The widespread presence of businesses on the web, social networks, websites and blogs to promote and sell products has made the need for content writing more felt than ever.
This article addresses some of the most commonly asked questions about content writing jobs and provides answers to them. Given the breadth of the job and the generality of the questions, we can not claim that the solutions provided are complete and perfect; But they can also be a good starting point for further study and learning.
We have tried to make the points, questions and answers useful for both groups of audiences. The first group is those who have chosen (or intend to choose) content writing jobs, and the second group is companies and businesses that want to hire a person or persons as a content production expert.
What are the Different Types of Content?
We should say that electronic content or digital content is just one type of content: a paper brochure, a written advertisement, a newspaper article or a large poster for environmental advertising is also called content.
But content also has another meaning, something that has become more common in recent years. Nowadays, when we talk about content production, we usually mean content that is delivered through one of the following channels:
- Websites and blogs
- Social networks (including Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube)
- Messengers (such as Telegram or WhatsApp)
- This content can be in various forms, including text, photos, graphic works, video, audio files and podcasts.
What Skills Should a Content Writer have?
The answer depends on the field you want to focus on. For example, you may produce content on a news website for years and not even once turn to software such as Adobe Premiere (for editing movies and clips). But you may be hired to produce content for promotional teasers. Then you’ll have to know how to work with Adobe Premiere.
However, there are some skills that almost all content producers and professionals are expected to have, and if you want to know more about content writing jobs, it is a good idea to take the time to plan and learn them:
1. Writing | Skills in Writing and Arranging Textual Content
Writing fluent text is a skill that you can’t run away from; Even if your job is to produce audio or video content.
If your users can not easily understand what you’re talking about, they will immediately leave your website or page!
Familiarity with Office Family
The Microsoft software family is diverse and includes a variety of applications.
But the following software is at least what a content production activist is expected to be familiar with:
- Word
- Excel
- PowerPoint
- OneNote
The need for an office family is more evident than we need to explain further to convince you.
If you also want to know about content writing skills, read the article below:
Further Reading: Content Writing Skills; Key Strategies to Improve Your Writing Skills
2. Content Management System| Familiarity with at Least One CMS
You usually need a Content Management System (CMS) to store, manage and publish your content on the web.
There are many CMSs in the world; one of the most popular is WordPress. But the world of CMSs is much larger and includes options like Joomla and Drupal.
Familiarity with CMS is not just a technical issue; Rather, it increases your intuition about content and content management and gives you a better understanding of the capabilities and limitations of publishing and content management.
So, even if it’s impossible if they take the content from you and say we always publish it ourselves, learning and mastering a CMS system can still be helpful.
3. Graphic Tools| Familiarity with at Least Two Graphics Tools
If your job is to produce graphic and visual content, you should be a professional in software such as Photoshop, Illustrator, CorelDraw, and so on.
But even if your specialty is not graphics, you still need to be able to get your pictures done in the basics (you can’t go to a professional graphic designer for a small thumbnail next to your article or a small diagram).
You will have two types of graphic work:
The first type is what is called a raster and is made of pixels. Photoshop is, without a doubt, the best choice for this type of graphic work.
But some of your work also has lines, circles, and geometric shapes, called Vector work, and Photoshop is not designed for them (for example, drawing sales charts, organizational charts, or other geometric works).
Even if software like CorelDraw and Illustrator is complicated for you, you should at least learn to get started with more advanced software such as PowerPoint or Visio (this is not a professional method, but it often gets you started).
In short, you should be able to edit a photo at a fundamental level, and you should also be able to draw an organizational process or chart in any form with any tool you can.
4. Search| Professional Search on the Web and Social Networks
In different content writing jobs, a content producer is expected to quickly and accurately search content on the web and social networks and find the content they are looking for.
You need search skills to study and research, track competitors, and find people copying your content. The better you know about search, the more you can create content that is faster and easier to find.
5. Content Calendar| Ability to Set a Content Calendar
Setting up a content calendar does not mean having a spreadsheet and filling it in any way you want (this is useful, of course, but the benefits are minimal).
Content Calendar is a tool for organizing your work, tracking the effectiveness of previous activities, and scheduling reviews of the published content.
Professional use of the content calendar transforms the content production work for you from a set of activities to a project and improves the quality and quantity of your work.
6. SEO| Having Knowledge of Search Engine Optimization
The complex and challenging reality for a content creator is that content that search engines do not find is not much different from the content that has not been produced and is still in your brain.
Therefore, it is necessary to follow the principles of SEO in content production.
Further Reading: SEO Content Writing; 7 Skills to Help You Become an SEO Content Writer
SEO was an independent business a few years ago, and content creators were concerned with content production. But with the unprecedented rise of content production, which can be called a content shock, the story is different.
Content creators must follow the principles of SEO from the beginning, and after publishing the content, They must constantly take the time to optimize it. Otherwise, there is no guarantee that the content simply on the first page of Google today will have the same position next month.
A more straightforward form of SEO is SMO (Social Media Optimization.) Social networks do not have complex search algorithms and are based solely on the basics of search and relatively simple search engines.
Therefore, the principles and techniques of SMO and SEO are not very similar; But they both have the same concern: finding your content while searching.
If you want to choose an SEO agency for your business, read the article below.
Further Reading: Choose the Right SEO Agency; Important Questions You Should Ask an SEO Agency
The more you master these skills, the more successful you will be in getting content writing jobs. If you have any related questions about content writing jobs, please don’t hesitate to ask.
