So you want to start writing good web content? We’ll be honest, there’s no silver bullet. Quality content marketers hone their craft, and tailor their web copy to the channel they’re writing for.
But there are tips you can use to improve your content creation skills, equipping you to rank higher in search results, drive web traffic, and convert more customers. These include:
- Define your purpose
- Know your target audience
- Hook your readers early
- Write how you speak
- Don’t forget a call to action
We cover each of these tips below, so that your web copy and landing pages get the reception they deserve.
1. Define your purpose
Let’s first take a step back. Before you can even think about writing good web content, you need to answer the question, ‘what is our mission statement?’ From there, you can decide your values.
Are you passionate about your industry and looking to make a change? Or are you traditional and deliver to the exact specifications of your clients? Note down what it is that makes you different from everyone else, and why anyone should care.
The answers to these questions provide the foundations of your entire digital marketing strategy. Your beliefs and values determine your tone of voice, branding and customer experience. It’s down to you to ensure all three work in harmony.
2. Know your target audience
Now you’ve got your identity, you need to pinpoint your audience. Who is most likely to engage with your message, or purchase from you? What are their interests, aspirations and motivations?
This will form your customer profile, as will any keyword research you do. Here, you’ll find the subjects that your audience are interested in, and the word and queries they typically search for when buying a product or service within your industry.
Provided you’re answering the questions your audience are typing into search engines (which indicates to companies like Google that your content is relevant), you’ll bump yourself up the results page and start seeing more clicks come through.
3. Hook your readers early
Where you answer these search queries could be anything from a web page to a blog post [LINK: How To Use A Blog For Business]. And if you want people to read through, you’re going to need to put the answer front and centre.
That being said, having your important information at the top of your content renders the rest of the copy useless. You need to put the benefits of reading at the beginning, yes, but you also need to gradually tell a story, explaining the answer to their search and how that relates to you.
With that in mind, use your opener to summarise the piece and make it clear what your audience is going to get out of it.
4. Write how you speak
Now, any content writer worth their salt would explain that content should be tailored to your target audience. But a content expert will tell you that, regardless of your customer, you should write in a way that’s accessible, easy to understand, and sounds like a real person.
Emails, blogs or content for a website should sound like you. It’s fine if your brand is professional, but don’t let cryptic jargon or overly long sentences put barriers between you and your audience. You want to appear human; it’s key to being viewed as authentic, which is a value that 86% of customers prioritise.
Social media posts and emails are especially important, as a prospect can smell a marketing message from a mile off. You’ll catch them in the ribs if you drop the dress-up and speak to them as you would if you met them on the street.
5. Don’t forget a call to action
Just like your opener, your call to action should offer a summary of what your piece is saying. If there’s a particular learning outcome you want readers to take away from the page or article, specify it here.
Depending on what the content is for, link it back to your product or service. If you’re purely writing for entertainment or education purposes, include some detail about how readers can get in touch.
If you’re pushing a new offering that’s not quite ready yet, make it clear how it can address the customer’s problem, and outline where they can find out more about it.
Making You Content’s approach
Struggling to capture your audience online? We’ve got you covered. Our team will take you from crystallising your brand message, to creating compelling web content, to distributing it across various platforms.
Speak to one of our content creators today and bring your brand to life.