A blank sheet of paper in front of you and the question to write something about yourself. Do you immediately clam up? You are not alone. Describing your company, product or service often feels just as uncomfortable. Yet, good SEO texts determine whether your message comes across and where your website will appear in search results.
When developing a website, the focus is usually on features and design. But to the question “what about the texts?” the usual replies are “we can use those from the old site”, “the same text as in the brochure”, or ” we’ll get to that later…”.
The importance of text is often overlooked. And yet, attractively describing what you have to offer is more important than ever. To be found in Google and to convince your customers, good SEO texts are indispensable.
Article for Weducon Technologies: research, text, SEO, layout, illustration, translation into German and Spanish, social media publication.
How do you write good SEO texts?
For compelling, readable SEO copy, you need to think about who you are writing for. Your target audience, that is. Knowing who belongs to your target audience is the beginning. Where do their interests lie and what problems do they encounter? How can you help them? What do you have to offer that your competitor does not? And last but not least, how do you package that information – what does your ideal audience find appealing?
Things to avoid
Even though you know your product or service like no one else, just writing about your strengths and those of your product is not the best approach. In fact, it is just as annoying as a conversation with someone who only talks about himself. Most of all, your text should express engagement and interest in your audience.
Although keyword research is indispensable in discovering the needs of your audience, writing for search engines and stuffing your text with keywords is not the way to engage people. Your text will become unnatural, and your readers (as well as search engines) will drop out.
But … how do you ensure your texts rank high in search engines?
Search engines’ revenue model depends on providing the best answers to our search queries. Algorithms are therefore getting better at recognizing valuable information and analyzing the length of an article, sentence length, consistency and readability.
Texts with the same keyword too often or other SEO tricks are not rewarded with a high ranking; on the contrary. The originality of an article also plays a role. Are you copying an interesting article from a competitor? Google knows, in most cases, when the original was published and will not reward you with a high ranking*.
Does your page give the best answer to a question? Is your information popular? The more visitors and links from other sites your website attracts, the higher your search engine ranking.
So it all starts with an easy-to-read, well-researched and original story. Next, you need to help Google and Bing find your story. With a balanced distribution of keywords and their synonyms, structured data (schema.org), headings that serve as signposts, descriptive images, and meta-descriptions.
Essential steps for SEO texts that work
In summary, texts that yield results are always well-prepared and written for people, not search engines. So whether you get started yourself or outsource the writing, don’t skip these steps:
- Make sure to know your target audience and what problems and questions they have
- Research how your product or service can help your target market
- Ask yourself what sets you apart from your competition
- Perform keyword research
I help you perform these steps and write (SEO) texts for your website, social media and press releases. Texts that tell a good story and portray you as an expert and an authority in your field.
How I can help you write and publish your story
Writing copy is just a part of a process with the goal: Publishing a story that gets read and moves readers to action. Sometimes you need help coming up with interesting topics for your article. Or maybe you want to publish your article in more languages. Texts are also better read if they contain appealing images or illustrations.
I can help you with that too! In addition to copywriting, clients in various sectors use my complementary services such as:
- Suggesting topics for blog and social media posts based on USPs and trends
- Research
- Layout, including images or technical illustrations
- Implementation of your texts in CMS or HTML site
- Addition of structured data and metadata for search engines
- Social shareability
- Translation implementation and support
- Writing and publishing your social media posts
Want to know more about search engine-friendly texts? Or do you need help writing or publishing your texts because you don’t have time for it yourself? Contact me!
