Archive for Writing
Tips for Repurposing Your Content
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Content is an investment. You spend a lot of time writing it. You probably also spend a lot of time planning and researching it. It makes good business sense to make the most of your investment. When you repurpose and reuse your content, you maximize your return. Here are five tips and ideas to repurpose and reuse your content.
Build it up - Gather articles that fit together nicely and create a report. You’ll want to add an introduction and a conclusion. You may also need to add some transitions and polish the content to fit a cohesive theme. To monetize the content, consider adding affiliate links where appropriate. You can also include the occasional product or service promotion for your own business.
Break it down – If you have existing reports, then they’re perfect to create articles and blog posts. You have many options here, too. You can simply pull apart segments of the report to create articles. Add an introduction and conclusion paragraph and you’re ready to publish. Or you can take it further and create lists and other information-packed articles.
For example, if you have a “how to” report with ten steps and ten pages of content, you could create an article that’s a much abbreviated version of the report. List the ten steps with a one or two sentence explanation. You could also write a “three things you need to do to…” article. In fact, with ten steps you could write three of those articles.
Republish old content with updates - Often evergreen content isn’t as evergreen as you hope. The world moves quickly and most industries grow and change regularly. Take a look at your “evergreen” articles and blog posts. How can you refresh them with updated content?
Partition ebooks - This method is similar to breaking down reports to create articles and blog posts. You can break ebooks down into reports, articles or blog posts. In fact, you can get quite a lot of content from an ebook. Take a look at the ebooks you’ve purchased or written and brainstorm content ideas.
Group reports – If you’re looking to create a new information product, consider grouping them to create an ebook. You’ll want to organize the reports in a logical manner. You’ll likely also need to add an introduction as well as a conclusion. Transitions will be necessary and you can add some nice graphics. Add checklists, worksheets and lists to add value to your ebooks and reports for extra value.
Repurposing your content is a smart business strategy. With each new piece of content you create, consider how you might be able to use it in the future. Content is essential for online business success. Make the most of your efforts and maximize your content to the fullest.
Secrets of Email Subject Lines – Wisdom and Fun
Posted by: | CommentsMy friend and colleague, Linda Claire Puig, has me wondering how she has grabbed so much wisdom and fun at the same time!
You see, she has an important free 75 minute training on Tuesday (Oct 11th) called “Subject Line Secrets: How to Get Your Emails Opened and Acted Upon So You Can Have a 6-Figure Business and the Life of Your Dreams!” If wisdom and fun are a combo that work for you, you will want to be there.
Here’s the wisdom:
Your email subject lines are vital to your success. If your readers don’t open your emails, they won’t sign up for your services, buy your products, or register for your programs.
It doesn’t matter how amazing or persuasive your information and product are. If your subscribers don’t open your email and see your words, all you get is wasted marketing efforts and disheartening results.
Linda is an expert in subject lines and taught me tips that make a difference in my business to this day. More than 3000 people have already signed up to learn from her on October 11th. Wouldn’t it be wise for you to be there too?
Here’s the fun:
Because she is such a wise biz person, Linda is giving gifts to you just for registering for this exclusive training! First, you will receive Linda’s “Subject Line Success Checklist” which is a $79 value. Then you will also receive a fun series of short training videos from Linda about using newsletters and other emails to create a 6-figure business (videos that were shot in Italy as she runs her own 6-figure business abroad!).
And there is fun for me too. Linda is wise enough to have a contest for those of us who are recommending her free training to see who can get the most signups. She’s giving us great gifts from Italy – including time in her home there that goes to the big winner. (I am currently in 5th place so I am thinking more about the Italian pizza prize. That’s fun too!) If you sign up to help me, I guarantee Linda will help your business as well.
I’ll be joining Linda on the “Subject Lines Secrets” training for a dose of her wisdom and a side of fun. I hope you’ll be there too.
WHEN: Tuesday, October 11, 2011, at 1 pm Pacific, 2 pm Mountain, 3 pm Central, 4 pm Eastern, 9 pm UK (London), 10 pm Italy, 7 am Australia (Sydney, Oct. 12)
My Top Marketing and Blogging Tips
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I was recently interviewed by my good friend Michelle Salater about my favorite marketing and blogging tips for the solopreneur.
Michelle did a fabulous job picking my brain and I’m excited to see what came out of our time together.
Take a few minutes to head on over to Copy Doodle and check out Part 1 and Part 2 of my interview. Then let Michelle know what you think. Oh and don’t forget to subscribe to her RSS Feed because she is famous for her quality!
Don’t forget to “Mind Your Own Biz”,
Janet
3 Ways to Improve Your Article Writing
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Article writing is part science and part art. As a solopreneur it’s important that you feel comfortable and confident writing content for your business. Content is too important to disregard or not take seriously. The good news is that even if you aren’t presently comfortable with your writing skills there are simple things you can do to improve your article writing.
Create a Structure
Before you sit down to string sentences together, create a structure for your article. Think of it as a very informal outline. For example, the outline for this particular article might look like this.
How to improve your article writing
- Create a structure
- Write conversationally
- Add keywords later
Taking a few minutes to create a structure for your article will make the article writing process faster. It also helps ensure your article stays on topic and has a logical flow. Creating an outline before you write also helps ensure you cover all the points you want to cover. It’s a quick brainstorming session before you write.
Write Conversationally
Unless you’re writing for a magazine or newspaper, most articles are better received if they’re written conversationally. That is to say, they’re written like you speak. Conversational writing is informal. It uses contractions. It uses the word “you” occasionally. And it can break a few grammar rules when necessary.
Conversational writing helps your reader feel like you’re writing directly to them. It is personal and effective. So the next time you’re writing an article, pretend you’re writing a letter to a friend or that you’re talking to a friend. If that doesn’t work, try voice to text software. It records and automatically transcribes your spoken content and can help you write conversationally.
Add Keywords Later
Write your article first without worrying about keyword placement. If you write with keywords in mind there’s a greater chance that your article will feel forced. You want to first write for your readers and then write for the search engines. Complete your article using the words that come naturally to you at the time.
Then go back and look for places where your keywords will sound natural. Look to include them in your subheadings along with your first and last paragraph. Don’t force the issue. Search engines and readers are savvy now. They can recognize a good article when they see it and will respond positively.
Practice writing articles. The more you write them, the more comfortable you’ll become with the process. And you know what they say about practice, right? It makes perfect. Write often, write conversationally, plan your content and focus on keywords after the fact.
Surveys That Work
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Customer surveys are a powerful way to get in the minds of your customers and really figure out what they want and what makes them tick. It can give you information on how you’re doing currently as well as what your customers want in the future.
Here’s how to create a customer survey that will give you meaningful results with the least amount of effort on your customer’s part.
Start by Defining What You Want to Learn
What specific piece of data do you want to obtain by conducting this customer survey? Simply saying “We want to get to know our customers better” is not a good answer. Surveys without a clear goal in mind tend to be far too long and untargeted.
Instead, have a clear question or direction for the survey. For example:
- How is our current service? What are we doing right and what are we doing wrong?
- What do customers want in our current product?
- Who is our demographic?
Once you have a specific line of questioning or specific question you want to answer, then start building your survey.
Creating the Survey
When you’re creating the survey, make it as short as you possibly can while still getting the data you want. That way you’ll have more people actually complete the survey and you won’t bore your customers.
Some options for what kinds of questions to have in your survey include: Multiple choice answers, rating 1-10 scales, true/false questions, strongly agree / strongly disagree scales and open-ended answers.
Generally your questionnaire should be a mix of the above options. Make sure you include at least one open-ended question in your survey so your customers can freely express their thoughts.
Interpreting the Data
Make sure you have statistically significant data for each question before you deem the survey complete.
Then take your survey and start extrapolating results and what you’ve learned. Were you right about certain things and off about others? What were you surprised by?
Carefully read over all the open-ended question answers. Were there common themes in the answers?
Now take everything you’ve learned and write down what your top three discoveries were. Then, use the data now available to you to come up with new action plans to improve your customer experience.
One thing to note about customer surveys: If you’re conducting a survey about what customers will or will not buy, keep in mind that what someone says they would buy may not always match what they’d actually pull their credit card out for. It’s good data to have, but having a survey saying that they’d buy something is not a guarantee that the product will sell.
Design your surveys with a goal in mind. Keep them short and concise, then use what you’ve learned to immediately create a plan and put it into action.
