5-Step Content Creation

If you’re an infoproduct creator, online marketer, blogger, author or other online business owner, then you’re going to need to create ongoing content to serve your audience.

Whether you’re creating free content, paid content, short content, long content or anything in between, this 5-step ‘checklist’ will serve as an overview of the overall steps you will need to complete.

Of course, not just any content will do. It needs to be GOOD content — something useful, something engaging, and something your audience wants.

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How do you create this sort of in-demand, helpful content? By following this simple five-step process:

• Step 1: Choose a Topic
• Step 2: Create Your Outline
• Step 3: Craft Your Content
• Step 4: Call Readers to Action
• Step 5: Convey Benefits

Let’s walk through the steps…

Step 1: Choose A Topic

In order to choose a topic, you need to do the following:

1. Pick your goal. For example, do you want your readers to buy a product when they’re done reading? Join a mailing list? Register for a webinar? Share your content? Take action on what they just learned? Make progress toward their desired outcome? Pick one primary goal and then move on to the next step.
2. Select an in-demand topic. Here you need to do your market research to figure out what your audience wants. A good way to do this is to find out what they’re already buying. If people are buying products on a topic, they’ll likely be interested in reading about them on your blog or elsewhere.

TIP: Go to marketplaces such as ClickBank.com, Amazon.com and JVZoo.com and search for your niche keywords — then check what topics are selling well.

1. Choose the right format. What sort of content best fits your needs? A how-to article, a FAQ, a tips article, etc.?

Let me share with you a typical example…

You’re selling a dieting guide. You do your market research and find out that people are really interested in getting rid of belly fat. You then choose to create an article such as “10 Tips for Boosting Your Metabolism to Burn More Belly Fat.”

Next…

Step 2: Create Your Outline

Your next step is to outline and organize the talking points for your content. How you do this depends on what content format you chose.

Here are three different outlines to use:

1. Chronological outline, which is for step-by-step content. This works for how-to tutorials, case studies and other similar process-oriented pieces.
2. Complexity outline, which is when you order content from easiest to more difficult. This works for content in the form of tips, FAQs and other list-oriented pieces.
3. Categorical outline, which is where you group information by categories. For example, if you create an article with social media marketing tips, you might create three groupings: Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.

The key here is to…

Create as detailed of an outline as possible, which will make the writing easier.

You’ll want to first brainstorm information you’d like to include in your content and then research the topic to pick up extra talking points.

Once you’ve got a detailed outline in place, then move on to the next step…

Step 3: Craft Your Content

Now you need to craft your content in a way that keeps people engaged and naturally leads to your call to action.

• First, let’s talk about creating engaging content. Avoid stuffy “textbook style” content or trying to impress people with your big words. Instead, create content that an 8th or 9th grader could easily read and use a friendly tone as if you were speaking to a friend.
• Secondly, provide at least one piece of unique content if possible. Share a unique tip or just present the information in a unique way. Take a look at this lesson as an example, where I’ve used alliteration — each of the five steps of this process starts with the letter “C.”
• Finally, develop your content to lead to the CTA (call to action). For example, if you’re preselling an offer, then create content that’s useful (to help solve part of a problem), yet incomplete (so that you can promote a related paid offer for additional help).

Let me give you a couple of examples of this last point….

1. An article sharing dieting tips is useful, but readers need to purchase the paid offer (a diet guide) to get the full details on how to lose the weight and keep it off.
2. An article providing an overview of the steps for writing a sales letter is useful, but readers need to purchase the copywriting course to get in-depth training for each of the steps mentioned.

Step 4: Call Readers To Action

In Step 1, you chose a goal for your content. Now you need to encourage people to take your desired action by inserting a call to action. This is where you tell people what to do next.

E.G., “If you liked these tips for burning belly fat, then you’re going to want to download this free set of fat-burning meal plans and recipes. This set makes it both easy and delicious to lose weight! Click here to claim this offer now…”

Step 5: Convey Benefits

Your final step is to convey the benefits of your content by creating an appealing title that promises help for solving a problem, reaching a goal or enjoying an interest.

For example:

• [Number] Secrets of [Getting a Benefit]. E.G. “3 Secrets for Rapid Fat Loss — Even If You’re Over 40.”
• How to [Get a Benefit] In Just [Short Amount of Time or Small Number of Steps]. G., “How to Double Your Conversion Rate With a Five-Minute Tweak.”
• [Number] [Type of] Tips for [Getting a Benefit]. G., “17 Homeschooling Tips for Transforming Your Kitchen Table Into a Fun and Effective Learning Environment.”

NOTE: Be sure to be truthful in your titles, offering “hope, not hype.”

Conclusion

These five basic steps will help you create just about any kind of content that you can use to generate traffic, build relationships, presell offers, and generate direct sales as you provide real help for your audience’s wants and needs.

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