how to become a better writer

How To Put More Of You In Your Own Writing

August 1, 2014 by Marc Guberti 4 Comments

Chances are as you write more blog posts, you will do more digging on the web to find good ideas. For most bloggers, that means reading other people’s blogs and writing similar blog posts. Chances are people do the same thing to your blog and write similar blog posts. I have a blog post called 10 Ways To Get More Twitter Followers, but I am sure that there are numerous blog posts that are similar. Performing a Google search on this phrase leads to many results.

An additional problem is that as we read enough content, we start to like some of the writers. Then, we write content just like those writers without putting our own personalities into our content. It is important to look up to writers for idea, but it is also important to put who you are into your content. Other writers are here to give you ideas, but in the end, you need to express your inner voice.

There are hundreds of blogs like yours. I’d even take it a step further and say that there are thousands of blogs like yours, and that also applies for blog posts on the web that are similar to yours. The answer isn’t to accuse the other bloggers of plagiarism. The answer is you. To be more specific, your personality is the answer.

The key to expressing your personality is by writing something that no one else could have (or had the guts to) write. Mike Michalowicz does a fantastic job at expressing his personality in his blog posts. Here was one of his blog posts he used to promote his book Profit First. You’ll either get a good kick out of the blog post or wonder why I even decided to mention it in the first place. That’s Mike’s personality, and he is not afraid to show it.

The point of this blog post is not for you to rave about yourself. The point of this blog post is that it is okay to show your personality. This blog post isn’t going to destroy Mike Michalowicz’s reputation. In fact, most of the people in his audience probably liked the blog post. They respect the honesty in sharing a personal perspective (and some of us also appreciated the laughter).

Be who you are. Don’t act as one person at home and act as another person through your content. Then how are you going to act when you speak at the podium? The best thing to do is to read your content out loud as if you were having a conversation with someone, and they wanted you to recite one of your blog posts. Then, think of side comments you would have said if you were having a conversation with your friends. Then, add those side comments into the exact location of your content in which the mock conversation was taking place.

Show off your personality so people know who you are. Act as the same person in everything you do.

Great, Honest, And Thoughtful Content Wins

April 23, 2014 by Marc Guberti 1 Comment

This seems obvious. However, we all need to be reminded.

There are shortcuts to writing. Sacrificing quality writing means a blog post takes less time to write. However, that kind of content never wins.

We are all focused on writing quality content, but that is not the only kind of content that wins. People are not going to like something just because it has quality. It needs to be something that is great, honest, and thoughtful.

Show your readers that you took the time to write a brilliant blog post. It is easy to stop at the first sentence. It is easy to overlook your writing and forget to fix the spelling mistake. It is easy to write a 5 paragraph blog post and then leaving out the last tip.

If you want to be an elite blogger, your content needs to be great, honest, and thoughtful.

Why Proofreading An eBook Is Very Important

April 19, 2014 by Marc Guberti Leave a Comment

Proofreading an eBook will reveal spelling mistakes, bad sentences, and typos in your book.After taking several months to read, proofread, and proofread Honest Ways To Make Money Online, I decided that it was finally time to publish the eBook. As a new author who wanted to see results, I knew that by publishing more eBooks, I would get better results. As a result, I wanted to publish as many eBooks as I possibly could. I rushed through Keep The Ball Rolling, and it ended up being only 20 pages. That taught me to slow down my frequency so I could write longer, higher quality eBooks.

Looking back at Keep The Ball Rolling, I knew that I could do a better job at relaying the information to my readers and giving them the motivation they needed to finish their eBook ideas. I did proofread for bad sentences, typos, and spelling errors, but I did not proofread thinking that I could add more content and make the message clearer for my readers. That was the big mistake I made as a rookie writer. I also knew that instead of thinking about my mistakes and lamenting over them, I could make a change. It was at that moment when I decided I would proofread all of Keep The Ball Rolling and provide more content for my readers.

I decided that within a week, I would have Keep The Rolling updated on Kindle so that it would reflect the changes that I made. Within the first hour of typing, I got Keep The Ball Rolling from 8,000 words to over 10,000 words. All I did was proofread the book with the mindset that I could add extra content anywhere in the book. By adding extra content to Keep The Ball Rolling, I was able to provide more content for my readers. You can see the updated Keep The Ball Rolling here.

There are two lessons that you need to learn from my story. The first lesson is that proofreading an eBook is very important. However, when you proofread a book, don’t just check for spelling mistakes, typos, and bad sentences. Check for ways to add more content to your eBook. The second lesson is that not all mistakes are final. Publishing a ridiculously short book was a mistake. Now, Keep The Ball Rolling has a lot more content, and I am happier with where Keep The Ball Rolling is now than where it was when I published it.

4 Big Reasons To Schedule More Blog Posts

April 14, 2014 by Marc Guberti 2 Comments

Scheduling blog posts was a game changing experience. As I was able to schedule more blog posts, I decided to try publishing two blog posts every day to give myself a bigger challenge and get better results at the same time. The entire process has been very rewarding, but scheduling blog posts has other benefits as well. Now, I have numerous blog posts that are scheduled, and throughout my adventure, I have learned about the four big reasons to schedule more blog posts.

Better results. I briefly mentioned getting better results, but I would like to go more in-depth about those better results. Immediately when I published two blog posts every day, my traffic doubled, and people who visited my blog stuck on for longer periods of time. That was because content was getting added to my blog at a faster rate. Therefore, visitors had more content to read.
The more you practice, the better you get. There is no limit to how good of a writer someone can become. In order to become an effective writer, you need to practice often. By frequently scheduling blog posts, you will be able to get in the practice that turns you into one of the best writers around.
Less stress. You do not have to be writing every day in order to publish a blog post every day. Instead of coming home on day at around midnight and rushing to write the blog post your readers are expecting, you can schedule blog posts in advance so you deal with less stress.
You can focus more on big projects. If your big project needs to be completed in a week, and you still have to write blog posts during that week, that will take up a lot of your time. However, if you have your blog posts scheduled weeks in advance, you will be able to focus more of your time on the big project.

These are the four big reasons to schedule more blog posts. What are your thoughts on the list? Do you have any other reasons that you schedule blog posts in advance? Please share your thoughts below.

It’s Easier Than You Think To Write A Book

April 3, 2014 by Marc Guberti 3 Comments

There are some moments when it seems nearly impossible to write a book. Whether the problem is finding sources or turning your idea into 100 pages, writing a book can sometimes get tough. If you want the entire process of writing a book to become easier, you need to be actively publishing new content on your blog.

Starting at the New Year, I have written over 70,000 words for this blog alone in less than a quarter. 70,000 words equates to something close to 150 pages, and by the end of the year, this blog will have gained an extra 300,000 words of content. Writers are constantly finding ways to have bigger numbers for their books. They want a book with triple digit pages, over 100,000 words, and anything else they need. By writing quality blog posts every day and sticking with it, not only will you grow a big presence, but you will also be able to create your own book with your blog.

Many authors have created books with a collection of their blog posts such as Seth Godin (who did that twice). Both of those books became bestsellers. Even if you do not become a bestseller right away, this gives you an advantage because you have already written all of the content. All you have to do now is arrange that content in an organized way so a certain theme can be emphasized.

There should be no hardships that stop potential authors from writing their books. If you are able to send out one blog post every day, you will eventually able to have a blog with enough content to fill an entire book.

7 Habits Of Highly Effective Writers

March 23, 2014 by Marc Guberti 12 Comments

In order to write quality content, you need to be an effective writer. However, that is not the case for every writer. That’s why writing quality content is appreciated the way it is. Writing quality content is a challenging process. After completing the challenge, writing quality content becomes much easier. By exhibiting all 7 of these habits, you will become an effective writer.

Write often. Practice, practice, practice. As you keep on writing, you learn new things along the way. You get to see what went good and what went bad. Soon, you will have more things that go good than bad. By writing often, writing will become easier. You may be able to go from writing 200 words per day to writing 2,000 words per day. The more you write, the easier it gets.
Be motivated through tough times. There are going to be many moments in the beginning when there are numerous mistakes in your writing. Writing blog posts every day is different from writing the weekly essay at school. Quality blog posts require good insight and quality content at the same time. In a weekly essay at school, the minimum word count is where most people stop. For a blog, there is no minimum which extends the boundaries. You need the motivation to write often, get better at writing, and ultimately become an effective writer.
Be an active reader. By becoming an active reader, you will be exposed to numerous writing styles. These writing styles can have an impact on how you write your content. In addition, you can get ideas for your next blog post by reading a few pages in a book. By reading more books, you will expose yourself to more vocabulary words which will add more flavor to your writing. Just be sure to avoid using big SAT words that the average person does not know the definition of.
Don’t focus on the money. When some people think of writing, they think of their book becoming a bestseller, their blog making $100,000 a day, and speaking at events related to the book they wrote. That does not happen overnight, and the people who do focus on the money will not be able to get the second habit which is being motivated through tough times.
Write in a way people want to read. The giant block of text is something that no one wants to read. Instead of writing a giant block of text, break that giant block of text into small, bite-size blocks of text. Although some people would define these are 5-8 sentence paragraphs, some of the small, bite-size blocks of text are less than that.
Get to the point. Why are you writing? You need to be clear what your book or blog post is going to be about within the first paragraph. If someone continues reading a book without knowing what it is about, that book will become confusing. Quickly tell people what the point of your writing is, and do not use any fluff.
Support the point you can make. I could say that aliens invaded Earth. However, I would not be able to support that point very far. There are no UFO’s or intergalactic civilizations in touch with Earth. I could say that Abraham Lincoln was an effective president. However, that’s just a fact. Effective writers ask the “why” question and then answer their own question. Abraham Lincoln was an effective president because he reunited a nation torn in Civil War.

Those are the 7 habits of highly effective writers. Do you any other habits you would like to add to the list? Please share your thoughts and insights below.