01 Mar 11 Why You Should Not Read Blogs, if You Want to Succeed?
I am certain you didn’t wake up today thinking of confronting such titles on a day when things are falling just in place for you, first time in many years. I know this introductory line sucks, and this is precisely why I wanted to write this blog post.
Why you shouldn’t read blogs?
The correct headline should be: why you should not read too many blogs. And the answer is because reading too many blogs takes time which else could have been devoted to taking action. Reading too many blogs would paralyze you. There are so many blogs out there, each one of them presenting different point of view, calls to different part of your mind. How can you respond to all?
How many should you read?
As many as you can in maximum two hours of time. I know I have been very liberal in allotting time to blog reading and I should have only asked for one hour. But we need to go slow when persuading people to change habit, or else our effort will not bear desirable result.
In the beginning, you should read and understand fully as many blogs as you can in 1-2 hours every day. Not a single minute extra should be wasted on this activity. But over time, you should reduce this time spent on blogging to 45-30 minutes.
What should you do in spare time then?
You should read books, industry journal, watch documentary, do research, or talk to people. In short, you should engage yourself in activities that give you more benefit. It is more about ROI on time invested. Some good blogs, like this one, do give you higher ROI on your time, but surfing through low-quality blogs take away from the overall benefit you get from reading a blog post.
Reading blog can be advantageous, and it often is, but indulging too much into it will reduce your productivity. So be judicious in your time allocation.
So what is the bottom line?
The bottom line is this: you must read various blogs, but your reading should not be limited to blog reading only. You should read from other sources as well. The varied your sources will be, the richer your experience will be.
Tags: 30 Minutes, Benefit, blog, blogging, Bottom Line, Different Point Of View, Documentary, Extra, Habit, Introductory Line, Limited, Low Quality, Maximum, Persuading People, Point Of View, Productivity, Roi, Spare Time, Talk To People, Time Allocation
07 Nov 09 Get Maximum Value out of your Marketing Writing
The marketing writing is different from any other form of writing in the sense that the former kind of writing requires people to take some kind of action, while general writing just aim at informing and persuading people. Thus, you need to make your writing clear, concise, and emphatic. You need to entice your customers into reading your stuff to the end, and to achieve this goal, you need to follow the following guidelines.
Use emphatic headlines
The goal of a headline is not to sell the product, but to push the audience to read further by generating interest in them. When writing a marketing copy or copy for print ads then write headline in such a way that audience get curious after reading this and decide to read further.
Use descriptive sub-heading
The purpose of the subheading is to explain the promise made by the headline and push the reader to read the body copy.
Write focused body copy
This is where you need to sell your stuff. Your body copy should fulfill the promises made by the headline and the sub-heading. Use a conversational tone, do not preach your target audience. They hate it like anything. Each word of the body copy should lead you to the next word, and the next word to the next word, and so on. You can achieve this only by using measured words.
Tips for writing body copy
- Use short sentences.
- Write the body copy using active voice.
- Keep the writing jargon-free. No one likes to read technical details.
- Express the benefits not the features.
- One size doesn’t fit all, therefore, right body copy with the target audience in mind. The copy you will write for a doctor who is 26 years of age and an artist of the same age will be different. Keep this subtle difference in mind.
- Talk, do not preach.
- Tell the reader, how you can help him solve his problem.
- Use direct sentences.
Add Call to action
The marketing copy will fetch no result, if there is no call to action included at critical juncture in the marketing copy. A call to action tells the user what is expected of him. What action you want from him. This is very, very important.
Conclusion
Marketing copy writing is as much a science as it is an art. You cannot achieve anything meaningful by just making the writing flowery. Always remember, you are not writing a birthday card, its marketing stuff that you are writing.
Tags: Active Voice, Aim, Audience In Mind, Conversational Tone, Critical Juncture, Doctor Who, Headlines, Jargon, Marketing, Maximum Value, Persuading People, Print Ads, Promises, Sell Stuff, Sentences, Size Doesn, Subheading, Subtle Difference, Target Audience, Technical Details
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