How To Write An Article In 15 Minutes Or Less
Did you ever have a good idea for an article but not enough time to finish it? We’ve all been there. But guess what — I’m going to give you a four-step process that will allow you to write an article in 15 minutes or less!
You can use this whether your goal is to get more work writing online, or just to improve your writing abilities. Let’s get started so we can go over the 4 steps: 1) Pick a topic, 2) research it, 3) create title and outline, 4) start writing.
Step 1: Pick A Topic
You probably already know what topic you want to write about if you’re reading this blog post right now. If not, spend some time brainstorming your own ideas. Make a list of your ideas and pick the idea that “sounds” easy to you.
Before we start this process, I want to tell you that you must be interested in your topic for this to work! It won’t help if you’re picking a topic about something you hate doing or learning about because it will feel like work and not like fun. And when writing is hard, we don’t get results as quickly as we would if we enjoyed our writing subject. So pick something that excites you right now, not something abstract such as “marketing,” but rather something more tangible such as Facebook marketing for small business owners.
Make sure the topic is both specific and actionable so that there’s plenty of opportunities to write about it. If you’re having trouble thinking of a specific topic, start brainstorming with these questions:
How can I ________? What is the best way to _______? How do you _____? How do others go about doing ____? How would you go about ____?
For example: how can small business owners market their businesses on Facebook?
Step 2: Start Your Research!
Once you’ve chosen a good topic for your article, it’s time to start researching! You want to have at least three solid research sources that speak directly to the issue of your article. Anything else is just fluff and doesn’t add any extra value for readers. In fact, it probably even confuses them because it brings up tangents that you didn’t even plan on talking about. At this point, the goal is to develop your main points for your article without getting too sidetracked by other things.
You can use any combination of resources for your research, but make sure they are reputable sources. Don’t rely on forums or opinions from people you don’t know well, because their ideas might be biased or make assumptions not directly related to the topic you’re writing about. And definitely don’t use Wikipedia! Those articles are often full of errors because anyone can edit them and there isn’t any accountability measure in a place like there is with a publication such as The New York Times.
Tip: ask some friends if they’ve heard of your topic before, or if they know anything about it. You might be surprised by how much they already know!
Step 3: Outline Your Article
Now that you’ve done your research on your topic, it’s time to create an outline of your article. This is where you formalize the main points you want to make about your topic, and decide what order you’d like them in. Keep it simple at this point; just jot down a few bullet points for each of these topics:
At least 3–5 strong main points about your topic
The order in which to present those points in the article (most important point first)
One sentence summing up what readers will learn from reading your article once they reach the conclusion.
For example: here’s an outline for this article:
Research and writing process How to make sure your topic is specific and actionable 3 sources of research 1. Lifehack 2. HubSpot 3. Forbes The New York Times Outline Your main points in the correct order (most important point first) Conclusion — readers will learn what you need to know in order to write a successful article about choosing a great topic
Step 4: Start Writing!
Now that you’ve done your research and outlined your article, it’s time to start writing! Follow the exact same process for every article you write when working online or building up your portfolio so you can build momentum and get in the habit of creating great articles. And if you want even more ideas for how to brainstorm article topics, check out this post. With all that in mind, the only thing left is to write your first article!
Remember to use correct grammar and punctuation, and to include a call-to-action at the end of your article so readers know what you want them to do next. If you need help with formatting your articles so they look professionally written, check out this guide here.
Keep in mind that you can reuse parts of your articles on multiple websites, as long as you alter them enough so that Google knows each instance is unique (do it automatically in a couple of seconds). This will come in handy when expanding your portfolio or increasing the number of articles you have online. Think about it: if we’re hiring someone else for their writing skills, wouldn’t it be better to have two articles written by the same person rather than the same article being repeated on several different websites?
