I take lots of photos for a local pet rescue group. Lots. Hundreds each year. I volunteer my time, my equipment, my editing and my eye, and it’s one of the most fulfilling things I’ve ever done in my life. Photos — just like blog posts, white papers, videos, articles, quizzes and so much more — are pieces of content that can make or break your website and even your business plan. No matter how pretty the design may be, without quality content, readers won’t make repeat visits to your site.

Content — quality content — is a valuable commodity. More and more, companies large and small are recognizing that it is just as important a piece of the website puzzle as great design. So, why would anyone — individual or business — give content away for free?

1. To stay on top of trends. What’s the latest and greatest in your industry right now? Are you in-the-know about the next big social media trend? Be the first to write about it and you’ll likely be considered a thought-leader and expert in your field.
2. To make themselves (more) marketable. If your company makes the best widgets in town, you probably know everything there is to know about widgets. That makes you the authority on widgets! When you give away content — articles or videos about how widgets work, for instance — others will then start looking to you more frequently for your expertise.
3. To secure clients and partnerships. Sometimes, just like the nibbles and bites we can grab when wondering the aisles of Costco, clients and potential partners want a taste of what’s to come. Although they’ve probably seen your work elsewhere, they may want to know — without spending a dime — exactly what you can do for them. Provide an article for their website, pair up with them to produce an eBook, produce a podcast together. Don’t just tell them what you can do for them, show them!
4. To build a portfolio. Sure, a company can build a portfolio based on their work from their own websites or published materials, but if that company has had blog posts or articles published on, say, Mashable.com, SocialMediaToday.com and TechCrunch, they carry more weight. Provide a high-quality piece of content to a big-name industry source for publishing, then show the world.

Have you ever given content away for free? What was your experience?

Last week, I had the pleasure of attending Steph Hay’s Writing Content for Usability webinar. Steph’s main question (and the one we’ve been asking ourselves for years) is “Why does the Internet still lack great content?”

Steph’s short answer is that most of us rely too much on design to catch the attention of readers, rather than the content we write. For a few hours, Steph talked about focusing on the following three criteria to improve your writing:

1. Focus on your audience, medium and network. Start by figuring out to whom you are sending the message. Instead of considering everyone who might drop by your site, focus on one ideal person and directly speak to him or her. Then, determine how you want them to feel.  Consider how your network will describe you—and then influence your target audience. Once you are satisfied with your content, capitalize on other communication channels to tell your story.
2. Write credible content. Obviously, usable content has to say something substantive. Too often, we get caught up in filling space rather than creating something that will reach our audience. Remember that credible content is meaningful, helpful, results-oriented and confident. Here are a few tips for achieving credible content:
   
   • Meaningful: Take time to ensure that your writing actually says something. Remove buzz words and industry jargon and tell your audience exactly what you want them to hear.
   • Helpful: Don’t assume users know what to do once they reach your site. You have to tell them what you want them to do!
   • Results-Oriented: Explain what awesome things your users will get from you. Writing a list of what you do isn’t enough to get results.
   • Confident: Be careful not to over promote. Showcase confidence in your work while being humble.
3. Achieve consistency. Content is consistent when it is uniform in structure, style and voice.
   
   • Structure: Always lead with the most important information, include what is relevant, and use keywords throughout the site.
   • Style: Make sure every page of the site uses the same format for capitalizations, punctuation, headings, etc.
   • Voice: Always write in a genuine tone. Read your content out loud and then rewrite anything that sounds questionable.

What’s your definition of great content? Let us know in the comments below.

Many marketing departments in particular are grappling with the content demands of today’s 24/7, firehose media. Marketing departments were traditionally built on planning, research and strategy, with perhaps a freelance copywriter on call. With Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and your own website now clamoring for content along with traditional communications vehicles, the traditional structure can’t meet all your needs. When you need to expand your content team, how do you do it?

First, know your goals. I don’t mean the “what’s on your to-do list today” kind of goal. I mean the big, hairy goal. The “increase sales 15% over last year” goal, or “Cut call center volume by 20%” or “Improve customer satisfaction by 30%” kind of goals. Many people get stuck here because the company has a stated goal, and then it has the way it acts day to day. Do everything you can get to clarity on the real goals before you begin.

Know your timeline. Are you embarking on a campaign, or establishing a new method of operations? If you can clearly answer this question, it will help you decide whether you need to hire an agency or a staffer.

Know your core competence. What is your organization? Is your core competence something outside of the marketing and communications arena? For most organizations, the answer is yes. That doesn’t mean you need an agency, but it might make it more likely. Conversely, even communications-heavy organizations hire agencies to bring in fresh ideas or handle extra work.

Define the judgment needed. Anyone who’s going to be the last person to see content before your customers has to have judgment that you trust completely. Someone who’s writing copy and submitting it to you or another trusted staff member needs less authority. Sure, you’d let a 17-year-old run the register at a retail location [and thus represent you directly to customers], but you shouldn’t let a junior-level staffer with little training run your Twitter account without supervision. The potential for damage is significantly higher.

Finally, let’s talk skills. When you’re thinking about making a hire or signing a contract to procure content services, you not only must identify the skills you need today, but you also have to think about what you need tomorrow. If you can’t count on a budget for professional development [and time to support that as well], you are better off contracting with a freelancer or agency that aggressively educates its own staff. The world of digital content is changing minute by minute, and many of the skills we need today won’t be current tomorrow. You want to hire curious people who are always learning. If they’re on your staff, you have to support that. If they’re your vendor, expect to pay more for it.

So what’s right — hire a staff or an agency? There’s no right answer, but these questions may help you shape your thinking.

How did you decide whether to outsource or hire? What skills do you value in your content staff?

From time to time, big projects come across your desk that require large amounts of content. Obviously you can’t create thousands of articles over night, so you do the next best thing: Hire a content vendor. But before you sign on the dotted line, you want to make sure your contract works for both parties.

While it’s obviously important to include pricing details in your contract, you also want to cover the types of services you need. Here are questions to ask yourself before you commit to a vendor contract.

1. What do you want from your vendor? If expedient customer service is important to you, be sure to outline the terms of service in your contract. What level of copyright are you buying — do you want to own the work outright [most expensive option] or just license it for use for a while? If you need to reserve the right to make grammar or style changes to content provided by a vendor, add that to the contract, as well. Determine what you need to complete your work, and make sure the vendor you hire can meet those needs.
2. Who will facilitate the implementation? Do you want your vendor to provide the content and put it in a usable form for your content needs? Perhaps you’re willing to edit and format the content to save some money. Before you pay for a content service, work with your vendor to determine how the product will be implemented. Ideally, your vendor is writing to your defined content strategy, right?
3. What is your liability? Obviously both parties will want to limit their liability in the event of a problem — plagiarism, copyright violation, garden-variety errors. Be sure to add a section about liability to your contract, and negotiate for the terms that will best suit you. Liability issues will include who is responsible for a delay in service, potential damages and attorney’s fees.
4. What are the terms for pricing? While you’ll certainly want to agree on a standard price for your vendor’s services, keep in mind that you might need extra services at some point. Will the vendor charge a fee for extra content? Are the rates locked in for a certain period of time? Your contract should include any potential pricing issues.
5. What are the grounds for termination? Mistakes are one thing — but what about Really Big Mistakes? Before you sign a contract, identify your dealbreakers, and include them in a termination section of your contract.

While you know what your content needs are right now, be sure to include a clause that specifies your vendor’s responsibility for additional programming or other changes that could be necessary to meet your standards. A good contract uses flexible language that will keep it relevant throughout your relationship with your vendor.

My dad had all sorts of great one-liners. They seemed to come out of his mind and mouth quickly and appropriately for any occasion. For a skinned knee, he would always say, “It’ll feel better when it quits hurting.” When it came to love, he often reminded me, with a wink, “It’s just as easy to marry for money as it is for love.” (I married for love, in case you’re wondering.) And when it came to my career, he encouraged me to aim high, explaining, “It’s better to aim high and miss just a little than to aim low and be right on the bull’s eye.”

Columnist Regina Brett from The Plain Dealer of Cleveland shared that same tip with participants recently in a Content Marketing World breakout session on emotion and storytelling. Brett encouraged those of us in the room — whether we’re writing for a newspaper, a personal blog or a corporate website — to pick a bull’s eye and go for it. To aim high or not even bother.

While I walked away with a full page of notes from her session and probably 20 tips for telling a great story, 5 from my list are definitely favorites:

1. “Put a face on it.” Say you run a hospital with the highest birth rate in the state. Instead of spouting off numbers and statistics in your writing, talk about specific babies or the doctors and nurses who give them such exceptional care.
2. “Circle the wagons.” If your manufacturing plant runs on the sweat of employees who have been there for 20 or 30 years, instead of writing from the corporate viewpoint, share the point of view of one of those employees. Brett called it “hearing the story through different ears” and seeing it through a different set of eyes.
3. “Show me, don’t tell me.” Do the words alone do your story, blog post or article justice? Would a picture make a positive impact? What about an infographic?
4. “Tell a big story small.” There was a huge music festival in Austin this weekend — Austin City Limits. It brings hundreds of thousands of visitors to the city and puts millions of dollars into the economy. Our local newspaper ran many stories on the festival, one of which focused on a 9-year-old boy who had been to the festival every year since it started when he was only 10 months old. Telling the story from his viewpoint makes a big story small.
5. “Edit.” It just takes a couple of minutes. Read it out loud. Email it to yourself and read it in a different font. Go eat lunch and come back to read it again. Just make sure you give every piece a good once (or twice) over.

There is lots of content on the web. Lots. If you wanted to build a website about, say, the health benefits of running, there would be no shortage of content already out there that you could license and curate to fill your pages. But don’t underestimate the power of custom content — your own words, videos and pictures produced from your own point of view — and what it can do for your site.

If you’ve been thinking about custom content but aren’t sure you’re ready to take that plunge, here are four benefits that might help persuade you:

1. It fills a void. What are readers searching for when they visit your site? More importantly, are they finding it? If not, fill those gaps with content that you create in the form of how-to articles, videos and illustrative photographs. If readers aren’t finding what they’re looking for when they search your site, you can be sure they’re searching for it — and finding it — elsewhere.
   Do you have content you wish you could get your hands on? If you’ve been spending your energy searching for just the right content vendor for that dream content, why not just write it yourself? You’ll save time, energy and money, and that custom content will lead right to the next three benefits.
2. It increases traffic. Google and other search engines really like fresh, relevant and timely content. It other words, if you wrote an article on cold weather running gear back in 2004 that only your employees read, Google doesn’t really care at this point. A new article on the subject will allow you to share that content with readers on your site and through social media tools. If people like it, share it and link to it, and if it contains strong keywords, more search engines will point to your piece of content when potential readers search for “cold weather running gear”.
3. It makes you the authority. If you’re licensing content from Kyle, The Running Expert, readers of your website will soon realize they only need to read and subscribe to Kyle’s site to get the information they want. Instead of serving as the middleman, sharing Kyle’s content, providing your own content will make you the expert and allow readers to trust your expertise enough to visit again, subscribe and share.
4. It creates an opportunity to make money. Yep, money! If you start creating enough quality content on a regular basis, maybe someone will knock on your door — or at least drop you an email — and ask about licensing your articles, videos or photographs.

   Let’s say you start a monthly video series on how to get started with a running program. it might include the right gear, proper nutrition for before and after a run, mistakes beginners make and so on. That new content is not only updating your website, but it’s also producing good “Google juice,” as it’s sometimes called. It’s making you an authority on the subject and it might even be good enough that someone else wants to pay you for using it. How cool would that be?!