If content is king, process is the power behind the throne
I read an article over at Freelance Switch yesterday called "Dissecting the Logo Design Creation Process". It was one of the most useful articles I've read in a while (or would be if I was regularly called on to design logos).
A while later I realized that the article gave me no advice at all one what makes a good logo, design tips, or ideas for composition, fonts or colors. Instead the article focused entirely on process.
Capturing a process in writing means breaking a task down into a set of steps, and telling the reader what you do in each step.
Don't focus on how to do it well, just how to do it at all. Because this was an article about designing logos, for each step she showed a picture of what she had at the end of that step. So we know exactly what sort of output we can expect.
Most authors I work with don't see the value of writing out a process. Perhaps because once a process is familiar, it seems so obvious as to barely be worth sharing. Yet it is one of the main things I wish all authors of practical books would give me. When you come to teach the reader a new skill, don't try to capture the magical talent, hard earned experience, or special technical knowledge that leads to success. First of all, get the process out clearly. Break the task down into the main steps that you go through when you carry out the task, and simply describe what you do. Show an example as you go.
Try to capture in writing what the reader would see if they were watching you over your shoulder as you did the work yourself.
Once you get into the habit of capturing processes in writing, you'll discover writing can really be quite easy... and that it's suddenly much quicker to fill pages with high quality, relevant writing in a short time. Give it a try.
Here's that article: Dissecting the Logo Design Creation Process. Look at how it's written, and see what you can learn for your own writing.
Of course once that process is set up, the author could give us more information about how to do a good job at each stage... how to find the best imagery, how to come up with cool logo concepts, how to choose the best colours and fonts. She's given her article a strong skeleton, and can now attach as much flesh as she wants.
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