Online Writing and Beyond: Writers Will Lead the Content
Revolution
Introduction
It is often thrown around loosely on the web that "Content is
king."
If content is king, then what is a content writer?
Unfortunately, we are not yet royalty. We're never paid as well
or considered as skilled as a web designer or our more technical
counterparts. This is changing, however, with an influx of
writing for the web courses and the frenzy of corporate training
in writing for the web. Training an already overworked,
understaffed web team to write specifically for the web is
costly and distracts technical workers from updating their
ever-changing, ever-evolving techie skills. And then there is
the whole left-brain, right-brain trap. Technical workers
usually work from the left side of their brain, programming ASP
and javascript. Designers use the right side of their brain to
apply design elements to the technical aspects, such as forms
and web sites.
Good writers are already gifted in using a voice that reaches
their audience clearly and effectively. Content writers work
behind the scenes to help websites retain and expand their
readership, sales, and visits by offering articles, sales copy,
email outreach, and other types of writing to enhance a web
site's overall "stickiness". The basic premise behind content
writing is that without content, a website creates no reason for
a customer to return. And it's much easier to get a customer to
return than to visit the site in the first place. The web is
still referred to as the "information superhighway", and
millions of users expect their information for free.
Where Writers Fit In
Ultimately, it is not "Content is King." As readers adapt and
change their uses and needs on the web, it is clear that really,
the users are king and queen. Providing fresh and interactive
content is simply the role content writers undertake. This is
similar to the role of jesters, caterers, tutors, and playhouses
to our royal readers. (Online books have failed thus far
primarily for this reason; much of the content isn't uniquely
informing and the format doesn't make an enjoyable read. How can
somebody enjoy reading over 50 pages of boring, painful-to-read
Adobe- Acrobat text?)
Content writers entertain, refresh, inform, educate and expand
the world of their readers through writing. Those of us who
write and love writing understand that the essence of writing is
invoke emotion, take your reader "another world", inform them or
prompt them to action. Combine the passion for writing with the
need for content on the web, and a writer can have it all. Not
only can a writer fulfill these needs, but also the web writer
can achieve a coveted, long-lasting goal for every website;
compel the reader to interact.
Writers Engaging Readers
As more forms of entertainment move online, more unique ways of
fulfilling their goals will surface. Some of the most popular
websites today begin with a little content and build a
community. Community-based websites not only have online
writers, but also provide a forum for their users to interact to
the content. Building conflict and community can engage your
readers in such a way that they no longer feel like readers, but
an audience. Members of an audience can applaud, converse,
heckle and cheer when appropriate. By encouraging the use of a
message board or other interactive media, readers return to see
what the next day, week, or month will bring. They "get in on a
piece of the action".
More and more websites are creating audiences rather than
readers, and writers are helping them through polls, feedback
forms, and message boards. However, it seems that the web has
not completely transformed the web into a completely interactive
medium yet. Content writers will create a way to force the
reader not to be an audience, but a part of the play. As a
writer, I think that we'll give audiences more and more room to
interact and influence actual events and mediums.
Where We'll Take Content Writing
In the future, I see nonfiction e-books allowing readers to pick
and choose chapters based on their skill and knowledge levels.
Students will be able to skip the grammar review in an online
textbook if they feel their skills are up to par or took an
online skill test to "test-out". Web designers will skip the
HTML basics and move straight to HTML 5.0 new features and XML.
Writers will be writing both for a general audience and a
skilled audience, and readers will participate in the process by
choosing the specific information they need. "Take what you need
and leave the rest" will be the new online writing mantra.
Contentville.com already did this (although they are now
defunct) with a huge database of articles, thesis papers, and
other formerly print media that readers pay a small fee to read.
Others are following this pattern. This market will expand and
readers will only pay for what they get.
In the fiction market, readers will be taken to the next level
of participation by finding not only a choice of characters,
plots, and settings through interactive websites and media, but
through a Choose- Your-Own Adventure type of structure. Similar
to online games, users will be able to choose Jane's physical
traits and John's personality, and set the story into sequence
at a setting of their choice. They will choose their favorite
outcomes in their online soap operas. (No more, "No! John! You
should have married Mary, not left her for Margaret! She's
evil!")
As for the writers? We won't have to choose the perfect
beginning, middle, or end anymore. We won't have to decide on
one specific audience. We'll be writing for all cultures, all
ages, and all interest levels. Where content is king, we'll be
the knights in shining armor, rescuing the reader from the
boring, redundant, or irrelevant web reading and the writing of
yesteryear.
Oh, yeah, and we'll be paid as well as the Duke of Earl.
*This article originally appeared in Web Writing Buzz Newsletter
in April of 2000.