Web copy – the art of sweet talking Google

On-site search engine optimisation for beginners

Meeting the beast

Search engine optimisation is a curious beast. It shifts shapes, speaks in tongues, and just when you think you've got the hang of it, it'll leave you mystified. But don't fear the beast! There are tools at hand to harness its power!

Without fully understanding the intricacies of Google's algorithms, we can still optimise our websites and come out on top. It is actually simpler than it initially seems. But there's a catch: it takes time to conquer Google. Lots of time.

But, considering Google is now the 'go to' when researching and choosing a product or service, it's time well spent.

iProspect had this to say about search results:

Regarding findings for which iProspect has trending information from previous studies, key among them is that 68% of search engine users click a search result within the first page of results, and a full 92% of search engine users click a result within the first three pages of search results. The importance of appearing high in the search results has steadily increased over time.

On-site, off-site – divide and conquer

Put simply,search engine optimisation(SEO) is the process of appealing to Google (and other search engines, of course!) and employing a range of techniques to appear higher up the search engine ladder. These techniques fall into two categories:

• Onsite SEO deals with what’s contained within your own site.

                   This means your content, your words.

• Offsite SEOdeals with demonstrating your value through back-links (other quality sites linking to your site and demonstrating its worth) and it is an ongoing, long-term task.

Both of these aspects are vital to a strong search engine ranking. But let's start at the beginning, with what you can immediately control.

On-site SEO – striking a balance

The first step is to allow Google to know, very clearly, what it is that your website is about. It will then index it, relating it to the keywords that arise in your web copy.

What this means, is that you need to make it easy for Google to understand what it is you are talking about. One of the ways you do this is by using important words, or keywords, regularly. It makes sense, for example, that a site about a florist will be full of words like ‘bouquets’, ‘florist’, ‘flowers’ etc.

But be warned! If you stuff your site with so many keywords that it no longer makes sense, Google will penalise you because it will think your site is spammy.

This leads me to the first and most important aspect of on-site SEO:

Writing for Google must come second to writing for your human visitors.

After all, they're the ones you actually want to engage with - Google is just the vehicle for that interaction.

What's important then is the ability to write copy that is engaging, and makes sense to your visitors, but that can be easily and correctly indexed by Google.

Web copy – what’s the difference?

When we read, we are constantly jumping forward and back, and filling in the gaps in between. Our attention is constantly diverted towards big headings, bullet points, or bold words. These devices are used to highlight important points, and to deliver key messages.

Because Google's aim is to deliver relevant information, it uses these same devices to ascertain what a website is about and how important or recurrent that theme is.

Further, when we are reading online, we have even shorter attention spans - studies published at Jakob Nielsen’s Alertboxindicate we only spend about 4.4 seconds reading 100 words!

Here are some techniques to keep your readers interested, all the while telling Google what exactly it is you're on about.

Headings

Humans use headings to scan a page and decide what it is about. So does Google. It deems heading copy amongst the most important, so make those words count.

But don't just make them count to Google, make them count to human visitors. If your website is about SEO, you will use 'SEO', but you'll also use other words in context.

An example of this is: SEO Copywriting – Making Sense to Humans & Google. It gives keywords (Google) and context (readers).

Bold

Both Google and human visitors see bolded words as an indication of heightened relevance or worth. This doesn't mean you should go through your copy and bold every keyword you come across. Instead, you should strike a balance between bolding words that will get you indexed correctly, and that will act as signposts to your readers.

Lists

Lists are used to make sense of large amounts of information very quickly. They're great for:

• Scanning over & getting a quick summary,
• Persuading the reader of the key points; and
• Optimising your copy – again, Google knows people like lists, so Google likes them too.

If possible, limit your bullet points. Lists lose their value if they go on and on. Also, the closer your keywords are to the bullet point, the better.

Links

If you link to other sites, the anchor text you use (that's the text the link is on) will be seen as important. Optimising anchor text speaks volumes to Google about what you are discussing.

Keep in mind though, if you really want your audience to follow the link (and find it helpful and in turn, find your page helpful) then engagement should come first.

A ‘read how’ start to a link could be a better option - but that depends on the context. I'll leave that up to you.

Captions

This is the only time I'll say this. Google comes before humans. When it comes to captions, that is. Reason being, Google has no other way of knowing the relevance of an image. A keyword rich caption won't detract from the message the image will send a reader, but it will do worlds to describe the point of your site to Google.

So optimise your captions!

Variants

Google is smart enough to know that if your page is about SEO copywriting; your page will also use stems or variants of that phrase. It will pick up on lots of different combinations so you can mix your keyword phrases up as much as you can creatively manage whilst still making sense. You can also break your phrase up with grammar.

E.g. Need help understanding SEO? Copywriting tips from leaders in the field….

That said; keep the words in the phrase right next to each other where possible, they’re much more effective that way.

Off-site SEO – the next step

Once you have your web copy in tip-top condition it’s time to get on to the time consuming part – off-site search engine optimisation.

This is easily the most important aspect of SEO. It is the act of attracting as many back-links as possible. There are many ways which you can do it, some of which are outlined on our web strategy blog.

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We help marketing managers and businesses create and implement business strategies on the web. To find out more, call 1300 258 394 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              1300 258 394      end_of_the_skype_highlighting.