This week: Solve Your Writer’s Problems Edited by: Jayne  
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Hi, again! We’re continuing on our journey of contest creation and overhaul. If you’re surprised that we started from such a high level of planning, don’t be. We will get into the nuts and bolts of set up or revamping in the next few issues. It’s important to examine these broader concepts to ensure you’re confident about why you’re developing your contest or activity, and who you’re catering to. More importantly, you have to know why and how you’re meeting their needs.
If you’re looking to catch up, we started here: "Who Is Your Audience?" . We covered the basics of how your contest/activity is your brand, and why that matters.
The second issue is here: "Have I Made Myself Clear?" , where we tackled the three types of problems your writers face and touched on the concept of clarity. We answered the question about clarity of purpose and message—what your role as a contest/activity owner is.
This entire series is adapted for our needs from Storybrand by Donald Miller.
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When you sit down to map out your contest or activity, you’ll want to take a minute or two to identify the problem you’re solving. We previously discussed how you’re not the hero, but we also mentioned it’s preferable if you’re not the villain. So, how do you go about selling this external, semi-tangible thing to an audience looking for an external solution to an internal problem?
Start by identifying and personifying the villain. Your writers won’t necessarily ever see your behind-the-scenes work, but in some cases, personifying the internal fight your writers experience can motivate them to start tapping the keys.
The Writer’s Villains
For our purposes, the villain will typically fall under one of these categories:
 Too challenging/not enough of a challenge
Not enough time/distractions/too many overlapping contests
Too expensive (auctions/raffles)
No payoff/not enough payoff/too little recognition
Instructions unclear – no clue what to do
When addressing these villains, keep them relatable. We already know writers suffer from at least one of these problems from time to time. By keeping them reasonable and grounded, you also won’t blow everything out of proportion. While there may be a gap you identify, you don’t want to overwhelm yourself.
Keeping the categories of villains in mind, this is where you become the guide, offering a path that lays the road around these problems. You answer the most important question: Why?
Why is it important to take part in this?
Why do I care about the stakes?
Why are you trying to cater to me? Is there a deeper connection to this activity I’m missing?
Why do you think you can give me more incentive/meaning with your activity/contest/prompts?
Solve Your Writer’s Problems
By identifying the villains plaguing your writers, you can tap into their external, internal and philosophical needs. You won’t be able to solve every problem, nor should you try to. However, if you identify one to center your concept around, you’ll often find a few others synergistically fall into place.
While this isn’t an exhaustive list, here’s some examples. Note that I didn’t provide any solutions—that’s between you, your activity, and your writers.
Villain: Boring, repetitive prompts.
External: I want to write something.
Internal: I want to write something new, but I’m not sure I’m any good outside my comfort zone.
Philosophical: My writing should let me explore deeper themes and character development in a way that doesn’t leave me feeling embarrassed.
Villain: Lack of time.
External: My IRL commitments are keeping me from writing as much as I would like.
Internal: I want to write something meaningful that I can pull off quickly.
Philosophical: I already feel guilty I don’t spend enough time writing, and now I can’t find any prompts that inspire without having to write for 30 days or complete 2,000 words to even be considered.
Villain: The Landing Page
External: To much text, dense explanations, hard to capture the message.
Internal: I’m confused, is there a contest in here somewhere?
Philosophical: I’m probably the only one who doesn’t “get it”. I need to find something that I understand, something that speaks to me.
Villain: The Rules
External: Unclear rules/too many rules (says the lady from The Quills. I’m aware.)
Internal: I don’t understand these rules/why is this even a rule?
Philosophical: I could never win something this complicated. I’m not good enough.
Villain: The Rubric
External: Very complicated judging criteria or lack of judging criteria.
Internal: What am I being judged on?
Philosophical: I probably don’t have a chance of winning anything.
Villain: Overlapping contests
External: Demands on time.
Internal: Haven’t I seen this before? Didn’t I just do this somewhere else?
Philosophical: Maybe I’ve outgrown this place.
Help Your Writers Achieve Success
Your role is to help your writers both achieve success and avoid failure. Basically, even if they don’t win, they should still have a positive experience. Help them through both these scenarios by keeping the following in mind:
Avoiding failure:
“Participation” awards shouldn’t come across as “well, you made an attempt, I guess.” Real feedback, honest discussions and sincere rewards mean a lot.
Help them understand the stakes beyond the prize. While you want to avoid blatantly playing to the ‘fear of missing out’, there should be a cost of not doing something.
How are you going to keep negativity out of the pool? It should be clear, upfront and you must be ready to back it up.
Achieving success:
Don’t assume people automatically understand something just because you do. Explain it in plain language.
Don’t assume people will recognize rules are in multiple places. Make them easy to find and keep them together.
Don’t assume everyone knows how to do everything on the site. Provide clear instructions in plain language and offer demonstrations where needed.
Don’t assume your writers are confident in their abilities. You may be the guide, but you carry a cheerleading outfit in your backpack. Make previous examples available.
Don’t assume people understand why your contest/activity is important or will have an impact on them (contests/activities) or the site (for fundraisers). You need to explain, in plain language, how and why their participation matters.
It’s essentially an offshoot of SHOW DON’T TELL for nonfiction copy. If you can wrap your head around that, you’re going places.
Community Within Community
Building up a base takes time. Sometimes there’s an initial rush to an activity, but it dies down. Participation will wax and wane. If you’re met with crickets, maybe you addressed the wrong villain, or you found the right villain, but the solution didn’t address the correct need. Asking for feedback from the community is not a sign of weakness. You won’t get answers to the questions you don’t ask.
Your planning will be the foundation your community builds itself on, which is why all this critical examination of what you’re doing matters. By having a philosophy people can get behind, a stable commitment from you and an open agreement that anything new is a process, you can meet their needs and grow your activities together.
Up Next:
April 27: Clean Up Your Copy: The Nuts and Bolts of it All
Clear Messaging
Less is More
Sensible Content Linking
Images and Logos
The One-Sentence Pitch
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Contests & Activities: March 30, 2022 Issue [#11290]
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