Writing Guidelines Archives | Cosmic Development https://www.cosmicdevelopment.com/tag/writing-guidelines/ Mon, 22 Jan 2024 12:42:49 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://www.cosmicdevelopment.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/cropped-favicon-32x32.png Writing Guidelines Archives | Cosmic Development https://www.cosmicdevelopment.com/tag/writing-guidelines/ 32 32 10 Free Writing Tools You Can Use to Spruce up Your Content https://www.cosmicdevelopment.com/10-free-writing-tools-you-can-use-to-spruce-up-your-content/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=10-free-writing-tools-you-can-use-to-spruce-up-your-content https://www.cosmicdevelopment.com/10-free-writing-tools-you-can-use-to-spruce-up-your-content/#comments Thu, 06 Aug 2020 10:00:55 +0000 https://www.cosmicdevelopment.com/?p=4867 by Biljana Ognenova Online writing tools complement your writing acumen, enhance creative flow, help you get better SEO rankings, and create an anxiety-free working day. As long as you know how to expand your talent with effective writing resources, you can concentrate on what matters most — crafting messages for your target audience and connecting with visitors that search for…

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by Biljana Ognenova

Online writing tools complement your writing acumen, enhance creative flow, help you get better SEO rankings, and create an anxiety-free working day. As long as you know how to expand your talent with effective writing resources, you can concentrate on what matters most — crafting messages for your target audience and connecting with visitors that search for your brand services. Shortly, you build more time to do proper research and develop your voice. 

The best writing tools will not only aid with grammar, punctuation, tone, and style, but also enhance your organizational, communication, and time management skills. 

Free Writing Tools To Use Daily for No-Sweat Content Marketing

Imagine being scrutinized by the world’s toughest content editor — you need all the help you can get to polish your writing and submit flawless drafts. Even if you are not a professional content writer or copywriting expert, most of today’s work runs online. Therefore, everyone could use extra help when staring at a blank screen and struggling with writing and editing. 

The IT industry, in particular, relies on innovative technologies. It would be a shame to miss out on so many writing resources that you can download or subscribe to for free. Here is a list of ten writing tools that are easy to use and let you reap the benefits of free writing software: 

  1. EMV Headline Analyzer
  2. Grammarly
  3. Google Ads Keyword Planner
  4. Paper Rater Plagiarism Checker
  5. Readability Score Calculators
  6. Hemingway Editor
  7. Website SEO Score Checker
  8. Last Pass Password Manager
  9. Exploding Topics
  10. Thesaurus

1. EMV Headline Analyzer

EMV Headline Analyzer Free Writing Tools

Visitors have become smarter — they are spoiled for choice. You have seconds to attract people to read and share your blog. The easiest way to do it is to create appealing headings. Catchy, attention-grabbing titles and headlines are what draws in the largest number of visitors.

Instead of wasting your time on buffing the titles by yourself, you can enhance the heading’s copywriting value by using the EMV Headline Analyzer. EMV stands for “Emotional Marketing Value”. The EMV writing tool was created by the Advanced Marketing Institute (AMI) to analyze the emotional impact of a heading. The emotional impact contains intellectual, empathetic, and spiritual relevance analysis, all to help you create deep bonding with the potential readers. Your heading must be between 4 and 20 words to be eligible for this analysis. Most professional copywriters create titles with an EMV score of at least 40.00 percent, while the best ones will aim for above 60.00 or 70.00 percent EMV scores.  

2. Grammarly

Grammarly Extension Free Writing Tools

Grammarly is a popular writing resource for correcting grammatical errors and improving writing quality. As a subscription-based web editor, MS Office plugin, and as a browser extension, Grammarly lets you edit texts in American, British, Canadian, and Australian English. Therefore, it can help you meet client requirements worldwide. This is how it works: 

  • Set up the language you need, 
  • Copy and paste your text in the appropriate box, and 
  • Get scores for correctness, clarity, engagement, and delivery. 

The feedback for performance, word count, and readability comes back in real-time. You can edit as you go and improve scores immediately. Apart from a free writing tool, Grammarly extends its features in a premium version to provide smooth word choice and advanced style and punctuation corrections.

Great titles and precise grammar are only a part of what it takes for people to like, share, and comment on your content. Improve your writing skills further by reading our writing guidelines.

3. Google Ads Keyword Planner

Google Ads Editor writing tools

Although primarily targeting keywords for Google Ads campaigns, the Google Ads Keyword Planner is an invaluable writing resource for anyone testing the waters with SEO, keyword research, and keyword use. Google Ads is the tool-to-go for SEO experts. 

All you need to start and delve into a resourceful learning library is a Google account. On the bright side, you can use Google Keyword Planner for free. But the skills to implement its best features and grow your business through SEO do not come without investment costs. 

It takes years of experience to reach an expert level with SEO for Google. The best place you can start is by taking Google Analytics Academy lessons.

4. Paper Rater Plagiarism Checker

Paper Rater Free Writing Tools

Original, informative content is a top priority of any content marketing strategist

If you sacrifice originality, you can not only lose valuable audience but also get penalized by Google. College papers and essay writing are subject to plagiarism detection, too. Plagiarism is among the worst copywriting sins, which, in the worst-case scenario, incurs legal fees. However, as much as you can try to be original, certain topics are widely explored and elaborated online. To skip Google penalizations and unintentional content-copying, always use a plagiarism checker once you finalize your draft. 

The one you can start with is Paper Rater. Paper Rater uses algorithms to analyze similarities between your text and already published content and provides a percentage score. As a bonus, this free writing tool for producing clean copy includes a Grammarly editor. 

5. Readability Score Calculators

Flesch-Kincaid Score Calculator Free Writing Tools

Fluffy, verbose writing is compelling if you are trying to hit the creative beat. However, it can repel an audience unused to reading long, complex sentences. Moreover, it produces more work for editors. 

Flesch-Kincaid Score Calculator

Condense writing that meets the reader’s expectations is the most-sought-for copywriting skill. If you are honest as a writer, there is always space to improve in this area. Use a Flesch-Kincaid calculator to judge the readability score of your writing. The Flesch-Kincaid score measures readability according to the educational level of your reader.

Be careful with the Flesch-Kincaid score when writing for an educated, expert audience. You will have to adjust your writing to match the technical experts’ level, for example, or you will end up losing them because you’ll bore them to death. For the widest outreach, however, choose simpler words and sentences. 

Gunning-Fox Index 

If you have time, improve readability further by adding another resource on your list of best writing tools. This is the Gunning Fox Index check, shortly called FOG. FOG tools inspect your brand’s underlying message for its maximum potential outreach. 

Do not be afraid to simplify your sentences despite sacrificing some of your creative juices. The majority of online readers spend minutes on reading content. Pack as much useful and practical tips in fewer, shorter sentences. 

6. Hemingway Editor

Hemingway App Free Writing Tools

The Hemingway writing app can be frustrating when you use it for the first time. Later down the line, you will grasp the merciless massacre of sentences it performs without taking it personally. The app is available via the browser in a free version or as a paid desktop application. Apart from letting you format directly on the screen, you get immediate feedback via the app about:

  • Extensive use of passive voice
  • Phrasal complexity
  • Adverb density
  • Sentence complexity (hard or very hard readability) 

Too many adverbs or knotty phraseology can ruin excellent writing. However, try not to be too hard on yourself if you cannot master this skill; even the author of the most cited writing resource for professional writers “On Writing”, Stephen King, doesn’t always adhere to his rules about adverbs. In time, as you improve your skills, this app will be among the writing tools you will use the least. 

7. Website SEO Score Checker

SEO Score Checker Free Writing Tools

Measuring SEO scores comes after you perform keyword research and analysis, and write, edit, and publish the content. Some errors can still slip through the cracks after all that effort. Moreover, Google makes changes to its algorithms, so you never know for sure how your website performs over time. 

To find the most critical SEO mistakes of your website, copy and paste your website domain in a free SEO score checker. Despite its inapplicability for in-depth SEO analysis, you can occasionally use this tool to check the performance of your pages and to correct obvious mistakes.

8. Last Pass Password Manager

Last Pass Password Manager Free Writing Tools

The average computer user has between 70 and 80 passwords. Since you will have multiple accounts to free writing tools, inventing, remembering, and saving all those passwords can be a problem. 

Last Pass is an effective and secure method to store sensitive information that indirectly improves your writing. It also generates maximum security passwords. Think of enhancing personal organization and saving brain cells for the meat and potatoes of writing. 

As a cross-platform password manager, Last Pass provides access from your computer, tablet, or smartphone. The free version is somewhat limited but still excellent for storing all your account passes and locking them in with a master password.  

An easy way to use Last Pass is by installing a browser extension. Once you get used to automatically creating, safely storing, and filling your passwords, you will never look back.

9. Exploding Topics

Exploding Topics Free Writing Tools

When you constantly design editorial calendars and compete to innovate in a world saturated with great content, producing new attractive topics is a challenge. Readers change their behavior and habits quickly. You need sophisticated AI algorithms to catch intricate interdependencies between data. 

If you want to rush ahead before Google Trends and come up with topics no one else has explored, experiment with Exploding Topics. Exploding Topics is one way to stay ahead of the curve. Search for exciting topics, new industry vocabulary, and groundbreaking products and services by selecting the relevant timeline and industry category.

10. Thesaurus

Thesaurus Free writing tools

It is not unusual to hit a dry vocabulary spell once you spent years creating similar content. Hence, having a free writing resource for synonyms and antonyms such as Thesaurus stimulates your skills in new ways. 

Its impeccable authority among users of online writing tools makes Thesaurus a favorite of advanced writers, as well as of students and writers beginners.  

More of the Best Writing Tools for Effective Content Creation

We could continue with this writing tools’ list and add dozens of more resources. Yet, using too many is not helpful either. Find your set of best tools and use them to support you in your daily schedule without overwhelming you.

In case you are ready for additional exploration of writing help, here are some extra tips to help your progress:

  • Install Google add-ons and extensions for better writing:
    • ProWriting Aid
    • Text Cleaner 
  • Improve the visual appeal of your content by finding and properly attributing royalty-free images:
    • Perform reverse image search tools
    • Write clear, high-ranking alt tags for images
  • Download free SEO web extensions, for example, the SEO Stack Keyword Tool  
  • Learn how to use Yoast for WordPress to enhance SEO and readability scores directly in the WP Editor

Interested in going beyond the power of writing for content marketing? Find out how to increase sales with video marketing tools.

Aside from using free writing tools, ensure that you spend at least some time each day reading authors, magazines, and blogs and articles by companies you admire. Many of them will be your best teachers, not only in terms of writing style, but also for practicing technical accuracy and creating informative, shared, and liked content.  

If you still have doubts about which writing tools to use, schedule a free consultation with one of our experts and you will get a personalized solution to your problem.

Free IT consultation

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Writing Guidelines for a Blog Article https://www.cosmicdevelopment.com/writing-guidelines-for-a-blog-article/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=writing-guidelines-for-a-blog-article https://www.cosmicdevelopment.com/writing-guidelines-for-a-blog-article/#comments Thu, 02 Jul 2020 10:56:34 +0000 https://www.cosmicdevelopment.com/?p=4593 by Viktorija Nikoloska Are you searching for the basic writing guidelines to help you with writing blogs for your specific target audience and customers? If the answer to this question is ‘Yes,’ then you are in the right place. By reading this article, you will learn what a good blog post is and how to write it, but most importantly,…

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by Viktorija Nikoloska

Are you searching for the basic writing guidelines to help you with writing blogs for your specific target audience and customers? If the answer to this question is ‘Yes,’ then you are in the right place. By reading this article, you will learn what a good blog post is and how to write it, but most importantly, you will discover the basic writing guidelines that will lead you through writing a blog post for your website.

With the digitalization settling in every aspect of our lives, we must increase our online presence and pay more attention to our audience’s interests. The best way to achieve this is by creating a content marketing strategy with implemented Search Engine Optimization (SEO), which will increase your company’s presence and traffic.

The writing guidelines in this article will teach you how to optimize your article for search engines such as Google and guide you through the process of writing blogs. You will get answers to what are keywords and how to conduct a keyword analysis for a specific topic. You will also learn how to write meta titles and meta descriptions and why they are essential. And finally, you will enrich your knowledge of the most important grammar writing guidelines that a professional blogger and editor should follow.

Read more about How Rumble’s Content Editor Nick Naumoff Chooses the Best Content Ideas for Rumble’s website or click on the image below and schedule a free IT consultation

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What are Keywords and How to Conduct a Keyword Analysis?


Keywords, also known as ‘Key Phrases’ or ‘Search Queries,’ are the words that people enter in search engines when looking for something online. From the company’s aspect, they are the ideas and topics that define your content’s purpose. In terms of SEO, keywords are the words and phrases that searchers enter into search engines. Companies use strictly-defined keywords according to the products or services they offer so that their businesses may rank higher in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) when people search for those keywords. The main target of business owners is to use keywords on their websites that will bring them higher chances of getting more website traffic. For that purpose, content creators and SEO analysts will have to conduct keyword research to ensure that the keywords they will use on the website and blog are relevant and searched for. 

Therefore, I can say that the most crucial part of these writing guidelines is to learn how to conduct a keyword analysis. Keywords are essential for creating an article. Keywords are important because they represent the connection between what people are searching for and the content that is written for that purpose. Moreover, they help in ranking higher on SERPs, thus driving organic traffic to your website. The keywords chosen by an SEO analyst will determine what kind of traffic you get. 

Example: If you are offering software development services, you may want to rank for “python programming language,” – but if you’re not careful, you may end up attracting traffic interested in the family of snakes – python. 

Business owners usually want to have content that ranks well organically and drives visitors to their websites. However, they need first to understand their reader’s language and the type of content they seek. They can do this by talking to the customers, by conducting keyword analysis, or by frequenting forums and community groups. Nowadays, there are various tools for conducting a keywords research. You can choose whichever suits your needs. The choices vary from browser extensions such as the Keywords Everywhere and Google’s product Keyword Planner to SEO software such as Moz, digital marketing toolkit such as SEMRush, and start-up companies that offer marketing tools such as Ahrefs

Writing Guidelines for blog posts
Image source


What is a Meta Title?


The meta title is, in fact, the title of the HTML document. Both browsers and SERPs use meta titles for displaying preview snippets of the landing page. Meta titles describe the article’s purpose and inform Google of that purpose. 

Ideally, meta titles should be between 50 and 67 characters (580 pixels long) and concisely explain a specific topic or phrase. From my personal experience, the optimal length of a meta title is 55 characters.

The meta title consists of the article title followed by a vertical bar, with space before and after, followed by the website name. Every meta title must contain a major keyword; however, it must not contain any periods. 


What is a Meta Description?


Meta descriptions explain the functions and the purpose of the page shown, and it is displayed immediately below the Meta Title on a SERP. The main focus of the meta description is to contain concise and thorough sentences that will make an emotional impact on the readers, thus enhancing the user experience. Meta descriptions must contain action words that may vary based on what the users will find on the page. If the page is informational, point out the information that they will read.

Meta descriptions should contain from one to three keywords, depending on the length of the keyword itself. When creating a meta description, you should already have a list of keywords that you will use throughout the article. Think of keywords that people mostly search for. If possible, make sure to add keywords to the beginning of the phrases in the meta description.

Meta descriptions must be between 120-158 characters. Try not to go over 158 characters (919 pixels long); otherwise, you run the risk that Google cuts the description off. Unlike meta titles, the meta descriptions contain sentences, so you need to add a period at the end of each sentence.

Examples of meta title and description as part of the writing guidelines
This is an example of a meta title and a meta description. The meta title consists of the page title “About Us | IT Support Services Company”, followed by a vertical bar (|) and the name of the company “Cosmic Development”:
About Us | IT Support Services Company | Cosmic Development

The meta description is the text below the meta title:
Learn more about Cosmic Development and the IT support services we offer. Discover our story and meet the team that motivates our people.

The main keyword used in both the meta title and the meta description is: IT support services


What are the Basic Rules for Writing a Blog?



Blog Post Length
We are aware that nowadays, people’s attention span is several seconds and that no one wants to read long blog articles. However, the blog post length is one of the essential writing guidelines for a successful blog article. Google usually prefers longer articles that contain relevant keywords according to the article’s topic. It is a general rule that longer posts tend to rank better because they cover the issue more thoroughly, and Google considers these articles as expert articles. Therefore, the ideal blog post length would be above 2,000 words. Those articles should usually be from five to seven minutes of reading time. 

Furthermore, when considering the blog post length, you also need to have in mind the readers and not only the search engines. After all, you are also writing for the readers, not for the search engines alone. After conducting thorough research of your blog audience, you will be able to determine the length of your blog posts. However, the articles should not contain less than 1,000 words, which is approximately a post of three minutes of reading time. Besides, keep in mind that the blog post length is also dependent on the keywords you choose for the article.

Language Usage
When writing a blog article, you should use plain English language, which will be equally understood by both native and non-native readers. Make sure that you blend the tenses wisely and that you mostly use the present tense. Moreover, make paragraphs short and break them up with lists, bullet points, and subheadings. Use collective nouns and avoid writing in the first person singular, because it is considered as informal. Try to use the third person when writing articles, to avoid informal texts. Both second and third persons are acceptable voices, so long as you are consistent with it in a given sentence or paragraph. 

Furthermore, make sure that you avoid fluffy writing when creating your blog article. Fluffy writing is actually writing that is done simply to reach the word count. Every paragraph that you have in your article should provide valuable information to the reader. No one wants to read articles written simply to meet the word count. Everything you write should provide useful information to the reader concisely and cleanly.

Tone of Voice
The usage of active voice should be dominant in your blog articles, while you must avoid the passive voice. The article’s tone should be direct and informative. A passive voice gives the idea that the writer is not sure about the content provided. Active voice, on the other hand, projects confidence and authority. When it comes to the tone of voice, there are seven rules that you should follow throughout all blog posts:
Human, not impersonal
Conversational and engaging 
Knowledgeable, not professorial
Professional, not corporate
Confident, not arrogant
Straightforward, not rude
Friendly, not colloquial


Structure Tips
When writing a blog post, you need to pay attention to the beginning of the article. At first, you need to create a topic sentence that will serve as an opener of your article and will catch the reader’s attention. Therefore, make sure to take your time when crafting this topic sentence. Secondly, you need to have an irresistible introduction to the article. You can start by creating an attention-grabbing hook, for instance, using a metaphor, asking a question, telling a story, using statistics or facts, etc. And finally, you must include the keywords that you chose for the article at hand. Make sure to place the keywords in the meta title, meta description, subheadings, image alt tags, and throughout the entire article.

Pronoun Agreement
When writing blogs, content creators need to ensure that they have a pronoun agreement both within the sentence and within the paragraph. What does this mean? It means that if, for instance, you are writing in the third person singular, you need to continue using nouns of third-person singular throughout the entire paragraph. 

Wrong: “The applicant must apply to their office.” “Applicant” is a third-person singular noun. “Their” reflects a third-person plural noun. 
Correct: “Applicants must apply to their office.” or “The applicant must apply to his/her office.” 

When writing official and expert articles, you should choose to avoid personalization (he/she). Therefore, it is better if we write persons in the plural. Moreover, make sure to use proper pronoun agreement with a collective noun. Since a collective noun (the team, the agency, the department, the company, etc.) represents a singular unit, a singular term must follow, not a plural one. 

Wrong: “To contact the department, call their number.” 
Correct: “To contact the department, call its number.”

Important AP Style Writing Guidelines

The AP (Associated Press) Style is a writing style that every journalist or content creator must know by heart. The Associated Press has published numerous editions of their AP Stylebook so far, abounding with writing guidelines that writers and editors must follow if they want to produce qualitative pieces of writing. Blog editors are encouraged to follow the AP Styleguide when it comes to online content. AP Style is used to format numbers, dates, addresses, and much more. Below are listed some of the most important writing guidelines according to the AP Stylebook:  

  • Only use single spacing – Do not double-space after the end of a sentence.  
  • Be mindful of when to write out the number and when to use the digits.  
  • Write out numbers when they start the sentence unless it is a year date. Examples:
    • Twenty-five years ago, shoulder pads were popular.  
    • 2007 saw a quick resurgence of the trend.  
  • Write out numbers from one to nine. From 10 on, you use the digits. (11, 12, 134, 155) 
  • Ages: all ages should be written out in figures: 1 year old, 2 years, 3 years, 4 years of age, etc. 
  • Write out percent. Five percent chance of rain. 
  • It is not AM or pm. It is 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. (do not include the :00 — you only include real minutes, like in 7:21 a.m.) 
  • Years: the 1960s, the 2000s (no apostrophes are necessary) 
  • Use double quotation “marks”, not single ‘ones’.  

For more detailed writing guidelines, download the latest edition of the AP Stylebook.
OR
Schedule a free IT consultation with our experts and let us help you compose a successful blog post.

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