What Makes Good Content? 5 Tips For Better Writing
By: Connor Fowler
Tags: Writers On Writing, Content Writing, Better Writing, Content Writing Services, Content Marketing

Your organization is doing something wrong if only 23% of your readers read your copy, right?

Well, things might not seem as bad as you think.

Even with 5%, your content can achieve what you desire. Sometimes all it takes is a few tweaks here and there.

Read on to find out what makes good content, and turn your engaged readers into loyal ones.

Why should you care about content, let alone what makes good content?

Content seems to be an element of online business that you just can’t avoid. You can have the best product globally, but without content marketing to back it up, you will never reach the people you are selling to.

Some stats I managed to pull up about the current state of content marketing show:

70% of marketers are investing in content strategy

Businesses are now onboarding teams of 2–3 content specialists.

In particular, blogs make up one of three primary marketing tools in an overall content strategy framework.

Most people are skimmers and won’t read the stuff you write (hence the 23%)

Companies are spending around 46% of their marketing budget on content.

If you want to check out the full page of marketing statistics, check out this post by Hubspot.

So it is becoming a matter of survival if you want to grow and prosper in cyberspace, to have some form of content strategy.

But content is just about everywhere we turn; how do you make good content.

1. Know the reader

Possibly the most essential quality of good content is that the writer (or content) knows who they are talking to.

I can’t stress this enough; whether you are writing a sales copy or an informative blog post, you are doing it wrong if you aren’t talking directly to the reader.

An exercise you can try is to become one of your potential readers. Understand what their daily lives might be like. What kind of struggles do they face day-to-day, their likes and dislikes. This exercise will help you understand the piece’s tone and purpose (another two qualities that we will explore later).

When you begin to understand the reader, you can then help solve their problems, or at the very least, understand their issues.

People want to relate to things. If they can’t connect, you have lost them, and they’ll stop reading.

2. Purpose

Once you have a better understanding of your audience, you can begin to flesh out the piece’s purpose; why are you writing this post, this whitepaper, or this article?

Are you trying to:

Solve the reader’s problem? (inform)

Build authority for your website (inform)

Lead generation through content? (sales)

Build brand awareness? (sales)

Entertain your reader? (sales? maybe?)

Whatever the reason you choose to write this content will decide how you organize the piece, which is the next tip.

This shouldn’t take you too long, but make sure you get it right.

3. Organized Writing Means Organized Thoughts

You may have noticed that all the points mentioned so far do not involve any writing at all. But that is the trick:

Prior Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance.

And that is where organization comes in. Writing is an excellent way to organize your thoughts, so scattered writing means scattered thoughts, which will not drive the point home.

It would help if you shot out all the good ideas you have for your content but use the writing to give those ideas flow. Good writing, or content, should follow some structure. This way, the reader knows what to expect next, and in the best of cases, they even figure out what you are trying to say before you say it (it makes them feel good too).

What I like to do before writing anything down is to outline; this will save you huge amounts of time and energy. Use the outline as a road map; where do you want to lead the reader? What makes good content? (this also ties in with the purpose).

If you are struggling, try writing a listicle, like this article, it’s a quick and easy way to organize your thought, and people love lists for some reason.

4. Tonality, Vox Populi

Photo by Jason Rosewell on Unsplash

Knowing your readers and the purpose makes this much easier to get right.

Mistakes I often see, especially in B2B content is that agencies often forget that CISO, CEO, and CTO’s are people too. Emotion sells, not rationality. As a content writer, it breaks my heart to see clients ask me to revise a piece to be more “business-like”; they mean, taking away any emotion and only talk features.

The bad news is that they are not going to make any sales like that. It might be that case that you only wish to inform your reader, which in turn builds your “authority.” But you must understand the purpose of the content and avoid emotions at your peril. After all, you are still speaking to people and not robots, and our feelings drive our decisions.

It might be good practice to write the way you would speak. This is especially true when you are writing sales copy. Depending on the type of content, this may require you to change the way you write the text.

For example, I believe it is still more effective to write the way you speak, even if you are writing a technical or informative piece. Think of it as giving a lecture, people resonate more when they can see the speaker or professor teaching them, and if written correctly, they can imagine it too.

5. Save the Good Bits for Below the Fold

This tip is where you turn the engaged readers into fans. Most people are dirty skimmers and won’t even read the article but will still share it. This is why headlines sell impressions or views or whatever, but it doesn’t mean that those individuals are engaged in the message. But you don’t care about them, and I’ll tell you why.

If you got to this part of the article and didn’t skim, congrats, you are one of the 23% and a special person.

You make up part of the engaged audience. The engaged audience is where you make conversions — turning mere interest into loyal fans or customers.

In print media, you might hear the phrase “above the fold” this is the part of the newspaper that you see when it is folded over. You might read a bold headline intended to capture your attention and subsequently buy the paper.

Blogs and digital media also have something similar. The top part of a webpage is where people will land when they first load your page. So you might put in a button that will take them to the latest deal or something like that.

An article, though, does not have much use to put in useful information above the fold. You should save the section above the fold as an advert to get your readers to read on. When they finally arrive at the ending or just before the conclusion of an article, you can reward them.

Maybe put in a coupon for something you are selling or something extra, a “bonus” tip, like this one:

Bonus Tip: don’t concern yourself too much about length; try to bring value to the reader before you worry about how long your content should be.

Final Thoughts

Photo by Juan Rumimpunu on Unsplash

A well-developed content strategy and useful content can make a massive difference for your brand of the business.

If you are just looking to improve your content writing skills, consider incorporating these tips into your routine. What makes good content:

Know the reader: understanding your audience means you know their problems.

Find your purpose: have clearly defined goals for the piece you are writing.

Organize your writing: good flow leads to higher engagement.

Get the voice right: the tone of your writing should match that of your readers.

Below the fold: reward your engaged audience for sticking around till the end.

If you are looking to improve your content strategy or finding new writers for your team, check out my website, and contact me today.