Stop. Don’t read this. There’s nothing new here.
Don’t you wish most of the so called content you read came with a warning like this? After all, so much of the “content” that’s being created these days is crap.
Sorry for the language, but this is a huge pet peeve of mine. Social media has led to an explosion of content production. Every company is so desperate to be “liked”, “shared” and tweeted, that quantity has dominated quality. We’re polluting the Internet with content sewage at an astonishing rate. Consider these stats for a typical day on the Internet:
- 2 million blog post are written.
- 294 billion emails are sent.
- 864,000 hours of video is uploaded to YouTube.
It’s time to outlaw cut and paste
If you’re going to create content, make it useful. Skip the vague theories…or worse, the thinly guised sales pitches. And please, do not copy other people’s work and just dump it into your blog (sad, but I’ve seen this happening a lot lately).
Here’s are three easy ways to produce great content.
- Provide specific advice. Address the problems your audience has. Include how to’s, best practices, case studies, etc.
- Offer real insight. Don’t just share an article, discuss how the topic impacts your clients.
- Make it entertaining. You don’t always have to educate, simply sharing a great picture or a provocative opinion can make your content great.
Be astute. Don’t pollute.
When you’re blogging, sharing an article on LinkedIn, writing an email or creating a video, please remember that your content is designed to steal time away from people who are already very busy. Make sure the interruptions are worthwhile for your readers…and you’ll get a much better response!
And now you may return to you regularly scheduled work.
