Good content marketing is not about selling. Marketing aims to provoke a change in your audience's lives.

The only purpose of writing content is to connect your readers with your brand to help them improve their lives.

If you think about anything else, you're doing it wrong. It is not about your brand (or client's brand); it is about them, the customers.

This must be the only thing you focus on as a content writer or if you review a piece written by a freelancer or in-house writer. It is not the number of words to get better SEO (although it can be helpful to get people in the first place), nor to find more clever wordings.

The key here is empathy.

It is knowing what is in your reader's mind.

Content marketing starts with audience research. It is the essential part and often overlooked.

Because, as simple as it sounds, it is incredibly difficult.

The essential skill to create great content: empathy

You have to make an effort to put yourself in the readers' shoes. You need to understand how they perceive the topic you are writing about and how they feel about it.

Have you ever tried to understand someone else fully?

Almost impossible, even with someone very close, even with your partner. There are always aspects that you don't get.

But you can get close. You know that because you have already read something and told yourself: "This is me! This writer is reading my mind".

You are not there, and neither do I. Not yet.

For now, you feel like you are trying to look through some fog to see the mountains. You don't see them, and you don't know how to do it.

Don't worry; it is a skill that can be learned.

A good exercise is the empathy map. I strongly encourage you to do it.

I didn't do it before writing this piece; thus my words are not hitting you as profoundly as possible if I had taken the time. It's OK. It is a short essay, and I am not trying to trigger an action from you.

What's next?

Once you better understand where your reader stands before reading your content, you can guide them.

You have to move them through the necessary steps to gradually get closer to the solution you propose, the action you want them to take.

Conclusion

Don’t force your content/products into your audience’s mouths. Delight them with the delicious smell of it to appetise them to eat your product.