Blog Posts Can Have Similar Settings, Yet Tell Different Stories

Readers first meet both J.M. Barrie’s character Peter Pan and Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist in bedrooms, we’re reminded in Everything You Need to Ace English Language Arts in One Big Fat Notebook. But of course these two texts tell very different stories, because each author wants to emphasize different things. Life is peaceful and private in Peter Darling’s home, while Oliver sleeps on a rough hard bed in a large orphanage.

It’s the same with blog posts, I teach at Say It For You. Today’s post can slant in one direction; tomorrow’s can take the same theme and deal with it in a different way, perhaps appealing to different segments of the business’ (or the practice’s) audience. Different posts can offer valuable information and advice relating to different aspects of your product or service offerings.

The Oliver Twist approach:
Using the Oliver Twist setting, content writers aim to demonstrate they understand the challenges the readers are facing. It must be clear that you (or the business owner or professional practitioner client you represent) understand online searchers’ concerns and needs.

The Peter Pan approach:
Using the Peter Pan setting model, in contrast, means helping readers visualize themselves “soaring”, picturing the end result – the relief, wealth, ease, pride, and comfort they stand to achieve through following the advice in the blog post. While the Peter Pan story is far from realistic, it’s important to describe realistic, achievable and easily identifiable signs that will tell clients that they are on a trajectory leading towards the desired outcomes.

Whichever approach you select for the “setting” of any one post, the authors of Everything You Need to Ace English Language Arts in One Big Fat Notebook offer a “sound argument checklist” blog content writers will find useful:

1. Everything must relate to the central idea.
2. All the evidence must be relevant.
3. Word choice is important, including analogies and allusions.

“Fiction is imaginary,” the authors conclude, “but that doesn’t mean we can’t learn anything from it,” At Say It For You, our business blog content writers know that’s certainly the case!
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