I typically have 5 draft articles in process. I still publish every week but each article now gets about 3 weeks of thinking and re-writing. So I forced myself to slow down the writing process. Plus I was probably making lots of mistakes (See my article Two Ways Writing (and Publishing) Can Make You Stupid). However, early on I became worried that writing and publishing quickly (say in 3-5 days) was resulting in shallow thinking. My schedule is to write only on weekends (I almost never write during the week) and to publish one article per week. So it helps to have a weekly schedule to stick to. I find my thinking is just much clearer when I'm active - and not sitting at a computer. By the time I start typing, the article is usually 75% done.ĭigging into your key question and building an audience are long-term activities. Yes, I seem to have alcohol next to my notepad in both photos. The below picture is my writing spot in Rio. The above picture is my favorite spot for writing in Santorini, Greece. I have a notepad and I just walk somewhere pleasant and think. So I now do most of my writing while walking. I do lots of re-writing and copying and pasting. And over lots of iterations, I eventually get to a good headline (usually). Every time I look at the article, I redo the headline. My approach to writing headlines is to do lots of iterations. If I have a clear and focused headline, the article is much easier to write. But I have found that the headline really does determine your readership. Plus it helps with focus. The truth is the more I play with the headline the worse it generally gets. People say you should spend 50% of your time on the headline. I have found "a unique take on a trending topic" is a good phrase to remember. I look at this topic very differently than most. Most people who write about Chinese consumers focus on market research. My research in competitive dynamics usually gives me a fairly unique take on stories about Chinese consumers and companies like Alibaba and Mobike. You'll note this is different than the question I just said I am researching. What I am doing is leveraging my research into a frequently trending topic (i.e., Chinese consumers and digital China). My writing falls under the tagline of: the fight for Chinese consumers and digital China. I am basically adapting Warren Buffett / Bruce Greenwald / Michael Porter thinking on competitive dynamics to situations like China, digital China and US-China.Ģ: Have a unique take on a trending topic. The question I eventually chose was: " how are competitive advantages different in China (i.e., in developing economies, in cross-border situations, in digital China and in State capitalism). And then just keep digging into it month after month and year after year. And make sure it is valuable to readers and in your own career. If you view writing as mostly a research process, then that's a good approach.Ĭhoose one question you are going to answer with your writing. Looking back, here are 6 things I wish I had known when I started.ġ: Choose one valuable question to focus on.Īlbert Einstein used to say the secret to his success was choosing the right question to answer - and then keeping at it. There was a lot of trial and error (mostly error). But there was a lot of struggle along the way. This is great and something I am really thankful for. Now two years later, I am over 2M followers. It was a pretty frustrating beginning overall. My followers inched up from 500 (my connections) to like 505. Over the next several days, it eventually got about 50-100 reads. I labored over it for about a week and then finally hit "Publish". I posted my first article on LinkedIn on May 22, 2015.
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