Write the Goal Before the Story
We have already talked about keeping it simple and writing just one thing. We also talked about how, when doing that, you need to have a goal in mind. So which comes first, the goal or the thing? Before we answer that, let’s backtrack a bit and talk about why you even write at all.
In the whole scheme of things, you are writing primarily to promote your business and, as a secondary objective, to promote your specific products or services. Finally you are writing to give a sense of who you are, your brand voice, as you inform and entertain leaving the reader with a feeling they’d be comfortable doing business with you.
This is all part of your social media marketing strategy. Each individual piece of writing, whether it is a small story, a listicle, a picture with caption, a sound bite or an infographic, has to support this strategy to some degree. In fact, each individual piece of writing is an actual tactic for achieving your strategy.
When you sit down to write you need to have an idea of what you want to write about and what you want to achieve by someone reading it.
Most of us just sit down and start typing and there is nothing wrong with that to get the creative juices flowing and the idea down on the page. But you might find yourself getting lost if you cannot pull from that writing a working title and an idea of where you are headed. Let’s say you were like us and wanted to promote a service that developed digital media marketing strategies for small business. State your goal:
- I want to let people know what we do
- I want to showcase some of our clients
- I want to give some ideas about how we develop digital marketing strategies
- I want to develop a case study about a client for whom we developed a digital media marketing strategy.
The more refined your goal, the easier it will be write, to edit and to actually achieve it. The less refined, the more likely what you write is not unique and adds little value in the context of your competition for the same topic. Regardless, at the very least, by stating a clear goal, you will know what to include and what to leave out.
Writing is a creative process, and sometimes you’ll start writing about one thing and end up writing about another. But always start with a goal.
Sometimes it helps to write a short brief at the top of your page covering:
- how you plan to write it = the chosen genre
- what you are writing about = the content (often defined by the working title)
- who you are writing for = the reader, including any assumptions about their existing knowledge of the “what”
- why = the outcome you expect from the reader reading your post
- where = what social media platforms you plan to promote your piece so you can prepare any additional marketing materials e.g. extra graphics
- when you plan to publish = entries on your social media calendar.
When you review and edit your work, ask yourself did you achieve your goal?
