Take one of the reseller partners of a major software company. It's just one of many similar businesses across the country, offering much the same mix of implementation, consultancy and support. I've written copy that all of the partners can use as templates, so I know that geography may well be the only way to differentiate them.
It's in a highly competitive market, and yet this company has chosen to forgo direct mail to hook potential new customers, and is focusing instead on getting its name to the top of the search engine rankings. The theory is that if you're not on the first page of Google, you're nowhere. But if you are there, you're ahead of the competition.
How does that work?
It's all about SEO keywords. Discovering which are the words and phrases that your potential customers might use to search on, and ensuring that those words are prominent in the text of your web site. That sounds simple, but actually it's a pretty major task. Not only do you want your keywords to be popular with your target audience, but you want them to be unpopular with your competitors. So when a customer searches on “cat food”, they might be rewarded with thousands of replies. But if they search more carefully, as many of us do now, on, say, “dry food for senior cats in Surrey”, there will be fewer responses, and as a supplier of just such cat food, you could be in there on the front page.
There are two stages to this. First you find your list of keywords through diligent research. Then you insert them into your web copy as often as you can, without forgetting that the prime purpose of your site is to inform your customers and sell your products and services. That means that your web content still has to be accessible, easy to read, and intelligible. That, of course, is where an SEO copywriter can help.
Slide your keywords seamlessly into your web copy, taking every opportunity to make your headings, your tabs, your links and your text more meaningful, and you'll be able to move your site up the search engine rankings over time.
You can also help your cause by getting links to your web site out there in as many places as possible. Writing blogs on your site and contributing to others, submitting articles to industry and social publishing sites, and getting listed in directories will all help. And copywriters can help you to put the blogs and articles together, just as they would with any other marketing communications – and again aim to include your keywords of the moment.
It's an ongoing task. The people at Keytracker, which is highly recommended for researching keywords, suggest reviewing and revising your keywords monthly. Yet in a world with increasingly web-savvy customers and competitors, it has to be a worthwhile effort.
If you would like Wrightwell to help you seamlessly add your keywords to your web content, just contact kathy at wrightwell.com
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