Why Understanding Your Audience is Fundamental

Any writer knows that writing to your audience is important, but knowing and doing are not always one and the same. Crafting content that gives your audience what they truly desire in the right way can be challenging, especially if you’re writing for multiple clients with little, to nothing in common.

Whether you like it or not, that’s a challenge you’ll have to meet if you want your audience to respond and make your clients happy. Here are a few things to keep in mind that will help you better connect with each of your audiences, regardless the differences among their respective brands, or industries.

Research, Research, Research

Going in cold, it’s very unlikely that you will be an expert in the services all of your clients offer, but an expert is what you’ll need to become. As your client’s representative, the content you create for them needs to be confident and informed.

About a third of the time you plan to spend creating content should be dedicated to research. Find out all that you can about your client and the services they provide, along with competing companies in their field.

• Search using appropriate keywords and phrases to get an idea of what people are searching for in regard to what your client offers. Are they looking for technical information, advice, reviews or tutorials? Once you know that, you’ll know what types of content to create.
• Take your research a step further and dive into social media. Find out what people are saying about your client and the services they offer, and if possible, get interactive and simply ask friends or followers what they want.

Use the Right Voice

Using the right voice is like dressing appropriately for an event. Just like you don’t want to be the only one wearing a tux at a barbecue, you are going to want your voice to be appropriate to the niche your client occupies.

Content for a medical association or educational institution will need to be formal enough to convey authority, but clear enough to hold the attention of a broad range of readers. Content for an entertainment company or landscaping service should be more conversational in tone.

Make Images and Headers Work for You

• Many readers skim content for images and headers before deciding to read more. Images and headers should give the reader a clear idea of what the content will provide without requiring further explanation.
• Much like voice, images should be appropriate to your client’s niche. Bright and playful images would likely be out of place in a blog post for a medical office and overly technical or mundane images would be off-putting on a party planner’s website.

Simple, but Vital

This may all seem like extremely basic advice, but a surprising number of content creators don’t follow it. Whether you’re new to creating content or you just need a refresher, keep these things in mind and all of your content will be quality content.