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Pre-Production

Pre-Production is where we do our brainstorming and prewriting, or thinking of your topic.  Sometimes you’ll be writing on assignment, from a content calendar, or as a reaction to current events.  All of those things are solid ways to write.

1. Pick Topic/ Audience: What are you going to write about?
2. Write Outcome Desired: What do you want them to know, do or feel as a result of this work?
3. Make an Outline:  What are the main points that you mean to make because of this work?
4. See how long the post will be and set a limit.
5. Prioritize the most important point/points.

When we think in terms of outcomes we could be writing:

• To clarify our own thinking.
• To fulfill a promise we made to someone.
• To sell a product
• To build an audience.

Whatever we do we want to have one thing in mind when we do it.

An outline usually has 2-4 main points.

Production

1. Write up the main points:  I start in the middle because the intros take care of themselves, and starting in the middle takes the pressure off.
2. Write conclusion
3. See if there are opportunities for images and other media.
4. Will there be a content upgrade?
5. Write 3-5 headlines.

Packaging

We want to package our work so that it’s appealing to people.  Our standard is as follows:

1. Select and Perfect a VERY compelling Headline.  The better the headline, the better the post.  Spend time thinking this through.
2. Have one image for every ~350 words.
3. Create a featured image that is compelling (Viral Content Templates)
   1. Create same for Instagram.
   2. Create same for Medium, FB & Twitter.
4. Visualize all data.  If you have a claim of 67%, show us the pie chart.
5. Build a header image & adapt for all social media posts.

Perfecting the Post (aka editing)

1. Make sure the post serves the intended goal.
2. Use a basic Grammarly or equivalent edit.
3. Take the result through Hemmingway; disregard useless suggestions.
4. Read the post aloud.  Make sentences sing and dance.
5. Repeat #1 and take suggestions.
6. Create content upgrade if any.

Publishing

1. Publish full posts & images on blog.
2. Post them to your social feeds.

Promoting

1. Write Medium Post
2. Spend $20-30 on FB to promote post when appropriate.
3. Email 6-8 people.
4. Put in Buffer on social posting sequence: Write 6-10 tweets about the post (rewrite headline.