As a content marketer or business owner who likes to DIY your social content, your writing skills are crucial to the long-term success of your posts.

Whether you’re writing blog posts, social media updates, or email newsletters, your content needs to be engaging, informative, and convincing your audience of your knowledge. 

As an expert SEO content writer of 5 years, I have developed a process that helps me optimize my time and effort to ensure I get the best results with each article I write. But if you cannot afford to hire an experienced writer who knows SEO to help you identify the best keywords for your website, I am writing this post for you! 

I know that some business owners still prefer to write blog posts by themselves. To help you improve your writing game, I’ve compiled my top 5 essential tips to help level up your writing process!

Here we go!

My TOP 5 writing tips for Bloggers and Content Marketers

#1: EDIT your posts multiple times

Editing is a crucial part of the writing process, especially for content marketers. I would never publish my first-hand draft just because I know that it’s NOT going to be good. After you’ve written your first draft, take a break and come back to it with fresh eyes. The goal is to communicate your message clearly and effectively, so don’t be afraid to simplify your sentences. Your readers will thank you for it.

I usually follow these 4 stages when writing articles:

Step 1: Hand-written draft 

Write your main points, headlines, and loose ideas into a notebook. Once you have a basic outline, you can go to the next step and write full sentences.

Step 2: Type your draft in Grammarly

Using your hand-written notes, type your draft post in Grammarly. Here you can expand your points into longer sentences and break it up into paragraphs. I like typing into Grammarly directly because I can also edit at the same time and remove spelling errors. 

Step 3: Style your text in Google Pages

Paste your text from Grammarly into your word-processing tool and complete your posts with URL links, images, and text formatting (bold, italic, headlines, etc). I like using Google Pages because it auto-saves my writing, even if I close the page. 

Step 4: Come back the next day and look at it with fresh eyes

Look for ways to tighten up your writing and eliminate any unnecessary words or phrases. Cut out any jargon or technical language that might confuse your audience. 

#2: USE AI writing tools for content ideas

AI writing tools promise to write entire blog posts for you? If it’s too good to be true – it probably is. But I am not 100% against using ai tools for writing. 

Personally, I think that some AI tools are great for finding keywords and ideas for your blog posts. You can use tools like SEMrush and Ubersuggest to analyze your competitor’s websites and identify keyword gaps – this helps you in making sure you choose the right topics for SEO. 

However, you should not fully rely on AI writing tools to generate entire blog posts. AI tools cannot copy your voice, personality, and experience. Instead, they will generate a generic text from information that is already available on the web. 

Should you use AI writing tools? 🛠️ Yes, if they help you to find topics, and no if you are looking to just copy and paste content to your blog post without considering what your audience wants to read.

#3: Include REAL-LIFE examples 

When it comes to writing, using real-life examples and your own experience can make your posts more relatable and engaging. Whether you add a personal anecdote or share a case study from a project you worked on, including specific examples can help illustrate your points and make your writing more impactful and authentic. Don’t be afraid to share how you solved a problem or provide concrete examples to support your ideas.

Tip: When you share a case study it also helps your SEO because other writers will want to link to your research and examples.

#4: Find a writing routine that works best for you

I have spoken with several writers and they all agree that it’s important to balance writing time with enough downtime for maintaining consistency. 

Here’s what my IDEAL writing schedule looks like:

• 2 weeks of intensive writing: This is when I write 2-3 articles/day, every day for 2 weeks. I try to minimize distractions, TV time and avoid long travel.
• 2 weeks of recovery time: This is when I slow down on writing, take easier and smaller projects, incorporate reading books, watch a new TV series, or travel to another town to clear my mind. 

Remember, I said this is the ideal schedule, but often it isn’t so accurate. However, I still try to balance intensive writing time with time that I am completely away from my laptop. More breaks, better ideas. It’s so important!

#5: Specialize in topics and industries that interest you

When I just started writing content, I explored different topics. And because nobody would pay me to write for their website (yet) – I went and started 5 blogs on topics including beauty, leadership, travel, social media, and cats. Eventually, I learned which topics I find more interesting to write about and started focusing more on social media and business case studies.  

So, I know that if you’re just starting up, you need to explore different industries, but you should pick clients and projects that you know you are interested in. The reality is that – as a writer – you spend most of your time (I’d say 80%) reading and researching materials for your articles. So why choose topics that you know don’t interest you or you find boring? 

For example, I recently had to turn down a project because it involved writing about “car engine oils” – and I don’t even own a car or want to learn about engine oil. Of course, being an experienced writer, I know how to write articles on any topic – but will it be my best writing? Probably not. And in this case, it’s best to say “Sorry, I am not the best person to help you” than doing a mediocre job. 

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Final thoughts – Writing tips for bloggers

Whether you’re a blogger, content creator, or just someone who wants to improve your writing skills, you can take your writing to the next level with these tips. From editing your work, to using AI tools, these tips can help you create content that truly resonates with your audience.