Article writing is something millions of people have thought about. Business owners, students and many others have thought about writing articles for websites and blogs to ear additional income. What many have learned is that writing content is harder to do than they imagined or they don’t know how to get started writing articles. Once this realization is made, many use this as a reason to stop and move on to their next idea. What many don’t realize is that, with a few tricks and a little advice, article writing is easier to do than expected.
Knowledge is power and sharing knowledge makes a business more powerful in their industry. When it’s time to write those nuggets of knowledge, most people don’t know what to do. There are tons of tips designed to help but often, those tips just overwhelm a beginner. The following tips will make the first leap into article writing painless.
10 Tips for Article Writing
- Articles are a Necessity
When it comes to rankings in the search engines, articles are necessary. Without someone writing content and articles, there is nothing for the search engines to rank a website for. The easiest way to gain rankings in any search engine is to submit articles and allow them to be published. The more articles published on a website, the better their rankings become and the more people will know the business exists. When it comes to article writing, just thinking about the need for content will it a bit easier to sit down and write.
- Once Started, It Becomes Easier
The fear of doing something new often makes the doing impossible. The best way to overcome the fear of article writing is to just do it. There is nothing that anyone through the fear of writing other than sitting at the computer or tablet and just typing. Once those first few lines have been typed, it gets easier and often the words start flowing.
- Good Enough is Just Enough
Writing online is not the same as writing in college or high school. There are no teachers available to grade or judge something as perfect. There are no grades to be given. Often people assume that article writing is the same and it’s not.
New writers should always remember the online reader is often reading for information, entertainment or to solve a problem. They often don’t have time to sort through unnecessary words and look up the definitions of others to understand what they’ve read. Often, what was deemed good enough is enough for the online reader to get what they need.
- Blog and Article Length Varies
After an article is written, new writers often think what they’ve written isn’t long enough. They don’t understand there is no set limit on word count when submitting articles. Most people and publishers want at least 400 words but that can be discussed. The most important thing writers should remember when it comes to article writing is quality. There are many quality articles written that are less than 300 words and some are more than 1500 words.
Any writer should concentrate on the quality of their articles rather than focusing solely on the length of the article.
- Keeping Formatting Simple
Again, there are no professors or teachers ready to reject an article due to being submitted in the wrong format. When it comes to formatting, those that are concerned should review the ASCII format. The ASCII, American Standard Code for Information Interchange, is very easy to follow and most blog editors are set to address any formatting issues.
When in doubt, use a word document to create start writing.
- Spelling and Grammar are Important
There aren’t many hard or fast rules when it comes to article writing. One of the few things writers should pay attention to is spelling and grammar. In order to communicate the point of the article, the reader has to understand what is being said. Since articles are written conversations, writers have to be certain they are writing their articles in a way that is understandable to their audience.
Once an article is written, it should be edited with special attention being paid to the spelling and grammar used.
- Publish or Submit the Polished Article
Once an article has been edited and proofread, there is nothing left to do except publish it or submit it for publication. This is the most never wracking part of article writing. Some writers fear their work will be rejected and that rejection means they are a horrible writer. That’s not always true.
When an editor rejects an article, it often comes with suggestions on how to make it better. Once those suggestions are made, writers have an understanding of what their editor or publisher is looking for with that particular article.
Writers that publish their articles themselves are often scared their audience will hate what they wrote. What they forget is, their audience is there for a reason. As long as the article delivers what it is supposed to, their audience will continue to be their audience.
- Promote and Link the Work
There are millions of articles published every year. Every writer dreams of having a large audience that follows their work, no matter their industry.
In today’s world, the only way to do that is to promote their work that’s available and link it to them. Most writers or business owners have an online presence through social media or website. Instead of publishing their work and moving on, they should link their work back to their online presence. This helps everyone find other work that writer has produced.
- Always Have Patience
As with anything, to be successful with article writing, it takes patience. There is nothing harder than working at something and having to wait for the success to follow. Instead of thinking in those terms, writers should think of themselves as successful when they produce content and publish it for the world to review.
Success is only defined by the person chasing it. Writers should determine their definition of success and work for that definition of success.
- Write Consistently and It will Show
The worst thing a writer can do is only produce one piece and think they will get calls back for another. That is just not the way to build a career article writing. Anyone that is serious about building a career ass a writer need to write consistently and striving to build their portfolio. With a portfolio of multiple, well crafted articles, the opportunities will come.
There are many tips that new writers have to field through to find what will help them in their career. Rather than read the mounds of tips and get discouraged, new writers should consider the information given about article writing and apply it as they need it.