I make my living writing, at times freelance, but 90% of the time writing my own products such as ebooks, books, courses, seminars, manuals and so on.
In addition to writing, I communicate information to very specific audiences in other ways such as audio interviews, audio podcasts, screen capture videos and live videos – all with the intent of targeting very specific challenges and opportunities within niche markets.
These are all non-fiction, informational products, often known as "How To" or Information Products to writers and online entrepreneurs respectively.
It’s true, I enjoy writing but the fact remains I enjoy solving problems, researching and helping people in my niche markets even more so writing, for me, must be something I can do fast, painlessly in a way that communicates very clearly and effectively with my readers.
So far, judging by customers and subscribers – things have gone quite well so I would like to share with you some tips I’ve come to learn on how to make writing faster, less painful and more effective.
Writing Tip #1: Take Control Of Your Writing. When do you write best? In most cases, it is when you like or have experience with your topic. See if this makes sense to you…if you generalize across many markets you may get more work, but you will be less productive and less happy writing for many of the markets. Ideally, you take full control of your writing by launching your own information product publishing career with systems like the one we outline over at InfoMarketer’sZone. As a freelancer, the trick is to specialize in a small number of niche markets where you enjoy what you are writing about and can leverage that knowledge across many projects.
Writing Tip #2: Write Without Editing. Too many people try and edit and write at the same time, for most of us that will not work. A better approach is to write in a free-flowing manner and take care of editing at the end. That way, you are allowing your brain to get into gear and stay in gear each time you sit down to write.
Writing Tip #3: Learn How To Outline. Are you writing without an outline? Unless you are the rarest of writing talents who can spin out a complete book without nary a single word of outline, you will benefit tremendously from outlining first. My preference is to research my market first pulling the outline from the market itself in the form of questions. With non-fiction, informational products you are providing answers to questions, systems to follow, tips to apply or an overall formula to try – so understanding the burning questions your readers want answered is the greatest step toward structuring your writing.
Writing Tip #4: Write Like You Speak. This one is easier to grasp for non-writers than for trained writers. Trained writers are taught to think in terms of sentence, paragraph, page and book formulas with various rules of English and grammar influencing the creative act of writing. Having a grasp of the English language insofar as it helps you communicate is necessary, but don’t underestimate the power of writing as you speak. If you are searching for a next thought, sentence structure or way of expressing a thought – just talk it out and translate what you say directly into writing. Remember, you can edit later.
Writing Tip #5: Be 100% Sure About Your Approach. Fuzzy thinking, lack of commitment to your topic or angle on a particular written piece will doom you to low productivity. Any level of uncertainty will weigh on you mind causing interference with the normal channels of creativity. I’ve trained myself to know the feelings I get when I’m not 100% behind my approach to a particular written project. When in doubt, I head back into the market to further reinforce or re-position my project so that I am able to remove any uncertainty over its direction.
Writing may be fun for you or it may be one of the most challenging chores eclipsed only by having to watch another episode of "Dancing With the Stars" – but the rewards can be amazing, especially if you take control of your writing and build yourself an online information publishing empire.
No matter what your perspective on writing, you will be able to improve the speed, quality and effectiveness of your writing with these 5 tips.
Don’t forget – you can turn your writing into hot selling information products to sell online, a terrific way to lower your reliance on contracted writing work. Visit the Infomarketer’sZone for more details.
