content writing tips - Express Writers

What the Heck Are Internal Cliffhangers?

January 1, 2021May 1, 2014 by Adam Oakley

Image credit: Tumblr Grammar Nazis: you have to love them, or hate them. When it comes to grammar phrases, clauses, conjunctions, and all that good stuff, this could bring images of nightmarish English teachers peering over a frosted set of glass to your mind. (However, if you’re one of these people, then it will probably make you think of rainbows and Skittles.) One phrase in the Grammar Nazi’s book that any typical layman would probably not understand is just what we’re going to talk about today: “internal cliffhangers.” Just what does this curious phrase mean? Let’s take a look at internal cliffhangers with those rascally Supernatural hunters Sam and Dean Winchester as our guides. Cliffhangers: Dean Might Be Going To Hell You already know what a cliffhanger is, especially if you are an avid TV watcher. Supernatural uses major cliffhangers throughout the show and always at the season finale. Is Dean or Sam going to hell? Are they getting out? This is a cliffhanger on the macro level; something we are very familiar with in movies, TV, and books but let’s take a look at the micro level of cliffhangers. These handy tools keep audiences reading your content instead of glancing through and forgetting about you. Internal Cliffhangers: Dean’s Going Downstairs but What’s Sam Doing? Internal cliffhangers are those little statements or sentences that keep the reader’s attention throughout the whole article or book. In the podcast episode for The Lede, Demian Farnworth defines internal cliffhangers as the sentences that piece your story, article, etc. together with emotion or shock to keep the reader interested. You don’t keep watching Supernatural because of the old, overdone cliffhangers of a character going to hell, you keep watching due to internal cliffhangers like wondering what Crowley is up to or if Castiel will ever stop being awkward. These are story arcs that piece the grand story together, but keep you interested until it is time for a massive plot twist and the season finale. Using internal cliffhangers will help cultivate long-term readers and customers, which will help your Google rankings and make your business successful. Utilizing Internal Cliffhangers In Your Content You need to be using internal cliffhangers in your content to help generate buzz and keep the reader’s interest. Cliffhangers can help in many areas and you can find ideas for them everywhere. Here are a few ideas to get you started: 1. They Can Help Your Storytelling. Storytelling is a perfect way to keep readers interested in your content. You don’t necessarily have to write a “Once upon a time” sentence, but you can outline your content in story format. Internal cliffhangers work wonderfully for storytelling, as they are major parts of stories already. Get to crafting some intriguing stories for your site and you will see that internal cliffhangers begin to come naturally. Don’t stress too much when it comes to writing these, though. You do not want your content to come across like you are trying too hard. Just write naturally and see what happens! You’ll be surprised at how easy it is to get these cliffhangers by just being natural. 2. You Can Gain Inspiration from Other Stories. If you are having a hard time coming up with great internal cliffhangers, try watching a few TV shows or films. This blog is inspired by the CW’s show Supernatural and that show really helped with the outline. The show is a great illustration of the use of major and internal cliffhangers; it also is a fairly popular show that many people enjoy, therefore, keeping the content relevant. 3. Internal Cliffhangers Keep You Relevant. The best way to learn how to use internal cliffhangers is by staying current. Relevant content is what will keep readers coming back and using relevant and fun cliffhangers will help. Stay Inspired, Young Hunter If Supernatural isn’t your thing, never fear; there are so many wonderful TV shows out there that can inspire your writing and give you great illustrations of how to use internal cliffhangers. You can even try to read the latest book series or look to some old, yet incredible, stories. Some great authors who are perfect with internal cliffhangers are George R. R. Martin, Stephen King, and Suzanne Collins. Pick up a book and see how many times you keep reading because you have to know more. Find different things that inspire you and help you craft excellent content. It doesn’t have to be a TV show or another form of entertainment. It can be something as simple as taking a walk or watching how people interact with each other. Stay in school and be willing to learn new tricks every day!

8 Reasons Why Content is the Most Crucial Element of SEO Today

January 1, 2021April 22, 2014 by Adam Oakley

If you are in the SEO business or in case you are thinking about it, there is one major rule you will have to keep in mind: the search engines don’t care about companies; they only rank content. It doesn’t matter how great your company is if you can’t offer the readers high quality content. The main purpose of search engines (including Google) is to offer their users the best experience possible. When a user searches the answer to a question, the more details the answer has, the more useful it is for the user. As a result relevant and high quality content will have a better ranking in the search results. All this determines your goal in content creation: publishing marketable, useful and relevant information. This will boost your ratings and it will ensure that your SEO strategy will have long-term effects. So here is why content is the key element of SEO: 1. People Are Interested in What You Have to Say According to Brafton.com 52% of people made purchase decisions based on what they read on blogs and 57% of the marketers gained new customers because of their content. 42% of people look for articles and blogs about the products that they wish to purchase and 60% of the marketers claim that content helps them make better decisions. 61% of the customers say that they are likely to purchase the products of a company that offers custom content. All this should show you how important your content really is. Now that you know your content makes all the difference, what could you do to improve it for higher SEO ranks and more traffic? 2. Give the Consumers What They Need First of all, you have to know what your target audience is. Secondly, you need to know what they want and what information is relevant to them. If you don’t, you will waste time and energy offering solutions to problems that don’t exist. Once you know what the target audience wants, make sure that the content you offer is really helpful. Think of the most common questions and offer answers. This way you will become the source of knowledge to the readers. While the other people will be too busy with self-marketing, you will give people exactly what they need which is the best self-marketing strategy ever. 3. Just Give Yourself Regardless of the kind of content you are thinking about, you can be sure that there are hundreds of people who thought of it before you woke up this morning. This is why you will have to find ways to make your content stand out; find ways to present your content in a way that has never been used before. If your content is similar to the others’, you will just need to add value to it. There are many different ways to make your content stand out, such as adding videos, infographics, images, or anything else that would make it unique. 4. Boredom Is the Death of SEO You may be working in a field that is boring or dry, but you can be sure that they are always ways to add a fun and creative spin to it, even if you are in the field of toilet seats. One of the most important aspects that you will have to be thinking about is branding, according to Seth Godin. Based on information from brafton.com, half of the users are more likely to visit a page if it appears several times among the search engine results. For this you will need a diversified content strategy. It means that you should have blogs, webpages, images, videos, whitepapers, social snippets, infographics, and anything else you could think of. All this will result in people being engaged with your brand. You will be able to fill the content gaps and you will maximize the benefits of all your content. 5. Content Reduced to Keywords When you’re searching for something with the help of search engines, you have to type in keywords. These are the same keywords that the users type in to find your content. Since you know what your target group wants, you should have a pretty good idea of what keywords they might use to reach the desired content. All these keywords must be a part of your pages. This way in the moment the user hits enter, your content will be first on the list of results. 6. Can Keywords Reduce Your Ranking? In order to have high ranks on the search engine results, there is need for your content to contain keywords. So, why wouldn’t you include all the keywords that you can think about? The truth is this is a very bad strategy. Keyword stuffing isn’t the solution to your problem. If you have too many keywords, the content will lose its purpose and it won’t be useful to the readers. This is why there is a keyword density accepted by common sense. If your web content keyword density is higher, it will hurt your ranking. On the other hand, if you don’t have keywords, it will become very difficult to attract traffic to your content. 7. Is Your Content Engaging? If you have high quality content, you will be able to engage the readers and this is something that the search engines also measure. The more time readers spend on your site, the better the rankings will be. If you don’t have high quality content, the readers will simply bounce back to the search results and, again, this will hurt your ranking. 8. Be “Socially” Involved You can see social media everywhere you look. If you get shares, likes, tweets, or any other kind of social feedback, it means that you have high quality content and this is something that the search engines will appreciate as well. All in all, no matter what kind of feedback you’re striving for, it all comes back to your content and whether or not your readers … Read more

Is Your Content Smarter Than a 5th Grader? 4 Steps To Readable Content

January 1, 2021April 8, 2014 by Adam Oakley

No matter if you’re a lawyer or agricultural field surveyor, your website and your services should be worded in a way that everyone on the world wide web can read and understand it. Ask yourself – Is my content smarter than a 5th grader? Don’t worry – we’re not exactly asking you to “dumb it down.” In fact, we get that you want your content to be smart and informative. This is more about making your web content reader-friendly. Stop trying to be the Charles Dickens of copywriting and begin crafting readable content. What is Readability? First off, let’s discuss what readability is when it comes to web content. You should know a few literacy facts before you begin writing. For example, National Law Review states that the average reading level in the United States is a seventh grade level with 1 in 5 American adults who can only read at a fifth grade or lower level. Creating something that is readable for a fifth grader is not just a catchy title for our blog; it is true. You need to write your content so that a fifth grader can read and understand it. Now, not all of your readers will only be able to read at a fifth grade level, so let’s look at a few ways to make your content easier to read for everyone. 1. Stay Away from the Robo-Boogie. You want your content to rank in the search engine so people can find you, but if you write your content for a search engine you will find readers leaving ASAP. The people you are writing for are not the robots that pop your site up in a search result. If you write predominately for a search engine, your content will not be reader-friendly and will sound awkward because of all the keywords you stuff throughout your content. Don’t do that! Focus on writing on a personal level with a conversational tone. This makes your content easier to read and people can actually relate to you, which is what you want. 2. Jargon-Schmargon. A key part of keeping your content reader-friendly is to stay away from technical jargon. Yes, you may be writing content for legal or insurance companies, but you need to stay away from all the legalese. The general population will not understand most of it, and you want them to be able to relate to what they are reading and to seek out the company you are writing for. If you constantly use technical terms in your content, people will feel like your business will not work well with them and they will look elsewhere. Don’t let that happen! If you have to use institutional jargon, then give brief explanations or say that a friendly associate is willing to help people understand the terms. Make sure people will feel helped. 3. Utilize those Sub-headers. Sub-headers make reading any piece of content a cinch for readers. Copyblogger says that sub-headers engage readers throughout the entire piece and provide mental breaks for them. Sub-headers are like chapters in a book. Your mind knows to rest once you get to the next chapter, so too with sub-headers. You can use sub-headers to grab attention, to tell some information about the paragraph, and to provide an outline for readers. Many readers really enjoy outlines as they can read ahead and know what to expect throughout the article and if the article is interesting. This also helps for the readers who will not read the whole article. They will get the information they want simply by reading your sub-headers. If you don’t provide this, they’ll move on to other content. 4. Lists For the Win! You’ve seen them all over Facebook – lists are an absolute favorite of readers right now and they organize thoughts in short, concise sentences, sometimes offering descriptions. Lists are great ways to get your ideas across to your readers while keeping them engaged. They provide people with enough information and many will read a post in its entirety if it is in list format. Lists are easy to scan and if they are made in a bulleted format, they will stand out from the rest of your content. If someone is scanning your content for the bare information, that bulleted list is going to capture his or her attention pretty quick! FTW – Simple Content Matt Cutts recently came out and said (just this February 2014) that it’s better to write with “content clarity” rather than using technical language. He said to focus on clarity of writing and simplicity in words, rather than jargon or scientifically-important language. Way to back us up here, Matt! By following these steps, you will be able to craft incredible and readable content. You will not have to sacrifice your information or feel that you are “dumbing down” your content because you will still be creating something that is done well. Readability is all about engaging readers, regardless of reading level, and helping them to learn more about your product or services in a simple, yet informative way. It is never too late to start crafting your wonderfully reader-friendly content!

Infographic: The Era of the Content Beast

January 1, 2021March 19, 2014 by Adam Oakley

Embed this infographic on your own site Copy and paste this code into your blog post or web page: <a href=”https://staging.expresswriters.com/infographic-the-era-of-the-content-beast/”><img src=”https://staging.expresswriters.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/content-beast-890×6468.jpg” alt=”Infographic: The Era of the Content Beast” title=”Infographic: The Era of the Content Beast” width=”539″ height=”2894″ /></a><br /><small>Like this infographic? Get more tips from <a href=”https://staging.expresswriters.com/”>Express Writers</a>.</small> Express Writers is pleased to introduce our third infographic, The Era of the Content Beast. Our creative writers came up with the text, and our team infographic designer put the visuals together. There’s no better way to put it—when it comes to content on the web in 2014, there’s a real Content Beast out there that needs to be fed! The Era of The Content Beast To stay alive on the Web, you need to feed the content beast. What Is the Content Beast? It’s our ceaseless need for new and fresh information on the web. The voracious Content Beast feeds on content. To keep the beast happy, renew and update content constantly. How to Keep the Content Beast Satisfied 1. Plan Ahead. It’s difficult to create original, unique content all the time. To keep the content monster satisfied, plan things in advance. This is like stuffing your refrigerator with semi prepared food for when you don’t have time to cook. It doesn’t mean it’s less healthy. Planning your updates and posts early on will allow avoiding being stuck. This way you’ll always have something at hand to feed the Content Beast. Just open your content fridge, heat the creative oven, and serve the monster with a delicious meal. 2. Create a Unified Voice. Stay in sync to keep the Content Beast happy. Website, blog, and social media pages: several tones, but one voice only. Once the Content Beast starts eating food and likes it, he wants the same taste and flavors across all your content. 3. All for One, One for All. Content writing is like music played by an orchestra. To make sure your team is never off-key or out of tune, you need a conductor. Enter the content manager. 4. Upcycle. The content beast may be insatiable, but he’ll soon get tired of stale content. Use what you have to create new content. Change the angle, scrutinize unexplored facets of a topic, which proved to be successful in the past, and delve into your readers’ mind to see what they crave. The New (Web) Content Beast Internet users seem to prefer longer website content. Statistics show that longer web pages and blog posts have more followers than shorter web content. 2014: The Walmart Phenomena- A One-Stop Shopping Experience The beast gets hungrier… We live in an on-demand, want-it-right-now society, where people want to find what they need in one spot. That’s why longer content has gained ascendancy: because it saves time and provides substantial information. With quality, longer content, you don’t have to sift through piles of information to find relevant things. Web Content: Where To? Long Content: A Game Changer. To keep the content beast happy you need to feed him long articles. Long means longer than so far. Sweet spot: 2,000 words per blog. Social Media Sites: No More Junk Content Large social media sites, such as Facebook, LinkedIn or Google + are now full of junk content and link spamming. People go to niche sites to find truly useful content. How Can You Make It in the New Context? 2014: Specialized, Actionable Content. Content is specialized when it responds to specific needs. Create niche content that empowers the reader. Specialized, informative content means authority, expertise, and credibility. Content is actionable when readers learn something and can implement what they learn. The New Content Beast: shows readers “how-to” gives them what is promised in the title makes the “magic” in the title happen with more comprehensive copy general vs. specialized Content Specialization It’s a win-win for both the content writer and the website owner. More quality traffic- more visitors- more loyal followers- more paying customers. Loyal website followers backlink more, making today’s backlinking = a personal recommendation from a friend. How to Write Quality Longer Content Avoid stereotypes and keyword stuffing Create a really great title for your article Google favors the content displayed in the first third of your article, so: Get out the good stuff first Start with the main point(s) then move to the details Longer content builds a personal and lasting relationship with the reader. Bottom line, to make the elusive Content Beast of 2014 a happy one: create longer, specialized, actionable content, which builds loyalty.

23 Ways to Know If Your Copywriting Sucks

January 1, 2021February 19, 2014 by Adam Oakley

There’s no need to be shy. You’re reading this because you’re worried your content, well, sucks. You get a few positive comments on your work, but you’ve noticed the results aren’t backing up those friendly comments. Great content drives traffic, is engaging, and sparks discussion in the comment section. Excellent copywriting doesn’t become popular right away, so if you just wrote a piece, you need a little patience. But, there are cases where your content just isn’t great. Great Copywriting? Let’s Have a Reality Check Great content can still go unnoticed. If your blog or website is relatively new, you’re not going to have the same following as a blog that has been around the block a few hundred times. Readership alone isn’t a great way to gauge how bad your content is. Also, just because some people say they like your content doesn’t necessarily mean it’s great. Think of who is complimenting you. Are they family, friends, and coworkers? You’re not going to get an honest opinion from your close friends — after all, what kind of friend would say “hey, this sucks?” There’s not a single clue that tells you your content sucks. To help you decide if your copywriting is lacking, we’ve compiled a list of 23 ways to tell if your content needs a re-do. 1. You Yourself Don’t Give Your Content High Scores Ask yourself what you really think of your own content. Be honest here. On a grade of A (for awesome) and F (for bad), what would you give? If you can’t give your own content an A, then it is probably a good indicator you’re not doing what you should be. 2. You Don’t Have Any Comments Let’s face it: people read and comment on stuff that is great, and they skip right over the stuff that sucks. If you don’t have any comments or just a fine trickle here and there, you’re visitors are telling you something. If you have a new blog you probably won’t have hundreds of comments, but if you have a lot of subscribers and no one is saying “boo,” there you go. 3. You’re Not Really Targeting Your Readers If you aren’t addressing your reader’s issues, problems, or frustrations, it’s unlikely you’ll have a high engagement level on your blog. These days, readers want it all about them – and one of the most useful practices for good copywriting is to create content that actually targets them. What are your readers looking to solve? What problems do your readers face? Think about the issue from your reader’s perspective next time you write, and you might boost how many comments you get. 4. You Only Post the Good Stuff for Paid Accounts There are some sites that only give the good stuff to their paid accounts, but how on earth do they expect people to buy a subscription if there is nothing but crap to preview? It’s true. If you want people to pay, you need to show off what they’re going to find in a paid account. Give them some good reads for free as a preview of what more is to come if they pay. 5. You’re Negative No one wants to read a downer. If you have lame excuses, “poor me” styled posts, or you’re just down right moaning all the time, no one wants to read much further. You need a positive spin and something that is uplifting to your readers. 6. You’re Throwing Out Journal Entries Instead of Blog Posts You might not start your posts out with “Dear Diary,” but your content and blog posts read like a journal entry. Yes, back in the day that is what blogs were for, but today blogs and websites serve a purpose and read like magazines. Take a look at what you’re writing about. If you’re blabbing on about your dog, the weather, etc. you have a problem that needs serious fixing. 7. The Average Visitor Bails Fast Websites should have Google Analytics installed — if you don’t it’s time to get on that. See how long your average visitor sticks around. If they bail less than two minutes into their visit, it’s obvious your content isn’t holding their interest. SearchEngineWatch.com has an interesting post about how reports in Google Analytics can give you more insight. 8. You Spend 30 Minutes or Less Creating Your Work Most of the best copywriters write their pieces by taking no less than 30 minutes for short pieces and anywhere from two to eight hours on longer pieces. Copywriting is a work of art — not a short essay assignment. The more time you spend on your content, the more appreciated it will be by your readers. 9. You Have Very Few Followers Popular people get all the love. If you have no followers and haven’t ever received a “hey your site is awesome” message, then you have definitely got a copywriting issue. When your copywriting does it all, people will be compelled to tell you how great it is. 10. You Don’t Have Any Haters Great content gets those people who dislike the content too. They aren’t saying you suck; instead, they want to argue with a point you’ve made and start a debate. Haters who mock and disagree are a sign you’ve written something great just as much as fans are. 11. You’re a Keyword Junkie There’s no better way to write horrible copy than stuffing it with every keyword imaginable. If you are focusing on keywords or basing your posts around keywords, you’re tainting the quality of your work. Focus on real, high-quality posts — not keywords. Read more about the SEO trends for 2014 in this article by Entrepreneur. You’d be surprised how little focus there is on keywords these days. 12. You Care Too Much About SEO If you think SEO is the way to create a popular … Read more

Longer Is Better For Blog Content: Truth Or Myth?

January 1, 2021February 6, 2014 by Adam Oakley

350, 500, 1,000, 1,500, 2,000… all of these numbers have been thrown at us when it comes to creating blog content. Some sources say shorter blogs are better because your audience doesn’t have time to read. Other sources say longer blogs are ideal because they build credibility, authority and SERPs. Finally, there are still more sources that claim shorter is better because it does everything a long blog does in a short, sweet package. So, which is it? OK, so lately I’ve seen “shorter is better” circulating around on the Internet. While we DO have only 33 seconds to grab attention on a home page, a long-form blog over 2,000 words will actually get you noticed in search engine rankings. If you have a really good, poignant message in 100 words, but Google never ranks it—good luck Charley! Getting found is most important, and you can’t get found with a blog less than 500 words. Ideal Blog Length: Short Content versus Long Content Since Google dropped the Hummingbird patch, there’s been a new secret ingredient to getting noticed on the Internet: longer content equals higher rankings. Google indicated that content totaling 2,000 words versus 500 or less will rank higher on search engines. We here at Express Writers were skeptical at first. After all, up until this tidbit of information was released the rule of thumb was “less is more.” We conducted our own case study in an effort to test this new secret ingredient out. We switched from writing 300 to 600 word blogs to publishing 1,500 to 2,000 word blogs. We made the switch in mid-November 2013. We posted our new lengthier blogs daily. Each post included at least one, sometimes two, stock images. We followed our usual search engine optimization techniques and shared each post socially. By mid-December 2013, we watched in excitement as our rankings took a huge leap upwards! Before switching to lengthier blogs, we had 7 keywords in the top 3 rankings on Goggle. After switching, we had 35 top keywords in the top 3 rankings on Google! So, is shorter content better for blogging? Based on our study, we say this belief is a myth. Myths about Content Length When it comes to content length, we receive tons of input from all sorts of sources. Unfortunately, some of what we hear may sound great, but is really a myth waiting to be debunked. Let’s consider three: Reputation trumps content length. Tell me if you’re heard this: “He can write 100 words and get 100+ shares on it. Why? He’s been blogging for more than 10 years, and he reportedly blogged every day for that time. Today’s, he’s the “top blogger in the world.” Sometimes it takes that long to consistently build up a name.” Awesome! He built a name for himself. But the second his blogs lack value, his audience is likely to jump ship. Status means more than content. Consider Google’s Webspam Robot-Man. We like him. But really. Since he LEADS Google’s Webspam team, he can also write100 words and the entire world (well, Internet, well most of it…) listens. The rest of us can’t depend on our status to carry our content. Shorter content equates to more sales. When’s the last time you bought a product or service from a sales page that amounted to 500 words or less? In all likelihood, you haven’t. Potential customers want to know why they should buy from you. They don’t want hype and sales fluff, and they absolutely don’t want to be pressured. They want to be educated consumers, the sort who understand their purchase and clearly see how it will benefit them today and in the future. You can’t accurately convey this type of quality information in short content and expect to appear credible. What Truly Matters, Content-Wise QuickSprout.com published an article about long copy effects on rankings and the truths of content. They covered three truths that are inescapable when it comes to blog content: Quality content is king. According to a serpIQ analysis, Google doesn’t prefer lengthy content simply because it feels more valuable. Google also prefers it because the data indicates that audiences like longer, meatier content. The average length that scored as “most liked” was 2,416 to 2,494 words long. Sites rich with content get more links. The trend is that people feel more content offers more value. If your website is rich with well-written, longer content, it will attract more people and result in more links. Social media prefers lengthier content. A writer for Quick Sprout took the 327 blog posts they had written for Quick Sprout and sorted them into two categories. The first category held posts of less than 1,500 words. The second held posts greater than 1,500 words. The writer discovered that the posts with a length greater than 1,500 words received 22.6 percent more Facebook likes and 68.1 percent more tweets than posts that were less than 1,500 words. Lengthy content is also on the rise due to a notable change in user search engine queries. According to Hitwise, 8-word search queries have increased in use by 34,000 percent. People are far less likely to enter a keyword of 2 to 3 words into a search engine query. More and more users are using long tail keywords, or keywords that are anywhere from 4 to 8 words in length. The longer your content is, the more words you use and the more likely you are to rank when a person uses a long tail keyword. Does Short Advertising Sell More? Over the years, we have been conditioned to think that less is more and shorter ads sell more. While this might well have been true twenty years ago, today we live in a customer driven time where the customer’s want for knowledge outweighs our want to keep things short, sweet and simple. BusinessInsider.com published an article covering just why short copy doesn’t sell more. They gave five “most … Read more

New Year Tips: What Do I Have To Worry About With Duplicate Content?

January 1, 2021January 15, 2014 by Adam Oakley

Some people copy content in order to fill a website; others have all original content except for a list of automotive parts that really can’t be reworded. The hot question circulating in the online community is how much duplicate content will hurt you? Matt Cutts, head of Google’s Webspam team, says that today “something like 25 or 30 percent of all the web’s content is duplicate content.” For years, duplicate content has been a search engine optimization issue that has caused much debate. Some say matching content has led them to ranking ruin, while others claim it’s mostly harmless. Understanding Duplicate Content and Why It Must Be Avoided Simply put, duplicate content is the content that shows up multiple times in numerous places on the Internet. Search engines are on a mission to provide the best search experience. As a result, they avoid displaying identical material. There are three big issues with duplicate content: Search engine algorithms don’t know which content version(s) to include or exclude. Search engines cannot determine whether to direct link metrics to a single page or separate it between several versions. Search engines cannot decide which version(s) to rank for query results. You should avoid duplicate content whenever possible. It will only serve to decrease your SERP ranking and decrease traffic potential. Disclaimers, Legal Information, Terms, and Conditions Depending on the nature of your business, your service or product website might need to display a disclaimer, terms and conditions or some other sort of legal information. Let’s face it; nearly every website out there has something along these lines—even if it’s as minor as the same copyright information displayed on every page of the website. Duplicate content of this nature is going to exist. It’s virtually unavoidable. Here’s the good news: Google understands. If they were to rank websites negatively for duplications that arise from disclaimers, legal information and terms and conditions, they would likely cause a negative impact on overall search quality. In Cutts’ words, “I wouldn’t stress about it” when it comes to the necessary legal jargon. Ingredient, Product, Service and Other Lists Lists are another element found on almost any website. Companies display lists of ingredients, parts, specs, and so forth. Your website might have a list of affiliates. In general, these types of lists should not detract from your ranking. However, a word of caution does demand attention: if you have just an affiliate feed or the exact same paragraph(s) of text that mirror what everybody else on the web puts in their list, duplicate content could become a problem. Quotations and Citations Don’t worry if you use quotations or citations. It is okay to quote, provided you link to the original source and indicate that you are quoting. Google won’t see this as duplicate content. However, remember, quotes are the golden nuggets of copy. Don’t write copy that is quotation heavy. This will be seen negatively by Google’s eyes. Avoid “Fly-By-Night” or Duplicate Content Branding Duplicate content brands a website as “fly-by-night,” meaning the content was quickly copied and pasted from somewhere else just to get the website up and running with a shot at gaining quick SERP ranking. It’s important that your webpage content not give this deadly impression. The solution is simple: use original content as much as possible. By using original content throughout your webpages, little duplicates (such as the ones we discussed above) won’t carry much weight because your original content will far outweigh any matching material. In essence, showing that you are a reputable, established presence depends on value. How valuable is your content to the potential customer and the researcher who wants to be educated and informed? Keyword Stuffing is Deadly One of the largest contributors to duplicate content on the Internet has been the previous SEO strategy of stuffing content with keywords and keyword phrases. Up until now, this used to be a solid way to show up on search engine result pages and generate website traffic. Today, Google is smarter. Their search algorithms are able to identify synonyms and extrapolate relevant search results to a query based on concept. What does this mean for your content? Do not stuff keywords or phrases! It will create rapidly recognized duplicate information. Your search rankings will take a not so graceful swan dive, and you’ll likely be branded a “fly-by-night” website by search engines. The Practices to Avoid to Stay Free of Duplicate Content Cutts makes an interesting statement about duplicate content. He says that in general, “duplicate content is not really treated as spam.” Most of the time, it’s “treated as something that [needs to be] cluster[ed] appropriately.” It’s important to realize that search engines are endeavoring to preserve quality search results. Put yourself in the shoes of your audience. If they are looking for a local mechanic, then their search engine results need to return with several unique hits. They will then surf their way through these before choosing which mechanics to contact. If their search query returned a page with 10 links, all to the same mechanic’s website just different pages, they would be frustrated. It’s likely they would avoid giving business to this mechanic due to the sheer frustration of only his pages appearing. Google wants to ensure the audience is happy. They’ll weed out duplicate content as their algorithms allow, and you don’t want to be a weed that gets pulled. Here are the practices to avoid: Keyword stuffing. Using the exact same paragraphs over and over on multiple pages. Reusing the same biography, about or general company/business information because that’s all there is. Using lists that appear on other websites. Creating multiple domains, subdomains, or pages with duplicate content. The Practice to Adopt How do you not worry about duplicate content? It’s really very simple: stay original. One of the best ways to ensure your content stays creative and original is to hire a professional. An expert copywriter or copywriting agency … Read more

How Low-Quality Website Copywriting Services Kill Your Website

January 1, 2021November 4, 2013 by Adam Oakley

You’ve heard the saying “you get what you pay for,” but if you’re not taking that literally when it comes to your website copywriting, you’re throwing your brand’s valuable resources away. Quality Copywriting Not Your Concern? Well it Should Be. Websites with thin content, repetitive information or irrelevant content won’t rank high with Google and other search engines and it certainly won’t go over well with readers. Back in the day content didn’t matter. Instead search engines cared about links and keywords. Websites could sprinkle a few keywords (or stuff them depending on their tactic) and rank high without much effort. Today, however, search engines have raised their expectations and there’s no tricking their robots anymore. Once Google’s Panda and Penguin came around starting in 2011 and 2012, how web pages were ranked fell heavily on strong website copywriting. If the content is low-quality, search engines don’t want it and they certainly won’t recommend it to users. Understanding Poor Content Search engines rank your website based on what content you have on it. Two major areas search engines look at include: Length – If you only have a few sentences per blog post or on your web pages, search engine spiders will think your content is too thin. While there’s no minimum or maximum word count, you want at least 200 words or more. Originality – If you’re just rewriting what’s already on the web, you’re not original and search engines won’t think so either. Review your content and make sure it has some personal touches even if you got your ideas and research elsewhere. Also, it wouldn’t hurt to run your articles and website copywriting through a plagiarism checker just to make sure you’re not featuring what is elsewhere on the web. So Does High-Quality Content Matter? High-quality website copywriting is crucial. If you fail to invest in quality services, you’ll not only risk your brand, but your revenue too. Want to know some other ways poor-quality content hurts your business? Poor Quality Website Copywriting Kills Your SEO You’ve poured plenty of money and time into your SEO, but if your content is thin, you copy other sites on the web or you’ve stuffed your content with keywords you can be flagged or penalized by search engines. According to Brafton, 89 percent of consumers use search engines to find products, services and companies. If you’re flagged and not showing up on search results, you’re losing out. Even worse, the top three search results are the highest clicked by users—about 60 percent of clicks go to those top three according to Search Engine Watch—so risking your ranking does a lot more damage than you might realize. You’ll Lose Your Rep If you don’t check the facts or you copy your content from someone else, you risk losing a portion of your customer base. Once those customers are gone, it’s pretty hard to get them back. You Won’t Have Much of an Audience Consumers love to find stuff on social media. When friends, family and acquaintances are recommending something, consumers jump all over it. Low-quality website copywriting is rarely shared with social media and since social media is a hot way to gain a bigger audience, your website is missing out. You’ll Lose Trust Consumers rarely purchase from a company or listen to what that company has to say if they don’t trust them. Can you blame them? Low-quality content isn’t trustworthy content. You Don’t Increase Loyalty—You Might Even Lose It It’s said that 50 to 60 percent of customers put trust into businesses after they read high-quality content on their website. From a business perspective, it’s more expensive retaining customers than getting new ones; therefore, you need to ensure brand loyalty through the content you post on your website. How Do You Find High Quality Website Copywriting Services? Just about everyone these days calls themselves a copywriter, so how do you pick out the quality ones from the average ones? While some copywriting services offer general writing services such as: blogging or article writing, others are copywriting specialists who offer customized website copywriting services. Look for an Eye for Detail Website copywriting services should be perfectionists. They want to represent your brand in the best way; therefore, they should provide you with error-free, interesting content. If you’re looking at a larger agency, look for one that employs in-house editors in addition to their writing staff. That means a second set of eyes can review and proof the work before you see it. Hire Someone with Experience Great copywriters know how to write and can tackle a variety of industries and topics. Whether you’re looking for an entire website, a few blogs or sales copy, an experienced copywriter can get the job done better than one just starting out. Not sure how to tell if they have experience? Ask for references and a portfolio. And, don’t be shy about asking for a sample to prove their expertise. Quick Turnaround There’s nothing more annoying than a copywriting service that takes months to get the job done. If you’re looking for lightning fast turnaround times, you might want to consider an agency rather than a single copywriter. An agency has multiple copywriters on staff that can accommodate rush orders. Extra Bang for Your Buck A website copywriting service that offers multiple services in one gives you more options than a company that just writes for one industry or specializes in one section. For example, sales copywriters are excellent, but limited to only sales copy such as: landing pages or advertisements. If you needed general blogs or specialty copywriting services, your sales copywriters might not be able to provide you with those things. Look for copywriting services that offer SEO writing capabilities and consulting services. Often they can look over your website, help you devise a content strategy and even offer search engine optimization tips.

5 Keys To Choosing Your Content Writer Before You Start Interviewing

January 1, 2021September 23, 2013 by Adam Oakley

Over the past decade, the incontestable power of the Internet has brought millions of business owners from all parts of the globe together in investing their time and money in cutting-edge websites and suitable web content, elaborated according to their needs, specifications and expectations, with the pen of a content writer making their content happen. When it comes to articles that actually draw visitors and serve a higher purpose, most company owners spare no expenses and do everything in their power to identify the best content writer or team of writers available. Here are 5 important things that you should know about talented, active, sociable, Internet-savvy and creative freelancers who have what it takes to guide you towards business success. Your Ideal Content Writer Candidate Should: 1) Write On a Daily Basis We’ve all heard this lesson a thousand times: practice makes perfect. A content writer who spends more than a couple of hours a day writing informative, educational, entertaining materials for different clients with different needs and requests will always respond better to new challenges, unlike novices or other freelancers who only write every once in a while. 2) Be well-organized, do a lot of research and always Google before they tweet. Extensive research is part of the job and professional content writer always take this important phase very seriously. The worst mistake one could ever make is writing and distributing inaccurate, outdated, ambiguous content. In such cases, readers flag low-quality web material and start looking for trustworthy sources of information, so make sure you count on content writers who check and double-check the information before making it public. 3) Have an amazing, writing style which is audience-friendly and engaging Your content writers should make the most of their unique set of skills and their inexhaustible talent and creativity to promote your brand, services and products in an engaging manner, while embracing a truly accessible writing style. 4) Be great at social media. Would you really trust a freelancer who refuses to profit from amazing opportunities available on social media platforms? Would you hire a writer who doesn’t spend at least an hour a day on major social networking sites, like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and LinkedIn, where all the important elements go viral and all the most relevant trends are anticipated and widely commented? Make sure you hire a social savvy writer. 5) Is proud of their masterpieces, charges the right price Reputable content writers won’t hesitate to link their most relevant content pieces for you and promote their professional services in an effective manner. Perhaps in the near future business owners will be able to count on different ranking systems allowing them to determine the real value of a particular writer. Until then, Google Authorship will enable you to identify some of the most active, talented freelancers who might have what it takes to complete your writing assignments in a more than satisfactory manner. Make sure you pay the right price for unique content writer to create your pieces; an insignificant fee could trick you into opting for low-quality writing services – a big mistake which could impact the profitability and popularity of your online business for a long period of time. Neil Patel, a top Internet marketer, says that you should expect to spend $100-200 per post. Conclusion A content writer could be the biggest boon for your business this year and beyond. It’s the era of the Internet; and the Internet thrives on content. Don’t just throw this job on anyone. Make sure your writer meets the criteria above, and you’ll find yourself a good one. Hire yours today!

4 Secrets Every Content Writer Should Know

January 1, 2021August 20, 2013 by Adam Oakley

So, you’re a new content writer. You’ve spent a few hours perfecting your latest blog post, and you finally hit the publish button, thinking to yourself, “This is a good one!” Satisfied with your efforts, you go out and have yourself a nice dinner, and when you come home several hours later, a depressingly barren inbox awaits you. No comments, no likes, no re-tweets, no shares? What happened? You may even sleep on it, only to discover the next morning that your results are still abysmal. What have you done wrong? Why are other bloggers doing so well, while your arguably superior work sits unnoticed in the annals of the Web? Well, let’s take a look at some of the secrets every content writer should know about getting the most out of every post.