These days, anyone who is realistically looking into setting up his or her business online is bound to come across the term ‘content writing’ at one point or another. In the simplest of terms, content writing can be defined as the creation of written text in a variety of different forms, such as:

• Articles
• Forums
• Blogs
• News Updates
• Reviews

Generally speaking, the term ‘content writing’ could easily apply to all types of writing on the internet. However, as many online entrepreneurs will recognize, everything in the world of business has multiple facets, types and categories, and content is no different. A five hundred word piece of content on any single subject could be written in hundreds of different ways, and only one or two types of content writing will be relevant for the specific purpose or goal you are trying to achieve. Many people who do not realise this make the mistake of using the incorrect content in particular places, and by doing this, they miss out on the success that they could otherwise be generating.

Ghost Writing

One particular type of content writing called ‘Ghost Writing’ is the situation wherein content is written by one particular person, but is used by another person under his or her own name. Often, in the internet marketing world, you can find many writing services that offer SEO articles under the category of ghost writing. The client can then take the SEO articles and subsequently post them on other people’s blogs, in directories or even in his or her own blog.

Web Content Writing

Web content writing or marketing content is a descriptive piece of text based on the idea of advertising or selling a service or product. Often, you will see plenty of examples of this kind of content on websites where the purpose or business of that website needs to be explained and advertised to the general population. Often, the objective of this particular style of writing is to draw visitors to the business domain through search engine results, but also to ensure that the visitor is encouraged towards a desired action, such as buying a product or hiring a service.

Press Release Writing

Once, in traditional terms, press releases were used within businesses to make customers more aware of the updates and developments taking place within a particular industry or company. Press releases were used to announce the arrival of a new and improved product or department, the expansion of the business, new mergers, important business events that were taking place and new marketing deals. However, in the modern media of today, the term ‘press release’ can be regarded somewhat differently, even though some businesses still commit themselves to following the original format. Press release in new, and digital media are often used as a form of sales pitch by medium or small organizations, allowing them to act as part of the sales-central or marketing areas of content.

Technical Writing

Technical writing is the type of content that is often restricted to particular complex or complicated industries and technical concepts. The purpose of this kind of writing is to attempt to simplify or convey a complicated idea to the general public, whether they are from the same industry or not. A good example of technical writing in everyday life would be if you were to see scientific evidence or content being written and exposed to mainstream media, allowing information that would otherwise require expertise and advanced knowledge to be recognized and understood by the common man.

Although these examples display some of the forms that content writing can take on the internet today, there are constantly new and evolving forms of content to see.