter blog posts. I wrote about that.

Just make sure that when you are disagreeing, you have a valid reason, otherwise, it becomes counter-productive.

Share quick tips and tricks about your business or expertise

Again, these tips and tricks don’t need to be very long and comprehensive.

Take for example this blog post – Content writing advice: In the beginning it is important to associate your name with what you do or offer.

I was having a conversation with a client, and it occurred to me that the advice that I was giving to him, I could also write and publish on the blog. I did. It hardly took me 10 minutes.

As I mentioned in the beginning of this blog post, some clients are simply miserly and don’t appreciate paying for good content, and some clients have a real problem. These clients know the value of high-quality content. They wouldn’t mind paying for it. It is just that right now they need to work on a shoestring budget.