SEO writing can be a challenge for some because you must write content optimized for search engines while appealing to the readers. If you want to build up a blog audience, you’ve got to be smart with the content. Many reputable websites have everything planned and get positive feedback from their blog and other pages of the site.
If you don’t understand SEO, there’s nothing to fear because this guide has some great tips to get you started. However, if you’re staring at a blank screen in Microsoft Word, you can always use our SEO copywriting services!
SEO does sound complicated, but it’s easier to grasp than you think. Just understand that you have to write for the people reading the content and not the search engines.
To thrive, the business can’t just write content. It must solve a problem and appeal to the user (prospects, clients, readers, customers, etc.)
What Is Search Engine Optimization?
Whenever you search for something in a search engine, you receive the search results relevant to that term. Those results pages are because of SEO.
In a sense, SEO helps you optimize the content to ensure that it is effective for search engines to help it rank high when compared to other sites targeting those same words.
You research certain keywords, select the one to use, write content surrounding that word, and then others share the SEO article on their blogs and social media.
Google displays web pages in the search results based on the relevance of the page, visual aids used, and authority that might enhance the searcher’s experience. How does it measure all that?
It determines how relevant your page is by analyzing it based on many factors. Then, it gives you more authority, depending on the trustworthy links pointing to the page.
The Elements of SEO Writing
There are a few things to note about the elements of valuable content, such as timelines and visual appeal. Implementing the best practices for SEO writing throughout the content pushes it to the top 10 to increase your website traffic.
However, there are various elements required for SEO copywriting that always ensure you rank higher in Google, which also boosts conversion rates. Here are a few SEO tips for getting those elements right:
Site Speed
Site speed is a ranking factor for Google and has been since 2010. This is also good for the users. Content writing should actually start with your website before you produce any SEO articles! If you have a site loading time of over two seconds, it’s just not fast enough. People click off before enjoying the content and information you offered.
Attention spans are much shorter now than in the past. People want it now, and you’ve got to give it to them. Otherwise, they find a competitor that can.
How is it possible to measure the load time for your site? Here are the basic steps:
- Use a website speed test tool.
- Get your results.
- Check the history of the speed tests to find out the previous load times.
If you noticed that a page is running slower now than in the past, you can take steps to reduce the size of the page to improve the speed.
Headline
You could have a great article with tons of value, but a mediocre headline reduces your clickthrough rates. Never waste your SEO copy with a boring headline!
Bloggers tend to spend roughly six hours on each post. That includes creating the content, tracking its progress, and monitoring for social signals or reactions.
For SEO copywriting to be effective, the headline must attract attention and prompt people to click on the result and read more. As long as you are in the top 10 on Google, it doesn’t matter if you’re in the top position because your headline is attractive.
Also, it can be better to craft the headline before you start the body of the blog post.
Typically, headlines that focus on a specific idea or message are best. Include numbers if it makes sense for the best results.
Sometimes, you might get stuck and have no idea what to write about. If that’s the case, you can get blog post ideas from online tools before hiring a writer for your blog post.
Then, you must analyze the results in Google. If your topic is to save money, you go to Google and plug that in. Most of the search results are very SEO-friendly and include a targeted headline, even if the headlines aren’t attractive.
Learning SEO copywriting isn’t always easy, but it’s important if you want to rank high on Google and get more clicks.
Content
The content you craft is crucial for SEO copywriting. Most people conduct Google searches because they want useful content. Search engines also crave fresh SEO content, so you must update your site frequently and consistently.
Long-tail keywords are crucial because if you write content with specific keywords and goals, you can show up on the first page in Google.
If you crave the best content that ranks well, you require target keyword phrases. Don’t stuff keywords into the SEO content. Just put the keyword in the headline and ensure that it appears naturally in the text.
With that, new updates to the algorithm on Google penalizes shallow content, so it doesn’t rank high. Typical articles should be 1,000 words. Generally, longer blogs rank higher, but you can’t focus solely on length.
Before writing the content, make sure that you know who your reader is. Focus the topic on a particular problem you think the reader has, and then solve it with the content!
This is the basis of SEO copywriting, and you require a compelling intro that keeps people on the hook. From there, you start writing the text to get them to stay interested.
Meta Description
Before writing the content and publishing it, you should craft meta descriptions to guide the search engines. Meta descriptions can help researchers and search engines understand what your topic is and why the main keywords keep showing up in the content.
Ultimately, the meta description is your HTML attribute that offers an explanation of the page’s content. Google uses this meta description on the page as a snippet. People search for those keywords, and your page is relevant, so it shows up. That snippet determines if you get clicks, regardless of if you’re high in the search results.
Typically, the meta description needs to be 150 to 160 characters. If it’s any more than that, Google truncates it.
How can you write meta descriptions that catch attention and help you rank well in Google search?
Understand Intent
Keyword or search intent is the main goal or reason for using the keywords. If you were a social media consultant wanting to attract clients, you might have “social media expert advice” as your keyword. Prospective customers type it in, but what are they interested in learning?
They require a social media expert with tons of advice on how they can get to the next level with their business. With that, they could want more followers, greater engagement, or anything else. The meta description must appeal to them and be relevant.
Write the Description
Once you’ve crafted the article, you need the best meta descriptions. You should start with a question and keep it at about 141 characters. For example: Are you looking for social media tips to help you gain new leads and improve your brand?
Then, you state the obvious, such as: Most companies have already given up completely on social media marketing. They don’t know what to do! You just need an expert with proven success.
In a sense, you don’t always have to include the keywords exactly in the meta description. If it doesn’t flow, don’t add it!
Keyword Frequency
Keyword frequency focuses on how many times the target keyword appears on the page. For example, if you’re focused on “best London hotels,” you may wonder how often it should appear in the SEO article.
On the other hand, keyword density focuses on the ratio of that phrase to other words. Both are still important when writing SEO content, but they aren’t as effective as they have been in the past.
Still, keyword density impacts organic ranking to an extent. You just don’t have to go overboard with worrying about it. If you want to check, there are various density tools out there you can use.
Page Links
Links are crucial for your webpage. Google understands that there is always more info available. When you have page links, it tells Google that you’re sociable and connected and that people can gain access to more useful content elsewhere on the site. This content might be your own or from other sites.
Linking out to authority sites or pages indicates that you know other people create content with value. Google rewards you because you’re in sync with its mission of organizing all the information in the world and making it accessible to everyone.
Copywriters often find appropriate keywords, research data to be accurate, and then use both of those to create the best content. That’s why copywriting is crucial for search engine optimization.
The rules for linking to another site aren’t set in stone. However, online marketers who want to focus on internal linking because they know how it does in search engines should link:
- To relevant pages in and outside the site
- To in-depth guides and content on your page/elsewhere
- With appropriate anchor text
Anchor text is the three to four words that tell the reader what they can learn if they click the link. In a sense, it’s like they typed in those words into the Google search bar, and that information popped up.
Regardless, the rules are not set in stone by search engines. It’s important to understand the audience and produce each SEO article to solve the reader’s issues.
Remember: you can’t predict rankings, regardless of how much information you have. This is because Google updates its algorithm all the time. If you plan to hire someone to help you, they need to understand that it all changes frequently.
However, you can take a few steps to ensure that your web page shows up in Google, such as:
- Meta title tags – You should know how to craft meta title tags for SEO. The meta title is the HTML tag (like your meta description) and is like the title of a book. Usually, it’s what first appears in the search results. It must be concise and accurately describe the web page. Usually, Google displays 50 to 60 characters, and it should align with the brand.
- Heading tags – Heading tags are the ones that go from H1 to H6. These heading tags enlarge the font size so that it stands out and goes in a cascading way with the sixth heading being the smallest.
- Optimize the title – This is a crucial step to ensure that the title ranks well and attracts a good audience.
Writing Content Useful for People and Search Engines
Words are very powerful and can drive engagement. If you piece the words together to provide a very informative article, your target audience is sure to love it and stick around to get more quality content from you.
There are tons of blogs out there that produce fresh content each day, and the list just grows and grows. If you have lower-quality content, keyword-stuffed content, or duplicate content, you’re not helping the readers. This isn’t a good strategy, and you can’t produce a great article if that is what you’re doing.
Even if the content is useful, it requires the right elements to drive organic traffic. These include:
- Optimize for various keywords in many searches
- Gain a good number of trusted backlinks
- Use evergreen ideas and topics
Keyword Research for a Blog Post
Keyword research is important, and the intent of the word is crucial here. Before you write fresh content that solves a problem, you must know what the keyword stands for.
You also need to consider keyword classification. This is where you understand whether the searcher wants to buy a product or learn about it. Commercial and informational keywords are crucial.
For an informational main keyword, people search for it to get information without having to pay. They are often how-to articles. Typically, the searchers want free blog posts, videos, lessons, and articles.
You should write useful content around these informational keywords, but you aren’t likely to convert the readers to customers because they’re not interested in buying. Just use them to nurture the audience and build your brand.
Commercial keywords have a buyer’s intent. They show desperation from the person searching because they want quick solutions.
Usually, they want to buy a product or at least sign up for an email list to at some point be converted into customers.
When someone types in a commercial keyword, it means they are there to take action. They often contain words like review, order, buy, reviews, compare, comparison, and others. When you craft content around the right keyword for commercial use, the goal is to offer information on using the product and what features/benefits it provides.
Should you use target keywords? Yes! Google analyzes keywords to tell it what a web page is about. Therefore, you should use the target keyword with caution and don’t over-optimize it in the blog post.
When focused on keyword research and targeting, you should follow these steps:
- Include the primary term in the headline.
- Use alternative keywords in the meta description, intro, and title tag.
- Write naturally to appease the readers and include the primary term in the conclusion.
Keyword Research for Creation
Typically, the first five websites in a search get the most click, so if you want this opportunity to rank high in the search engine results, you must understand the best practices of keyword research.
Even if you have a helpful article, you may not rank high if you don’t use long-tail keywords. They’re the best option for modern SEO purposes because the top brands don’t target them. If you produce great content and naturally target those keywords, you dominate the search engines and get on the first page!
Overall, SEO doesn’t happen if you don’t research the key terms. That’s how you figure out the intent and mindset of the audience. Usually, long-tail keywords define that.
For niche marketing, the most challenging part of building a website is to choose the best keywords. When you’ve selected the topic, you need to find terms that fit in the industry and are relevant.
If you sell waterproof digital cameras, you may use a special keyword-finding tool like Ubersuggest. It tells you:
- Search volume – How many searches that keyword has each month
- Difficulty – How much competition the word has in organic searches
- Paid difficulty – How much competition there is for paid searches
- Cost per click – The average cost per click in a Google Ad
This tool also gives you an overview of what it takes to reach that first page in Google for that keyword in terms of domain score and backlinks. That’s located above the chart that displays the search volume throughout a 12-month period. Pay attention to traffic dips. For example, with “waterproof digital cameras,” the volume is likely to drop off in the winter and fall months.
The tool also shows you long-tail keywords to use to optimize the content. From the list, you may pick out “best waterproof digital cameras” because it has a high search volume that other competitors aren’t using as much.
Optimize for Robots
Web robots or search engine robots are sometimes called spiders and crawlers. These programs scour the web to find your site and others that match.
Whenever a spider crawls the web page, it wants to find new content. Some might even claim that crawlers and spiders feed on fresh content and reward you because you’re updating your website frequently.
There’s no proof that this is true, but it can’t hurt. Remember, you want to get repeat readers to your website. This isn’t possible if you’re producing content once a month. People have short attention spans and forget about you because you’re not getting more information on the site.
With that, you should be aware that when Google crawlers index the site, they are only interested in your meta tags (the meta description and title tag). Indexing means that you’ve added new content, and Google is putting it into its search database.
Even more important is that Google wants to know what keywords you’re targeting. That helps it determine if the content is beneficial and for what industry. For example, is your information for health and medical, internet marketing, small business, or something else? With that, your content can work well in different niches, and that’s noted in Google’s search database, too.
For the best results, you need to optimize the content for search robots by adding:
- Primary keywords into meta descriptions and title tags
- Alternative keywords into the introduction to ensure that it flows well. If one keyword doesn’t sound natural, ignore it.
In the past, we had many people ask us to use keywords that appeared wonky and didn’t read well. It’s not so bad if stop words were allowed, but that wasn’t the case.
As an example, you have a keyword phrase “best web design NY SEO.” This just doesn’t work in a description, title tag, or the content because it isn’t natural. Instead, you want to use “best web design in NY for SEO.” You can easily write something around that to make sense. If you’re not so inclined to writing, you may always hire us to do it for you!
Storytelling
Storytelling is a great way to set you apart from the competition. Humans always love a good story. If you weave in the brand story into your article or blog post, you get more attention.
Brand storytelling isn’t new, and several brands have been using it for a while. However, when you tell stories in your SEO writing, you impact the reader more.
However, it’s up to you to ensure that the reader walks away saying: “the article explained it all.” Remember, they are your target audience, and if they don’t get the right information that they need from the blog post, they may never visit your blog again.
Humor
Humor can be great in an SEO article because it keeps the audience engaged. If you’re writing about a controversial or uncomfortable topic, humor can simplify things and bring them to light more easily.
SEO copywriting isn’t focused solely on writing content to solve a problem because it can’t be boring. The content must excite the readers and leave them wanting more from you.
They should want to click the headline, read your intro, and move excitedly through the body. Writing persuasively is the best thing to do. When you achieve that, you can create just about any type of content, and people flock to it. Then, when you recommend your products or services, they clamor to buy from you.
Case Studies
You’ve probably been to other websites before that have a section on the navigational bar about case studies. In the past, they were boring reads that only focused on statistics. While they should still be factual, you can turn a case study into an SEO article that gets you more conversions and clicks.
Case studies have been proven to drive traffic to your website and are powerful because they’re so useful. If you can consistently write detailed case studies, you could see the major long-tail keywords showing up in Google as relevant.
A case study explains what the services and products are. They should contain experiments, interviews that you conduct, and research studies. Then, you explain the results you received.
It’s a good practice to share all case studies, even if they didn’t give you the results you wanted. As long as it shows that you’re trying and that you care, you’re golden.
On-page SEO
On-page SEO isn’t complicated or tedious if you know how to do it. Many posts are out there to address the topic. Really, it amounts to the elements that are on your site that add value, such as internal links. You control just about everything on your site, and this is why Google focuses on your web pages to measure bounce rates, engagement, social shares, and retention rates.
Ultimately, the foundation of SEO is what happens on the site. Therefore, you should focus on the words you target, anchors you use, and all the rest. That way, each SEO article does its job for the reader and Google.
Off-page SEO
In the world of digital marketing today, the public decides if the content is useful and relevant. Google utilizes off-page SEO factors to determine authority and value the pages of content.
Usually, you can’t control the things that happen outside of the website. For example, you can’t determine who links to you or the website quality of those that reference the work.
However, you can use off-page SEO to build a better online brand and increase traffic to your site. The best strategies to use here include:
- Engage and build up a raving community using social media.
- Expose the business and use local SEO.
- Instill confidence in your brand with business reviews.
- Promote local citations using the NAP (Name/Address/Phone) method.
- Use link building through guest posts, blogging, blog outreach, competitor link analysis, networking, and more.
Get the Reader to Act
The last piece of the puzzle for content writing is to persuade others. This is the ability of the SEO article to drive people to take action. It’s not hard to do because there are tons of tools and resources available.
Copy is primarily written to sell services, products, and ideas. That means starting with selling yourself. In a sense, you’ve got 30 seconds to sell yourself to get the people begging for more.
One way to get people to take action is by highlighting the key points in the content or topic with bullet points. Before writing, list three to four benefits that you want to cover. This is crucial because it helps you create the powerful paragraphs, headlines, and subheadings.
Create Valuable and Irresistible Headlines
Many content creators have realized that headlines are the most crucial element of an SEO article. Therefore, you should think like the reader and craft the title first. Try to target one keyword and make it attractive.
You might start with a headline like: Diet Plans and Weight Loss – Find Some Healthy Diet Plans.
However, you do your research online and decide to go with: Best Diet Plans to Keep You Fit.
From there, you already know that using numbers is beneficial, so you make it more compelling by writing: 30-Day Diet Plans to Burn Fat.
They all have the keywords, but the last one is more interesting to the potential reader because of the number.
Have Clarity and Purpose
You need to have a clear message to produce quality content. Every freelance writer knows that they have to focus on a single idea and write in a way to solve a problem, address a challenge, or explain something complicated.
Here are a few ways to achieve clarity and purpose when writing:
- Know what you want before writing it.
- Use “you” when writing to B2C customers and “we” for business organizations.
- Research data and make sure it’s relevant and accurate to the topic.
- Target up to five keywords in one post and make sure they read naturally.
Conclusion
You’ve learned some great tips to help with your SEO strategy. However, if SEO writing still isn’t your style, you may want to hire an SEO writer to help with high-quality content.
We can help you craft your next blog post and ensure that it’s everything you’ve ever dreamed of. Don’t feel shy, get a free analysis today so that you can update your site and bring in more viewers who may turn into customers!
