Funmi Akintade: You Need to Know the 3Ws Of Content Writing

Content writing, for many people, can prove difficult. Most times, it is the process of planning, drafting, researching, and editing that gets people discouraged. But content writing doesn’t always have to be arduous; if you can master the 3Ws of writing a good copy, you’ll be in for a less bumpy ride.

As a content writer who is writing for blogs, social media pages, and creating email copies, there are some essentials you need to know before you set out to work. 

Know who you are writing for

Knowing your target audience/readers gives you an edge over your competitors. It puts you at the forefront of your course in such a way that your audience will appreciate your content that is if it is directed to them. For example, you can’t have a mom’s blog and your target audience will be men or youths. Because what you’re writing on doesn’t really affect them, they may ignore your content. So the first thing you must consider before writing a speech, proposal, article, email copy, or book, is who you are targeting. Otherwise, you might just be shooting arrows sporadically.

What are you writing about? 

Before you put your pen to paper, you need to carry out a lot of research. Is it something you can write? Do you need in-depth research to know more about it? Don’t you think your audience would appreciate you more when you give them facts and figures rather than churning out baseless statements that cannot be ascertained. If, for example, you want to publish a blog post on ‘the right way to feed your toddler,’ you don’t only publish your experience as a mother or that of other mothers, you need to do in-depth research on why the mother needs to learn how to feed their toddlers rightly, who recommended the right way of feeding toddlers, and why. Tell us how feeding toddlers the right way has helped in the growth and development of the child, and then how mothers who refused to feed their toddlers in the right way suffered the consequence.

You can make this easier by splitting the essay into two variables so that you can easily work on them. For an essay on motherhood and feeding toddlers, first, make research about toddlers. Then research on the right way toddlers feed. This will enable you to write freely with an in-depth knowledge of the topic concerned. 

Why are you writing?

This questions your motive for writing. What are your reasons? What do you seek to achieve concerning the topic you are writing about? Are you writing it to reveal your experiences on the topic, for money, or impact? All these will enable you to know how to write the content to tailor the needs of your audience and your own needs too. Knowing the problems of your target audience will also help in shaping your content as well.

Content writing, in entirety, is not a difficult task, however, you make it tedious when you lack the inspiration to do so, and when you don’t follow the 3Ws. So learn them, and put them into practice.

***

Photo by Karolina Grabowska from Pexels