In 2011, SEO and writing is going to change big time as the rules of SEO game has changed and so has the readers’ mindset. People have stopped paying attention to copy that looks crappy, as lot of bad content has been littered on the Internet.

Not just the search engines, but users even are a lot more conscious of the value your content adds to his or her life, and after the introduction of snapshot feature in Google SERP, it has become more difficult for badly written content to make its way to the customers’ computer. Even when it gets a chance to get there, they are quickly thrown out.

So how to make a content interesting both for people and machine?

To make your content interesting for your readers you need to do the following:

• Use the language that your visitors converse in.
• Provide them the value they are looking for.
• Do not just write anything. Do a research before delving into the actual writing process.
• Read blog comments, forum posts, and watch YouTube videos to see what your customers are getting and what their requirements are.

Following the handful of tips given above will take your writing business to all new height, but how to make the same content accessible for machines (search engine bots).

If you are new to the field then the fact that you have to write content for machines as well may make you cringe, but this is what we all have been doing since always in the name of SEO content. We have been working to satisfy the needs of machine, so that it could display our websites when visitors come searching information on the topic we are writing.

To make your content standout with machines you need to do the following:

• Do not write for the machine. Even it does not want anything to be written exclusively for it.
• Place important keywords and other related terms at appropriate places.
• Do not go overboard with optimization.
• Write with audience in mind and SEO should be the secondary thought.

Content written for the two groups that we talked about above should not be mutually exclusive. You need to write content that meets the needs of both of them. This is not very difficult, all you need to do is practice.

But how to keep the creative juice flowing? Here are tips below regarding where to get creative ideas from.

Choose an area of interest

Choose an area of work, which interests you. Don’t do what everyone is doing and is counted as trendy, or what brings money. Follow your heart and aptitude. You should do things which interest you, what you are passionate about. Then work will never seem like burden, it will be enjoyable. Within your passionate field further choose an area which you are good at. Like some artists are best in oil painting. So they excel if they go to the same field.

Draw inspiration from a source

You should be inspired by someone, to get going. It could be anyone – a mentor whose work inspire you or a famous person, a renowned global personality whose creations and success have always driven you crazy. Don’t imitate them blindly, get inspired by them.

Challenge yourself, do something new

Don’t end up doing what the rests have been doing. Challenge yourself constantly. Even if it seems impossible and full of hurdles in reality, if you think your idea is good and you can do it, go for it. It may take time and patience, but all great things come after long wait. Don’t be nailed down by failures. Failures will take you to success. If breaking rules help in procuring something good, let it happen.

Write down your ideas

Whenever something unique comes to your mind, pen it down and keep safely. It will keep you involved, focused, motivated and will help you to measure your progress.

Consult outer sources

Stay humble and open to new ideas. Don’t think you know it all. Tomorrow while talking to someone you come up with a better idea than before. So keep learning from others, books, films, articles – whatever is relevant for you. Even in an informal chat over coffee, great ideas may spring up.

Stay creative!

Prepare a structure for the article

Before you begin writing, you should create a structure of the article. When you undertake this exercise what you are basically doing is creating a skeleton which you will later fill with flesh, blood, and muscles. The structure of an article provides it a basic framework that will later be developed in a full grown article.

Divided the contents in subheadings

Once you know how your final article will look like, you need to divide your articles into sections and sub-sections using headings and subheadings for better readability. To break an article into sections and subsections apply the rule of thumb given below. The rule of thumb is: always put the important ideas into headings of an article, so that people know what individual paragraphs will talk about, and what the article, as a whole, is about.

Write down main points

Now it is time to add some flesh to the structure you have created so far. Under each headings and subheadings, write 2 or 3 bullet points that summarize the central idea of each paragraph, and which add up to make the complete paragraph.

That is it. You are done. Now only the filling up step is left, which could be done anytime, even after one or more breaks.

As said, the final step in the process is to write content beneath headings and subheadings using the main points (bullet points) that you have listed. By following this guide, you will be able to write good quality articles even when you take frequent breaks.

You do not need any experience to start with your freelance writing career. All you need is writing ability and determination to make it big. You need a lot of determination because I know many freelance writing aspirants who left the field just after a handful of failures.

No, it is not tough to break into this career, but it takes time before you start making significant sum of money. Initially, the growth rate may be slow, but eventually it will pick up. This is not the right career choice for those who want overnight success, as success comes slowly. I think it happens in every legit field.

What role does experience plays?

Although it does not matter if you have any experience of writing or not, but experience does play a part in your freelancing career. Experience does two things:

1. Get you higher pay rate.
2. Help you complete the assignment in significantly less time.
3. It also helps you know beforehand how much time one project will require. You can use this knowledge to properly bill your clients.

Lack of experience will only result in lower rate and more assignment completion time. And I think, when starting out you can adjust with this. Do not give up, if your rate doesn’t increase in a month or 2 month or may be even in 6 month because the more time you are spending in this career the stronger is the chance of your success. Do not quit it now.

And who said you do not have experience?

Even if you have not written professionally, you must have written a lot of stuff—term paper, assignments, school and colleges essays, or even for school or college publications. Won’t you call it experience? I certainly will. After all, writing is writing is writing, no matter for what you write.

In terms of writing ability, you may already have what it takes to make it big in the freelance writing. If you are not sure then show your written pieces to someone whom you know is good at writing, and go by his opinion. If he says you need improvement then work on it. Nothing is here that you cannot do. All you need is sheer determination. Keep pushing, you will soon be there.

For your free writing success!

Below, I am giving a handful of writing tips that will help people like me read more on the Internet, by the way, most of the people on the Internet are like me only.

1. Use Headlines, headings and subheading that make sense. Keep clever lines safe for print.
2. Use simple words. No one like using a dictionary when scanning through the Internet.
3. Use short sentences to convey the idea.
4. Use short paragraphs. Paragraphs that run into 10s of sentences are strict no-no for the web.
5. Write a proper paragraph; one idea per paragraph.
6. Break the articles into small chunks by using headings and subheads.
7. Make your text more scannable by making important keywords bold, italic or by underlining it.
8. Use lists like this one, wherever it is possible. It is easy to go through a list than a 10-sentence paragraph.
9. Use objective language. Do not make your article sound like a promotion material.
10. Link old articles or blog-posts on your domain to retain visitors for long.

Learn… in30 minutes

A headline like this will give the reader a definite time frame in which he or she can acquire the skill or knowledge talked about in the article in question.

Example:

1. Learn to Disinfect Your PC in 30 Minutes.
2. Learn Piano in 30-Minute a Day.
3. Learn HTML in 10 Days.
4. Learn Photoshop in 30 Days. (Photoshop in 30 Days).
5. CSS in 10 Easy Steps.

Tried and tested headlines

A “tried and tested” headline infuses credibility in the article. A headline like this suggests that the article following the headline will provide the solution which has been tried by many people and they got benefitted from it. This is a type of testimonial headlines. (Read more on Testimonial Headline)

Example:

1. Tried and Tested Formula for MLM Success.
2. Tried and Tested Method to Make Your Abs Flat.

50 best…tips

“50 best…tips, or 10…tips” or any similar headline gives a definitive idea about the length and nature of the article following such headlines. The article following this kind of headline should be written in a list-format. You can also use subheadings (Tip 1, or X tip 1) to write the article.

Example:

1. 50 Best SEO Tips.
2. 10 Media Marketing Tips for Success.
3. 10 CSS Tips.

Record what you do and eliminate unnecessary things

In order to take time out from your daily schedule, you need to figure out how you spend your day. Start with recording everything that you do in your daily life. Once you have a complete list of things that you do in any day of the week, start striking out the thing you can do without. You will be amazed to see how much time you wasted in idle talks, and television watching. These things are important, but when done in excess, they can kill your productivity.

Cut on rests

One needs to work hard, if one wants to achieve something. You need to cut on sleeping, and lunchtime rests to take time out to write. You can use this time to write down the thoughts that come to you, or even use this time to develop your story.

Write while you travel

Well, this is not always possible to write when you are going from one place to another, but you can always use this time to write down the key points, which you can further develop at your leisure.

Talk to your family and ask for support

Take your family in confidence and speak your mind, tonight on the dinner table. Tell them what you are planning to do. Ask your partner, or parents to look after your kids at least once a week, so that you can have some free time to write. If you have grownup kids then ask them to do the house works once a week to help you in taking time out to write.

Let’s give you a personal account in brief to explain this more clearly. Couple of years back, I was employed in a space selling team of a national newspaper (for convenience sake let’s call it X-Paper). My stay there was not long, but I learned quite a few things there. While in X-Paper, I made a friend, who was very polished, professional, and stiff and had a quirky sense of humor. One fine day, he was not in his usual mood, not cracking his kind of jokes, which made me ask, how he was doing. In response to this he started verbally bashing our bosses (we had a handful of them). As he said, his issue was with the way our bosses lick the clients boot by being polite (overly) to make a sale (perhaps he was referring o their soft skills), and to meet their targets. He felt, it was not being professional. He went on saying he was against such things; one should do what he used to do, make a good PPT, put all the necessary information in it, and deliver the presentation, as best as one could. And that according to him was how sales should be made; no personal chit-chat, no small talks. What he was suggesting was this: do not be friendly (over, as he put it) with the people on the other side of the table, they are just business associates, so, instead of showing concern to their matters, we should focus on solving problems in their business. As he said, we should focus on what problem clients’ business had, and how our product was going to solve it.

After couple of months in the only corporate job, I quit and started a viral marketing and buzz generation agency (I come from MARCOM background), and hired this person for sales job. Six months into the position, he was still looking to make his first sale. I tried convincing him the other method, but he did not listen, and shifted the blame on our agency being a new thing. His point was well taken. Interestingly even when he was with X-Paper, a very well established niche newspaper, his sale was still not justifying the salary he drew. I was naïve then, and due to lots of other reasons my venture failed, but while taking its last breath it taught me the power of soft skills. The power of a simple smile, saying sorry, listening carefully, politely disagreeing when the difference in opinion arises, and admiring heartily when come across wonderful thing. All in all it taught me the wisdom that lies in being a good human.

Why my friend from X-paper despite those glittering MBA degree from a reputed college failed in doing what my bosses found it every day affair? Most of my bosses did not even have an MBA degree, they were plain vanilla graduates! I am not planning to kill you by the length of this post, so return tomorrow and get the answers. Till then, so long!

I am sure you’ve heard of de.li.cio.us. It redirects to delicious.com, but as a .us domain and social bookmarking site, I can’t help thinking that their creativity was first sparked from the lack of interesting domain names available. If you can take something short and to the point from your search on word navigator, your next step would be to check it’s availability. The following guidelines can speed up the process:

• Since there are 3,563 words that end in -us at the time of this posting, the easiest thing to do would be to copy and paste each list (by length) into a text document, which took me about 7 minutes. You probably won’t take as long, if you copy and paste only half of all the words.
• In the document, click Edit and Select All. Proceed to toggle the bullets off. Then use Ctrl+F and type us into the search box. Click on Find All. You will notice that the -us ending has been selected for all of the words. Now click on Replace All. Your document should no longer have any of the -us endings.
• If your document is 75 pages long, perhaps it would be best to weed out words before continuing. Or you can copy and paste the words in only chunks (maybe 30 words) at a time into this domain name regristration search (clicking on the us extension, while unselecting the com extension), so that your internet browser doesn’t freeze up during the process.

Of the first thirty words I submitted, 14 were available. Here is my example chunk with unavailable .us domain names crossed out:

fagaceo.us                          furacio.us
felonio.us                          furfuro.us
feracio.us                          garrulo.us
ferocio.us                          gingero.us
fervoro.us                          glaireo.us
filaceo.us                          glamoro.us
flavoro.us                          globulo.us
fractio.us                          gluteno.us
frivolo.us                          glutino.us
froufro.us                          granulo.us
fugacio.us                          gummato.us
fulgoro.us                          gumptio.us
fulguro.us                          hazardo.us
fulmino.us                          hilario.us

Honestly, if I were a business looking for an attractive and modern domain name, gumptio.us would be my first pick! If you don’t know, gumptious is an adjective that means enterprising (synonym to energetic, industrious, up-and-coming). Or how about furacio.us? Hurry up, domain names like these will soon fill up the Web 2.0 (or is it 3.0) scene! If you really don’t care what the domain name is and just want to set something up quickly, your best bet would be to submit one or two words into a domain name suggestion tool.