Content Operations: To write a good copy, start by learning how to chat

Sincere emotions, clear views, fluent language and layered logical structure are the core points for evaluating an article in different eras.

However, the way content is presented by "clicking" to obtain link details and the user's "fast food" reading habits of fast-food content make the content of the Internet era slightly different from that of other eras.

These differences are not only reflected in the "four major elements" mentioned at the beginning, but also in the careful adjustments made by content creators in article selection, title highlights, and main structure after figuring out "user psychology", so that they can quickly "attract the attention" of users and be shared and collected to achieve the purpose of secondary dissemination.

In this article, Zhu Zhu will share his own understanding of content in the Internet era and several tips for writing popular content from four aspects. Everyone is welcome to add comments:

1. Topic selection: sensitive and sharp insight, "playing" with user psychology

Insight means insight into human nature. Human nature here includes both advantages such as "love, compassion, mercy, gratitude, responsibility, kindness, diligence, bravery, and tolerance", as well as shortcomings such as "arrogance, jealousy, rage, laziness, greed, gluttony, and lust".

The insight of topic selection means that when we select content, we must carefully consider the psychological demands of specific users, grasp the key points, and then create content that can better address user pain points.

In Zhu Zhu's opinion, insightful material selection requires two points: 1. User segmentation; 2. Time popularity

Segment users, that is, choose materials that are consistent with the product user portrait as much as possible , and choose content that the main product users are concerned about. Segmented content for specific user groups is also a vertical segmentation demand for the development of Internet content. To grasp the insightful content of user segmentation, first, we need to analyze the user's age and occupation; second, we need to observe the specific external atmosphere to see if there is any heat that can be leveraged ; third, we need to comprehensively consider finding a small entry point that can combine the product and the user to carry out divergent conception of content.

The above theory is a bit boring, so let me give you an example of my own. In his spare time, Zhu Zhu has been exploring the characteristics of Internet content and experimentally operating a WeChat subscription account . At present, the public account has attracted a group of post-90s grassroots users with 1-3 years of work experience through the two major sections of "Life Diary" and "Operation Notes". Zhu Zhu regularly uses public account messages and group chats to start a topic, then guides them to join the discussion, and finally compiles several representative cases in the article. These topics are basically the "weird boss", promotion and salary increase, "rent increase" and other workplace life, social hot spots, etc. that this group is concerned about.

September and October of each year are the second golden period for job hopping in the year. During this period last year, Zhu Zhu heard that many of his friends born in the 1990s were planning to change jobs. Zhu Zhu then realized that this might represent the thoughts of some grassroots employees in the workplace. After grasping this point, Zhu Zhu raised the topic of reasons for resignation in the user group . After the topic was guided, several related character stories indeed emerged. Zhu Zhu collected and selected a story from the materials provided by users, and sorted out two examples of friends in life, and wrote an article titled "Do you think I work just for a few thousand dollars that will not starve me to death? 》 , which reflects the job-hopping mentality of the post-90s generation at the grassroots level in the workplace who “advocate a comfortable and fulfilling working atmosphere and do not compromise” through short stories.

This reason for leaving is different from the commonly thought reason of "too low salary" , and it is a keen insight into this group. Two days after I launched the WeChat subscription account and Toutiao simultaneously, I received objective data on reading, sharing, forwarding, even reprinting and appreciation. Many users even left messages at the end of the article to express their feelings about job hopping and resigning. This article is also one of the few articles in my "Life Diary" section with relatively good overall data.

Now, through this case, I will summarize how I gain insight into users’ psychological needs and continue to explore them .

• First, discover universal psychological demands through unconscious conversations with target users in daily life;
• Second, grasp the appeal points, organize topics and discuss with target users, verify opinions and enrich materials;
• Third, organize and enrich the materials, clarify the core ideas, and organize them into a written document. During the whole process, Zhu Zhu found that keen insight into specific users is the most basic and critical step, which is related to subsequent work such as the central idea and expression form of the writing. Insights into user psychology also directly affect users’ click-through rate , jump rate, etc. of articles.

So, how can we improve our insight and keenly understand user psychology?

First, we should seize every opportunity to "chat" and find out what the user group cares about during the interaction.

First of all, you should communicate more with the target users of the product around you, consciously or unconsciously , and discover users’ demands during conversations. Secondly, communicate more with product users. When you feel like you don’t know what to write, chat with people more . Maybe your creative ideas will come out during the conversation.

Second, read more and be sensitive to major hot topics.

You should develop the habit of browsing PC portals, Tieba forums, social tools , mobile clients and other carriers that can present content, pay attention to hot topics in a timely manner and seek out key points of content related to the product. Different user groups have different opinions on hot topics. How to write content with high click-through rates in hot topics requires us to grasp the characteristics of our own users and start from small points to avoid blindly following others.

After having a higher level of insight, you also need to find the right time to capture the user's "enthusiasm" . Now let’s look back at Zhu Zhu’s case. This article of mine was published during the “job-hopping season”. This also takes advantage of the needs of some users this quarter. When they see content they care about this quarter, they will naturally click on it. If we change the time period, the data presented will be difficult to estimate.

Hotspots can be roughly divided into two types: 1. Seasonal and regular holiday hotspots; 2. Sudden social hotspots.

The reason why hot spots are "hot" is that they are extremely time-sensitive. If you need to take advantage of the trend, it must be completed within 24 hours . If it is a sudden hot spot, it is best to launch content that takes advantage of the trend within 2 hours to seize user time, and then launch serialized content.

In the Internet age, content, in addition to keen insight, also needs a title that arouses users' desire to click. The second part explains the characteristics of the title.

2. Title: Information aggregation and link content, quickly attract attention and distinctive features

The title is the "eye" of the article. It is a highly condensed summary of the main content and central idea, and has a great influence on the content of the article. Times are changing, and although the carriers of content presentation are changing, the role of "title" remains unchanged, especially in the Internet age where content is presented by "clicking links " . An obvious feature of content presentation on PC/mobile terminals in the Internet era is that the first thing presented is the “title aggregation page”.

Users will decide whether to open the link text after the title based on their interest in the title. This way of presenting content is significantly different from the previous era of engraving and printing. In the Internet age, the title + content will not be presented directly to users, but the title is the first thing presented to users. Only by catching the user's "eyes" with the title can you retain the user with the subsequent content , so the title is crucial.

Zhu Zhu divides the titles into the following categories according to his own understanding. If you have better opinions, please add them. The following are explained separately:

First, story-type titles

As the name suggests, a story-type title presents story elements such as characters, time, and place in the title to attract users to read. In addition, they will deliberately create suspense in the title to highlight the curiosity and mystery of the content and attract users to click. This type of title is often used by "push-based" self-media such as Toutiao and UC Toutiao. Appropriate titles can get higher data push. Therefore, it is very easy for such titles to produce irrelevant and overgeneralizing headlines . However, "clickbait" only attracts users' attention temporarily. What really retains users is good content with flesh and blood and rich emotions. This is consistent with the concept that the essence of operation requires good products.

Second, chicken soup titles

This is a "chicken soup article" on WeChat public accounts, a title format often used. This type of title is often a highly condensed version of the article, using one sentence to explain a truth or present a certain point of view . Generally speaking, those that are slightly different from the public's thinking patterns tend to have a higher opening rate. Mimi Meng 's "toxic chicken soup" is the best example.

To write a brilliant title for this kind of chicken soup, you need to pay attention to two points: first, the point of view should be small and novel, and you should have your own unique insights to avoid blindly following others; second, the language should be concise, simple and direct to highlight your own point of view; third, use "you" and "I" as much as possible in the title. Such first and second person pronouns can narrow the distance with users and increase the user opening rate; finally, there should be a certain emotion between the lines to express your own point of view and bring certain emotions to the reading users. For example, the case Zhu Zhu just cited earlier, "Do you think I work just for a few thousand dollars so I won't starve to death? ", this rhetorical question with a questioning tone expresses a certain point of view in a very emotional way, so it can touch the hearts of some people, making them click in unconsciously.

Third, knowledge sharing titles

The titles of useful articles are simple and concise. They directly summarize the useful information that the article wants to share or select small and novel ideas in an article. Articles that provide valuable information have clear user segments and "non-entertainment" purposes , that is, users who read the articles are there for the purpose of learning. Therefore, the title must be concise and highlight the theme, that is, it should allow users to understand what you are talking about in the shortest time. There is no need to consider too many emotions in the title or to be mysterious and play some word games . Zhu Zhu suggested that the title of the learning content should use as many numbers as possible to summarize the main points of the article , so that users can understand the content structure of the sharing in the shortest time and it is easier to make specific details.

Fourth, news and information titles

This type of title is a very common news and consulting title. The same title goes straight to the core of the content and does not require too many gimmicks and suspense. The more formal and serious the platform is, the more conventional it should be. There are a lot of titles in this column, so I won’t list them all here. You can see a lot of them by opening any of the major news portals.

These different categories of titles, and even different self-media platforms , have different characteristics. The above title classifications and characteristics are for reference only and are not set in stone. Everyone should combine the products, content and the rules of the corresponding self-media platforms they are stationed in, analyze specific problems according to the actual situation, practice more, summarize more, and keep writing and thinking. In Zhu Zhu's opinion, no matter how the external factors change, any title that can reflect the main content and embody one's own views is a good title. Regarding how to write a good title, Zhu Zhu has a few more tips to add, which are also for reference only :

a Celebrity

Celebrities have their own IP attributes and a large number of followers. Their words and deeds are easily believed and followed. If the content contains parts related to celebrities, the celebrities should be presented accordingly in the title. Below, Zhu Zhu takes two titles of a WeChat article as examples:

Original title: Meditate for 10 minutes every day to delay aging and look younger

Current title: Sitting like this makes you as beautiful as Fan Bingbing, with firm skin and 10 years younger

This is a soft article launched by a yoga public account, which mainly introduces how to meditate and sit in silence. In fact, the content of the article has nothing to do with Fan Bingbing. The title at the beginning is an extremely ordinary title. After modifying the title, users can think of tangible celebrity personalities when they see the title, so some beauty-loving target women will click in unconsciously.

b. Concrete presentation of abstract concepts

This is to say, we should try to make the unit nouns of abstract concepts as specific and figurative as possible in the title, so that people can have an intuitive and vivid feeling. This is particularly suitable for some explanatory articles that introduce specific products. Zhu Zhu gives another example:

Original title: 10cm small black umbrella for sunny and rainy days, easy to carry and very practical

Current title: A small black umbrella that is as big as an iPhone 8 and can be used in both sunny and rainy days. It can fit even the smallest bag!

This is a soft article launched by the Sun Umbrella WeChat official account, and its user group is mainly young women . The original title uses numbers to accurately show the length of the umbrella and its convenient and portable features. But it won't have a deep impact on you when you read it, and you still can't get a specific idea of ​​how big this umbrella is, especially for women who are not sensitive to numbers. After changing the title to the second one, set the reference to the popular iPhone 8. This will allow people to intuitively feel the size of the umbrella and also take advantage of the hot spot, which will naturally increase the opening rate.

3. Content: clear and straightforward viewpoints, narrative and discussion, eye-catching step by step

After talking about the title, the next part is the very important content body. Most users who read content on the Internet have a "fast food" reading mentality , which means that they will not read an article at the speed of reading a printed book, nor will they carefully consider the meaning between the lines like we do when studying Chinese textbooks. On the contrary, if I find a line or two obscure or incomprehensible, I will quickly jump out of the text. Therefore, what content entities in the Internet era need to do is to "retain" users' attention step by step . Regarding this part, Zhu Zhu also summarized four points for reference only.

First, get straight to the point and make your point clear.

This means that we should directly state the purpose of the article at the beginning of the content. The role is like the "lead" in news reports, which quickly cuts into the topic and allows users to understand what you do. At this time, we must learn to temporarily forget the writing skills we learned in Chinese class, such as first suppressing and then praising, and blending scenes, and make sure users quickly understand your purpose.

Second, use less reference and more exploration, focus on "I", and write more about the people and things around you

In the Internet age, the convenience of “ctrl+c” and “ctrl+” in extracting information has also made content homogeneity increasingly serious. At the same time, users see and watch more, their tastes become more and more picky, and their requirements for content become higher and higher. Therefore, high-quality, original content with personality is in short supply . This also requires my content producers to focus on "me", write more original things around them, refer less to examples, and form their own unique and irreplaceable style . When Zhu Zhu said this, I am not asking everyone to stop paying attention to competitors. On the contrary, I am asking you to pay more attention to them. I am not asking you to imitate their choice of words and sentences, but to pay attention to their content output rules, material selection key points and other more macro things.

Zhu Zhu also has personal experience on this point. Most of the operational articles I wrote are summaries of my own experience. Therefore, when writing, I did not refer too much to other similar articles. They are the kind of self-written summaries. At first I was still doubting whether my language was too straightforward, my insights were too basic, or my categorization was correct, but when I saw that my content was becoming more and more popular with users, my doubts gradually dispelled.

Third, narrative and discussion, with case studies as the main focus

Users often read articles online for the purpose of leisure and entertainment . Therefore, we should use less theoretical content and more vivid story cases to attract users' attention and make them read easily. Most of the current “chicken soup type” public accounts adopt this structure. To sum up, the structural pattern is nothing more than this template form of " a short text at the beginning + story + a short text discussion + story + a short text discussion + story + a short text discussion + story + summary ", with three stories supporting the main body of the article . Users also like to read such articles. However, the story you choose must be consistent with the main points of your argument and must be feasible. You can also try this mode.

Fourth, it should not be too long and should be combined with pictures and text

Soft articles must not be too long. It is generally recommended to be around 1,500 words. Text that is too long will test the user's reading patience. For non-knowledge sharing content, you must pay attention to the length. It is absolutely not advisable to have as many words as I have now. In addition, keep the combination of pictures and text to avoid the dullness of pure text.

4. Reply: Message interactivity to show personalized demands

This part mainly involves the interaction with users after the content is published, mainly the replies in the comment section of the copy content. The purpose of doing this is to make users feel that they are interacting with a real and vivid life, rather than communicating with a simple lifeless product/brand. In the Internet age, more and more brands pay attention to personalized imagery, and use tangible and visible characters to narrow the distance between brands and users and increase opportunities for communication with users. Proper response and interaction is an important way to showcase your brand image. to this end,

• A: Try your best to respond and reply to all user messages/comments within 24 hours , interact with users in a friendly manner, narrow the distance between you and users and increase their sense of being valued.
• B: No matter when and where, keep the reply language style consistent so that users can have a consistent perception of the brand's personality.

Well, the above are some of the experiences shared in this article. This film is quite long, so it took me a long time to write. Everyone is welcome to add to it and share your thoughts. The next article will mainly talk about the skills that you need to master as a senior content operator . If you are interested, please continue to pay attention.