6 Psychological Insights to Improve Your Content Writing Skills
Whether you write content for your personal blog or an official company website, implementing tried-and-tested psychological principles can always help your cause. Apply these six psychological insights to improve your content writing skills.
Given that readers have far more options in regards to the content they read online, it’s pivotal to make your writing “pop” and stand out. According to Smart Insights, it takes 65% more time to write a single blog post than it did in 2014 due to formatting and optimization. Based on Impact BND, only 42% of companies consider their content writing efforts mature enough to meet modern needs.
Paired with fierce competition, writers have a tremendous challenge on their hands in regards to creating engaging content. This also makes it important for both indie bloggers and corporate content writers to do their best in implementing practical psychological insight into their writing. With that, let’s take a look at the benefits of using psychology in content writing, as well as how to take practical advantage of it.
Advantages of Implementing Psychology in Content Writing
As humans, we are prone to rely on emotions and instinct when we make moment-to-moment decisions. Different individuals respond to various triggers to buy online products or follow a blog they’ve just discovered. According to 99 Firms, 70% of consumers would rather learn about brands from blog posts than adverts, while 77% of internet users follow blogs regularly. By relying on psychological insight and research for your writing, you can find inspiration to create more engaging and worthwhile content for your readers. Thus, introducing psychological triggers into your writing process can bring about several important advantages to your content, including:
- Higher engagement and subsequent conversion rates
- Higher SEO ranking with search engines such as Google and Yahoo
- Increased follower loyalty and brand advocacy
Psychological Insight to Improve Content Writing Skills
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Embrace Positivity
People want to hear positive news; especially in 2020, where the COVID-19 situation has changed the way we live. In order to affect your readers in a positive way, you should embrace a more positive mindset in your writing. If you are writing about a negative topic, don’t be a Debbie Downer.
Look for a silver lining in every piece of news, trend or insight you want to write about in regards to your industry. Communicate positivity to your readers by using empowering words which will help them cheer up and get motivated for the rest of their day. This will have a huge impact not only on the way you write but also on how you manage your website and engage with readers.
- Use FOMO to your Advantage
If your website’s business model lies in online sales, you should use FOMO to your advantage. Fear of missing out can be a great tool for encouraging visitors to make a purchase sooner rather than later. You can use FOMO by placing sales timers or limited-time coupons on your landing page, as well as in banners throughout your website.
Let your visitors know that you have a one-of-a-kind deal prepared just for them and that the clock is ticking. FOMO is a powerful psychological tool which can improve your content’s engagement substantially if used sparingly and with powerful copywriting messages to boot.
- Implement Social Proof
When it comes to online services and untested brands, humans tend to exhibit a herd mentality in psychological terms. We want to make sure that our money and time are well-spent by looking for people who have already used the product or service before.
Thus, it’s essential that you collect social proof from loyal followers, satisfied customers and B2B contributors for your website. Likewise, you can interview industry experts, long-time brand advocates or influencers and write engaging content based on those interviews. Use this content to your advantage to build trust and respect for your brand in the eyes of uninitiated visitors. Good social proof content will have a positive effect on your website’s appeal and ensure that visitors are more likely to convert into paying customers.
- Cluster your Content
In order to convince readers to stick around and visit your website often, you should aim to provide them with a long-term value proposition. It’s good practice to implement topic clustering in your content writing efforts to do just that.
Topic clustering represents creating a single comprehensive piece of writing, called a pillar. Your article can then branch out into different subtopics, list articles and tutorials which can be interlinked between each other. Content created in such a manner will encourage readers to come back to your website again and again for more info on any given topic.
- Facilitate Content Skimming
For better or worse, readers who tend to follow online blogs skim through content by scanning subheadings and keywords. If you want to engage your readers as much as possible, play on their psychological need to save time and skim through content.
While it may seem counterintuitive, content skimming will ensure that readers who are interested in your writing stick around for a while. Readers who are uninterested in your style of writing or information you provide will nevertheless click on your link and bounce back without second thought. Retain the readers that matter – facilitate content skimming by formatting your writing properly and making it more legible.
- Cap off with a Call to Action
Lastly, calls to action are a powerful marketing tool which will boost the psychological effects of your content writing on would-be readers. Calls to action are just that – calls to a certain action by the reader. Whether you want a reader to subscribe, comment or share the article with their social circles, why not tell them to do so?
Using a personable tone of voice and addressing your reader with a personal pronoun can do wonders for your content’s mass appeal. The best use of calls to action is found in their placement in introductory and concluding segments. Engage your readers personally and reap the rewards of doing so.
In Summary
Psychological insights in content writing are all about appealing to your readers’ emotional triggers to provide them with additional reading value. Taking such an approach to writing will ensure that your brand stands out in the market more than any form of technical SEO ever would. Once you start to apply these tips in writing, you will learn how to adapt them to your target audience with more ease and precision. Give these insights a shot in your content marketing activities and share your own psychological insight with us in the comments section below.