Great website content is informative to both readers and search engines and sets you apart from your competition. There is no denying that creating effective website content is an important part of any digital marketing plan. But how do we do that? Let’s discuss the top 10 ways to create content that serves your business.
Top 10 Rules for Writing Effective Website Content
- Write to your buyer personas
A buyer persona is a semi-fictional description of your ideal customer(s) based on data and research that you have conducted. Write content that would both interest and answer their questions. Do this by asking yourself what kinds of questions they would ask online and write content that answers those questions.
- Research competitor websites
Digital marketing is largely about creating a strategy that will drive traffic to your website by beating your competitors in search results rankings. Before you start writing content, it makes sense to take a look at what your top competitors have written about. How informative is their content? How readable is it? What sorts of topics or questions do they cover? Take notes and then figure out a way to make your content that much better.
- Put the meat of the content at the top
Most people are busy and skim articles. This means that when someone clicks onto your content, you only have a few seconds to grab their attention and give them the information they are looking for. Never bury your main points at the bottom of the page – the meat of your content should be at the top where readers are most likely to absorb the information.
- Make the content easy to skim
Making content easy to skim is important for readers but also for search engines. Breaking content into logical paragraphs and using paragraph headers and bullet points are some of the most important tools a writer can use to make it easy for readers to navigate your content.
- Write at an 8th-grade reading level
Professional industries such as law firms, may be tempted to write their website content in a scholarly tone with legal jargon but this is only effective when writing for other attorneys. When it comes to blog posts, service pages and the home page; the content should be written in a way that’s accessible to all. Forget unusual, “fancy” words and industry “speak.” Your sentences should never be long and complicated.
- Provide examples
If you need to explain a tricky subject - especially one that involves numbers - providing “real-life” examples is the best way to make your points clear. Examples create a visual image that readers can understand and/or relate to.
- Avoid repeating words over and over
While it’s important to identify primary and secondary keywords for your content, try to avoid repeating a single keyword multiple times within one article. This can lead to getting dinged by search engines for “keyword stuffing” but it also just makes the article much less enjoyable to read. This goes for non-keywords as well; try to use a variety of descriptive words to avoid using the same words over and over.
- Always use an image or video
All written content should have a visual component. It helps draw readers in and provides insight into what the content is about. Images can also be optimized to help search engines understand more about what the content you’ve created is all about.
- Link content within your website
Where it makes sense, link content to other content within your website. You may be writing about one of your services but make reference to how it ties into another service, for example. Use this opportunity to provide a link to the other service. The more time a potential customer spends on your site learning about you and what you offer, the better. It’s all part of the buyer journey.
- Always include a call to action or offer
When it comes to your content, there should always be a goal aside from it being read. What action would you like the reader to take? Providing a link to something valuable such as an e-book or a free evaluation of their current website can be a way to entice potential customers further along the buyer journey. In other cases, they may be ready to book or buy and a simple call to action link or button may be the way to go.
Look for a Digital Marketing Agency
Softwired provides digital marketing solutions for our clients and partner agencies. We’ve got you covered for web design, blogs, landing pages, SEO, local online presence and optimization, digital marketing, and social media marketing. We build websites with WordPress themes and have also been using the HubSpot platform to build blogs and landing pages since 2012.
Over the years, we’ve worked with lots of clients who need help with web engineering and digital marketing tasks but don’t have in-house staff. Finding freelancers can be a nightmare and cause a lot of problems when promising delivery of service. Whether you’re interested in web design only or more; we’re ready to help you get started!
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