What you say and how you say it matters.

From the words on your website to how you interact with clients, your spoken and written words are an extension of your business and your brand, so you want to put your best words forward.  

Kathryn Stewart from Kat Comms discusses the power of strategic content.

How often do you cringe at a misspelt word or sigh when you have to read a long report full of jargon and solid blocks of text?

Business is full of written communications, so when you are trying to write your own it can get tricky. The world may be leaning towards TED Talks or podcasts, but there will always be a document in the process, even if it’s just a script. 

Cleverly composed and targeted content contributes vastly to your brand, reputation and visibility in the marketplace. Regular articles will certainly attract more business and new clients.

However, the less known advantage is that by publishing original information pieces you will be viewed as a knowledge leader. Why? Because you are demonstrating comprehensive understanding of your industry and gaining a higher credibility through doing so.

How to write an article:

• Simply ensure the who/what/where/when/why/how questions are all covered. It can be frustrating reading an article with a missing location or no contact details! 
• Who is your target market and what interests them? What type of medium would they view your article on (online/offline)? Ensure your article is newsworthy so base it on people or local/business/community news. Specific business information such as fundraising, internal competitions, customer profiles, new product development or financial reports are also great topics to tap into.
• Make it interesting! Use the right tone of voice and word-set to suit your specific audience and check it is clear and understandable. I obviously had a thesaurus to hand when I was writing university essays, so I sounded clever! Perhaps it was suitable for academia but absolutely not for sales and business content. Also, lay off the jargon because people are tired and we just want easy reading.

To become a knowledge leader in your sector you should start publishing these articles at least once a month via a medium that suits your industry. Marketing specialists would want more content, but let’s be realistic about your time and how often people want to hear from you.

One of the biggest keys to success with your blog is simply to stick with it. At first, it might feel like no one is paying attention, but it just takes time to build up that traffic and grow an audience.

All business leaders are time poor so the sensible ones will outsource work to professionals. You may be an awesome writer and just need someone to skim over your copy for any errors. 

Alternatively, English may be your second language, or you have learning difficulties so writing is just downright painful. Whatever your situation is, I’m always keen on a coffee and chat to see how I can help so do get in touch!

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