You’re a businessperson. You may not think of yourself as a writer, but you know that writing well can boost your results and your career. Naturally, you want to do better. Every week I point you to one or two pieces that I think will teach you something or spark an idea or two. This week I’m pointing you to pieces on paying attention to content and writing advice from famous writers.
From Claire Cain Miller: Why BuzzFeed Is Trying to Shift Its Strategy
“Can a company known for content that is more clickable than memorable survive when people inevitably change the way they read online?”
Wally’s Comment: The true core of this article is documentation of a switch from search to social as a driver of activity. For BuzzFeed that means ad dollars. For you it means that blog traffic will increasingly come from social referrals, not search.
From Adrienne Crezo: The Rules of Writing According to 20 Famous Writers
“Being that writing is such a strange job, if there are rules, they should come from those who do the job, too. Here, 20 bestselling classic and contemporary storytellers share their rules for writers. To kick things off, let’s use this shiny gem of good advice from Bad Feminist author Roxane Gay: ‘Ignore all of this as you see fit.'”
Wally’s Comment: I find that tips from writers are often useless, but every now and then I’ll read one that makes me slap my forehead and think, “Wow!” and change the way I work to test the idea. If you enjoy this post, check out Advice from the Masters on this site.
Sources I Check Regularly
I find the posts and articles that I share with you on The Writer’s Edge in many places. But there are a few that provide insightful pieces again and again. Here they are.