Tips on content creation

Let's complete the Build phase with some general advice on creating your paid content.

The next Phase will deal with my strategies for growing your business through free content, so much of this advice will also apply to your on-going content development as well.

Photo by John Schnobrich on Unsplash

Personally, my first rule with any content is to plan out the logical order first then, once you’re happy, fill in the gaps. Think of how you might create a drawing, doing the outline first then colouring in the spaces.

Leading on from this advice, another tip that works great for me is to split the planning stage apart from the actual production. I like to plan on paper first and then go to the computer, instead of staring at an empty document. I like to do my planning sitting outside, if the weather is pleasant, or in the sauna, in the bath, or in bed.

This is a technique I have used for years, which I call “think then do”. You might think of yourself as having two hats: one for planning and one for doing. Put on your planning hat for figuring out the structure of what you’re going to do, then take off that hat, stop planning and strategizing, and get on with the doing. My preferred approach is to map out what I want to achieve on paper, with circles, lines, and arrows showing the relationships between elements. Only once I am happy that I have the content mapped out will I start to type.

Before and during production, always be clear in your mind what you want the content to achieve, and what you want the consumer’s experience to be.

Whether I am writing a whole book or a blog post, I’ll start the document by adding the headings that represent the main ideas, and after I am satisfied that they are complete and in the right logical order I will then start to write the actual content. I find this method allows me to achieve good results in a relatively short time. You will discover the methods that work best for you.