I've been getting into the habit every week of sharing a video to LinkedIn with a simple content tip. I've mostly been covering titles so far, but this week I thought I'd dive into a topic that's of interest to me, namely whether your content should be useful or clever. I have uploaded it to YouTube so that readers who haven't connected with me on LinkedIn can still see (here's my profile if you want to say hi).

Here's my two cents:

Your first instinct when writing content should be to be helpful, not clever.

I admire clever writing as much as the next person, but when it’s valued above substance it quickly loses its lustre, particularly in the B2B sector where your aim, surely, is to establish your value as an expert. The error then is that you’d be making the content about yourself, and not your audience.

Clever writing might earn you a few admirers, but helpful writing will help you establish meaningful relationship, and win over prospects. 

So do spend time crafting beautiful sentences but don’t do it to the detriment of meaning.

That’s my takeaway: it’s all about not them, it’s not about you.

If you need more tips for creating accessible and helpful writing, my colleague Eugene wrote a great post here.