Writing On The Web - Part 5

Mind Games: How To Eliminate The 5 Negative Thoughts That Shut Down Your Writing

By: Daphne Gray-Grant


Have you ever reached for a brownie when you were trying to lose weight? Or stayed in bed when you intended to go to the gym? Or put off paying bills because it was "too much of a hassle"?

There are lots of different ways in which we sabotage ourselves. This is true of life in general and also true of the writing life.

Writing depends not just on discipline but also on the complicated interplay between what we know and what we feel.

I've worked as an editor for just about 30 years (honest, I was really young when I started) and I've noticed there are five key negative feelings or thoughts that tend to shut down our writing -- in much the same way that a circuit breaker shuts down electricity. BOOM and the lights go out.

Often, simply being aware of these thoughts is enough to take away their power. At other times, it's important to challenge them head-on. So let's see which ones are disrupting your writing (and therefore taking a bite of your income) and figure out what you can do about them.

1) I'm a lousy writer; I don't have the talent to do this.

This is probably the most common negative thought of all. My theory is it's usually born in high school when writing teachers single out one or two people in the class for praise and use their red pens too liberally with the rest. (To this day, when I'm editing, I make a point of never using red to make suggestions or corrections!) And too much of a focus on grammar and spelling in childhood often mean trouble for the adult writer.

But here's the interesting truth: We're all born lousy marketing writers. The people who become "good" are the ones who are prepared to do the following simple things:

- Read good writing and work to emulate it;
- Write a lot -- because writing is like exercise: the more you do, the better you get;
- Spend double the time on self-editing that they spend on writing.

If you discover that you're constantly bad-mouthing yourself as you write, replace the inner negative chatter with the following statement: "Writing is about practice. The more I do, the better I'll get. When I finish this article (letter, report, etc.) I'll have more experience and I'll have improved."

2) I don't have the time to write.

This is one of my favorite negative thoughts because it's so common and sooo easy to blow out of the water. The writing world is littered with people who quit their day-jobs so they could work on their books. But here's the secret: The published novelists and non-fiction writers are almost always the people who continue with their regular work and write in their spare time.

Just as the cactus thrives in a hot, dry environment, writing thrives in the absence of time. Yes, you read that correctly. Writing not only can be done quickly; it is better done quickly. That's partly because, if you're fast enough, you can usually out-run and out-write the negative chatter in your head.

People often make the mistake of trying to set aside huge chunks of time for writing (especially for reports). Me? I love writing in 10-minute bursts. Not only does this allow me to get ideas out of my head and onto paper when they are fresh, but it also gives me a big payback down the road. That's because when I go back to the document I often discover my article is much further ahead than I'd realized. No blank page. It's a great feeling.

I do like having a decent chunk of time to self-edit -- a different task from writing -- but I'm talking maybe 30 to 60 minutes. Not all day.

When you're planning your writing time, think in small increments, not big chunks. Remember: If you write 300-350 words a day, you'll have written a decent-length book by the end of a year.

3) I'd better do a really good job on this (article, report, letter) because my reputation/sales results hinge on it.

Of course you want your writing to be good. And of course certain pieces of work you do can be important to your business or career. But to understand why this negative line will do you in, it might help to think about professional sports. Take tennis for example.

Do you think Martina Navratilova won a record nine Wimbledon singles championships and 58 Grand Slam titles by telling herself, "I really need to win this game; if I don't, I'm in trouble." Of course not! I don't know about Martina, but I do know many professional athletes work with psychologists precisely so they can learn to turn off this unhelpful chatter. After all, this sort of self-talk is more likely to cause them to choke than to win.

Similarly, when you're writing, you need to shut down the tiny yet persistent voice that tells you how much you have riding on this job. Instead, do what the athletes do. Focus on the ball -- in your case that means: focus on what you're writing.

And if that doesn't work, tell the voice that you don't have time to listen to it while you're writing, but you'll attend to it when you're editing the piece (when it can't do so much damage.)

4) I need to write about this topic.

Truth is, unless you're a journalist or someone else who writes professionally, there are precious few topics that anyone is going to force you to cover. Sure you might need to write a pitch for a bank loan or sales letter to promote your product, but if you're writing an article for your e-zine or website, don't be bound by duty. Instead, focus on topics you feel passionate about.

Readers can smell disinterest the way lions can smell a steak. I've seen too many consultants who start an article by saying to themselves: "This is a hot topic in my industry right now." Or, "I want the search engines to pick me up on this one." Or, "People expect me to be an expert on this." Yawn.

Instead, choose a topic that excites you and has you fairly bursting to write. Then think hard about how to make it relate to your business, your keywords or your target market. Your enthusiasm will not only captivate your readers, it will also inspire you to write quickly and fluently.

5) Writing is too hard.

Let's get something straight. Lifting bricks is hard; waiting tables is hard; telling someone they have cancer is hard. Writing is not hard. Writing is just writing.

There is a romantic notion -- perpetuated by Ernest Hemingway, Raymond Chandler and others -- that writers must be tortured. In fact, writing is just a job. Sure, sometimes it's more difficult than other times -- just like it's hard to return voice mail messages when you're headachy and grumpy or hard to go for a run when you're bone-tired.

But overall, writing is actually pretty cushy. You get to sit in a warm dry place. You can have a steaming cup of tea or coffee beside you. You don't have to do any heavy lifting (with Spell check, you don't even have to lift the dictionary!) And best of all, you get the privilege of sharing your thoughts -- the ones inside your head -- with other people.

So, dismiss the notion that writing is an onerous act. Writing is something we all can do. Sure, some of us are better at it that others than others. But that's mostly because of practice. And if you write more, you too will improve.

Get at it.


Article Source: http://bytepowered.org/articles

A former journalist, Daphne Gray-Grant is a writing and editing coach who helps people writer better, faster. Visit her website at www.publicationcoach.com where you can sign up for her free weekly newsletter on power writing.

Next: Writing On The Web Part 6; Making The Most Of A Career In Writing

Writing On The Web - Part 4

Writing Articles - 3 Common Mistakes to Avoid

By: Nick Summers


Calling all writers and non-writers - now is the time to start enhancing or preparing those creative writing skills!

Alongside the development of modern communication technology, the popularity of information-based marketing has grown; it is now one of the best established and most effective techniques in getting targeted prospects to sites and converting them into buyers. This is why article writing, submission and publication is also increasingly popular.

There are already many tools that people can use to make the process of distributing their articles easier. Although wide distribution of articles is invaluable in getting their contents more exposure, that is only half the story.

First, let us take a quick look at the common mistakes that some people make before submitting their contents to article directories:

1. Confusing the reason to promote the articles with the reason to write them.

When you write articles, there are three key benefits from distributing them: branding, lead generation and promotion. These are all part of your search engine optimization and traffic generation efforts.

However, there should be only one real reason why you write any article - informing your audience. If your article is not focused on this crucial and most significant purpose, it will fail to achieve any of the three promotion benefits because no one will be interested in reading it!

To make your articles work for you, people must want to read them and then want to find out more - so they will then click on your resource box. You can only achieve this by producing well written articles with high quality information and other content.

2. Failing to maximize the promotional opportunities of article marketing.

You may know already that your articles can help you generate additional links back to your site. But do you know that you can get more visitors and better search engine results from those same articles?

To optimize traffic generation and search engine results, you will need to mention keywords at strategic places. However, you must be sure not to overdo them or your search engine ranking can actually decrease. You can also use keywords effectively in anchor texts but do bear in mind that many directories are not able to support this.

Remember that is not only about the links back to your site from your resource box once the articles are distributed. Part of doing well in your article marketing is being recognized by major publishers who will have a large audience. You can then gain the ability to leverage and joint venture with other brands because of the quality of your work. Relevant links and promotion from related sites will lead to better search engine results.

Having said all that, these things might not put much money in your pocket. There are other factors that can turn your article marketing efforts into an opportunity that can boost your earnings rather than just increasing the number of visitors to your site.

The main principle to ensure your success is to plan you article to make sure that it will fulfil the function that you intended it to have.

3. Publishing content that does not help your readers.

Maybe in the process of writing articles, you fall into the trap of thinking that all that you want is to have links back to your site, and that any visitors it can generate are fine. But guess what? Not all article banks and directories are going to accept your content automatically. They regularly have guidelines and specifications on the type of articles that they accept.

You can double the number of sites you can submit to when you are writing articles that the directories will want to share with other people. All it takes is one publisher with a hundred thousand regular readers and your potential audience will increase overnight.

You should be aware and make use of the fact that general articles submitted on directories may not receive the same level and type of exposure as targeted, specialized content articles geared to a narrow group of people. Learn the difference between these two and it will surely help you know what kinds of articles to write and to submit.

Basically, you need to write articles that publishers want in their publications if you want your article marketing to work in the most effective way. This also means you have to obey the standard guidelines: spell checks, correct grammar, well researched content and an interesting and relevant topic. It may even mean that you have to hire a writer to produce good content on your behalf.

In the end, it is all really a matter of choice on your part. You can start getting a little exposure from increased links back but on a very basic level, or enjoy massive exposure from the relatively small amount of extra time it takes to research and produce quality content.

Article Source: http://bytepowered.org/articles

Nick Summers runs Content Cow Article Directory, a directory dedicated to offering the best of the web's articles formatted the way you want them. Visit www.contentcow.biz today for all your content requirements.

Writing On The Web - Part 3

Bytepowered Article Writing Tips

Where to start or First rough draft

Start anywhere--it doesn't matter. Putting words on paper is like planting a seed in your subconscious. Your mind will go to work on it while you're busy doing your daily tasks. No need to consciously dwell on it. When you go back to your writing, suddenly out of nowhere, ideas will come. That's the power of the subconscious, use it to your advantage.

You might try writing with the monitor off or using pen and paper to start. This way you are not inhibited by your error correcting and can get the thoughts down quickly without interruption. Also this frees the mind for roaming creativity. This is a first rough draft so grammar does not matter--just type. Having said that... Always use a text editor to spell check your writing when you are finished. If you would like some inspiration take a look at Article Writing Questions For You, by James Lowe.

Can a newbie, novice or high school dropout be a writer?

Yes! No college English degree needed. It's not always what you know, but whether you can tell others what you know! Everyone has a head full of knowledge about some topic. That doesn't help anyone but yourself if you're unable to relate it to others.

Common Writing Mistakes or Things that make your readers go away

Avoid using 'I' frequently

Forms of 'I' such as 'me' or 'myself', should be used infrequently. Over use will make you appear self-absorbed and self-centered. Readers are not too likely to finish reading this article as it is obviously all about you.

Example: I went to the college of my choice and I made good grades. I then graduated with honors.

Fixed example: Went to the college of my choice and graduated with honors.

Avoid run-on sentences

Run-on sentences are a common error. Take the time to make shorter more understandable sentences. The longer it is the more confusion ensues for the reader. Break it up! In the example below for each comma a period and new sentence should start as well as some conjunctions deleted. As a general rule if it has more than one comma in it, start a new sentence where the second comma is. Can you tell the examples subject below? No, because there are many.

Example: Went on a trip to my sister and brothers house so we could work on my computer and I took the pups with me so they could play with the other critters there.

Fixed example:Went on a trip to my siblings home. Needed my brother to work with me on this computer. Took my pups with me so they could play with their critters.

Delete unnecessary words, phrases and commas!

This is one piece of advice I will always remember because of the startling effect on the readability of my writing. The most common mistake made by new authors are unnecessary words and phrases, the killers of readability. Consider the example sentence below and lets try to make it more readable.

“I have written this article because of a huge and growing interest that there is in MySpace, the sort of explosion of interest that has not been seen for quite some while.”

First - Remove unnecessary words. The reason for your writing should be obvious after reading the first paragraph even if the title does make it clear! This example is not a good way to start an article.

"I have written this article because of the huge and growing interest in MySpace,..."

Next - Consider removing and reordering words to make the sentence more readable.

"...the sort of interest explosion that has not been seen for quite some while."

Finally - the sentence revised: Wouldn't the sentence sound better this way?

"I have written this article because of the huge growing interest in MySpace. This sort of explosion in interest has not been seen for quite some while."

BIG Words

Don't use big complicated or techie words unless necessary. Don't try to use big words to impress your readers. If you are not sure of the exact definition of a word--look it up in a thesaurus for a better word. If you don't fully understand a word there is a good chance your readers won't either.

If you don't understand the rules of punctuation and grammar, get an English book or search the Internet for grammar tips or tutorials. Most importantly, let other people check your writing. Choose people not as knowledgeable in the subject as you to see if it's easily read and understood. The process of allowing other people to check the grammar and readability of your article is used by even the most accomplished writers. It is extremely easy to over look simple grammar or spelling mistakes.

More Bytepowered Article Tips coming soon.

Next: Writing On The Web Part 4

Writing On The Web - Part 2

The Five C's of Quality Writing

By: Scott White

"Good content has five elements: it's clear, concise, compelling, consistent, and correct. Learn how to achieve each of these with your writing."

There are two components of any copy, whether it's an article, a Web site, or a book: content and appearance.

Content means the words that actually appear on the page - your message. It can be serious, humorous, elegant, bold, technical, or conversational in tone. But the message is the words themselves. What you're saying and how you're saying it. Content includes grammar, spelling, jargon, acronyms, and the like.
Appearance relates to the way the words (content) look on the page.

These are things that affect the way the words look on the printed page (or monitor, for Web copy) - all of which goes in to making your copy easy to read.

Are your paragraphs all piled up, one on top of the other, with no graphics, subheadings, or other means of breaking them up? Are they manageable in size and easy to digest? A paragraph is supposed to contain one chunk of related information. Sometimes they can get fairly lengthy and still be in correct literary form . . . but keep your reader in mind. If there's a way to break up one big, gigantic, one-and-a-half-page paragraph, DO IT!

THE 5 C'S OF CONTENT
Make your content CLEAR. Avoid the overuse of jargon and acronyms in your copy. Unless you are writing for a specialty Web site where only people intimately familiar with your industry and/or business will visit it, make sure your language is understandable to the broadest possible audience. Get someone objective (i.e., not in your industry) to read it for you. If they don't get it, chances are some of your other readers won't get it either.

Make it CONCISE - even for books and long-copy sales letters. Most people have a tendency to overwrite. Be precise with your language. Avoid run-on sentences. Avoid long, meandering phrases when one or two words will do.

Rule of thumb: Polish your written piece until it gleams. Get it to where you think it's perfect. Then go back and cut it by 25 percent.

"Not possible!" you say.

Oh, but it is. Get rid of phrases like "of the" and all the extra instances of "that". Delete redundancies like "simple, effortless, and easy-to-use." Sometimes more is better. Other times, more is just more - and might actually work against ease of reading and understanding - which means it works against you.

Make your content COMPELLING. Use motivating language. In sales copy, for example, detail your features and benefits. Give people a reason to want to buy from you or use your service. An isolated product list probably is not going to compel anyone all by itself. However, whatever you do, do not ever lie or misrepresent yourself! This will only come back to harm you in the long (or not-so-long) run.

If you claim to have contacts who are producers at Warner Bros., you'd better be sure the person you know at Warner Bros. is not the sister of the assistant to the catering manager. Or if you offer 2-day delivery at no extra charge, you'd better be ready to fulfill that promise, even if you receive 1,000 orders in a day!

Also, tell stories. Don't forget you're the expert. If you're writing a book about job hunting for baby boomers, and you've helped a lot of baby boomers get jobs, use those stories in your writing to illustrate your points. Stories are compelling because they help your readers relate to your material. They can be entertaining, offer lessons, or dramatize particular elements - but use stories in all of your writing to create and maintain interest.

Make sure your content is CONSISTENT. This is another place where you can tell a sloppy writer from one who takes time to double- and triple-check their work before they submit and/or publish it.

There is not necessarily a correct answer to these ones. Simply determine what your personal and/or company standard is, and stick with it. One of the worst offenses of inconsistency appears when there are several different spellings or phone number styles within a single document. Mistakes like these make your work - and by extension, you and your company - appear sloppy.

Is it on line, online, or on-line?

Is your style ABC Deli or A.B.C. Deli?

formatting phone numbers: Do you use 602.253.8463 or 602/253.8463 or (602) 253-8463?

Make your content CORRECT. Proper grammar and spelling are essential!!! There's no way to state this strongly enough, particularly with respect to Web copy. There is so much competition for business on the Web - if you have sloppy copy that is badly spelled and riddled with grammatical mistakes, the next site is just one click away - and you won't get a second chance to bring those lost visitors back.

Although everyone makes a mistake now and again, please do not underestimate the importance of correct grammar. If you don't know whether it's correct or not, ASK someone who knows, LOOK IT UP in a book or online resource, or PAY a professional editor/proofreader.

The most glaring grammatical errors:

Stupid spelling mistakes. Write your copy in Word and SPELLCHECK before you dump it into html (or Publisher, PowerPoint, or whatever other format you might use for delivery).

Missing and incorrectly used apostrophes. Again, there's no excuse for this mistake - and it is one that will set you apart from the others in your industry. Apostrophes are NEVER used to create plurals - but you see this all the time. A ridiculous sign of sloppy writing and a complete lack of editing.

Extreme Example of Common Errors:
In this writers opinion, dumb grammer mistake's cost people more business than they realize.

TIP: If you use ALL CAPS, change your text to lower case or initial caps to run SpellCheck. SpellCheck will not catch errors in text in ALL CAPS unless you set it to do so.

TIP: Use ALL CAPS sparingly. Text written in ALL CAPS is exceptionally difficult to read. The fact is that the shape of a word, as much as its spelling, facilitates quick reading. Words written exclusively in capital letters lose the shape differentiation caused by the ascenders (b, d, f, h, k, l, t) and descenders (g, j, p, q, y). As a result, words written in ALL CAPS take a great deal more effort to read.

(Editor's Note: Using all caps in any document is a very bad idea. I blame American institutions of higher learning for this bad habbit. Times New Roman font in ALL CAPS, is not easier to read!)

Remember, it is virtually impossible to edit your own work. You're too close to the material and have seen it too many times to even notice errors any longer. If you find yourself in a position where you must edit your own writing, take a significant break from it - two hours, at minimum, but two days is suggested. This will allow you to return to your work with "new eyes," able to spot errors you would likely have missed had you not taken the break.

Article Source: http://bytepowered.org/articles

Scott White designed a top SEO Program to Gain More web site Traffic Learn how to rank your website at the top with: SEO DVD, SEO Book, And SEO CDs on SEO Tutorial Program. His company provides awesome Freelance Editing.

Next: Writing On The Web - Part 3, Bytepowered Writing Tips

Writing On The Web - Part 1

This is the first post in a series of posts to this blog I will call "Writing On The Web." The series will include article writing tips from Bytepowered Articles and guest writers chosen by yours truly. If you have submitted articles to any of Bytepowered Articles writing categories, your article might show up here.

The intent of this series of posts, "Writing On The Web," is to emphasize the importance of good writing skills to all authors or authors to be.


Writing on the Web is booming because publishers understand that fresh and creative content is vital for Search Engine ranking. Webmasters, Ezine Authors and Bloggers are cranking out articles, blog posts and E-books by the thousands. The lure of page ranking and viral marketing has brought an onslaught of new authors and with new authors comes a boom in poor writing.

As the owner and webmaster of the free articles directory Bytepowered Articles, I see more writing mistakes than most Web surfers. Honestly, the writing skill of some supposed experts that submit articles to Bytepowered Articles is appalling.

When I am reviewing articles for acceptance into my directory, I have the following options .

• Accept the article as it is. (Posted to the directory immediately.)
• Edit the article. (Automatically accepted after edit.)
  
• Reject the article. (Puts the article on hold for the author to edit.)
  
• Delete (We all know what that means.)

How I use these options.
Bytepowered Articles is a niche articles directory which simply means that articles are accepted to a limited number of categories. All articles are read, edited and accepted manually to maintain excellence in quality. In this case, articles that are relevant to Computers, the Internet and Communications. You can view accepted categories at the bottom of the Bytepowered Articles index page.

Accept:
Well written and relevant articles are always posted immediately.

Edit:
If an article has very minor errors such as a common misspelling or is obviously missing a line break, I will manually make the correction and the article will be posted.

Reject:
If an article is well written but has poor spelling, too many personal hyperlinks in the body or is not well formatted, I may choose to Reject the article. Rejecting the article puts the article on hold and sends an email to the author describing the reason for rejection and gives the author the opportunity to correct the mistakes. After the author makes corrections the article is automatically resubmitted for review.

Delete:
What would you guess is the most common reason for deleting and article?
Spelling?
Too many hyperlinks?
Bad formatting?
Poor grammar?

My number one reason would fall under poor grammar. Articles are most often deleted because of bad sentence structure. The kind of sentence structure that leaves you wondering how the author could possibly fill out a job application or resume.

After reading the first paragraph of an article if I still have no idea what the article is about--I just delete it. The sad truth is that happens more often than you might think. At least two of every fifty articles reviewed read like the author just took some bad LSD. It begins with gibberish and ends with babbling. Words are in the wrong order or the author uses words that change intended meaning. This indicates that the author does not fully understand the meaning of the words being used. Sometimes using two or three redundant adverbs or prepositions where none is needed just causes further confusion.

I will stop ranting now and describe this in more detail later in this series of posts.

Next, "The Five C's of Quality Writing," By: Scott White

The Secret of Writing a Book Instantly

By: Steve Manning

This article will take you through every step of learning how to write a book. From start, to plot, to editing, to finished manuscript, to getting it ready for the agent.

Volumes have been written to show you how to write a book, so you know I won't be covering every step of writing a book in detail. For more information, look at the other articles in this series and for all the instruction you'll ever need make sure you sign up for the email lessons at the bottom of this page.

Do Optimized Press Releases Really Work?

By: Jeff Burdic

Optimized press releases combine the best of both new age and traditional modes of advertising. As the world becomes one singular global village, internet marketing is slowly making headway in being the medium of choice for companies to effectively publicize their brands and services.

What constituted as Public Relations between the company and the media has now become a more sophisticated tool to reach out to a larger audience worldwide. Publicity is no longer restricted to a geographical zone but transverses across countries in one single click of a mouse. The magic of internet is instant reach. And internet promotions have made brand awareness and PR easily achieved. You can give a better exposure and promotion to your online business by an optimized press release.