Content marketing in all its forms – blogs, sales pages, product descriptions, white papers, and email newsletters for example – is so effective that even the most profitable corporations like Coca-Cola implement it on a daily basis. But even with all their success, even the “big guys'” best writers tend to make a few common mistakes that hold them back in one way or another. Here are four common mistakes even the great writers make, and how you can avoid making those mistakes yourself:
Making Assumptions
It's easy to assume what your audience does and doesn't already know when writing a piece, whether for your blog or a sales page. But it's important to keep in mind that your readers likely don't spend as much time as you do learning about the subject matter of your content, so you may need to provide a little background before getting to the meat of the information that you'd like to share. By making sure that your content is written without any assumptions in mind, you'll increase interest among those who are just learning about your industry for one reason or another.
You don't have to dumb-down your content to ensure that it's far reaching – consider including links that provide readers with more in-depth information about a subject, offering quick tips and tricks that readers can apply to their own lives, or simply writing a line or two about the context of your piece.
Underestimating Workloads
Whether working as a freelancers, marketer, or full-time employee, almost all writers have underestimated their workloads at one time or another, which can be a serious problem come publication time. When a deadline is looming, and the workload is backed up, there are typically only a couple of choices you can make:
- Miss the Deadline – This can cost you readers and future work depending on your field.
- Gloss over the Subject for a Quick Turnaround – This can affect your ability to maintain an authoritative stance within your industry.
Neither of these scenarios is ideal, so it's best to stay on top of your deadlines and ensure that you never underestimate your workload. To be safe, it's a good idea to add an hour's worth of time commitment to every five hours of work you think you have on your plate.
Related: The 4 Most Common Writer Instruction Mistakes
Missing Promotional Opportunities
No matter what kind of writing you do, there are likely promotional opportunities that you're missing out on. You should be promoting your professional writing services, your company's product offerings, or your marketing chops every chance you get, so take the time to find an opportunity every time you sit down to write a piece. Consider one or more of the following options:
- Create a call-to-action at the end of your article by asking for comments or reminding readers to check out a sale.
- Include a couple of links to your website throughout the content where it's applicable.
- Incorporate a logo into your writer's bio so your brand can be instantly recognized.
- Recommend further reading somewhere within your content that will take readers to other pieces or sales pages you've written.
The idea is to come up with a unique and unobtrusive method for promoting yourself, your products, or other pieces of content that you've previously published.
Complicating Content
While it's important to go in-depth as often as possible when writing any style of content, it's also essential to make sure that your words aren't too complicated for the average reader. If people find themselves having to read a sentence more than once to comprehend it's meaning, it can throw the entire paragraph off course and result in lost reader interest. To make sure that everyone from the novice to the expert can follow your writing, keep things as simple as possible and provide links or references if necessary so readers who are interested in learning more know where to go.
By keeping these basic tips and tricks in mind, you should be able to create comprehensive, intelligent content that is intriguing to readers and makes them want to keep coming back for more.
