I Know I'm The Only One That Struggles to Write Content
That is said with lots of sarcasm! :)
It seems like a new blog post is posted on WA every few minutes. Some members here are extremely prolific when it comes to producing content. One Ambassador has been a member for two years and has over 640 post on WA. Another member, who is in the top 50, has been here less than four years has over 1,800 posts! This is only what they have produce for Wealthy Affiliate, it doesn't count what they've done on their websites.
"Writing is like a sport - You only get better if you practice." - Rick Riordan
A 1,700 Word Post in 15 Minutes
Why can some people sit down and pump out a post in less than an hour while it takes days for someone else to create a post of the same length? At the end of May, Leoemery posted that it took him just over 11 minutes to create a 1,788 word post. Leo is a fan of Dragon, a speech recognition software. Yes, he can talk faster than he can type, but he still had that whole post thought out so he could dictate it. That's impressive. Now I get that Leo has been doing this for a long time. Writing, like anything, gets easier as you do it on a consistent basis.
Be a Master…
On my search of "how to write content", I came across MozMary's post, The How-toWrite-Content Battle: Let Me Entertain You!. I had two takeaways from this.
Continue to learn. Although Mary has been doing this for a while, she still takes classes to learn and hone her craft.
Learn everything you can about what you want to write about. Don't copy from someone else. Learn it and put it in your own words.
I love doing things to improve. I've been listening to self-improvement books for years. I consistently take webinars and go to live events on a wide variety of topics in order to better myself. So I really connected with the premise of continuing to learn. It doesn't matter how much you think you know, there's always something to learn.
…at What You Do
The goal is to be a master in your niche. This seems obvious and Kyle hammers that point home in the training. Do your research when you are writing a post. Don't just copy from other articles and piece it all together. Make it your own. Understand it inside and out.
I've been in a funk and haven't been writing…at all! Not a good thing. I have a habit of doing something until it's perfect. In some cases this is a good thing. But, I'm discovering, not when it comes to writing. Thinking that everything I write has to be perfect is immobilizing me. I don't even begin.
My goal for the day was to write something that I know about and to write it quickly. I'm a little slow on the quick part. :) I wanted to write something that I had a great grasp of and wouldn't over think what I was writing as I was writing it. Does that make sense? I wanted to be confident in what I was doing so I didn't pick it apart until it was perfect.
A Great Example
As I said, I'm a huge fan of self-improvement books. The Five Second Rule is one of the ones I've listened to lately. I found Mel Robbins on YouTube. She's extremely dynamic and fun to listened to. I really enjoyed the book on Audible. Since I had a great feel for the subject matter I thought it would be perfect for a review.
The first thing I did was to check WA to see if anyone has done a review on it yet. And there it was, The 5 Second Rule by Kaju(jetrbby80316). Go ahead and click on it, it's a great read.
Kaju nailed. He did a great job of explaining the 5 Second Rule and the premise behind it. His explanations and examples clearly demonstrated that he knew his subject material inside and out. It was in his words.
It's Time to Take Action
So, thanks for letting me practice. :) I have set writing goals for each day to practice my sport of writing. I'm doing writing exercises just to write. This is working for me. Writing content for my website isn't so intimidating as it was in the beginning. The more I write, the more comfortable and faster I am becoming with getting my ideas and thought out there.
To all of you WA veterans out there, have you ever struggled to write content? What have you done to combat your struggles?
Recent Comments
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Hi, Suzanne, I think you may have just hit a home run, I see that you are developing a routine and some goals around your writing. that can be more than half the battle won.
The training here in WA can e so subtle and the opportunity to create content for a captive audience is an opportunity to try things out and to work on developing that creative style that suits you.
In answer to your question, when I first arrived herein WA couldn't write my way out of a wet paper bag, after time and much practice I have become very good friends with writing. At times we can all experience as you put it " the funk ", it is not a matter of if but more a matter of when. the thing about this online journey is that it is way more than just creating content like you have alluded to there is the research, devoting time to learning all there is to know about our chosen fields and then there is the technical side of things working to create that total web experience that will draw folks to our websites and hopefully that experience will cause them to stay a while and to return, so when the writing becomes a strain, time to step out and work different aspects of your business, it can bring back the flow.
Best wishes, it doesn't have to be perfect straight out of the gate one of the really good inventions we have at our disposal is that little button called edit, which can become a good friend as well.
Thanks, Alex! I agree, we can never stop learning! Working on my website does help to break up the monotony of writing.
It's a little bit of a comfort to hear that I'm not alone with struggling to write. I know that I will eventually get through this and know that when I come up against it again, I'll have the tools to get me through it faster.
Thanks for your insight. It's much appreciated!
I think that this is one of the real positives with WA, we are all real people who have real issues, sharing can actually be so helpful and as we know everyone has those bad days at the office.
You have hit the nail on the head next time it happens, we can recognize and see it for what i is, looking forward to reading about your successes.
Thanks, Alex!
It's great to have the support of such a caring community. That was a big draw for me when I first joined WA.
You write really well. I love your post. Keep on writing.
I'm here at WA for 6 months and I'm still very slow in writing. It takes days for me to finish a post. At first, I just write when I'm inspired, but I have to research along the way and editing takes the longest time.
We just need to practice to make ourselves better at it.
Marita
Thanks, Marita! I feel more comfortable writing now than when I first started.
I'm scheduling myself blocks of time to write. I'm afraid if I wait for inspiration or motivation, I'll never get started. Mel Robbins has an interesting point about why she thinks motivation is garbage. You can find the video on YouTube.
Keep practicing!
Thanks I'll look for Mel Robin's video. I know, we really have to plan things and stick with it.
My struggle is time and how to prioritize writing.
Marita
I struggle with that as well. Some days the planning and scheduling works. Other days, the day just seems to get away from me. I try not to stress about it.
Hello Suza,
Here's a trick once mastered--I haven't yet--will allow you to write quickly and consistently. The bonus is that Google will like it because it enhances your authority in your given niche.
What you do is take a look at some of the posts that you have written and see if you can get ideas for other posts from the opening paragraphs.
For example the opening sentence of my post might be:
Facebook will likely ban your add for medical marijuana. (Idea 1)
What is the alternative platform to FB for advertising medical marijuana? Influencers have more freedom than companies to talk about the benefits of Medical Marijuana. (Idea 2)
Which influencers can best be used to speak about the benefits of medical marijuana.?
You keep going. The object is to see if other ideas can be derived from your post. Often, once you master the technique, it's easy to get 6 or 10 post ideas from just one blog post. The reason why Google rewards those who can do this is because the ideas reinforce a theme or several themes and that shows Authority.--Very big deal with Google.
Apart from this technique, I also like constructing beginning and ending templates because sometimes the most consuming and hardest parts of writing are the opening and closing paragraphs.
Hope that helps...
Thabo
Hey Thabo! I like the thought of getting future posts from an existing one. That's very clever and makes a lot of sense. And keeping Google happy is the goal. :)
You mentioned beginning and ending templates. Are there certain points that you try to hit with them in every post you write?
Thanks for sharing. This is very helpful to me. I'm sure others will get something out of it too.
Hi Suza,
I think a lot depends on the type of post I am writing. For example, if I were writing a post about pets I might have a beginning that uses a statistic. I might mention the number of households with a dog in the United States. I might end it with the Do and don'ts of keeping a healthy pet.
On the other hand, If I were writing about someone battling an illness I might open with a story and end with and inspiring quote or wrap it up with a motivational message.
Everything depends on what message I want to send to my readers. That said, In every post I write I try to give a sense that I'm having a conversation with my reader. For example, when someone sees a cut on your hand they'll ask, "does it hurt?". But for some odd reason if they were writing to you, they might ask "Are you experiencing any pain?". I try not to do that.
I also try to remember that clarity is the one skill that without all the other skills are useless. The reader can't decide if he or she agrees or disagrees with what you are saying if they don't understand what you are saying. And I am from the school that if the reader doesn't understand what you are saying, it's your fault not theirs. So, you readers out there stop beating yourself up because you don't understand what some writer is saying.
Also, I never assume something will interest the reader simply because i say so. Thus, I never start any post with "This will interest you." or "You'll be interested in this."
In short, I try to have a conversation, clarity, and reason for the reader to check out what I'm saying.
Hope that helps.
Thabo
That helps a lot, Thabo! Thanks for taking the time to give such a detailed explanation.
What you said makes a lot of sense. I do try to write as if I'm talking to someone that's next to me...just having a conversation with them.
I appreciate the great pointers!
Hi Suzanne. When I first started at WA I had trouble writing 300 words. Now I can't stop writing. Jim
Not sure. I was always a good writer at school. I guess the words just come into my head. Sometimes I can't sleep at night until I've written down what I'm thinking about.
That makes sense. Writing has never been a huge strong point for me. Which is kind of funny since I have written many technical manuals. For some reason, that comes easy to me. Go figure!
Hey Suzanne,
I may not be a newbie but I have been away from writing for awhile. It will take me a while to get back to swing of things to speed back up. That's where blogging comes into play for me. I try to write long blogs so when I'm able to get back to work on my websites my word count will still be high.
Tried and True
Elaine
Glad to hear that, Mike. That's what I'm aiming for!
Do you have any tips that you'd like to share?
By the way, Mike. In case you didn't guess it, the WA'er that's written over 1800 posts is you. :) Thanks for all that you do here at WA!
I'm aware of that Suzanne. It's a sparsely settled region. I lead WA at this time but Davida Shensky is letting no grass grow under her feet. She'll crack the 1500 mark tomorrow! A 300 post lead can be cracked in 100 days!
Writing is my life and it comes motivated and free of charge in Wealthy Affiliate! I can reach the 2000 mark in November!
See more comments
Think that when you get going it is not to difficult, it is finding a topic to write about on my WA blog that I have a problem with, which is why I suppose I do not do one as often as I should. There again do need to keep my blog content on my site up.
But a very thoughtful post.
Stuart
Thanks, Stuart!