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content creation for IT consultants

How to Create Better Content for IT Consultants

Jacob Brain

Author

Every business relies on content in some way. From the slogans on the back of trucks cruising down the highway to the brochure in your doctor’s office, every industry needs great content. The same goes for IT consultants. Whereas shipping and flu season prevention can be explained in a relatively simple way, the information technology industry is full of jargon and complicated concepts. Great content makes the industry relatable to the everyday professional.

Content creation for IT consultants can be difficult. What do you write about? How do you make your writing engaging and relevant? This list is a good place to start.

Take Yourself Out of the Equation

When writing an article, it can be all too easy to operate only from the author’s point of view. You’ll find yourself going off on diatribes that relate to what you’re interested in or using jargon that feels like second nature to you. Unfortunately, those diatribes may not be interesting to your audience and those acronyms could make them immediately check out. When you’re writing, take yourself out of the equation. Focus on what you believe your audience is interested in. This may include common issues that they have, breaking news in their industry, or other relevant topics.

When writing for a targeted demographic, your goal should be to create helpful and relevant content that aids your audience in becoming successful. If your blogs sound more like a sales pitch, then you’ve done it wrong. The focus should always be on how you can help your customer, not on what you want them to do.

Know Who You’re Writing For

Great content is subjective. Content creation for IT consultants will look entirely different than content creation for a marketing agency. In order to create high-quality helpful content for your audience, you first need to cultivate a deep understanding of how they operate, what they struggle with, and what their goals are. Once you understand every little thing that makes your personas tick, then you create great content that helps them either solve their problems or meet their goals.

Show Off Your Voice

Do you remember reading your history or mathematics textbook in high school and college? The exercise typically isn’t remembered as enjoyable- but very dry. If you’re hoping to create an engaging enjoyable article, then don’t be afraid to show off some of your personality. Throw in a joke, use sarcasm, many modern writers even throw in a meme or two. Most content is not purely educational. It’s meant to be enjoyed by your audience. Using a personable voice will make them feel as though they’re in a conversation, not being lectured.

Make Your Headline Exceptional

Without a great headline, the quality of your content doesn’t matter. If no one ever clicks on the headline, they’ll never read the content. Studies have shown that longer headlines between 16 and 18 words and ones that start with “how to” perform better than shorter less active headlines. When possible, use verbs and exciting adjectives. Stay away from jargon and acronyms that don’t apply to your audience.

Create Backlinks

The saying “you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours” applies to content creation for IT consultants (as well as everything else in life). By throwing in some backlinks to well-established industry authors, you’re driving traffic to their site. Hopefully, they’ll appreciate the gesture and backlink to your site as well. This way you’re helping each other get more website visitors.

Write, Write, and Write Some More

You might hate hearing this, but it’s true: practice makes perfect. The more often you write, the better you’ll be. Great writing isn’t just about picking the right topic, knowing your audience, etc. It’s also about the basics. How’s your grammar? Spelling? The length of your sentences? When you’re first starting to write blogs, go back to some grade school tricks. Read your content pieces out loud and see if it flows nicely. Look at your paragraph structure. Does each one answer your thesis?

Include Eye-Popping Graphics

For better or worse, our audiences are accustomed to fast-moving text, high-definition TV screens, and flashing notifications. There’s a reason Instagram and Facebook are such successful platforms. Users can scroll through and don’t have to bother with reading- they can enjoy the images and videos as they flash by. Accommodate this change in entertainment style with your content. Throw in eye-catching visuals, such as videos, images, graphics, and more.

Write for the Future

The information technology industry is fast-moving with new developments every day. Your content has to keep up with it. That being said, there are some strategies for content creation for IT consultants that rely on evergreen content. Evergreen content lasts for years, instead of just one quarter. For example, a blog that discusses the latest breaking news is most likely not evergreen. A good example of an evergreen piece would be one that discusses how to create a great IT strategy. Evergreen content will garner more clicks, and engagement over the long-term.

Be Authentically Helpful

This second-to-last tip ties in our first two. The best articles are solution-focused. They solve real problems for a specific audience and come across as having no ulterior motive. Wouldn’t you rather have a conversation with someone who cares about your problems then with someone who is just waiting to talk about themselves? The best authors truly care about who they’re writing for.

Don’t Overdo the Sales Pitch

Imagine if you wrote a great article, filled with helpful information, and then ended it with a broadly overdone, unauthentic sales pitch at the end? Instead of saying, “Call New North now, we’ll solve all of your problems,” consider directing your reader to more relevant information that could be helpful to them. A big part of great content creation for IT consultants is understanding what level of the buying stage your reader is in. A very direct and assertive CTA may be appropriate for an eBook, but not so much a blog article.

Try ending your articles like this:

For more information on content creation for IT consultants, check out our other blog post: “You’re Talking, But You’re Not Saying Anything.”

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