Seven tips that will make you a stronger writer

Writing advice from Ann Handley, Erica Schneider, Ryan Law, and more...

Author

David Broderick
May 08, 2025

In partnership with

Want to carve out an enviable career in content?

Then you’re gonna need the skills to pay the bills. 

Here are seven tips that will make you a stronger writer from some of the world’s smartest content marketers…

Let’s go 👇

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🏎️ Get straight into it

Let’s begin with beginnings.

Here’s Ryan Law’s tip for how to write a banging intro:

open your article by distilling your entire argument into 1-2 sentences

if you can't, you don't understand your argument clearly enough (and your reader won't either)

get your reader aligned, and focus the rest of your energy on exploring why your argument is true

Wanna see this action?

Check out the opening to Ryan’s recent article GEO, LLMO, AEO… It’s All Just SEO:

✅ Keep a running checklist of client edits

Want to become your clients’ favourite writer?

Stick to this simple but super smart tip from Rosanna Campbell:

Use a checklist for each client with the edits you got the last time.

That way your clients will only ever have to pull you up on something once.

Here’s a real-life example of one of Rosie’s checklists (huge shoutout to Rosie for sharing this with us!):

🧑‍🎨 Use the right kind of visual breaks

Visual breaks will make your content more readable.

But cramming your content full of random AI-generated images ain’t it, folks. 

Here’s what Alex Lindley says you should do instead 👇

Consider ways to visually break up text that don’t involve logging in to a royalty-free images website:

– Bulleted and numbered lists

– Graphs, charts, and tables

– Section headers (H2s, H3s, etc.)

– Block quotes and pull quotes

– Callout boxes

– Embedded media (videos, tweets, GIFs, etc.)

These all reduce walls of text to rubble without making you say "What the heck do I write for the alt text here?"

Here’s Alex putting this into action in his latest article:

🎯 Be brutally specific

“Clarity beats fluff, specificity builds trust, and strong writing never hides behind weak phrases,” says Lily Ugbaja.

Want examples?

Lily’s got ‘em 👇

Vague vs specific:

❌ The platform focuses on helping teams communicate better.

✅ The platform gives teams a shared workspace to organize messages, files, and feedback in one place.

Weak phrases vs strong writing:

❌ “The article focuses on the importance of strong leadership in times of crisis…”

✅ “The article shows how strong leadership keeps teams aligned and motivated during a crisis.”

Passive vs active:

❌ “Growth is based on customer demand.”

✅ “Customer demand drives growth.”

Here's Lily’s top tip for kicking weak writing to the curb:

Ask yourself: Would this sentence still work if I swapped in a completely different topic?

If yes, it's too vague. e.g “This tool focuses on collaboration.” 

It could be about Slack, Asana, Zoom, or 50 others. That’s a problem.

Instead, name names, explain mechanics, and show outcomes.

🏷️ Label the function of each sentence

Feel like something isn’t quite right with a section of an article you’re working on but can’t put your finger on what?

Here’s a hack George Nguyen uses:

Use comments to label the function each sentence is performing. “Strengthens the opinion via consensus” and “Prompts the reader on what they can do” are a couple examples from the screenshot he shares in the article.

This helps you spot what’s missing from the section so you can fill in the gaps yourself before you send it off to your editor.

❓ Quality content in just four questions

What exactly is “quality content”?

If you can honestly answer “yes” to each of these four questions from Erica Schneider after reading your article then I reckon you’re looking at it:

1. Can readers visualize the concepts and extract takeaways they can emulate?

2. Does it speak to the correct audience and their experience/awareness level?

3. Does it include unique, data-driven, experience-based expertise and points?

4. Does it include strategic CTAs, both subtle and obvious, that motivate readers to complete an action?

👑 How to write like Ann Handley

Last but not least:

Ann Handley has distilled 27+ years of writing wisdom into nine short and sweet tips:

1. White space is oxygen.

2. Short paragraphs. Even one sentence long is fine.

3. Make yourself laugh at least 1x in every piece.

4. Write for yourself. Then edit for the reader. Never write and publish the same day.

5. One visual every scroll depth. (Andy Crestodina taught me this!)

6. Create a clear copy hierarchy. Subheads, bullets are your friends. Show your readers eyes where to go.

7. Don’t make 2,000 words feel like 2,000 words.

8. The more scannable your writing is… The more people will read it.  (Great life irony #74.)

9. Hire an outside editor.

🫵 What about you?

Pretty good advice, right?

But I want MORE!

Come let us know the writing advice you live by in Top of the Funnel!

Could be a tip you read somewhere, feedback you got from an editor, or something you’ve stumbled across yourself.

I’d love to hear your top tips, folks!

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