{"id":3241,"date":"2013-10-17T20:33:28","date_gmt":"2013-10-17T20:33:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mediashower.com\/blog\/?p=3241"},"modified":"2013-10-18T18:23:04","modified_gmt":"2013-10-18T18:23:04","slug":"the-ten-commandments-of-article-writing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/the-ten-commandments-of-article-writing\/","title":{"rendered":"The Ten Commandments of Article Writing"},"content":{"rendered":"

With a runtime of 220 minutes,\u00a0Cecil B. DeMille and Charlton Heston\u00a0did a good job covering\u00a0the Ten Commandments<\/a>. But\u00a0where oh where were the\u00a0lessons about article writing? We’re not sure what’s tougher:\u00a0writing an article on a stone tablet,\u00a0writing an article on a tablet computer, or\u00a0staying awake through that entire movie. Regardless,\u00a0the demands of writing articles for\u00a0the Internet are crying out for their\u00a0own set of commandments.<\/p>\n

Well here they are. Read them.\u00a0Share them.\u00a0Obey them. Or risk being forever plagued by the ghost of Yul Brenner.<\/p>\n

\"10<\/p>\n

<\/strong>1. Thou Shalt Not Steal From Other Writers<\/h3>\n

This first one’s pretty simple, no? Come up with your\u00a0own ideas or get\u00a0banished to the kingdom of\u00a0plagiarizing hacks\u00a0forever. Or 220 minutes of watching Charlton Heston in sandals. Whichever comes first.<\/p>\n

2. Thou Shalt Craft A Killer Headline<\/h3>\n

Getting your article to stand\u00a0out in a deep red sea of online information\u00a0demands a headline that’s attention-grabbing and relevant to the audience you’re going after. Make it great and never look back.<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0Thou Shalt Open With A Bang<\/h3>\n

The first paragraph of your article should serve as\u00a0the \u201chook\u201d and reel the reader in. Make it\u00a0so compelling that a\u00a0first-time visitor\u00a0to your\u00a0site\u00a0will have no choice but to continue reading. It should also clearly\u00a0state the\u00a0purpose of the\u00a0piece.<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0Thou Shalt Use Subheadings<\/h3>\n

Subheadings, those little bold words that break up the text and serve as mini chapters in articles, are very important.\u00a0It might help to imagine that\u00a0your article is being read by a ferret who’s been weaned on Red Bull, because\u00a0that\u2019s about the average\u00a0online reader’s\u00a0attention span.\u00a0Subheadings help break it up and make it easier to skim ahead.<\/p>\n

5. Thou Shalt Offer Up Ample Eye Candy<\/h3>\n

Be sure to include\u00a0photos in your article, because 4 out of 5 dentists not only approve chewing Trident in between meals,\u00a0they also prefer articles with pictures. The last thing you want to do is irritate a man with sleeping gas and a drill. Or Moses.<\/p>\n

\"moses\"<\/a>

The uh, eye candy.<\/p><\/div>\n

6.\u00a0Thou Shalt Not Drone On And On<\/h3>\n

Again, the reader’s attention span must be catered to. If you can get your point across in\u00a0500 words, you’re\u00a0likely to get the entire article read by more people than if you tripled that word count.\u00a0If the Ten Commandments only needed 70 words, do you really need 2,000?<\/p>\n

<\/h3>\n

7. Thou Shalt Have A Big Closer<\/h3>\n

A great article often ends with a great\u00a0concluding paragraph. If you can sum up your piece with style and a\u00a0satisfying conclusion, you’ll surely have pleased the article gods.<\/p>\n

8. Honour Thy Keywords<\/h3>\n

To improve your article’s searchability, it’s important to have the keywords in\u00a0both the title and the body of the article. For example,\u00a0if you’d like to be the first thing that pops up in a Google search for “220 minutes,” a headline like “5 Better Ways to Spend 220 Minutes” would be pretty neato.<\/p>\n

9. Honour Thy List Articles<\/h3>\n

It’s a fact: People love their\u00a0list articles. “The\u00a06 Surprising Ways to\u00a0Feed\u00a0a Ferret” would probably get clicked on by 90% of the people seeing that headline, even if 70% of them disliked\u00a0ferrets.<\/p>\n

10. Remember The Spellcheck, To Keep It Holy<\/h3>\n

An article riddled with spelling and grammar errors will disappoint everyone reading it, including your closest relatives. Use the software tools at your disposal\u00a0to check for errors, then read it again. Later, after apologizing to your relatives about all the errors in that otherwise stellar ferret piece, have\u00a0someone else take a look at it before posting it.<\/p>\n

\"ferret\"<\/a>

Misspelling ‘ferret’ could turn this\u00a0beast against you.<\/p><\/div>\n

They may not be written in stone (yet) but these 10 article writing tips, commandments if you will, are essential.\u00a0Whether thou is\u00a0writing about\u00a0energy drink-fueled furry critters or ancient Hollywood epics, keep these tenets close and thou will\u00a0have more than a prayer of finding success. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With a runtime of 220 minutes,\u00a0Cecil B. DeMille and Charlton Heston\u00a0did a good job covering\u00a0the Ten Commandments. But\u00a0where oh where were the\u00a0lessons about article writing? We’re not sure what’s tougher:\u00a0writing an article on a stone tablet,\u00a0writing an article on a tablet computer, or\u00a0staying awake through that entire movie. Regardless,\u00a0the demands of writing articles for\u00a0the Internet… Read More…<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":109,"featured_media":3249,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[146,147],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3241"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/109"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3241"}],"version-history":[{"count":25,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3241\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3263,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3241\/revisions\/3263"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3241"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3241"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mediashower.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3241"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}