Writing engaging content for your brand can be a daunting challenge, and, frequently, copy can be quite dry or egocentric. Even though you may be aiming for less than 500 characters, you still need to be able to captivate the reader long enough for them to finish reading the content. Your audience is constantly exposed to marketing messages, so those precious seconds of attention need to be engaging, entertaining and informative.
Finding your style and method of writing will help to make this become a less daunting task, and this article presents some tips by established authors to help you develop your own patterns.
Joyce Carole Oates
Joyce Carole Oates is an American writer who has published 58 novels to date and is a Pulitzer Prize finalist. She is a prolific and talented author who taught an undergraduate course on writing short stories at Princeton University, and some of that content has inspired these tips (Oates, 2022). Although readers may not be looking at writing a novel, it is worth thinking of each blog/article that is published as a short story to ensure it engages readers throughout and so they read to the end. Some tips include:
Make a checklist of items to include
Make bullet points about which topics or issues you wish to raise and check them off to ensure your article is on-point.
Get the first draft done quickly
By getting the initial task done, you will get a feeling of power and autonomy. Leave editing, formatting and correcting the grammar until after it has been written. Do not worry too much about detail at this point—it can be revised repeatedly until you are happy with it.
Focus on key characters
When writing an article, keep the number of actors to a minimum to focus on the story. Imagine your characters are paid actors—if they are not contributing to the article, cut them out and do not waste sentences or your readers' time. If the subject is a sensitive one, create a compound character so they are at least superficially not recognisable to protect them from exposure they will not want.
Write about pivotal events for your patients, not you
Make sure the event that is being written about is relevant to the reader. Although there may be an urge to write about a trade conference you have attended, remember that your prospects are not likely to be as interested in it as you are.
Weigh up how you are going to tell the story
The type of language you use can influence how your audience perceives your story. Do you want to describe it factually and clinically like a documentary, or through the eyes of the patient or clinician? You also need to decide how long your paragraphs are, how much text is used to describe scenarios and if you want to use dialogue in your story.
Protect your time
The worst thing for writing, or any creative work that requires concentration, is interruptions. Sometimes, external factors, such as work or family, or internal ones, such as looking at our phones or responding to each notification that pops up, break our concentration. Protecting creative time is paramount—find out what times work best for you and stick to them. Try to go to a separate room, close the door and, wherever possible, focus. Try working in a coffee shop or a shared office space if you cannot do that.
» For each character you are writing about, write down a few bullet points about their persona, interests and looks. You should also do this for your patients. Make a point of understanding where they like to go to socialise, what hobbies they are interested in and what they read «
Additionally, review the notifications on your smartphone. Many of them are irrelevant and not time sensitive. News, social media and game/app notifications can be disabled permanently, and most phones have focus modes that will suppress unimportant notifications, including phone calls. If you are concerned about missing important calls, make sure your voicemail is set up with a personal message.
Try writing at different times
While scheduling time is essential, it is also worth practising working at odd or spontaneous times. Try doing something in no more than 40 minutes, or even just 5 minutes, as a limited timeframe and a different mood can create a rush of creativity.
Write visual art
Paragraphs and sentences do not need to be formatted and justified blocks of text. Breaking up an article into bite-sized chunks can quickly let a reader dip in. As discussed in a previous article (Ratcliffe, 2021), playing around with typography and considering graphic design can create a powerful visual article that draws the user in.
Capitalise on rejection
It is inevitable that some of your articles will have a low number of views and be rejected or criticised. Oates (2022) recommends that this time should be used to view that work with ‘colder and crueller eyes’ and use that opportunity to revise. Everyone must put up with rejection—just know that you are in good company and treat it as an opportunity to improve.
Robert Lawrence Stine
Robert Lawrence (RL) Stine has published more than 300 books for children and teenagers, with one of his series, Goosebumps, becoming both a TV series and a film. He can develop a prolific and diverse set of story ideas and tailor his vocabulary to a diverse audience (Stine, 2021). While he espouses many of the tips Oates suggests, Stine can connect with an audience that is very different to his personality, so his insights are insightful:
Do not start with a blank screen
Collect notes, outlines, photos, cheat sheets and articles that inspire you, as discussed below, to build a portfolio of ideas. Write a conclusion first and then work backwards if needed.
Spend time with your target audience and tune in to them
For Stine, this means teachers and volunteering to work with children, but, in the case of many readers, it means your prospects and your patients. For example, if your patients tend to go to gyms or enjoy certain types of nightlife, try to join in. You will soon start to understand what their values and interests are.
Stay alert for ideas
Visiting new places or having new experiences will help develop those ‘eureka’ moments where you will come up with a new angle to promote your brand. Being more observant of your environment will also help, so make notes of conversations or take photos of adverts that stand out.
Have a cheat sheet for your characters
For each character you are writing about, write down a few bullet points about their persona, interests and looks. You should also do this for your patients. Make a point of understanding where they like to go to socialise, what hobbies they are interested in and what they read. Use this cheat sheet as a reference for your articles, and it will help maintain a level of consistency in your writing.
Be aware of your readers' vocabulary level
It is likely that most patients are not clinically trained, so avoid using terminology that makes them reach for a medical dictionary. Writing research papers and clinical documentation requires a very dry tone that does not engage on social media where the reader expects a casual experience. Make sure that the terminology used is appropriate—if your target audience is older business professionals, a dryer tone may be ideal; however, that would be less effective with a younger audience.
Understand what rules apply to your target audience
There will be topics that are considered unsavoury and language that will be regarded as inappropriate. Subjects such as sex, political affiliation or the environment may either build a bond between your audience or hit a nerve and alienate them from your brand.
Conclusion
While few of us ever envisaged the need to be proficient at storytelling, it nonetheless is an essential part of being able to tell your brand story and how the work you do impacts the lives of your patients. Building rapport with your audience will take time and research.
One final tip: when writing content, be gentle with yourself. Greatness in writing good articles does not come quickly and it will take time to connect with your audience. With practice, you will soon get great engagement with your target audience.