Showing posts with label content. Show all posts
Showing posts with label content. Show all posts

Monday, November 26, 2012

Repackage, Repurpose And Reinvent To Get The Most Mileage From Your Content

It took some time but you managed to put together the feature article for your upcoming newsletter and you're pleased with the results. It's a shame this great information will just be filed away on your computer or left to collect dust on your bookshelf with the rest of your valuable content.

Does this sound like you? Did you know that most business owners just write for their blog or newsletter and never do anything further with it?

Let's look at some ways you can repackage, repurpose and reinvent your articles, blog posts, videos and more to get the most mileage from your content producing efforts.

Here's what you can do:

1. Post your newsletter article to your blog.
2. Add a link to your newest blog post from your Facebook account.
3. Submit your newsletter article to the article directories.
4. Combine several similar themed articles to build an information product or e-course.
5. Compile articles with related topics to create an e-book.
6. Compile articles with related topics to create a book.
7. Record an audio or video of your article.
8. Transcribe an audio or video into a special report.
9. Restructure an informative or instructional email reply to a client into an article, blog post or training teleclass.
10. Rework chapters of a book or e-book you have written into several shorter articles.
11. Transform your e-course into a live in-person workshop.
12. Record a live workshop or online training to deliver as a self-study course.

To be most effective you will have to do some editing to restructure to the new format. Otherwise, you are only limited by your imagination and creativity.

It can be challenging to constantly create brand new information but you can break down the bigger pieces or combine the smaller pieces of content you already have to develop new and valuable information. When you're coming up with ideas for articles, blog posts, videos and other content think about how you can repurpose the information from one format or method of delivery to another later.

Not only are you preventing your content from going to waste, there are other reasons why you should repackage and repurpose your content:

1. To build a source of passive income by selling the e-products that you create.
2. To grow your list of prospects by offering a free giveaway to visitors to your website in exchange for them giving you their name and email address.
3. To create visibility and catch the attention of your market.
4. To establish your credibility and expert status.
5. To reach a larger audience by providing various ways for someone to work with you, if not one-on-one. For example one client may prefer to learn independently through your self-study course while another would rather absorb the information by attending a live in-person workshop.

Choose your packaging based on your strengths and how your market likes to receive their information to create multiple products from one set of content. If you're trying to grow your business and you're at full capacity with clients, repurposing content is a great way to increase your income stream.

Saturday, September 15, 2012

All About Having a 'Lens' on Squidoo

Squidoo is a platform for those publishers who like to offer web content services and for those whom would like to share their interests publicly. Squidoo is not like any other website where people dump their work; it is a very different website that appreciates good content. A person who writes article on Squidoo has to develop a page first which is called 'Lens'. An article can also be called a 'Lens' on Squidoo. The website is named strategically, and every article writer has a nickname of 'Squid', but they are officially called 'LensMasters'.

Squidoo allows writers to publish and to add website contents by writing on various topics, but guidelines need to be followed. When a user intends to join Squidoo, the most important thing he should have is the passion to write. Your areas of interest do not matter as long as you like to write. The articles can be about anything, ranging from food to fashion. All that matters is that the article is interesting and it must offer quality website contents. Some guidelines need to be followed strictly, and spamming is not allowed. This makes the website spam free and allows readers and publishers to have a decent environment at their disposal to make money and to create valuable content.

Squidoo is useful for people whom use internet marketing. Squidoo is also recognized by many reputable search engines, such as Google, which gives a lot of help to the internet marketers. If someone posts relevant articles on Squidoo, there is a high chance that Google would rank it highly, making it available to a larger audience. Therefore, if you are trying to promote your website with Squidoo, you will probably end up at a higher rank in search engines if you write articles and you promote those appropriately. Squidoo also allows backlinks, which can help a lot if you target relevant and high quality content. Squidoo does have a marketing advantage, but that does not mean it is of use only to the internet marketers. It can also be used by people who love to write, read, and to share high quality content. Squidoo allows this all without charges and also gives an opportunity of earning some money out of it.

With Squidoo, you can also build your own page and you can give it your own customized look. You can either choose the theme of lenses to be professional, or casual as per your choices. By having your own page on Squidoo, you can easily post high quality content, and you can see your page rank higher in the search engines. The type of page you create, and the quality of content that you publish is all that will determine how much potential you have to earn from it.

Squidoo has forums that are highly active, and that contribute a lot towards the knowledge and information of the individuals. Squidoo is also active with many charity programs and contributes to them generously. You also have an option to contribute part of your earnings to charity but that is totally up to you. With a user-friendly interface, and with an easy-to-use platform, Squidoo is a great platform for writers, and it is definitely better than its competitors are.

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Top No-No's When It Comes To Writing Articles

When you are writing articles, it is important to make sure that you pay special attention to the quality of content and to impress and impact through your persuasive words, you must avoid the oh-so-horrible writing errors. Simply put, your credibility and reputation can rest on the quality of writing you produce.

If you do expect to be taken seriously, you must make sure that your writing is free of common errors or mistakes that can alter the meaning of your communication through words. Most of the mistakes made when writing articles can be avoided by simply proofreading the article before submission. Here are some of the top no-no's for writers:

1. Grammar and spelling

These are probably the most common mistakes that people make when writing articles. While these mistakes usually occur in articles written by people who have learnt English as a second language, it is also a result of carelessness when writing for the native English speakers. Poor grammar and spelling draws readers away from the actual content of the writing. There are many online grammar and spelling checking tools that are readily available and they can help you to avoid making common and avoidable mistakes.

2. Plagiarism

Many writers make the unforgivable mistake of copy pasting other people's content and passing it off as their own. This unethical practice has been widespread with many people taking credit for other's work. This practice will make you lose credibility very fast especially in this day and age when there are online tools that can check for plagiarism. If for any reason you need to use someone else's content, make sure that you cite it as a reference.

3. Lengthy articles

Another common mistake people make is writing lengthy articles. Unless you are writing a novel, do not try to write too much in one article. Readers are looking for specific information and they do not want to read many pages to get a simple point you are making. Readers lose interest in long articles and will usually just skim the content or skip it all together.

4. Incorrect information

If you are unsure about any factual information or data, you should not write it down. Using incorrect data is unprofessional and it reflects poorly on the writer. You lose credibility and the readers can feel that they cannot trust anything else you have to say. Check your facts before writing them down, and if you are not sure about anything, do not write it. Apart from looking incompetent, you can also open yourself up to legal problems.

5. Writing style

Many people make the mistake of using the wrong writing style when writing articles. It is important to make sure that you use the relevant style for your target audience. When you determine who you are writing to, you can use a style that will make your article more interesting and easy to read, in accordance to the type of readers you are trying to inform or educate through your content.

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

The Inner Workings of Life As a Freelance Copywriter

As a freelance copywriter, you write "copy" or content for others for payment. Not everyone in the world has the ability to write well. If that's a surprise to you than apparently you haven't seen some of the content online these days. I've seen many online content and articles which have been full of grammatical errors and made no sense at all. As a business owner, I would never put such sloppy copy on my website or on one of my blogs.

Now, if you're writing for another business owner who doesn't want to or doesn't have the ability to write his or her own content-this person doesn't want sloppy copy either. That type of content won't present a professional image and won't sell. Business owners need fresh content all the time. They may need this content for their website or blog or to be posted on an online magazine and all this is done to generate traffic flow to their online hub. Their hub is their website or blog with connections to all of their profiles on social media sites.

Freelance copywriters usually work on an assignment basis and if you do good work, you'll get repeat leads. Sounds simple, right? It is simple if you follow some rules and don't run into various problems which can send your freelance writing career down the tubes. The best technique is to always provide great content for your clients. Now, your client might be a direct client who you have straight contact with and there is no middleman. You may have some indirect clients who hire a contracting firm to supply one of their freelancers to writer content for them. If you provide top-notch content, with your unique voice and you submit it in a timely manner within deadlines, then you'll have no problem getting repeat assignments.

One of the biggest issues is freelancers who plagiarize and use content which is not their own and claim that it is. Let's say for example that you plagiarized content for an article that you submitted to your client. If they ascertain that it was indeed plagiarized, you can say good-bye to a credible career. Just think how much damage this can do if your plagiarism wasn't caught and the content was used on the client's website or blog or in an article linking to their online hub. That is definitely not a situation you want to find yourself in.

Usually if a client asks for you to write content for them, you are given specific keywords to use. There is a point to that and not just to drive you nuts. Those key words are used for SEO which is search engine optimization in order to drive organic traffic to the client's online hub. The key is to organically input these topical key words into the article content in a way which reads naturally and isn't forced or looks like it was done "on purpose."

There are so many benefits to becoming a freelance copy writer and to reach a full-time work from home position takes hard work and dedication; however, if you put in the dedicated effort, you will succeed. Take the time to learn some simple techniques and always remain ethical and you will build up your credibility as a real freelance writer and will never be wanting for more assignments.