Are you building your house on a pile of sand?
November 28, 2007
There’s something to be said for offline writing. It’s generally more coherent, more engaging and better researched. I contend that this has less to do with the online medium, and more to do with the propensity for quick, sloppy content creation online.
It all started with back links. Your page shows up higher in the search engine results for certain terms when there are links out there in the Web ether back to your site. After link exchanges and other first generation back link techniques faded away, article marketing came to the forefront. Articles (well written articles, mind you) are great ways to build traffic. But it takes a lot of articles to create a big influx of traffic. So it takes lots of content to build up a large volume of traffic back to a site. Unfortunately, some people have taken this to mean that they need to write all of this content in a few days.
Whenever I start a project, I check out what others have done at Ezine Articles. I’m often shocked by the poor quality of the content. Many articles have run on sentences, bad grammar and pointless paragraphs. I imagine these are the type of articles people pay $1 for or write in a hurry. Don’t get me wrong, if the topic is right and I’ve had my caffeine I can whip up 400 words in 15 minutes. But that’s a first draft. I edit, perfect and then submit.
Writing bad articles because you need lots of back links is like building your foundation on a pile of sand. Over time, you’ll just have to produce higher volumes of bad content, because your first batches of bad content will fall in the search engine rankings. Worse yet, people won’t respect you if you represent yourself that way online. If you didn’t spend the time to proofread your work, why should I listen to what you have to say?
If you’re on the marketing side of the fence, purchasing poorly written content and using it in your marketing is doing your business more harm than good. Take the time to learn to write a good article, or pay for quality writing. I know it’s hard to swallow .04 a word, especially when there’s a $1 an article writer right around the corner, but isn’t your business worth spending the money on being represented professionally? Well written content isn’t going to take the rankings nose dive that bad content will. You won’t have to reinvent the wheel each and every month.
Well written content works for you. It informs your visitors, inspires them to take action and persuades them to purchase from you. It speaks for you when you’re not there.
I see a lot of frustrated marketers who throw in the towel because their once vibrant affiliate business is crashing to the ground. I often wonder what their content looked like and if that was a factor in the decline of their business.
It looks like great minds think alike! Hope Wilbanks started a three part series on quality content writing. Make sure to stop by her terrific blog and take a look.
Posted in Making Money, Web Writing Basics
content rss
November 28th, 2007 at 6:52 pm
Ooooh! Great minds DO think alike!
As you already know, I couldn’t agree with you more. 
November 28th, 2007 at 9:27 pm
Huzzah! Courtney. I couldn’t agree more (does that mean I have a great mind too?)
I think part of the driving force behind these crappy articles is a hit-and-run mentality that is being propagated in the IM community. Eveeryone wants to build multiple streams of income in multiple niches. Result — At best, a surface skim. At worst, pure crap.
If one is truly committed to having more than just an opportunistic business, one has to play in a single niche at a time and build credibility.
$1 articles won’t get you that.
November 29th, 2007 at 3:34 am
I couldn’t agree more, Courtney! I’ve never understood how anyone can think a sloppily-written piece of writing could possibly represent them well anywhere. It astounds me that people who would take time with their offline brochures and sales letters would just throw trash articles at the search engines. If anything, more people will see those online articles.
November 29th, 2007 at 4:49 am
I just wanted to say that I really like this blue/grey color scheme. The other was nice, but the bright colors kept drawing my eyes away from the content.
November 29th, 2007 at 5:05 am
I agree…these colors and overall look are much easier on the eyes.
November 29th, 2007 at 5:07 am
Thanks! I’m trying to play around with it….since I’m getting all this new traffic I figured I needed to dress the place up a bit!
I still have to tweak this one a bit, but it’s a good start.
November 29th, 2007 at 7:46 pm
Whoops! I tagged you for the same challenge.
December 8th, 2007 at 2:30 pm
[…] Courtney at Web Writing Info wants to know if you’re building your house on a pile of sand. […]
December 8th, 2007 at 4:01 pm
For the past year and a half, I have been wondering if these newbies on the scene would realize they were getting what they paid for–if they could tell. You make me think…maybe they will. Let me tell a story. My sister started getting Texas Monthly in the mail for some reason. We don’t live in Texas or know the personalities there. But the writing is so excellent, I read it cover to cover! Writing does matter. Come visit our new website, Writer’s Catablog. We are trying to combine humor and wisdom to bring back some respect to the profession.
December 9th, 2007 at 3:09 am
Excellent points Courtney. With mass publishing options available online, many businesses fall into the trap of ‘bulk buying’ poor quality content, losing out on the chance to provide customers and readers with solid information. No matter what type of website you have, quality content is critical–and it helps with the search engines!
December 12th, 2007 at 4:47 pm
[…] Are you building your house on a pile of sand? […]
December 13th, 2007 at 7:07 am
Thanks for this blog Courtney. I work hard to write well and get very frustrated when I see poor work rewarded, or underminingthe writing industry.
December 21st, 2007 at 1:59 am
[…] Courtney’s Post […]
December 23rd, 2007 at 7:11 am
[…] product you’ve written or a physical product you’re selling, you need quality content. See this post for more on how quality content […]
January 3rd, 2008 at 3:24 pm
[…] example, WebWritingInfo.com has an article called: Are you building your house on a pile of sand?. It does a good job of pointing out why good writing is a better marketing tool over time than […]
January 15th, 2008 at 10:06 pm
You write: “…I’m often shocked by the poor quality of the content. Many articles have run on sentences, bad grammar and pointless paragraphs. I imagine these are the type of articles people pay $1 for or write in a hurry…”
Question: Is “bad grammar” or “poor grammar” correct?