I realize the title of the blog post seems a little weird, but I truly believe that it’s ok if you think your article writing sucks.
Have you ever had a photo taken of you that you didn’t like, that you thought was completely hideous? If you’re like me then it’s about every other photo… 😉
If you take that photo of you that you didn’t like and ask someone else what they think of it chances are that they’ll just think that it looks like you. They might agree with you and say it might not be your best photo, but at the same time they won’t think that you look completely hideous.
The same concept applies to writing articles online. As with pictures of ourselves, we tend to be our own worst critics. We zero in and focus on the tiniest flaws, ignoring all of the positives.
Here is a list of reasons why it’s ok for you to think your writing sucks:
1) Other People Don’t Think It Sucks
It’s ok if you don’t have proper grammar or the biggest vocabulary. I’m going to let you in on a little secret here. The more you type/write like you speak when you are talking with another person, the more people are going to like your content.
Why?
Because it feels like you are talking to them. The only time you should be overly concerned with your grammar and punctuation is if you’re in a writing/English class. If you are providing people with solid information and advice that helps them solve a problem then they’ll be forgiving of a mistake here and there.
2) Over Time Your Writing Will Improve
Even if you are the worst writer on the planet, if you persist and keep at it, your writing will improve. Writing like anything else just takes practice. The beautiful thing about this is that the more frequent and often you write the faster your writing will improve.
This is a win-win situation. By writing frequently your writing improves and at the same time you are creating lots of content for your website! Nothing like killing two birds with one stone!
3) You Can Edit And Improve Your Writing Later
Getting your words down on paper or in the computer can be the hard part. The good thing is that once you’ve written something it’s here to stay, as long as you don’t lose the paper or delete the file! Hint: Back up your files… 😉
When you are writing you shouldn’t focus on editing what you just wrote. Your main focus should just to be to write. Then once you are done writing you can go back edit. Preferably you would wait a day or two so you can look at it with a fresh eye.
I usually will write a blog post/page and just publish. I then open up the page I just published in a new window. As I read through it I’ll make changes in the blog post editor. I usually will break the content up into more readable chunks and correct any spelling and grammar errors. I then republish the page. After that I’ll come back in the few days and reread and make any other changes that I deem necessary.
Your Most Important Focus
Your most important focus when writing should be just to write. Nothing else. Just focus on completing your writing task at hand. Throw all your judgments and worries about your writing out the window. If you can do this you are well on your way to getting traffic to your website.
If you write content on a regular basis it will start getting indexed in the search engines. If you are careful with the keywords you write content about you can start to get traffic to your website. When you start getting traffic to your website you have the makings of an asset.
What a lot of people don’t realize is that even if a website isn’t making money, but has traffic going to it is valuable. You can potentially sell it or sell advertising space on it.
Simply put the content you write today, is the content you have to work with tomorrow.