Effective copywriting for SEO
Copywriting is completely part of the SEO effort nowadays but ranking is worthless if your site does not convert into sales. Sometimes when browsing webpages I can see websites with a very poor quality of content on the top of SERP (search engines result pages) for very competitive keywords. Visitors on a website won’t read all of your newsletters and articles but they need to stick to your landing page and keep on browsing your products and services. Your content needs to meet certain criteria to have that impact.
First of all your content should be written in a color that is significantly darker than your background, which should be bright. Fancy websites don’t necessarily sell – this is an eCommerce rule that appears to be true in most cases. Overdone, heavy backgrounds and font formats are difficult to read. For best results – keep it clean!
Headlines should be displayed widely – they should put stress on the main topic of the page and they should possibly include your competitive advantage answering the question why visitors should keep on browsing. If your SEO strategy requires a not so attractive header on the page, just put your commercial phrases in an image or a flash. Search engine optimization basically requires an H1 tag per page because Yahoo, Google, MSN and others consider that the real topic of a site should be very visible to the user. Logical isn’t it?
Using sub-headers or, in technical terms, H2 tags is also very useful in terms of keeping customers on the site. The reason for this is that most readers will scan your text quickly – they need to be attracted with highlights in each sub-section.
Every word, every section and every sentence should have the exact same purpose of leading your prospects to the product catalog or product details. The tone of your web site should be one to one as if talking to one person. You should clearly explain the benefits of continuing to browse your site, the real benefit of to them – avoid talking too much about your self. Explaining how great your company is paragraph after paragraph will never be as effective as the writing a sentence that details the real benefit for the visitor in purchasing from you.
Having applied all these principles to your site, keep in mind that many visitors will apprehend buying from you. Some studies show that 80% of visitors find products online but buy offline. You must put your website traffic at ease and create trust. First, display your real business name and phone number since prior to buying visitors want to be sure that there are purchasing from a real company, possibly located in their country. If your site, products or services have an enhanced fraud protection or have received any business awards, it is highly recommended to make them visible to everyone. Also, provide your visitors with the opportunity to read some testimonial content, if possible.
As always, sticking to the basics of sales and using sales techniques online is fully compatible with any SEO strategy. Even if some consultants tell you differently, when working with a good SEO firm, there are always solutions that will allow you to apply your basic sales techniques without hurting your ranking results. Certainly, positioning keywords in specific areas on your site is necessary but the belief that that search engine optimization prevents applying basic online sales techniques it is a misconception.
