The Secret Formula To 3x Your Posts Engagement — Forget “How To…”
It’s a direct attack on “How To...” articles
I’ll come clean in the first sentence here.
I’ve done probably a LOT of “How to…” articles.
And I don’t blame myself. I was and STILL am a beginner writer.
But now I’ll try to never make a how-to article ever again.
Why?
“How to…” articles show little to no personality.
They are objective, and explain something from a broad view.
Imagine you’re talking to someone who is 20, or 30 feet away from you.
They have to yell for you to hear them (let’s say you have bad hearing)
And they keep pointing to one thing. They say something along the lines.
“It’s important to know *mutter* *mutter* *mutter* and how to *mutter*…”
You understand something.
I would have done the robot analogy as well.
If you really want to know How TO you have Google or ChatGPT.
The reason people read articles from other People is for a different reason.
People know how to tell stories.
Stories that:
- Catch attention
- Show emotion
- Relate to someone
And every story usually starts from the neutral part into something bad that makes the viewers say “Whoww… what’s going to happen” and then the HERO of our story does something right.
And then another “something bad” happens and then the villain is their father and so on.
Until they reach a happy ending (“YEY”). The power of friendship saved us.
So so so. We have a hero and a string of bad and good events.
Your job as a writer is:
- To position yourself as the hero
- Create your villain
- Position yourself as having finished a chapter of the book and being VICTORIOUS
- Position your readers on the NEUTRAL side, make them see the problem, and solve it for them.
In other words:
Take their hand and walk them across the same path that you did to safety. In return, they will give you their undivided attention and hopefully their trust.
You want me to put it in even simpler words?
I guess… I can do that...maybe…
If you ask nicely…
Ok.
Here’s the secret formula to boost your engagement:
Story + Valuable Information + Funny and Personal = WIN
There you go.
- Practice storytelling by reading fiction. Imagine scenarios and then put your value into it.
Build characters, dialog, and “think of the thoughts” of people. Good/Bad. Big/Small.
2. Inform yourself with valuable information by:
- Practicing self-reflection.
Document from now on what you’ve learned so far.
What did you do interesting lately?
What’s something that changed your life?
What did you learn in the last 2 years that your readers might find valuable?
3. You don’t have to be funny. You just have to be personal.
Don’t be afraid to let your inner child come out.
IT’S OK to act a little like the class clown.
Some people will love it.
They will love it so much because it relates to them in some way or another. And they’ll keep reading your content out of curiosity and desire for more.
And they will comment => more engagement.
Others will hate it.
They will hate it so much that they’ll keep reading your content just out of spite.
And they will comment => more engagement.
It doesn’t affect your life in any way whether or not someone on the internet likes your work on not.
That’s it for today’s story :)
Thanks for reading!
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— Cheers, Eddy!