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Writing Advice from Six Famous Horror Authors

October 26, 2018 by Katie Mitchell Leave a Comment

Halloween is just around the corner, and we’re celebrating by sharing writing advice from some of the spookiest authors of all time. So settle in, light a candle or two and listen to these haunting (and brilliant!) voices of the past and present.

1. Shirley Jackson

Shirley Jackson loved writing about the supernatural, and is perhaps best known for her novel, “The Haunting of Hill House,” which is often considered the best of ghost and haunted house stories.

In her essay, “How I Write,” Jackson highlights one of her favorite things about being a writer:

One of the nicest things about being a writer is that nothing ever gets wasted. It’s a little like the frugal housewife who carefully tucks away all the odds and ends of string beans and cold bacon and serves them up magnificently in a fancy casserole dish. A writer who is serious and economical can store away small fragments of ideas and events and conversations, and even facial expressions and mannerisms, and use them all someday.

Perhaps you keep a list of ideas in your files. Or maybe you make a habit of repurposing your content in ways that turn pieces of information into entire blog posts. This is what Jackson is talking about.

2. H.P. Lovecraft

H.P. Lovecraft wrote macabre and fantastic stories that appeared in magazines with names like “Weird Tales.” One thing that continues to be well-known from his writing is the human-octopus creature called Cthulhu.

In his guide, “Literary Composition,” Lovecraft demands something of true writers:

No aspiring author should content himself with a mere acquisition of technical rules. As Mrs. Renshaw remarked in the preceding article, ‘Impression should ever precede and be stronger than expression.’ All attempts at gaining literary polish must begin with judicious reading, and the learner must never cease to hold this phase uppermost. In many cases, the usage of good authors will be found a more effective guide than any amount of precept. A page of Addison or of Irving will teach more of style than a whole manual of rules, whilst a story of Poe’s will impress upon the mind a more vivid notion of powerful and correct description and narration than will ten dry chapters of a bulky text-book.

As any content-creator understands, simply knowing the rules of grammar, punctuation, layout, etc. will not make the content great. Writers must first and always read other writers and have a solid sense of what quality writing looks and sounds like.

3. Octavia Butler

Octavia Butler was not a horror writer in the strictest sense (she is better-known for science fiction), but her stories definitely have a way of making readers feel unsettled and disoriented. In “Kindred,” for example, a black woman from the 1970s unexpectedly and repeatedly gets pulled back in time to save the life her own slave-owning ancestor.

Butler had this to say about improving pieces in progress:

You don’t start out writing good stuff. You start out writing crap and thinking it’s good stuff, and then gradually you get better at it. That’s why I say one of the most valuable traits is persistence … A workshop is a way of renting an audience and making sure you’re communicating what you think you’re communicating. It’s so easy as a young writer to think you’re been very clear when in fact you haven’t.

In the content marketing space, the editing process functions as a workshop. The ideal is to establish a habit of pieces being edited, revised and edited again before getting sent to the client. Even a great first draft is likely missing things that will enhance clarification.

4. Stephen King

Stephen King is often called the “King of Horror.” His work has received numerous awards, and several of the stories were adapted into famous creepy movies, television series and comic books. The author’s name is practically synonymous with horror these days.

King is known not only as a great horror author, but as an expert writer who offers great advice to aspiring writers. In his memoir, “On Writing,” King said this about developing one’s own style:

You may find yourself adopting a style you find particularly exciting, and there’s nothing wrong with that … When I read James M. Cain, everything I wrote came out clipped and stripped and hard-boiled. When I read Lovecraft, my prose became luxurious and Byzantine. I write stories in my teenage years where all the styles merged, creating a kind of hilarious stew. This sort of stylistic blending is a necessary part of developing one’s own style, but it doesn’t occur in a vacuum. You have to read widely, constantly refining (and redefining) your own work as you do so.

While using another writer’s style is not necessarily akin to plagiarism, it can be stunting to your own development as a writer. It’s true that content creators must often strive to write in the style of their clients, but having one of your own is nice when you want to write your own brand’s blog post, for example.

5. Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe might be the most iconic of horror writers. He wrote terrifying stories and poems that explored the darkest regions of the human heart and mind. His own life was fraught with loss and depression, so it’s not surprising that he had a sense of what scared people in the 19th century.

In his essay, “The Philosophy of Composition,” Poe says this of the writing process:

Most writers—poets in especial—prefer having it understood that they compose by a species of fine frenzy—an ecstatic intuition—and would positively shudder at letting the public take a peep behind the scenes, at the elaborate and vacillating crudities of thought—at the true purposes seized only at the last moment—at the innumerable glimpses of idea that arrived not at the maturity of full view—at the fully-matured fancies discarded in despair as unmanageable—at the cautious selections and rejections—at the painful erasures and interpolations—in a word, at the wheels and pinions—the tackle for scene-shifting—the step-ladders, and demon-traps—the cock’s feathers, the red paint and the black patches, which, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, constitute the properties of the literary histrio.

That is to say, writing is not generally a straightforward process. Whether it’s an article, a white paper or a poem about a talking raven, a good piece of content rarely happens without some struggle and reworking.

6. Anne Rice

Anne Rice is arguably the greatest vampire fiction writer of our time. She’s the author of the renown “Vampire Chronicles,” and in some circles, her leading vampire, Lestat, has a following all his own.

On her website Rice offers the advice I saw from almost every other author on this list. In fact, it’s the advice I’ve heard most often from my professors, favorite novelists and writer friends. It thus seems appropriate to leave you with these words:

On writing, my advice is the same to all. If you want to be a writer, write. Write and write and write. If you stop, start again. Save everything that you write. If you feel blocked, write through it until you feel your creative juices flowing again. Write. Writing is what makes a writer. Nothing more and nothing less.

Happy Halloween, and happy writing!

Filed Under: Be Inspired

Why You Should Repurpose Content

August 16, 2018 by Katie Mitchell

If you read Carrie’s post about creating content faster and more effectively, you know that storing ideas for later is a great way to make crunch time less stressful.

But where do you get those ideas? One answer is from the content you’ve already created. I’m not talking about republishing the exact thing you did last month or even last year, but rather repurposing it into something fresh that gets attention and supports your brand. Let’s talk about how to do that.

Audit Your Existing Content

You create a lot of stellar content, but not everything in your files is worthy of another pass. Before you start repurposing content, examine what you already have to be sure you’re building on the best of it. Time for a content audit.

A content audit is more than a list of what you’ve created – it’s an analysis of the content on that list. The list is simply an inventory of your products and services. Just as a retailer might take inventory of what’s on the shelves and in the stock room, content creators can record work like blog articles, social media posts, white papers, web site pages, etc.

Once you have your organized list you can begin to audit the content. This will involve reading it, of course, but the final decisions about what you’ll repurpose must be about more than what you like and don’t like.

The Content Marketing Institute outlines five steps for auditing your content. Their steps are for content audits in general, so I’ve defined them for our specific intention of content repurposing:

  1. Know your main goal. In this case, the goal is finding content to repurpose, so keep an eye out for pieces that promote your overall messaging and contain opportunities for further research.
  2. Determine which content needs to be audited. Remember to look in all of your channels (website, brochures, social media, etc.). News items, reports on studies, seasonal pieces and other time-sensitive content probably won’t have much to offer, so you may choose to leave them out of the audit.
  3. Define the data types you need. What information do you need to determine if individual pieces are worth repurposing? The data could include a rating (based on a scale of how well it will work for repurposing) that you give the content.
  4. Inventory the content you’ve decided to audit. If the amount is small enough to inventory manually, a spreadsheet should work just fine. For large quantities of content, consider a web-scraping tool.
  5. Audit your content for repurposing opportunities. This could involve another spreadsheet, where you record individual repurposing opportunities within each piece of content. Repurposing opportunities might be a set of statistics, expandable e-book sections or social media posts that inspire blog posts.

We’d like to add a few tips of our own to that list:

  1. Audit by persona. What persona do you target that needs more information now?
  2. Audit by customer journey. Are there places in the customer journey that have holes in terms of the information needs of your persona?
  3. Audit by marketing goals. What key campaigns and marketing goals are you working on that could use some fresh content fast?

Finally, don’t forget that you can group multiple kinds of content together to create new content (a white paper with an infographic, for example, rather than simply looking at the standalone white paper for repurposing opportunities).

It might seem daunting to go through all these auditing steps and record so much information. However, once you develop a solid collection of repurposing opportunities you have a wealth of ideas for generating new content. That’s going to save lots of time in the long run.

More importantly, the careful review of your content will highlight the best aspects of your brand voice and give you a chance to reaffirm your core values and overall business goals.

How to Repurpose Content

Now that you have a good collection of content to repurpose, how do you actually enliven that old content to make it new?

I’m reminded of something I heard in one of my earliest college writing classes: The professor, in teaching the class to enhance creative pieces, used the phrase “Explode the moment” to help us get everything we could out of sentences, paragraphs and stories.

For example, consider this sentence:

As he walked his dog, Nate thought about what he’d make for dinner.

Much more could be said about everything happening here if we explode the moment:

Nate held the leash and trailed behind his trotting papillon. As she sniffed fire hydrants and trees, he debated with himself about dinner. Mac-n-cheese to keep the kids happy, or a nice curry that his wife would gush over?

Now, you’re probably looking for more than turning a sentence into a small paragraph, but you get the point. Basic pieces of information often have more to offer if we look a little deeper.

With marketing content, you have large assets that can be broken into smaller bits which can then be expanded to stand on their own. Better yet, each piece can be repurposed more than one way to spread the messaging across channels.

For example:

  • Take the chapters or sections of an e-book, and turn each into a blog post.
  • Go through one of your long-form blogs and pull out quotes, statistics and blurbs to make 10 social media posts.
  • New blog posts and social media updates can in turn be fodder for email marketing campaigns.

When you figure out how to repurpose blog content for social media or develop a new blog series from last year’s e-book, you position yourself as an authority on the topics covered. You also maintain consistency in your messaging and voice.

For more on how to make the most of your old and new content, sign up for our mailing list and get instant access to your content strategy blueprint.

Have you figured out a brilliant way to repurpose and freshen old content? Tell me about it in the comments below!

Filed Under: Be Inspired

3 Ways to Create Sparkling Seasonal Social Media Content

July 3, 2018 by Carrie Powers Leave a Comment

It’s almost the Fourth of July, and I know I’m not alone in my excitement. There’s nothing that defines summer in America quite like a good Fourth of July celebration.

Since many Americans feel the same way, Independence Day—and other holidays and seasons—are a perfect opportunity to catch readers’ attention with some well-executed content.

As we head into the holiday, here are five examples of brands doing seasonal content right, as well as three tips you can use for your seasonal posts year-round on Twitter and Instagram.

1. Pottery Barn

The 4th of July is one week away, what are your plans to celebrate? We love @onestylishparty’s Americana inspired BBQ! 🌹🇺🇸 Share your style stories and tag us in the captions of your photos to be featured! . . . . #mypotterybarn #potterybarn #interiordesign #homedecor #fourthofjuly

A post shared by Pottery Barn (@potterybarn) on Jun 28, 2018 at 2:34pm PDT

This photo from Pottery Barn isn’t overly salesy—in fact, without looking at the caption, you’d never know who posted it. This is part of what makes it so appealing: The picture seems to embody Pottery Barn’s elevated country style in a festive and colorful way without using any branding whatsoever.

Further, they go out of their way to call out the person who took the photo, which has the dual purpose of making their brand look good and appealing to fans of the photographer’s account.

The call to action doesn’t hurt, either: Notice how the brand asks readers a question, credits the owner of the photo and then tells readers how their photos can be featured, too. It invites engagement (a key factor for getting exposure on Instagram) without seeming heavy-handed or desperate.

2. Halo Top

It was ice cream, in the kitchen, with a spoon. pic.twitter.com/C22QwF5s2L

— Halo Top (@HaloTopCreamery) June 25, 2018

Everyone’s favorite low-calorie ice cream brand has some of the most charming social media content around. This post is no exception: While it may not explicitly mention the Fourth (or any holiday), those red and white stripes just scream Americana (and summer in general).

Unlike Pottery Barn’s post, this one does feature a photo of the brand’s offerings, but the caption doesn’t even have so much as a hashtag. This makes the post feel exceptionally relaxed and unaggressive. However, keep in mind that tweets with hashtags get double the engagement of those without, according to research from Buddy Media.

So, you probably shouldn’t stop using them entirely — instead, limit yourself to one or two Twitter hashtags, since tweets with more than two hashtags show a drop in engagement.

3. Casper

This #CasperFloatie could be yours for the price of a Casper mattress. No, really. We're having a promotion.

A post shared by Casper (@casper) on Jul 31, 2018 at 10:46am PDT


With a colorful photo, a laid-back caption and a quick tidbit of info about a new product, this post from Casper nails the casual vibe of summer, and probably piqued interest for those mattress-shaped pool floaties, too.

Take note of the caption’s sparse use of hashtags, as well: This creates a much cleaner look than dumping 30 different tags into a caption that’s 10 words long. Next time you’re posting an Instagram photo, clean it up by putting the hashtags in the comments, or just using one or two key hashtags in the caption relevant to your brand or topic.

Whether you choose to put your hashtags in the caption or comments depends on what type of engagement you’re after — a small study from Agorapulse found that posts with hashtags in the caption get more reach.

On the other hand, posts with hashtags in the comments section get more comments.

4. Blue Apron

We’re nominating tzatziki for sauce of the summer! https://t.co/GQWRtv1enw

— Blue Apron (@blueapron) June 23, 2018

I’m sure that sometime, say, 100 years ago, someone speculated that people in the future wouldn’t even have to go shopping for food—it would just be delivered to their door in temperature-controlled boxes. And look where we are now.

Blue Apron keeps it nice and concise in this summer-y post with a beautiful, well-lit photo of some fresh food, a cheerful caption and a link to the recipe on their site. I’d like to focus on this post’s photo: Every detail pops out, the colors are vibrant and the background looks homey rather than staged. Plus, who doesn’t like the sound of tzatziki in the summer?

5. Wayfair

How are you celebrating the 4th? We're hosting a patriotic party, and the best part is that we can keep this décor up until the end of summer. Don't forget a grand ol' dessert! #Wayfair

A post shared by Wayfair (@wayfair) on Jul 1, 2018 at 7:03am PDT

Yet another example of subtle branding: In this post from Wayfair, the caption doesn’t encourage readers to buy, buy and buy some more, but the video lets readers know they can expect to find some great Fourth of July-themed products at Wayfair.

Plus, the caption is conversational and engaging, which never hurts. They simply ask a question and give a quick decorating tip. Short and sweet.

How to Create Seasonal Content of Your Own

Learning from the examples above, here are some tips you can use to post compelling seasonal or holiday-themed content:

1. Don’t Be Aggressive

Most holidays are time for relaxation and quality time with family, so you don’t want to sound like you view your company as being more important than those things. That’s why so many of the above examples don’t read like a mattress store blowout—instead, they read like casual, upbeat posts that let the photos and videos do the talking. The brand becomes part of the things its audience loves.

To accomplish this, use hashtags strategically, not haphazardly.

On Twitter, this means choosing your hashtags carefully: As I mentioned earlier, tweets with one or two hashtags receive the highest levels of engagement, which is backed up by data from TrackMaven.

On Instagram, this means using nine hashtags, and no more than a dozen.

2. Rely On Visuals

Since many holidays are about visual excitement, you don’t have to do a whole lot of writing to celebrate it with your readers. For Fourth of July, for example, take a video of a local fireworks display, snap a photo of some red, white and blue food or insert your product into a summery scene, like a pool or picnic. Don’t forget to edit your photo so it appears bright, light and breezy, and check out my previous post to find out how to create awesome Instagram posts.

Just remember to keep the aesthetic consistent with the rest of your feed as well as your brand’s overall look (check out my previous post to find out how to create awesome Instagram posts).

3. Share Holiday Plans

Almost everyone has some sort of plan for what they’re going to do on big holidays, so why not get them engaged by asking them to share it? After all, Instagram’s algorithm heavily rewards engagement, so engaging users is one of the best ways to boost your brand’s visibility. Bonus points if you share your own plans or reference a local event. For example, you could ask who’s planning to attend a local barbeque or fireworks display for Fourth of July.

Incorporate these tips into your seasonal social media posts and you’re sure to nab the attention of some revelers. For more social media advice, take a look at my post on how to upgrade your social media posts.

What are your plans for the Fourth of July? Comment down below!

Filed Under: Be Inspired

Content vs. Journalism: The Differences and Opportunities

May 31, 2018 by Katie Mitchell Leave a Comment

It seems like we hear the word “content” all the time—more so in the past five years or so. Perhaps this is because, with the rise of the internet and devices, anyone can create content and share it. And a lot of people do.

The result is that a lot more content exists. Further, since we all have computers in our pockets, we consume that content at an astounding rate. We spend hours of every day absorbing what others share online.

While we might first think of content as text, the definition is actually much broader than that. Content is basically any substantial material on a website, such as text, images, music or video. Many sites produce all of these media types, and so need a crew of content creators and managers to ensure quality presentation.

The thing is, some people take issue with the way we use the word “content,” and how its connotations impact traditional journalism.

Does “Content” Degrade Journalism?

People are talking about a problem that the proliferation of content creates in the realm of journalism. Jon Christian of Slate bemoans the demand for “content” from publications such as Politico and Fortune, both of which mentioned the word in job postings for reporters and editors.

The problem seems not so much about the existence or definition of content—indeed, journalism is a type of content—but the lumping in of journalism with its numerous other categories.

Christian discusses the content spectrum, which ranges from hard journalism and quality satire all the way down to ridiculous quizzes about which cartoon character one identifies with. His opinion is that referring to journalism as content waters it down, and reduces it from an entity of sources and facts to one of interchangeable units and page views.

He goes on to suggest that the journalism-as-content approach leads to sloppy research, and thinly sourced pieces that lack context and originality. Pressured by management, journalists scramble to cover the trending stories, thinking about traffic more than serious investigation.

Ultimately, Christian says, established journalism is taking the hit, with veterans being laid off at rapid rates and coverage scaling back as a result.

Not only is the idea of journalism changing while we see a rise in mid- to low-quality content—many pillars of true journalism are forced to play along, and pander to the masses of listicle clickers and meme sharers.

A Darker Side of True Journalism

There’s more to the difference than quality, however.

Back in 2014, Danny Crichton of TechCrunch reminded us of a significant distinction between journalism and other content:

This distinction between content and journalism matters, because journalism often comes with serious side effects. Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras, the reporters at the heart of the Snowden leaks, have faced one confrontation after another in transiting across borders from their work. Such treatment doesn’t exist for Hollywood movie producers, BuzzFeed cat picture caption writers, or bloggers writing about how journalism is not content production. We shouldn’t necessarily consider journalism a more honorable profession given this fierce opposition, but neither should we equate it with simply placing words or pictures online.

Sobering, especially when we remember that more than 100 journalists were killed around the world in 2015.

While most content creators can sit safely at desks, and approach their work from a marketing standpoint more than an investigative one, true journalists aren’t afraid to spark controversy. Crichton talks about how journalists need the freedom to investigate and get to the truth of matters, even if that means taking a hard look at a news organization’s own advertisers or sponsors.

Unfortunately, the influence of corporations on the news media makes it harder and harder for journalists to maintain that freedom. But that’s a story for another day.

Google Favors Quality and Relevance

If Google has anything to say about it (and it does, of course), quality content and serious journalism are probably going to win out in the end anyway. The Google Algorithms get frequent updates, including some aimed at surfacing the highest quality and most relevant content in the search results.

Google also maintains something called the “Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines.” We emphasized the relevance of this internal Google documentation back in 2014, and the company has since updated the manual.

An item of note in the newest version of the quality rater manual is the Overall Page Quality Rating Scale. This is a five-point scale for overall page quality including lowest, low, medium, high and highest.

Here’s a breakdown of what it takes to get top ratings, mid-level ratings and low ratings:

  • Highest Quality Pages: the highest level of expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness (E-A-T) in the main content and the publishers/individual authors behind them, as well as a very high customer service reputation.
  • High Quality Pages: a high level of E-A-T in the main content, as well as satisfying information on the website, who’s behind it and how it serves customers.
  • Medium Quality Pages: achieve their purpose with a relatively neutral level of E-A-T, often exhibiting both high and low quality characteristics.
  • Low Quality Pages: unsatisfying and do not achieve their purpose, and show no true level of E-A-T in the main content.
  • Lowest Quality Pages: created to harm, mislead or misinform users or make money without meaning to be of any service, as well as pages that promote hate or violence toward certain groups of people.

Promoting quality and relevance is also supported by things like the Panda algorithm, which was a change to Google’s search results ranking algorithm that was implemented in 2011. The point of Panda is to lower the ranking of low-quality sites, returning solid news other content to the top spots.

Today, Panda is part of Google’s core ranking signals, and continues to promote quality search results.

Create Better Content, Support Serious Journalism

Serious content writers appreciate quality, not to mention the blood, sweat and tears that go into creating it.

One of the best ways to support excellent content across the board is to make it better yourself. If you have the opportunity to share something on the internet, take the time to make it worth the time of those consuming it.

The Content Marketing Institute has a few tips on how to do that, and they come from—you guessed it—traditional journalism.

Included are:

  • Write attention-grabbing, informative, genuine headlines.
  • Know your audience and what they’re looking for.
  • Check your facts and go directly to original sources when possible.
  • Avoid distractions, such as flashy ads, poorly placed forms and too many images or links.
  • Be honest and transparent about potential bias.
  • Look for the bigger picture about industries and issues.

Our content creators at bizbuzzcontent Inc. take certain, specific steps to ensure the quality of the pieces we write:

  • We work with a lot of reports, and while plenty of sites refer to them in reliable ways, we always try to find the original report itself to verify data during our research.
  • We avoid filler words like “that” and excessive passive voice. Ultimately, these fillers counter concise writing.
  • We don’t simply rephrase other writers’ words (to avoid plagiarism), but pull out the details we need and cite the source. Creating a truly fresh article requires using multiple sources to support an original idea.
  • In general, we strive to answer the “5Ws” and the “H” (who, what, why, when, where and how) to cover all the details and questions readers might have.
  • When we encounter buzzwords or jargon, we explain them to keep the writing basic and accessible to all readers.
  • We implement multiple levels of editing, where multiple people read a piece of content (sometimes multiple times!) before it goes to the client.

As content creators, we have an opportunity to take responsibility for web content for the businesses and brands we write for. Unlike journalism, online content has no real guidelines or “policing” (except from Google, of course).

Content creators can be part of the white noise, or we can create something that deserves to be singled out. Whether you’re making videos about cute kittens or writing about conflicts in the Middle East, you have the chance to vote for quality.

Filed Under: Be Inspired

The Top 5 Free Content Creation Tools

May 29, 2018 by Carrie Powers Leave a Comment

Let me ask you a quick question: How should you go about creating a video to post on social media? If your answer is something along the lines of “upload a clip straight from my phone,” then it may be time for you to explore some of the many content creation tools available.

In this post, I’ll go over the top five content creation tools (they’re all free!) and explain how you can use each one.

1. Headline Analyzer

The Headline Analyzer from CoSchedule couldn’t be easier to use: Simply plug in the headline you plan to use, enter some basic information (email address, company name and the like) and be presented with several handy charts that analyze just how effectively your headline will generate engagement.

From word balance and length to keywords and sentiment, this tool provides you with everything you need to know in order to attract readers.

Check out my blog post on creating clickable titles to learn more about what makes a title great.

2. Infogram

Aesthetically pleasing graphs, infographics and charts can be extremely appealing to a broad range of readers. Why? Because visual information is easy to understand and communicates important points quickly and compellingly.

If you don’t have an in-house graphic design team to create your visuals for you, you’ll probably want to check out Infogram, a free tool for creating infographics, charts, maps, reports and more.

Although there are paid versions, the free version of Infogram includes more than 37 types of interactive charts, 13 types of maps, online publishing capability, the ability to import data and maximum capacity of 10 three-page projects.

Since we’re big fans of Canva for blog cover photos at bizbuzz, I’ll also mention Canva’s free graphic templates. This tool lets you quickly create personalized infographics for blogs, websites, reports and more.

3. Lumen5

The next time you’re looking for an intriguing visual element to add to your article or blog post, you might want to consider using a video instead of an image. Don’t worry, it’s not nearly as intimidating as it sounds.

With Lumen5, an A.I. powered video creation tool, you can simply enter the text of your content and watch it come to life. After Lumen5 generates a video, you can choose your favorite stock images to include, add branding elements and select appropriate music.

The free version of Lumen5 allows you to create unlimited videos in 480p, utilize text-to-video technology and intelligent media matching, access more than 10 million free media files and upload your own logos, photos and videos.

4. Hemingway App

Long before minimalism became trendy amongst the Instagram crowd, Ernest Hemingway was a strong proponent of the “less is more” mentality. That’s the idea behind the Hemingway App, which uses user-friendly color coding to show you how your content can be made more simple and easy to read.

With the help of this app, you’ll be able to quickly see areas of your content where you’ve used too many adverbs, overly-lengthy words, complicated sentences and a passive voice.

For more on this subject, take a look at my post on how to write clear and organized content.

5. Google Docs Explore

If you’ve ever found yourself overwhelmed by a ridiculous amount of tabs whilst trying to research for an article, you should give the Google Docs Explore tool a try.

Handily located in and integrated with Google Docs, the Explore tool lets you conduct a web search for any topic without ever opening another tab. Plus, it automatically suggests related images you might want to add to your content (just be sure they’re properly licensed before publishing).

With these tools at your disposal, you’ll soon be able to create better, more engaging content. If you’d like additional help creating top-of-the-line content, check out bizbuzzcontent’s content creation services.

Do you use any of these tools? Are there any tools you love that weren’t included in this list? Let’s talk about it in the comments!

Filed Under: Be Inspired

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Testimonials

Professional content agency

Jessica leads one of the most professional content agencies I’ve ever worked with. We target a very niche industry, and Jessica and her team were very thoughtful in their approach. From planning thoughtful pieces, to researching and interviewing SMEs, to brainstorming promotion strategies, Jessica and her team maintain a high degree of professionalism and efficiency.

Steven S., Senior Manager, Demand Generation, Rentlytics

bizbuzzcontent
2018-07-31T17:22:53-04:00

Steven S., Senior Manager, Demand Generation, Rentlytics

Jessica leads one of the most professional content agencies I’ve ever worked with. We target a very niche industry, and Jessica and her team were very thoughtful in their approach. From planning thoughtful pieces, to researching and interviewing SMEs, to brainstorming promotion strategies, Jessica and her team maintain a high degree of professionalism and efficiency.
https://www.bizbuzzcontent.com/blog/testimonials/professional-content-agency/

Tailor-made content strategies

Jessica dedicated her time as a pro-bono volunteer with VolunteerMatch to help us with some key content marketing needs. What impressed me most about working with Jessica was the way she tailored her approach to accommodate the needs of our nonprofit with the resource constraints of our team. Jessica developed personas, one-pagers, case studies and website content that has resulted in an increase in traffic to our site and improved our ability to communicate to our key audiences.

Bree v.F., Director of Marketing and Engagement, VolunteerMatch

bizbuzzcontent
2018-07-31T17:22:20-04:00

Bree v.F., Director of Marketing and Engagement, VolunteerMatch

Jessica dedicated her time as a pro-bono volunteer with VolunteerMatch to help us with some key content marketing needs. What impressed me most about working with Jessica was the way she tailored her approach to accommodate the needs of our nonprofit with the resource constraints of our team. Jessica developed personas, one-pagers, case studies and website content that has resulted in an increase in traffic to our site and improved our ability to communicate to our key audiences.
https://www.bizbuzzcontent.com/blog/testimonials/tailor-made-content-strategies/

Highly targeted and relevant content

I've worked with Jessica at her company bizbuzzcontent for years. It's my go-to provider whenever my team is looking for high-quality content. What differentiates bizbuzzcontent is that they not only have superior writing skills but a rare ability to completely understand our industry, our company positioning, brand voice and tone, and customers. This just makes the content highly targeted and relevant, and goes a long way in achieving our marketing goals.

Nag P., Sr. Manager, Product Marketing, Salesforce

bizbuzzcontent
2018-07-31T17:22:31-04:00

Nag P., Sr. Manager, Product Marketing, Salesforce

I've worked with Jessica at her company bizbuzzcontent for years. It's my go-to provider whenever my team is looking for high-quality content. What differentiates bizbuzzcontent is that they not only have superior writing skills but a rare ability to completely understand our industry, our company positioning, brand voice and tone, and customers. This just makes the content highly targeted and relevant, and goes a long way in achieving our marketing goals.
https://www.bizbuzzcontent.com/blog/testimonials/highly-targeted-and-relevant-content/

Compelling content that drives results

I love Jessica and the team over at bizbuzzcontent. Within just a matter of a few interactions, she was able to understand, in depth, our complex solution and business model. Since then, she's been critical to us in driving compelling, engaging content via our blogs and white papers. She's a wonderful, thoughtful person to work with, and the work she's done has been a key factor in increasing our conversion rates.

Collin S., Angel Investor and Technology Executive

bizbuzzcontent
2018-07-31T17:22:41-04:00

Collin S., Angel Investor and Technology Executive

I love Jessica and the team over at bizbuzzcontent. Within just a matter of a few interactions, she was able to understand, in depth, our complex solution and business model. Since then, she's been critical to us in driving compelling, engaging content via our blogs and white papers. She's a wonderful, thoughtful person to work with, and the work she's done has been a key factor in increasing our conversion rates.
https://www.bizbuzzcontent.com/blog/testimonials/compelling-content-that-drives-results/

Outstanding process

bizbuzzcontent helps me efficiently leverage my own subject-matter expertise to create original content on timely topics. Together, we are able to distill complex topics into client-friendly articles that I can use across multiple platforms. I especially appreciate bizzbuzz’s super-efficient process because it keeps me on track for timely production of new content. Jessica Lee is a pleasure to work with, and I rely on her to bring a strategic eye to my publication efforts.

Priya H., Partner, Woodruff-Sawyer & Co.

bizbuzzcontent
2018-07-31T17:23:04-04:00

Priya H., Partner, Woodruff-Sawyer & Co.

bizbuzzcontent helps me efficiently leverage my own subject-matter expertise to create original content on timely topics. Together, we are able to distill complex topics into client-friendly articles that I can use across multiple platforms. I especially appreciate bizzbuzz’s super-efficient process because it keeps me on track for timely production of new content. Jessica Lee is a pleasure to work with, and I rely on her to bring a strategic eye to my publication efforts.
https://www.bizbuzzcontent.com/blog/testimonials/outstanding-process/

Strong content values

Jessica is a great content creator, writer, reporter and partner to work with. Highly articulate with strong content values and work ethos, Jessica adds great value to all projects she works on. I would happily recommend Jessica to people who wish to scale their content marketing efforts.

Andy B., C-Level Marketing and Strategy Consultant

bizbuzzcontent
2018-07-31T17:23:14-04:00

Andy B., C-Level Marketing and Strategy Consultant

Jessica is a great content creator, writer, reporter and partner to work with. Highly articulate with strong content values and work ethos, Jessica adds great value to all projects she works on. I would happily recommend Jessica to people who wish to scale their content marketing efforts.
https://www.bizbuzzcontent.com/blog/testimonials/strong-content-values-highly-recommended/

Added value

Jessica is a guest speaker of Microsoft internal training program. She made an awesome presentation of how to create marketable web ages to Microsoft Bing Ads product team and services team. Attendees found Jessica very engaging during the presentation. Microsoft Bing Ads is eager to apply the learning in our daily works, and look forward to partnering with Jessica to bring more value to digital advertising community.

Ping J., Product Manager, Microsoft Bing Ads

bizbuzzcontent
2018-07-31T17:21:44-04:00

Ping J., Product Manager, Microsoft Bing Ads

Jessica is a guest speaker of Microsoft internal training program. She made an awesome presentation of how to create marketable web ages to Microsoft Bing Ads product team and services team. Attendees found Jessica very engaging during the presentation. Microsoft Bing Ads is eager to apply the learning in our daily works, and look forward to partnering with Jessica to bring more value to digital advertising community.
https://www.bizbuzzcontent.com/blog/testimonials/added-value/

Critical extension of the marketing team

Jessica has been instrumental in building our content strategy from ground up, educating our stakeholders and increasing our exposure across all lines of insurance. I can say with confidence that she has been a critical extension of the marketing team, always producing timely deliverable. She has always been enthusiastic about creating new formats for us and new vehicles of information to help the marketing team raise awareness and drive internal adoption. Her most impressive feat from my perspective is how quickly and seamlessly she dived into our 12 lines of insurance. The dexterity and the level of expertise she demonstrated although she had never worked with insurance B2B client was absolutely incredible.

Stephanie M., VP Marketing Communications, Woodruff-Sawyer & Co.

bizbuzzcontent
2018-07-31T17:21:33-04:00

Stephanie M., VP Marketing Communications, Woodruff-Sawyer & Co.

Jessica has been instrumental in building our content strategy from ground up, educating our stakeholders and increasing our exposure across all lines of insurance. I can say with confidence that she has been a critical extension of the marketing team, always producing timely deliverable. She has always been enthusiastic about creating new formats for us and new vehicles of information to help the marketing team raise awareness and drive internal adoption. Her most impressive feat from my perspective is how quickly and seamlessly she dived into our 12 lines of insurance. The dexterity and the level of expertise she demonstrated although she had never worked with insurance B2B client was absolutely incredible.
https://www.bizbuzzcontent.com/blog/testimonials/critical-extension-of-the-marketing-team/

Excellent content program

We can't imagine how we managed without bizbuzzcontent before! Working with Jessica Lee is a dream. She is very creative and understands new concepts quickly. The content creation process at bizbuzzcontent is the most efficient we have come across in our many years of working with other writers and agencies. If you want an excellent content program and a company that goes above and beyond, hire bizbuzzcontent today!

Pauline J., CEO, Group Twenty Seven

bizbuzzcontent
2018-07-31T17:21:10-04:00

Pauline J., CEO, Group Twenty Seven

We can't imagine how we managed without bizbuzzcontent before! Working with Jessica Lee is a dream. She is very creative and understands new concepts quickly. The content creation process at bizbuzzcontent is the most efficient we have come across in our many years of working with other writers and agencies. If you want an excellent content program and a company that goes above and beyond, hire bizbuzzcontent today!
https://www.bizbuzzcontent.com/blog/testimonials/excellent-content-program/

Trusted partner for years

Jessica and her team at bizbuzzcontent have been a trusted partner for years, and have helped us with our blog, web copy and email marketing, in addition to providing lots of guidance on other content projects. The team is able to quickly get up to speed on any content project's requirements and create quality content that's on target. Over the years, they've helped us educate, drive brand awareness and website traffic. I would definitely recommend bizbuzzcontent for content services.

Ashley G., Digital Ad Management, SearchForce

bizbuzzcontent
2018-07-31T17:18:31-04:00

Ashley G., Digital Ad Management, SearchForce

Jessica and her team at bizbuzzcontent have been a trusted partner for years, and have helped us with our blog, web copy and email marketing, in addition to providing lots of guidance on other content projects. The team is able to quickly get up to speed on any content project's requirements and create quality content that's on target. Over the years, they've helped us educate, drive brand awareness and website traffic. I would definitely recommend bizbuzzcontent for content services.
https://www.bizbuzzcontent.com/blog/testimonials/trusted-partner-for-years/
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