Thinking from the reader’s perspective─How to write valuable articles?

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I read this article today in awoo Growth Hacker Marketing Diary (opens in a new tab) “What is the SEO trend in 2018? Awoo’s key organization + best practical secrets (opens in a new tab)”, to paraphrase what the other side said, the article is really full of useful information!

In this article, the importance of content for search engine optimization (SEO) is also mentioned. Regarding the question “How to write valuable articles?”, the author Hailey Huang (opens in a new tab) took an e-commerce company that sells women’s skin care products as an example to explain how to write articles on a blog to promote the company’s well-received facial masks.

Hailey Huang put forward three suggestions in the article, suggesting that everyone should think in the following directions:

2. What is the goal?

3. What do you care about?

4. What will you search for?

If you have attended the Content Hacker Lecture, or listened to the Content Marketing Course taught by teachers Vista and Baixiong, you should be familiar with the above three entry points.

What is value (opens in a new tab)? Wikipedia (opens in a new tab) tells us: Value generally refers to the positive significance and usefulness of the object to the subject. An amount deemed to fairly and appropriately reflect the goods, services or monetary equivalent.

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To put it more bluntly, the so-called value might as well be regarded as something that has specific benefits or benefits to people. For example, by reading a book, you can gain new knowledge and have a remote conversation with the author; by listening to a song, you can chase stars or get spiritual comfort; or even by watching a movie, you can kill time and even gain topics for chatting with your peers… To put it more pragmatically, we have invested time and exchanged some benefits, which is the demonstration of value.

Just like I often remind my classmates in class, no matter what the purpose of our writing is? In terms of mentality, please remember to “write for readers”; only in this way can you write valuable and even impressive articles. In other words, only by providing information, bringing benefits or satisfying curiosity can it arouse the resonance of the public and make them willing to take corresponding actions (such as purchasing goods, supporting charity activities, etc.).

So, how do you write valuable articles? To put it simply, you need to learn to put yourself in someone else’s shoes, abandon the traditional perspective of a manufacturer or boss, and instead stand in the perspective of a reader—think about what kind of content is of interest to everyone? Or what are the things that these groups just need?

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For example, I often use Google Analytics to pay attention to operational data, hoping to understand where this group of readers who visit the “Content Hacker” website come from? And, what topics are they interested in? What assistance would you like to receive?

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Occasionally, I will log in to Google Search Console and browse the backend data to see what keywords people searched for to connect to this site. Of course, I will also try to infer current trends from these search behaviors. For example, “narrative arc (opens in a new tab)” in the picture above may be confusing to ordinary people, but experts will know that this is a “good book” about non-fiction writing (https://goo.gl/7psTfx (opens in a new tab))! Only by doing your homework first to understand what issues readers or potential customers are concerned about, and then knowing how to lay out memes (opens in a new tab) and insert calls to action in the process of writing articles, can you achieve “know yourself and the enemy, and be victorious in a hundred battles.” Observing which keywords netizens use to search is actually a required credit for growth hacking (https://www.vista.tw/en/blog/master-the-secret-skills-2016-2017-taiwan) and content hacking!

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In addition to learning to think differently and see the world from a reader’s perspective, we also need to have a growth mindset and understand various contexts through the interpretation of operational data. In this age of communities, we can also combine celebrity quotes, word-of-mouth experiences, picture collages or event notices to enhance interaction with readers.

For example, everyone believes in authority. Instead of talking frothing at the mouth, it is better to invite industry leaders or your own customers to speak at the right time. Of course, whether it is celebrity quotations or customer testimonials, they must be original and cannot be fabricated or fabricated on your own!

If you want to know more tips about writing articles, you are also welcome to sign up for my online course “Content Power: The Super Power of Building Brands (opens in a new tab)”!

★ Photo Credit: Morgan Sessions (opens in a new tab)

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Further reading

• 6 steps to teach you how to master content marketing
• Strengthen your community penetration learn-from-content-hacker
• Growth Hacking: Build a sustainable marketing machine that reaches millions of people