No doubt about it – Hemmingway is genius.

From  his  word  economy  to  his  ability  to  express  powerful  emo7ons  without  resor7ng  to  purple  prose,  there’s  a  lot  that  content  writers  could  stand  to  take  from  the  books  of  Hemmingway.  

Let’s start with Hemmingway’s timeless lessons on the importance of brevity.

Your reader’s attention span is only so long.

There’s  a  legend  that  says  Hemmingway  was  challenged  to  write  a  story  in  10  words  or  less.    His  story?  

For Sale: baby shoes, never used.

For  something  so  short,  this  sentence  contains  a  beginning,  a  middle,  and  an  end  –  it  also  certainly  says  a  lot!  

If you can say something in 300 words, don’t use 450! There’s no golden number in any sort of content

writing. However, less is generally more.

“I like to listen. I have learned a great deal from listening carefully. Most people never listen.”

Want  to  become  the  go-­‐to  content  writer  for  all  of  your  clients?  Listen.  And  listen  carefully.  Make  sure  that  you  understand  all  of  the  project  requirements  straight  off  the  bat.  Not  only  will  this  endear  you  to  clients,  but  it’ll  save  you  7me  and  money.    Nobody  likes  rewrites!  

Writers who listen make themselves invaluable.

“As a writer, you should not judge, you should understand.”

It’s  inevitable  that  you  will  work  with  a  client  at  some  point  who  has  a  perspec7ve  or  a  business  philosophy  that  isn’t  going  to  align  with  yours.  Unless  you’re  offering  sales  consul7ng,  it’s  not  your  job  to  correct  a  client’s  sales  approach.  

Remember, a content writer is a ghost writer. You should blend into any situation.

“Prose is architecture, not interior decoration.”

If  you’ve  ever  goOen  halfway  down  a  page  and  thought,  “Wait,  what  am  I  wri7ng  about  again?”  you’re  decora7ng,  not  building  walls.  

Keep  your  wri7ng  clean  and  func7onal.  Think  load-­‐bearing  walls  and  protec7ve  roofs.  Your  wri7ng  is  not  paisley  wallpaper.  

With that said, architecture should still be attractive! Keep it on point and beautiful, just like Hemmingway.

Content  Equals  Money  is  a  content  wri7ng  service  that  serves  a  wide  variety  of  clients  with  top-­‐shelf,  sharable  content.  Our  goal  is  to  work  with  small  companies  in  order  to  help  them  reap  the  same  results  from  content  marke7ng  as  the  Fortune  500  companies.  Content  marke7ng  is  truly  scalable  and  can  work  for  all  businesses  and  business  sizes!