Having great written content is the lifeblood upon which your site is built.  It is the sheer power of words that turns your visitors into customers, so writing high impact articles is vital for your website and for your business.

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Photo: Vaguely Artistic

Google tells us that in order to rank highly we have to provide relevant content that visitors are looking for. Many website owners complain that they have filled their site with content but still do not get higher numbers of visitors or high ranking in the search engines.

That’s because writing website content has to appeal not only to your visitors but to the search engines as well.  Search engines like Google do not have the sophistication of human readers and there are limitations in its search algorithms.  Some website owners get caught up trying to write for search engines in order to generate higher levels of traffic but end up ignoring their readers who, after all, are the real targets.

Your web copy has to be carefully crafted to not only contain the information your readers are looking for but also to the changing peculiarities and vagaries of search engine algorithms.

This might seem a daunting task but there are a few golden rules you can follow to make sure that you satisfy both of these criteria.  Let’s take a look at some of them now.

  • Titles.  The title of your article serves two purposes.  Firstly, it has to be attractive to a reader and instantly create attention.  Secondly, it should contain the keywords you want the search engines to find.  Creating an engaging headline becomes easier with practice.  It should grab attention by making a claim, asking a question and leaving the reader with no option but to read on.
  • Tone.  The tone you adopt should reflect the content and nature of your site and should always be easy to read, but at the same time convincing.  It should be a little like an expert talking to a friend with a light and friendly tone that carries an air of authority.
  • Keywords.  You should always work your keywords into your headline and then at least once in the body of a 500 word article.  Some SEO experts also recommend using the keyword in the last paragraph of the article.  Google’s algorithm is becoming more sophisticated and is now able to recognize the relevance of content by identifying words that are similar in meaning to your keywords.  This means you should never stuff keywords into your article but simply use the language that an expert would normally use.

The most successful articles follow a simple formula including the above tips.

To generate immediate interest try the following tips when constructing your article.

  • Make your headline interesting by giving your readers easy to read lists, for example “The Top 10 Ways to ….”
  • Write “How to” articles like “How to Make the Most of Your….”, or “How to……Without Fear”.
  • Write reviews of products or services like “What You Need to Know about xxxx”.
  • Tell a story about an experience that is relevant to your product or service, people love to read stories.  Write something like “How A Three Minute Interview Change My Life”.

Follow these examples and your writing will come alive and, best of all, your visitors will want to keep coming back for more.