Writers who frequently produce long-form, high quality content fascinate me.
Three noteworthy writers I wanted to learn from are Neil Patel, Tim Ferriss and my co-founder Dan Norris. They share an incredible knack for producing long-form content at a breakneck pace. Truthfully – I’m green with envy and wanted to find a way to create better content, faster.
So, I did my homework.
Studying the gurus
Tim Ferriss gets into his writing zone in the wee hours of the morning. He takes detailed notes and has over 20 handwritten journals and a jam-packed Evernote app. His books and blog articles are research and case study intensive, so his system of synthesizing convoluted concepts into digestible chunks is his secret sauce.
Neil Patel blocks out 4 hours twice a week to create a rough, 2000 – 3000 word blog post draft in Microsoft Word about a hot topic in content marketing or SEO. During this Mixergy interview [80:25] – he admitted that his spelling and grammar is terrible, but that doesn’t slow him down when it comes to writing content. He uses an editor to upload to WordPress, format and find images so he can focus on what he’s good at.
I’ve known my co-founder Dan to pump out up to 2,000 (rough) words in an hour. His typing speed is truly phenomenal and he’s replaced the keyboard on his Macbook Air a number of times. He’s well-practiced, with over 500,000 words of content produced in the last 6 years. He was also voted Australia’s best business blogger in 2013, which means his content is very useful and actionable to business owners.
After studying each of these writers in depth for hours, I realized that while I can try and emulate their approach – I can’t copy them. An approach to writing needs to be tailor-made to your writing style, schedule and mere mortal typing speed.
Here are 5 triggers to add to your writing arsenal.
1. Make your content priority #1
There are dozens of semi-urgent tasks that steal your attention and energy as a business owner every day. Taxes, payroll, staff management, live chat and an inbox that’s bursting with unread emails.
You need to ignore this (temporarily).
Take a leaf out of Neil Patel’s book and specifically block out time in your day to write content. I recommend blocking out an hour of time in the most productive part of your day.
You can start with one slot, one day a week, but as you gain momentum and start to enjoy your hour of power – you will find yourself with 4 or 5 blocks of content creation time magically appearing in your calendar.
Don’t let content slip down your list of priorities – it’s high leverage and a business builder.
2. Go off the grid
It’s one thing to set aside time to research, write and edit… it’s another thing to be disciplined and actually use that time. The truth is – the attention-grabbing, energy-sucking tasks that you wade through every day can be pushed back, at least for an hour or two every day.
Didn’t reach inbox zero? Boohoo! There’s always tomorrow.
A few tips to really narrow your focus:
- Use airplane mode on your phone, so your notifications don’t activate your monkey brain
- Shut down any browser or applications that aren’t directly related to writing (except your favorite music app, of course!)
- Run a time tracking app like Rescuetime – the paid version includes a site blocker for Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn / Buzzfeed etc.
Now it’s just you and a blinking cursor.
3. Get organized
A lot of new writers miss this step. When I do, I start over.
Instead of blindly writing with no real outcome in mind, try and come up with the following outline before you start writing your content.
1. Write 3 – 5 post titles
2. Write subheadings for each section of your post
3. Spend 5 – 10 minutes researching each subheading
4. Jot down ideas, links and other tidbits of information under each subheading
Once you have these pointers in place, you’ve done 80% of the hard work.
It takes some practice and discipline, but once you get in the habit of setting up a post outline – you’ll wonder how you ever got the job done without one.
4. Find a production method that works for you
Billy Murphy explained that it takes him over 30 hours to write a 6,000 word blog post. He also highlighted the fact that it takes him about 8 minutes to talk through it.
That’s why I like using Siri for transcribing the spoken word. She will misinterpret 10% of what you say, but that’s OK. If you’re comfortable in front of the camera, you can also consider creating video content and including transcriptions like our friend James Schramko does over at Jamesschramko.
It’s easy to get started, here’s a resource to get your ‘studio’ lighting right for under $150.
5. Seek real feedback
The second most important part of the content production process is peer review. The good cop (the writer) shares a post in a Google document with the bad cop (the reviewer).
One way to handle the review process is by either allowing reviews to right click and comment. Another way is using this nifty Track Changes Plugin for Google docs.
By this stage, you’re probably attached to your piece of content – so beware of hurt feelings. Trust your reviewer and you will find that they are not criticizing you – they are critiquing your work in the hope they can improve it.
Pay an editor or ask a good writer to cast a critical eye over your work, but before you do, objectively answer the following questions about your post.
Mandatory
Is the content…
- Easy to read?
- Worth sharing?
- Packing an eye-catching headline?
Optional – (at least two)
Is the content…
- Useful?
- Valuable?
- Actionable?
- Evergreen (bonus points)?
You will be creating content like a machine in no time!
Your thoughts
What helps you write better content, faster?
PS – this 980 word post took 2 hours of effort to produce… the system works!
Ref- WPCurve