Content is the backbone of good SEO and that means that the way that you write your online content is super important for SEO. In fact, you can utilize a good SEO copywriting strategy to drastically increase your rankings!
Balance is vital because you need to strike write both for the human users and writing for crawlers (Google’s Analytic Robots) to make sure that your content is both helpful and optimized.
This definitive guide of SEO tips for copywriting will help you create the most optimized and interesting content to skyrocket the search engine rankings of your content.
What Is SEO Copywriting?
SEO copywriting is creating content in a way that optimizes its ranking in search engine results. This effort is important because without high search result rankings it is almost impossible for content to get high organic traffic.
High ranking content is based on a variety of factors, including:
- Keywords
- User Search Intent
- Heading Tags
- Meta Title Tags and Meta Descriptions
- Internal Links and Backlinks
- Readability
And more! Let’s dive into these topics.
SEO Copywriting: Find Relevant Keywords With Keyword Research
A big part of SEO copywriting, maybe the most important step is optimizing for keywords or keyphrases, so you’ll want to start with keyword research.
You will want to find a general topic and then explore specific search terms that have good search volume and matches the search intent of the users you are trying to attract.
Want some help? Here are the best free keyword tools to help you find the most relevant and effective keywords. If you want to dive even deeper you can explore long-tail keywords, which are longer phrases that are great for conversion.
SEO Copywriting: Focus on Search Intent of Users
What are users really looking for when they type in your chosen keyword or keyphrase?
If the content you create centered around your keyword doesn’t match what people are looking for then it will be almost impossible to rank highly, since users won’t click on content irrelevant to their search intent.
The easiest way to find the search intent of a keyword is to just search it in Google and see what types of content come up.
Are they ultimate guides? Lists? Reviews? Product pages?
By understanding search intent first, you’ll make sure you’re producing the right type of content.
SEO Copywriting: Titles & Meta Descriptions
The title & meta description are what is shown in the search results.
Treat this like writing an ad – you’re usually competing with ~10 other websites for a user to click on, so you want to engage and interest the reader the most!
SEO Copywriting: Optimizing The Content
Now let’s get to the content itself and how to write it the best way possible!
What Is High-Quality Content?
High-quality content in the context of SEO has many attributes including:
- Fully answers the reader’s question or solves the reader’s problem
- Has a clear and understandable format, is very readable
- Is up-to-date with the latest information
- Contains the primary keyword as well as long-tail keywords
Answer The Readers Question
The most important part of quality-content is making sure to answer the user’s question fully.
One of the best ways to make sure you are answering the question understand the search intent of your chosen keyword as we discussed earlier.
Content Freshness
Freshness, or how recently your content was published is also an important factor.
Search Engines don’t want to display outdated content, so be sure to update your content regularly.
Some search terms, such as news updates have a higher dependence on freshness.
Google’s algorithm weighs fresh content around “Query Deserved Freshness.”
This basically means that they weigh content as more relevant if it matches a search term that has become more popular in a relatively short time.
SEO Copywriting: Keyword Density
The risk of over-optimizing content is increased when you use too many of the same keyword on your page.
There is no magical keyword density metric. Instead, focus on writing your content naturally by inserting the main keyword phrase where it makes sense.
In addition to using your primary keyword, consider using synonyms as well.
For example, if your page is going after “fitness routine” you can use these words instead of “fitness”:
- exercise
- cardio
- work out
And these words instead of routine:
- schedule
- daily activity
- habit
This way you can avoid keyword stuffing for ‘fitness routine’ by using a diverse set of words related to the topic
Content Length
While there is some data that suggests that longer content tends to rank better, for the sake of SEO copywriting, I believe you should just write enough to cover the topic.
Writing for the sake of writing won’t help your real end goal – to rank and make sales.
So write about what users care about & the answers to their questions.
Divide Your Content With Headings
Using heading tags to divide up your content helps keep people reading and improves scalability for crawlers, win-win!
This will also help users easily find the most relevant sections of your text so they don’t waste time
Keep Paragraphs Short
By keeping paragraphs short to 1-3 sentences, you’ll also improve the readability of your content.
This keeps the reader engaged vs. trying to read a wall of text.
SEO Copywriting: Persuasive Writing
All SEO writing ultimately revolves around the “call to action.”
You must have a goal in mind, such as getting users to buy a product or sign up for a mailing list. That means the rest of your writing must persuasively line up with this goal and make it happen.
As we said, though, customers are wary if you sound like a salesman. How, then, can you make your text sound persuasive? It all starts with writing from the user’s POV.
For example, your readers are naturally curious about what you can do for them. Instead of imploring them to simply “Sign Up Now,” let them know how this will improve their lives.
For example, “Get Started Ranking Your Site” helps a reader imagine the tangible outcome of making a purchase.
From the headline to the CTA, consider their POV. Demonstrate that you understand their concerns and, where appropriate, demonstrate how you can make those concerns go away.
SEO Copywriting Conclusion
These tips tricks and frameworks will be very useful for SEO copywriting and SEO writing in general. Make sure to use them whenever you create new content so that your online content is as successful as possible! SEO copywriting is the key to content visibility!
And if you need help getting your content to more people after implementing all these tips, consider guest posting!