Content Writing Pitfalls & How to Overcome Them

When you first start writing content, whether it be quizzes about famous animals or analysis of the Civil War, there are a number of problems and pitfalls that you may struggle to overcome. Some can be extremely problematic, making it hard for you to progress or create quality content, and some can be relatively minor but still can prove annoying for a first-time writer or veteran alike. However, help is at hand, and this article will provide you with some top tips to overcome the problems that you may encounter when writing and producing content.

Time Management

 

When you first start content writing, whether it be for a client or for your own needs, you can often be overwhelmed by the idea of time management. I remember instances when I have been sitting there, starting to write something and then finding myself either finished within an hour, or barely making a dent in the project. This often let me feeling like I’ve rushed a piece of work or that I simply haven’t made enough progress.

Time management is an important factor of any writer’s lives and there are some brilliant ways to be effective and efficient with your time. I suggest the ‘Pomodoro Technique’ – which splits off your time into 25 minute chunks, with 5 minute breaks, and after you have finished three or four sets of 25 minutes, you can take a 30 minute break. This is useful because research shows that the maximum amount of time that you can focus for is 25 minutes, any longer and you start to get distracted. Then, in conjunction with this technique, I set myself mini-targets or milestones to complete within the 25 minutes, breaking any project down into easily-completed chunks and tasks.

Writer’s Block

Writer’s block is a common problem that affects many people who write content or who really write anything at all. It’s a familiar issue that often occurs when you run out of things to write about and cannot think of any more. I’ve often been in the middle of writing content, everything going well, before I suddenly stop and lack ideas to continue what I am writing.

There are several solutions to this. Firstly, planning goes a long way. When I was at school, I remember being told that ‘failing to plan’ is ‘planning to fail’. I often disregarded this until I started to write content for various websites and platforms. However, once I started to plan out my content before I started writing, I used to be able to divide up the project amongst those ideas, meaning that I never run out of things to write about. I always like to plan a few extra ‘bonus’ ideas too so that if I don’t quite meet my word-targets, I can always include them and do what I have to do.

A Lack of Uniqueness

This is a problem which often causes people to give up when writing content. If I had a dollar for every time somebody gave up on a project because it didn’t feel ‘unique’ enough, then I’d probably be a very rich man. Even I myself, in the past, have thrown in the towel because the content I’d written was similar to all the other content out there and it just didn’t stand out enough.

If this is a problem you face, there are ways to overcome it. Firstly, stick with it because often a lack of uniqueness is not the problem, more-so a lack of consistency and dedication. As you write more and more content of a similar nature, you naturally begin to look for ways to make what you produce more interesting. Whether that be a style of writing, an erudite vocabulary or a truly unique voice, it won’t just be there from start, you have to persevere. Secondly, if you still don’t find yourself developing a unique style, don’t look to others for inspiration. However much this may seem like a good idea, it really isn’t as it just reflects somebody else’s mind in your content.

Boring, Boring, Boring

What many content writers overlook is their audiences. If I chose to write in a super-mundane, statistic-heavy manner for a website about music or popular culture, then I am really not going to succeed in any way. You have to make sure that you do not bore or alienate your audience because at the end of the day, they are what should be motivating you to write.

A great way to overcome this is by just having a bit of fun with what you do! It is all well and good if you produce content that is grammatically and structurally a masterpiece but if it doesn’t hit your target demographic as it should, there really is no point to it at all. I often find that even when writing about more serious, sensitive subject-matters, it doesn’t hurt to be creative and add a touch of flair to what you do. This doesn’t mean, however, cracking jokes in an Associated-Press style news article, you just have to be sensible and pragmatic in your approach to it!

A Poor Start

Although I have, ironically, left this till last, it is still a very important point. Research shows that a lot of the time, the first paragraph or introduction is vital in a reader either continuing to read or giving up on your content. This is because humans generally have quite short attention spans and if something doesn’t grab our interest from the off, we usually won’t waste our time with reading it.

Therefore, you need to make sure that when content writing, you start off with a bang. Bring the reader in with rhetoric devices, or hit them hard with a statistic or fact if you are making an argument. Just don’t be afraid to take a risk when writing an introduction or opening paragraph because although sometimes it may not work, which is when editors come into play, it often increases the readability of your content ten-fold. The same goes for concluding too, although it won’t be the first thing a reader sees, people often skim through content and look for what interests them, and having a killer conclusion or final paragraph is often the key to success.