Web copywriting is one of the marketing activities that can have a huge impact on your online business.
But the thing is… where do you start?
In this guide, you’re going to discover:
- What copywriting is
- The importance of copywriting
- How to structure your website’s copy
- Best practices when it comes to website copy
So, let’s begin,
What is web copywriting?
Web copywriting is the process of writing online content for a site’s pages like blog posts, landing pages, and every other thing in between.
A good, compelling copy can keep your readers engaged and get them to take action that is both beneficial to you and them.
And, even though the way people use web copy has changed over the years, the fundamentals remain the same, which is…
The need to speak to your target audience in a way that’s easy to understand and which makes them take action that is beneficial to your business as well as beneficial to them and the problem they’re trying to solve.
Why is website copywriting important?
The reason web copywriting is important is because it can help you communicate with your audience in the best way possible.
You’ll be able to talk to a large audience in a way that resonates with them, no matter the niche.
But, having a good website copy is not a stand-alone solution, there must be substance behind your web copy.
This can help build that initial trust and relationship with a new customer.
How to structure your website’s copy
Firstly, there’s no one right way to structure your web copy.
This means you can come up with your structure if it works for you.
Also, you should understand that the process of structuring web copy for your website will depend largely on the type of business you run.
So, let’s see how you can structure your web copy:
1. Define your commercial pages
Commercial pages are pages that bring in revenue for your business.
If you’re a SaaS business, such pages may be:
- Homepage
- Feature-related pages
- Pricing pages
- Plan comparison pages
- Vs. pages and comparison guides
2. Define your content pages
Content pages educate readers about your business and service and help them understand how they can overcome their problems.
Content pages have different formats and the most constant ones are:
- Guides
- List posts
- Case studies
- Templates
- Checklists
- Infographics
You can begin with any of them and move into the others any time you want.
3. Prioritize the pages you need to create first
By now, you have an idea of the commercial and content pages you need to create.
And now, you need to prioritize them and decide which ones to create first.
The reasons you need to prioritize them are:
- Not all pages are important
- Not all pages have the same potential
No matter what you choose, you must prioritize them and start working on them first.
4. Creating your commercial and content pages
This is where you start creating your prioritized pages.
And the important things to note are:
- The channels you’re going to use to drive traffic to those pages
- How you’re going to create those pages
1. Choosing a channel of traction
Choosing the channel you’re going to use will affect how you write your web copy.
There are three main channels you can use:
- Paid traffic
- Organic search traffic
- Referral traffic
But the thing is, companies in their early stages cannot rely on organic search traffic… even if it’s SEO friendly.
So, in the beginning, companies should focus on communicating their message in their website copy in the best way possible, without having SEO in mind.
Then in the later stages, they can make adjustments to their website copy to make it more SEO friendly.
2. Choosing how to create those pages
There are two main ways to create your website’s copy;
- Hire a copywriting service, or
- Create the copy in-house
Hiring a copywriting service simply means outsourcing the job of writing your website’s copy to a copywriting agency.
But you’ll have to ensure that they’re the best fit for your company.
In-house simply means writing the copy yourself.
You’ll have to choose which one is best for your company.
If you have the time, you can write your web copy but if you don’t, then you can outsource the job to a good web copywriter.
5. Test your copy
You can’t be sure about the effectiveness of your web copy until you test it out.
Some of the elements of a web copy you should test are:
- Headlines (on-page)
- Sub-headlines (on-page)
- Call to action (on-page)
- Benefits (on-page)
- Features (on-page)
- Title tags (meta information)
- Meta descriptions (meta information)
You must do this to ensure the effectiveness of your content marketing activities.
This is to help optimize your content creation in the best way possible.
6. Optimize
This comes after testing.
Once you’ve tested the various elements of your web copy and you see what’s working and what’s not, it’s time to optimize.
You should update your web copy once in a while.
Here’s why…
- The market is changing
- Your product is changing
- More companies are entering the competitive landscape
- As the market becomes more mature, customers have different needs
- Customers become more educated about the solutions to their problems
Put that in perspective and optimize every once in a while for the best and continuous results.
Best web copywriting practices
Finally, here 4 some web copywriting practices you should do when writing your website’s copy:
- Write compelling headlines
- be consistent with your message
- Let your customers write the copy for you (This means a review from your customers)
- Write in an active voice (This means you should talk directly to your customer or prospect)
Conclusion
Web copywriting is one of the best ways to establish your brand and build a reliable business.
It’s important because it can be used to communicate effectively with your customers in a way they’ll easily understand.
Finally, use the 6 tips mentioned above to structure your website copy in a way that will resonate well with your target audience and bring in revenue for your business.
What is your best website copywriting practices?