Turn the work you already do into content worth reading

The best content in your firm is already happening. It is in the questions clients ask on calls, the thing you explained twice this week, and the mistake you helped somebody unpick. The only missing piece is a habit for writing it down.

The ten minute capture habit

1. 01Keep one running note called 'things clients asked me'.
2. 02After any call where you explained something twice, add the question in the client's own words.
3. 03Every Friday, pick the one that came up most often.
4. 04Write your answer in under 300 words, exactly as you said it out loud.

Sources hiding in plain sight

• Onboarding questions from new clients. These are the fears of every prospect you have not met yet.
• The email you have sent more than three times. That is a blog post already written.
• Deadline season panic. Whatever caused it, explain it two months earlier next year.
• Software you rolled out and what actually changed, including what went wrong.
• The advice you gave that the client ignored, and what happened.

Write client stories that are allowed to be published

Ask permission at the point of the win, not six months later. If permission is not available, anonymise properly: sector, size, situation, outcome. 'A construction firm turning over 6 million came to us mid year with two years of unfiled accounts' is compelling without naming anyone.

Nobody else can publish your client conversations. That is exactly why they are the most valuable content you own.

Keep the bar low enough to clear

A 250 word answer to a real question, published this week, beats the definitive 2,000 word guide you will start in the autumn. Publish the small useful thing. Do it again next week.