Writing Basics With Professor Sweet

Writing! The truth about writing is it is forever incomplete without someone to read it. Whether it be the writer, a crush, a publisher, or a hunky man in a superhero costume, without a reader, it's an intricate art design on paper.

Writing needs an audience and today that is you. So strap yourselves in because Professor Sweet is in the house! That means you're not just getting schooled, you're getting home schooled. Cue the opening music.

Let's start with a shameless example from one's personal collection of underrated Tweets. (For more information about these Tweets and future Tweets: @Sweetinator100) I started Twitter Tweeting for no reason. Just complaining about traffic and throwing in hashtags so that no one ever would want to engage with them. Here's a perfect example:

This might work if I had a ton of followers who know me but I don't and so this was a mistake.

Now compare that to this masterpiece of branded comedy:Perfection. Quintuple the engagement numbers, including some of my highest profile followers. Why did this tweet do better? I knew what my audience was looking for when they followed me and I delivered it to them. I thought of my audience first, took their need, filtered it into my brand, shook it up, poured out a nice cup of wordplay. Now that you're both following me on Twitter and seeing the potential here, let's get into how to do this consistently in everyday writing.

Step One: Know Your Audience. Seems basic enough but I want you to go further than demographic information, I mean truly, get to know your audience. Look through their tweets, see what they engage in, do some research, watch their movies, listen to their music, start a conversation. Bridge the gap between reality and your expectations before you try to sell fresh milk to the lactose intolerant.

Step Two: Know Why. Ask yourself why your audience would want to read your work. Is it to inform? Entertain? Bore them to tears? It doesn't matter if you have the Hakuna Matata to their everyday problems if they can't even listen to the chorus. Give them a reason to stop by, and keep giving them reasons to stay, like a well placed Disney reference.

Step Three: The Sauce. This is where you start writing. Speak to your audience without losing your own voice and boom, you've got yourself worthy content for people who would actually want to read it.

Congratulations, you have survived the first lesson of this blog. For more lessons, reviews, and other things about advertising and writing, consider subscribing for email updates, or following me on other social sites for updates there for my next big post. Next time I will be talking about content being defined by the medium it is contained in so you don't want to miss it.

Until that day arrives, this has been Sweet Thoughts, you've been subjected to education, and I've been deciding what my next Twitter pun handle will be. Farewell!

#writing #audience #blogging #tips