Guidelines for Planning Your Next Article Proposal

List of the most important things to consider when planning and proposing your technical article

Writing an Outline

Along with your topic pitch, I highly recommend you include an outline of your article. This really helps an editor assess the viability of the topic. It also helps you to plan your writing and to ensure it has a clear purpose and goal.

An outline is like a skeleton, showing an article’s limbs and bones. It’s similar to what you’d glean by quickly scanning a finished article: the title and main headings give you a sense of what the article covers, and the first line of each paragraph gives you a bit more detail.

Excerpt

• Thumbnail picture.
• Subtitle or a brief introduction.

Title

Title is crucial as it significantly impacts the article's success. Aim for longer titles (50-60 characters) to enhance reader attraction and SEO potential.

Introduction [optional]

Craft a vital introduction that communicates the article's essence, importance, relevance, and learning objectives. Ensure your outline succinctly covers these key points.

Headings

List main headings in your outline for pitching. These are critical for providing a clear overview, and like the title, carefully word them to summarize the upcoming content effectively.

Table of Content

List of main headlines and key points writing about.

List main points

Under each heading to guide your discussion. Consider them as potential paragraphs. Readers often scan headings and the initial words of paragraphs for a quick overview.

Conclusion [optional]

Wrap up your article with concise thoughts that reinforce main points and guide readers on the next steps. Include a simple list of these concluding points in your outline.

Demo outline

As an example, here’s the outline I put for PHP Clean Code Best Practices. I didn’t want to start writing until I had this clear overview of the article.

[title]
PHP Clean Code Best Practices

[intro]
Writing clean code is an essential part of software development that helps to improve maintainability, readability, and overall quality of the code. [...]

### Table Of Contents

- Use a consistent coding style
- A PHP built-in linter
- The PHP Coding styling tools
- PHP doc comments
- Conclusion

## Use a consistent coding style

## A PHP built-in linter
### Installation and usage

## The PHP Coding styling tools

### PHP CS Fixer
#### Installation and usage
#### Rules

### PHP Code Sniffer
#### Installation and usage

## PHP doc comments

## Additional Resources

## Conclusion

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