“You can’t judge a book by its cover” is something you have heard a million times and it is said for a reason. Naturally there is an important principle that is tried and true in that age old saying. So the moral of the story is, you need to “read” the substance in between to judge or conclude how you feel or what effect the book had on you, if any at all.

Beyond these fundamental truths and the common sense within, you need to consider the time and effort carefully put into formulating the content of the publication. By extension then we need to carry this line of thought over to the writing of an article. Why am I sharing this thought?

Simply and bluntly put the Internet has become a smörgåsbord of content ranging from articles, books, blogs, and forms of text correspondence, aka messaging. A number of on-liners have taken the creative writing options and turned their writings into on-line publications and then transitioned their work into an income making endeavor. How?

This is a result of a variety of Internet methods that connect content formulating and advertising into a marketing strategy. For more on that, stick with us here on BevyHost for future discussions and of course feel free to explore past articles reviewing the various Internet business applications. But for now we have some writing to discuss.

Writing what? We need to show some love for the people who have decided that they want to have a money making web page and they want their writing to be the feature product on their site. Be it a blog, storytelling, or an informative feature. And while there are many natural writers out there, many of them struggle with creating a good story presentation or developing a topic. And then there are a percentage of writers with a command of their language and grammar but they find it hard to put a story or topic together in a creative or interesting manner.

Well have no fear, some tips are here! And regardless of the subject or theme, these tips will help you through and lead you to some splendid and skillful writing. Make it your aim to be interesting! The subject may be interesting by itself and then flushed down the toilet with bad writing if you don’t put in the work before, during, and after. So picking the topic or story is just the beginning. Making it interesting, attention grabbing and desired is the end game. We are going to set out these guidelines with the understanding that we are talking about creative writing primarily. Be it fictional or non-fiction we are talking about a story type article or an informative overview of a topic. Therefore we are not talking about a tutorial or business report type article. So here we go. Feel free to take notes. (being facetious)

• Create a theme or title first – This will give you a direction. A theme or title sets up the foundation and dangles a carrot and/or a finish line for your writing. But like the book cover lesson we proposed in the outset it can be misinterpreted if it is not an accurate theme. Thus as you develop your content it should springboard off of the theme or title with constancy.
• Introduction – the objective of your introduction is to capture the imagination and yet begin to direct the thoughts of your reader in the “right” and specific direction. Even in the event that you are writing a suspenseful mind twisting “gotcha” story, you want to deliberately lead your readers into a calculated “mind path”. The challenge is, in any scenario or topic, to avoid obvious predictability and to not make the reader feel rudely manipulated. You want them to be sucked and pulled into to your story and feel like they are being taking for an enjoyable entertaining ride whether you plan to surprise them or not in the end.
• Introduction (Cont’d) – for an informative article, intro should also capture your audience. By a skillful use of questions, or an illustration, or some other type of mind picture you should set up your topic with flare and attention grabbing technique. But again it should lead the reader toward the main point or points of your topic.
• Body – The heart and soul of your story needs to flow but not lag. It needs to build on the set up from the Intro.. You will give your reader a descriptive word painting artfully designed with careful thought. It may carry emotional weight at times depending on the topic and details. It should be dynamic enough to entertain your reader. That does not mean it has to always WOW them or be overly dramatic. But they should feel like they just digested a pleasing word meal. Mix timely adjectives, metaphors, engaging dialog, illustrative comparisons, and any seasoned literary creative writing appropriate to that particular work. It needs to have enough information to keep the article lively but not have so much information you have lost your readers or overwhelmed them. In the case of an informative topic you may want to stick with 2 or 3 main points and blend a few sub points that support those main kernels.
• Conclusion – Once you have whipped your readers into an engrossing lather and given them just the right amount of morsels for their appetite, you need to give them a summary. With a story this is a little bit more of a hurdle. As a matter of practice when you write a story you don’t reach a point of a review. So part of the craft of story writing is keeping the reader on track with the main thrust of the story as you weave the character personalities and important nuggets throughout the meat and potatoes of the content with clever repetition. For example if one of your characters is a music lover than you need to entwine a few examples of this as part of the events of the story. Also when writing your conclusion, another item that is very valuable to a conclusion and leaves the reader feeling more of an impact and satisfaction, is if you can make the conclusion motivating or even somewhat inspiring.

So get your pen and pad out or pull up your “office” program on your PC and rough out an outline to be molded into a savory publication. Once you plot out the basics then use the tips we have given you to turn it into a distinctive and accomplished piece of work. And that will manifest itself indeed if you put in the work part with diligence and pride. I can’t wait to read your article now! So come on already get it out there.

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Don’t sweat the details, then again don’t overlook them either. In fact, often times success is a direct result of management and/or ownership keeping an eye on the details. So what about you and your business?

Oh yes, even in your web business you personally need to care for all of the incidentals or you need to delegate the fine points of your market and operation to someone. This obviously includes the bigger factors also. We are talking the entire minutiae of trivial to important, from minor to major.

Let’s apply this to your SEO plan and site operation. Now as many of you know a good SEO strategy revolves around wise keyword usage and application. On the other hand you have to be careful you don’t create content simply to attack these keywords. You need to hit your keywords in the context or framework of writing lively and winsome content. If you are writing for a search engine and not your audience you will eventually lose your audience. This is admittedly a challenge to pull off and yet it is a detail you need to carry out.

Ironically, even though you will see use of keywords as a top priority for search engine rank, it is more common that good quality content consistently ranks higher than just keyword heavy posts.

It is also a benefit to appropriately use your keyword or keyword phrase in your meta tag. For you rookie readers a meta tag is usually a header box that gives a description for what your post is about. They generally provide information pertaining to the creator of the page, how often is updated, what the page is about, and which keywords best represent the content of your post or page. Other tags are usually just keywords or phrases that relate to your post.

It is also better to use your anchor text as the text to click to get to your site instead of the far to common “click here”. For example you may have an invitation to your site that reads:

“Lose 10 pounds in a month” for more weight loss info click here.

Where as you want it to read: “Lose 10 pounds in a month” for more weight loss info go to http://www.fatloss.com. (< just an example)

Another reminder is that when you get people to your site make absolutely sure that they can easily find what it is that you are inviting them to see. Invariably people prefer a site that is user friendly and a cinch to navigate. So don't be enthralled with having a glut of technology and a saturation of eye candy and therefore create an overwhelming web site that is confusing and frustrating.

And of course remember to take control of the things that you have most control over; which brings us back to paying attention to the details.

So whether you are working on your content or on your SEO marketing plan it is necessary to make sure you cross the T's and dot the I's.

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“Did you read that post?” or “Hey, you have to go to CoolContent.com and check out the articles there”.

Are you getting this kind of response? While it may be true that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and that preference can be very subjective, there are some “how to” factors to consider when posting content on your web page.

Notwithstanding the reality that there is no exact science, it may help if we go over a few pointers of how to write some choice and yummy content. “Why is that?” some may ask.

Well I think you know what statement is coming next ………. because Content is KING! Yes there are other vital factors in managing a web site, like getting people to go to it for one. But the content is always going to maintain an honored place on the dais. Yes, whether your web page is content driven or the content is there to enhance your site, it needs to be shipshape and artful.

So, instead of giving you a lecture, or telling what you need to do, let’s try a couple exercises:
Let’s imagine that we have a web page called BestLunchesInTown.com. You may picture any “town” or city you wish. Our site provides people with, not only the best “bang for their buck” advice, but of some of the more tasty treats in our local restaurants.

A reader sees our well marketed site and clicks on for a visit. Today’s entry is about a place called “The Lunch Lady”. Here is what they read.

‘If you want a good lunch for a reasonable price than “The Lunch Lady” would be a great choice. You can find the restaurant on the corner of Boring Blvd and Stale St. …………… ‘

Okay, if you are someone who gets the killer content concept, than you see a problem already. While the above post tells you valuable info, it isn’t very inviting. Yeah people don’t like to sound like they are a commercial, but how would you tell your friend about this place if you just came from there all excited? Face it, we do speak like a commercial or advertisement at times, and our web page is a business linked with advertisement dollars when you get down to floorboards of the matter. So, how about this instead?

‘If you are looking for a tasty lunch at a bargain price, then you need to scamper over to “The Lunch Lady”, nestled on the corner of Bustling Blvd and Sweet St’ ………………..

The difference may seem subtle but it makes a difference. Is that it? On contraire’, my friends. What you would need to do next is give a romantic, aesthetic, whimsical and mentally pleasing word picture of the establishment. There is a significant difference between saying the place is decorated with a country theme compared to giving a brief description of what the place looks like.

Then, of course, the focal point of your web page is the FOOD! Write about the wonderful lunch, or lunches, as if you are placing us right in front of the meal.

For instance: You could say; ‘Today’s best lunch is the Roast Beef Platter. This platter comes with a pickle and chips for only $4.99. It’s good, you’ll like it.

Or you could write; ‘The Roast Beef platter may sound simple, but it is far from it. As the plate arrives, the freshly made bread captures your schnoz with a zest and an aroma of love. And then your eyes are drawn to the way that the newly baked bread is embracing finely sliced layers of overflowing beefy goodness. As you bite into this scrumptious morsel you can’t help but savor the hint of horseradish and mustard mixed to perfection ……………

Naturally, you have options at your fingertips. You don’t have to be corny, witty, poetic, campy, charismatic or Shakespearian. Even so, you should try and be as resourceful, enthusiastic, nimble, and tantalizing as you can and as is appropriate for your topic.

Hey folks, I am not saying I am a Pulitzer Prize winning candidate or a Best Selling Author. I am suggesting that all of us need to take stock of the time and effort we put into our content. And some of us have no clue as to where to begin. Hopefully I have given you some “food for thought”. (Sorry, I can’t pass on a pun)

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