Writing for SEO means that you are creating engaging, high-quality content that provides value to a user. SEO content serves two purposes: to help guide a potential customer to your client’s website, and then provide valuable content that will enhance the visitor’s experience. However, I think that SEO writers should think of ourselves as copywriters, rather than content-creators.
The term “copywriting” speaks specifically to writing content for advertising and sales. Many people refer to SEO “content”, but this doesn’t reflect the important role that this SEO content plays as an important marketing tool. The main purpose of SEO writing is to attract, engage, and convert leads. This is the same goal as traditional copywriting. Therefore, I encourage you to start thinking of the work you produce as “copy”, and seeing yourself as an SEO copywriter.
The following tips will help you improve both your SEO copywriting and your more traditional content writing. These tips will help you generate writing that has high-value content, and also ranks highly in searches and improves your conversion rates.
Choose Keywords Carefully
Keywords are words or phrases people enter into search engines to find information and products. Keywords can be tricky, because everyone is optimizing for the most common keywords and you will struggle to stand out using only common keywords. A good idea is to find some keywords that are less commonly used and work them into your strategy alongside more common keywords, so you can stand out in search rankings.
Know What Questions People Ask
A search engine’s main goal is to connect people with helpful information. It does this not only by searching the question asked, but also by remembering and linking to similar questions other people have asked about the same topic. For example, Google has a “People Also Asked” box near the top of its search results. By understanding how people are searching for content like yours, you can create copy that addresses many potential questions.
Understand What People are Searching For
Understanding “search intent” is very important, because search engines want to return quality content to users. A user might use several different keywords and phrases to try to answer the same underlying question. While we just looked at what questions people are actually asking, the intent of the search, or the underlying question, is bigger than that. It is important that you understand exactly what people are searching for, and show them how your website satisfies their question. This is called satisfying search intent. For example, a user who searches, “where to stay in Iceland”, “Reykjavik accommodations”, and “Iceland hotels” is probably planning a trip to Iceland, and if you own a vacation rental there, you want them to find your page.
Know What Your Competitors Are Doing
Industry research is key, for several reasons. First of all, it’s likely that your competitors have already done a bunch of work that you don’t need to replicate. A good example of this is keyword choice. By analysing competitor sites and seeing what keywords they are optimizing for, you can quickly understand what keywords are essential for your industry, and also see where a niche might exist for you to optimise a less-popular search term. Second, you want to make sure you are keeping up with your competition, and that you are updating content and refreshing your pages as often as they are. And if they come out with some exciting new product or idea, you will want to know.
Create Linkable Assets
A linkable asset is a piece of content that other people want to link to. A high-quality linkable asset will organically attract backlinks without you having to work to create these links. Good linkable assets can include many types of content, such as original research, how-to guides, and case studies. The most useful and appropriate type of linkable asset depends on the industry you are in, and this is another reason to regularly research competitors. Seeing what their best linkable assets are can help you plan yours.
Optimize Headers, Title Tags, and Meta Descriptions
When looking at a SERP, or search engine results page, people first see a page’s title tag and meta description. You want these to satisfy search intent and be under 60 characters long, and each unique page should have a unique title tage and meta description. This information should convince a user to click on your link. Once the user is on your website, headers can help them understand the content quickly and decide its relevance.
Create Organized, Easy-to-Read Content
People use search engines to find an answer to a question, and you want them to be able to find that answer quickly and easily. Therefore, your content should be organized, well-formatted, and easy to read. Avoid walls of text, use headers, and keep your content easy to read and engage with.
Include Visuals
Good visuals help keep users engaged and can help them understand your copy better. People are more likely to stay on a page with quality visual content, and to share it on social media. Also, you can use images to support better SEO through your file names and image descriptions. However, large image files can slow your load rate, so make sure files are compressed and your website loads quickly.
Include CTAs (Calls-to-Action)
A call-to-action is anything that encourages the user to move on to the next step on the conversion pathway. This might be a button, an image or banner, a link to a purchase page, or a redirect to more relevant content elsewhere in your website. This can improve your search rankings by reducing bounces and encouraging users to engage with more of your content. Make sure you don’t just put CTAs at the bottom of the page, because many people won’t read all the way to the end.
Include a Table of Contents
A table of contents can help a user understand, quickly, if the information they need is on the page they’ve landed on. This helps satisfy search intent, and will help engage users who are seeking your content. Also, a good table of contents makes navigating the page easier, and improves the experience for the user.
There are many tips and tricks for good SEO copywriting. The important thing is to keep your content high-quality and relevant, and then optimize, optimize, optimize.
