My secret to writing viral News Break articles
My entire process unveiled
When News Break pulled the plug on base pay for me a few month ago, I really thought I’d give up writing on the platform.
After getting over that initial blow, I decided to take a different approach. Instead I began studying top writers on News Break.
I looked at the kind of stories they wrote, how they wrote, what their engagement rates were like, I even found them on social media and learned as much as possible.
I’m a good little researcher and I became really interested in how they were creating their articles to get hundreds or thousands of comments.
The comments don’t necessarily tell you how many views or how much traffic a story got but it’s a good indication.
Here’s what I learned from it all..
My Top Secret Process for Creating Viral Articles on News Break
It boils down to four key things:
- Headline
- Image
- Your content
- Article engagement
What’s in a headline?
The headline can make or break your story. It’s part of what lures the reader in, to get them to click your article and read.
It’s got to be good!
And when I say good, I don’t mean clickbaity good.
Clickbait is frowned upon on News Break in the first place and then if you trick a reader to clicking into your article and they realize its clickbait, that can leave a sour taste in their mouth and prevent them from following you and reading your content in the future.
You do not want that.
Instead, you want your headline to be enticing, without giving away the gold and funny enough, the simpler the headline, the better.
For me, headlines like these are working:
Is______ coming to this city? (for example: Is Costco coming to Oakland?)
How to get _______ then name the benefit (for example: How to get Instacart for free)
Is ______ happening? (for example: Are locusts mating in New Braunfels?)
You can see that these headlines are incredibly simple.
But it’s enough to share what the main point of the story is and spark enough curiosity to get the reader to click and read the article.
Are features images really that important?
They are!
In fact they’re almost as important as your headline.
It’s easy enough to pick an image that fits from Unsplash or other freely-usable stock photo sites.
I just pick a photo that works for the story.
This is one of the easiest parts of the process for me.
How should News Break content be written?
I try to write as simply as possible.
Here are some of my rules:
- Short paragraphs
- Lots of white space
- Images/graphics/quotes and other features and media to break up the text
- Ask an engaging question at the end
I try to make my stories as long as possible but to be honest, they’re usually on the shorter side (most of them are less than 600 words).
Do I get the highest RPMS on my articles?
Not always but, I do get pretty good views I think…
What’s article engagement?
At the end of every article, just like on my Medium stories, I try to ask an engaging question. This encourages the reader to respond and make a comment.
When comments are present, I think it encourages more reads and comments.
If you browse the News Break site for example, there’s a ton of content and a lot of articles. My eye is drawn to the stories that have thumbs ups, comments and shares.
It’s FOMO and it exists on News Break.
What’s next?
My articles have had over 22 million impressions and over 1 million views in total.
I’ve been in the program for a year now and have over 10,000 followers.
These are the tactics I employ in my writing today and I think it’s been helpful to grow my following, encourage reader engagement and make money on the platform.
I’m so grateful to have picked up these gems that have helped me grow my story views and make money on News Break.
I hope some of these tips have been helpful to you.
What are some of your best practices you use when writing for News Break?
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