How to Experiment With Different Writing Styles

There are a million ways to relay a message to an audience. A style refers to a method of communication that can be related to the format of the content, tone of the message, and nature of the medium.

If you can write in various styles, it means you can write for different audiences spread across platforms. This keeps your options open in a ruthless industry. You can always, seamlessly, go to another niche or industry, and continue to dominate.

So, how do you do that?

Well, first, you need to read multiple types of written content across various languages. Novels, research papers, journals, technical breakdowns, educational content, and more. This is crucial to learn different forms of persuasion and textual communication.

Then, start mimicking those styles until mastery. 

In this chapter, I’ve shared some actionable tips that’ll keep this process measured and structured to help you improve faster.

Publish to test it

Don’t get me wrong, logging personal diary entries is useful. It is key for mental clarity, allows you to visualize deep into the future, and unlocks creativity. While all of that is valuable for personal development, you need to find a way to make it count in your professional world.

The only way you can truly know if you are adapting to new styles effectively is if others read it.

If you have an audience, it means that your words make sense. The sentences are cohesive, and the article delivers the value promised in the title. And most importantly, it will give you direction for refining your craft.

Creativity is a chaotic process. When you experiment with a particular style of written communication, there might be several creative elements within it. However, they may not be polished or tied together effectively to make your blog post artistic.

Social media and Medium are two great platforms to run your experiments on. You can create an anonymous account if you are too self-conscious at the start. I will request that you consider starting your own professional blog to maximize long-term value.

Create enough volume

You need to put out hundreds of drafts, if not more, to rank your skillset accurately in the overall content marketing industry. And the reason is simple: most of the pieces you will publish will hit zero views and reads.

There are multiple reasons for this. First, you are growing, so you’ll certainly get a handful of reads if at all. 

Second, on average, about 20% of the blog articles in the world get about 80% of the attention, and the remaining 80% of posts settle for the remaining 20%. This is known as the Pareto Principle and applies to you as an individual creator.

In other words, 20% of the pieces you will publish will bring you 80% of your overall traffic.

Hence, just publish as much as you can. There is no such thing as a perfect blog post. As soon as you cross a particular threshold of quality, put it out for the world to see. 

Be open-minded to make mistakes. Some errors will be more embarrassing than others. Currently, there are over 100 published blog posts on this website, and some of them carry some beginner-level oversights. It is what it is. That was then. I can only move forward.

Reread the hit ones

Some of your articles, out of hundreds, will hit the jackpot. It will break your expectations and will make all your effort worth it. When that happens, you need to go and analyze the hell out of those articles.

Look for the elements that stood out and that resonate. If enough time has passed, you can look at the piece from a reader’s perspective and take notes.

Medium is the best platform for this because it shows the views and reads for each individual article, making tracking simple. But the same effect can be achieved in other platforms, such as a personal blog or a social media profile.

Then, compare those hit pieces with the posts published before and after. This will uncover what you missed or failed to replicate.

Now, the not-so-popular ones, you can analyze them again, but with a grain of salt. Keep in mind that the Internet is a crazy place, and an article may fail to perform for a hundred different reasons; your subpar creative skills could be one of them. Shit happens. Move on.

Wrapping up: Consider blogging

A blog will grow your marketing skills as well. You will learn how to manage a website, plan content, and build an audience. These lessons will make you quite effective in your content writing career.

Furthermore, owning your content is better than hosting it on a third-party site. Medium’s policies are reasonable enough, but then again, anything can happen. A couple of strikes, and suddenly you are deplatformed.

Last but not least, blogging will teach you how to fail. Everyone knows how to win, because it comes naturally. Indulging in celebrations filled with dopamine hits is easy. But putting in effort every single day without any guarantee of success is hard.

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Next Chapter: Ideal Workstation of a Content Writer

Previous Chapter: Learn the Philosophies of Content Marketing

Index (Prologue): What is Content Writing