Content is the currency of content marketing for personal branding, but productivity–i.e., your ability to write as efficiently as possible–is the lever that can speed your journey to personal branding success.
Whether you’re writing articles, blog posts, resumes, books, or ebooks, to build your personal brand, the fundamentals of writing productivity remain the same.
Use the 7 tips to leverage your time and the value of your ideas to speed your journey to personal branding success.
And, use them frequently; the more you use the 7 writing tips that follow, the more powerful they’ll become, creating lasting habits of writing and branding success.
- Create your own challenges. Start by creating your own writing challenges. Identify the number of articles or blog posts you want to publish each week, or give yourself a deadline for publishing your book or ebook. Challenges and deadlines motivate you to take action. Sharing your writing challenges with others provides even more motivation.
- Schedule your writing. The difference between published writers and unpublished authors is often as simple as scheduling appointments to write your book. Schedule at least a half an hour each day, with a specific starting and stopping time. A written schedule is the difference between intention, commitment, and writing success. Use a Google Calendar to schedule your writing sessions, sharing your calendar with co-workers and family.
- Take frequent breaks. Several participants emphasized the importance of taking frequent breaks while writing. Avoid the temptation to write too much at one time. Short, frequent, writing sessions are more productive. Options include writing for 60-90 minutes, then taking a short 15-20 minute walk. Others recommend exploring the Pomodoro Technique website.
- Close your eyes to distraction. One of the biggest advantages of scheduling short-frequent writing sessions is that you can share your calendar with your co-workers and friends, asking them to avoid bothering you during your writing sessions unless absolutely necessary. The Pomodoro Technique, above, contains tactful hints for dealing with chronic interrupters.
- Model the best. Why re-invent the wheel, when it’s faster and easier to study what has worked for others? The goal is not to copy what they’ve done, but to adapt their proven techniques to your own goals and resources. If you’re writing a book to build your personal brand, analyze the contents and organization of the bestselling books in your field, study the online and social marketing techniques of their authors and analyze the products, services, and speaking topics their authors offer. For more ideas, see 7 Tips For Modeling Your 2012 Personal Branding Success.
- Create a style guide. Save time, and improve the quality of your writing, by preparing a written style guide. Use the style guide to eliminate the need for simple decisions like “Which words I capitalize in an article or blog post title?” You can also improve your writing productivity by preparing a checklist of things to look for when reviewing your own writing. Everyone tends to make the same mistakes over and over again; a checklist will remind you what to look for when self-editing your work prior to publication.
- Track your success. Although it’s impossible to predict the success of individual articles, blog posts, or ideas in advance, it’s relatively easy to track the success of your personal brand building efforts. All you need to track the results of your efforts is a tool, such as a spreadsheet, and a way of measuring response to each article or blog post. Measuring options include comments, Tweets, list-sign-ups, sales, or website traffic. After a short time, you’ll have the facts you need to identify the topics your readers, prospects, and clients are most interested in.
Author:
Roger C. Parker is an author, book coach, designer, consultant who works with authors, marketers, & business professionals to achieve success with brand-building books & practical marketing strategy. He helps create successful marketing materials that look great & get results, and can turn any complex marketing or writing task into baby steps. Visit his blog to learn more or ask a question.
