How do you get started writing articles? I've written a couple but they always seem to take me so long, about an hour per article yet I've seen people who can crank out 20+ articles a day, no problem. I understand some of these articles are just rewrites of other articles which would obviously take much less time, but how do you go about doing research and producing the first article so quickly? And please, don't just recommend Article Writing software, from everything I've heard plus the couple I've tried the articles they put out are worthless at best. I'm talking about a real quality article, 300+ words. Thanks!
You must read a lot of materials relating to a particular niche. If someone is really passionate about something, he/she can produce the articles really fast. Of course, he/she must also love writing. Lots of reading, online or offline, will give you the flow of writing which will speed up the writing process.
Being a fast and wide reader is also a plus. If you have stock knowledge of the topic, you can write a 500 word article in less than an hour. Personally, I make an outline of how I want the article to come. Rewriting is a messy business, for some it may be easier, but I don't really feel all that comfortable stealing someone else's idea.
I am not convinced that anyone who writes 20+ articles per day is writing original content. My opinion is that maybe someone could do 10 in one day if they knew something about the topic and had reference material to back them up.
At the beginning you should make up the structure of the future article, determining how many words the introduction will take, how to develop and to sum up the subject. Unfortunately, for some authors writing is like a Brazilian soap opera, where even its director doesn't know what all this stuff will end by. So, making a plan with bullet points can be very helpful. When you talked about spending an hour per article, did you mean only writing, or both writing and editing? The latter can be rather time-consuming, if one tries to write faster than he/she is able to. Anyways don't send the article as soon as you finish it - take your time to check everything properly. Finally, once you only start writing, try to focus on quality rather than on rapidity, because only quality content can help you to attract long-standing clients, while the output will grow with your experience. Good luck!
I honestly don't know how people are able to write quality articles in 300 words or less. I start writing something and the next thing I know, I have 800 to 1000 words. This definitely takes less than 1 hour, but like someone has already said, it is the editing process that takes the most time. Anyone can crank out a 1000 word article, but editing is what creates great quality. If you create bullet points of main ideas like was suggested, then it should be easy to create quality articles of that length. Editing is definitely a pain. Do I delete this word? Do I remove this sentence? Do I move this paragraph down 2 paragraphs? Is everything spelled correctly? Is everything gramatically correct? If you have natural ability to spell correctly and catch your typos as you type, then you should be fine. Spell checkers are nice, but even spell checkers can't catch those words with similar pronunciations but different meanings like to and too. Grammar is another story. It is difficult to be grammatically correct while typing an article. That is why you can use grammar tools to check what you have written. In the end these tools will help you improve your grammar and also inspire other lines of content that you hadn't thought of beforehand. Writing 20 plus articles per day is absolutely absurd. Noone can write 20 quality articles per day. They may be able to crank out worthless 200 word articles 20 times per day, but they will have very little quality. If you want to make big bucks in article writing then you need put out quality work. You don't want clients to get that, "yeah that'll do" attitude. You want your clients to walk away with the, "OMG That was Awesome!" attitude. Repeat customers are where the money is at. You can do work for 30 different people or you can do 30 different jobs for one person. It is a lot easier to sell an existing client, than it is to gain a new client. What I have just written for this post is in no way perfect, but without even trying I have written something that is over 350 words, and it took around 20 minutes. So even if you were able to put out 2 articles an hour, you would be working 10 hour days, plus the amount of time it would take you to deal with clients requests, sales, etc. Writing 20 quality articles per day is just not possible. (Oops. Now it is over 420).
thanks everyone for your answers copywriting911 and jjpmarketing especially (+rep to both) I agree 300 words is short, I always try and write closer to 500 for a basic article, maybe I'm just going about the process wrong - I do hardly any editing at the end, or write bullet points, instead I just start from scratch and go through in my head what the order should be. Obviously I do some editing afterwards for basic spelling and grammar to make sure things sound right, I absolutely hate poorly written content and definitely would not want to put my name on something that is poorly written. Next time I go to write an article I'll try to start out with some bullet points first, then go through just adding straight content then finish it up with some editing and we'll see how it goes thanks again (ps - please don't go any say this post is poorly written, it probably is - my excuse: it's christmas, give me a break cheers and merry christmas all) -Mike
Thanks for the rep. Appreciated. I never pay attention to forum posts quality. It makes me laugh with all the different nationalities on here, when some of them try to form english sentences. I took french in high school, and always wondered if that is what I sounded like speaking french.
i can write an article about online marketing for example on 500 words+ in only 10 minutes because i like the subject
hi, I completely agree with stretch86 as I'm a beginner and I try hard to write an article but it takes two hours to finish an article of 500 words at times.I think regular practice may reduce the writing time. aruna
You should definitely but controls on your writing. When I write a new article or blog post I try to keep it concise and informative. If you are writing in English it helps if you are fluent, if you are not you should read as much in English as possible and work on your grammar. I have always though that Google, Yahoo and MSN would eventually be able to actually read how well something is written and factor that into how well they rank a page. But currently I think its more to do with the site its on...
Don't think you are the only one here. Very few people can write too fast or concentrate long enough. Article directories like EzineArticles.com are good enough for ideas for article writers. Read more articles written for your target audience to obtain ideas. Relax your mind and enjoy it all.
I could probably do the same minus the editing process, but I only type 40 to 50 WPM (Words Per Minute). Some days I can hit 60 WPM, but others are typo plagued only around 40 WPM. Just depends on my state of mind, time of day, etc.
I used to want to be a fiction writer, and I read "Stephen King on Writing". I just loved his writing style. Even the stuff that wasn't all sci fi was great because he was such a good writer. One main thing he pointed out was in order to be a great author you need to read a lot to learn different styles of writing, and to learn new ways to build characters or plots, use words in different ways. This is no different with Article writing. I used to read lot so maybe that is why I find it so easy to crank out 1000 word articles.
IMHO this can have a lot to do with the length of time it takes you to complete an article. If you are a natural-born writer, and can crank out ideas at the bat of an eye, then the next step is to up your typing speed. Maybe I'm just lucky, but I came out of the era when typing was a required class for women, and I manage about 100 WPM. Which means start to finish I can complete an article (including minor editing) in about 10 minutes. Those here who have mentioned that being an avid reader is a must are absolutely right! The more you read on a day to day basis, the easier a time you will have getting the words to flow from your fingers in an easy to read, informative fashion. If you are writing in only a single niche, you will have an even easier time with it; since everything you read can focus on one particular niche, instead of jumping from one to another. The main thing you need to do when writing an article is to have a basic point that you want to make before you ever type the first word. You should have an intro of about 100 words that covers the background of what you're writing about; then two or three subheadings that make your point in further detail. Bullets are great, but subheads work just as well. Then close it off with about a 100 word conclusion. Go back and edit it a bit, and you're done. Anyway, just my two cents
Women... It was the same in high school when I took keyboarding. All the chicas were typing 100 to 120 wpm, while the dudes were lucky to hit 60 WPM. I think it has to do with fingertip size or something. LMAO. You basically just recited what my Junior English teacher used to tell us all the time. An opening, 3 main ideas and a closing. Simple and effective.
Most of the content articles on the web are horrible. So I wouldn't set my standard on someone else's speed. To be honest, those buying content don't always know the difference. To get good at it, you have to spend time at it. My first attempts at writing brochures took over a week of hair pulling but I stuck with it and am faster now. There are some articles that basically take days to write. Now I don't spend every waking hour writing it, but articles require some research. For instance, I am hired by hospitals to write for particular departments. I'm not going to put an article out there about trigeminal neuralgia without getting the facts right. If they're wrong, the hospital and the neurosurgeon look dumb and I get canned. The most important thing to keep in mind at all times is your TARGET AUDIENCE. Put yourself in the mind of the audience who would be interested in reading about whatever you're writing and you will find that you hit the mark more often than not.