The primary goal of a good SEO Copywriter should be to captivate and influence a targeted human audience and attract search engine rankings with content that informs and answers common queries in a unique and engaging manner.
In other words, the content has to do more than just read well – it has to be tailored around specific topics and phrases to rank highly for popular search terms and keywords. Therefore, excellent copy consists of content that is both written well and developed with search engine optimisation (SEO) in mind. Let's look at seven actionable copywriting techniques you can use to push your content to the top of the search engine result pages (SERPs) 1. Start with a Show-Stealing Title When you're initially coming up with the topic and outline of the content, the very first step will be formulating an eye-catching, click-provoking title. Fortunately, if the title is good enough to persuade people to click on it, Google's algorithms will recognise this positive organic traffic trend as an indicator that your page is a useful resource deserving of higher rankings. Here's a step-by-step example illustrating the typical SEO-oriented title creation process: 1. Think of a basic way to describe your topic. For example: Methods for Improving a Blog Post Title Check point 6 and make sure you include your longtail keyword research at this stage. Look for keywords which have less competition but describe the topic you want to cover in detail.
2. The above “title” is actually more of an extremely bland and vague description, so the next step is to spice it up using buzzwords/keywords, adjectives, lists, mystery/curiosity, benefits/advantages, and other persuasive tactics.
Except in this step you'll come up with a couple of variations like: 5 Title Tweaking Techniques that Promote Higher CTR Multi-Tiered Guide on Creating Blog Titles Like a Pro 3. Now list your prospective titles using a headline analyser (CoSchedule's is the most popular) and refine from there. These tools are very straightforward and highly insightful ways to make a good title great. Virtually all successful SEO Copywriters use a similar process to the three steps mentioned above. 2. Keep it Simple, But Not Short and Sweet To develop content that can accommodate the average attention span and patience of an online reader, you'll want to stick to certain formatting guidelines. Sentences and paragraphs should be straightforward and uncomplicated. However, the content itself should be full of useful, entertaining, and engaging information. Furthermore, the outline should be as comprehensive as possible. By keeping the attention of readers with succinct and effective messages, yet delivering a piece that covers every aspect of a topic, you'll position the page as a go-to resource that will attract inbound links and high rankings. Knowing that, here are a few steps you can take to make sure you're implementing this technique: 1. Pretend like you're having a conversation and use a relaxed vocabulary. There's no need to be extra fancy – just convey your point without adding extra fluff. 2. Once you're ready to write in a conversational tone, next you'll want to create an all-inclusive outline that covers every possible facet of the main topic. This is sometimes referred to as the skyscraper technique – outdoing the most comprehensive pre-existing resource. Many brands have begun simplifying their content while aiming to provide more informative value within fewer words. Writing in this style makes your content easier to scan and digest.
3. Using Google's Autocomplete Suggestions to Fill a Demand
One of the best ways to propel a page straight to a #1 ranking is to find a common search query that hasn't yet been answered definitively by an authoritative source. Questions and how to phrases are the best kinds of phrases to look for because there are a lot of them that have only been discussed on forums or user-maintained question/answer sites like Quora. Luckily, it's easy to find these terms just by typing an incomplete phrase into Google and waiting for the Autocomplete suggestions to pop up. Here's how: 1. Visit the home page of Google.com. Start typing a query related to your niche and pay attention to the suggestions that appear as you type each letter. If the suggestions feature isn't enabled, see Google's page on activating auto complete. 2. Another option is to use a Google suggest keyword scraper tool like the one at keywordtool.io in order to build large lists of suggested search terms. The best part about this technique is that many marketers neglect to use it to their advantage, so it's a largely untapped source of SEO topics. 4. Compile Massive Lists to Become a Popular Resource If you've ever seen the top 30 or top 100 lists on blogs, you know that they rank particularly well on Google. This is because the most exhaustive resources tend to be linked to within blog posts and on social media based solely on their usefulness. Here are a few steps you can take to build better lists than the competition: 1. Use a content map or brainstorming session to write down a predefined number of topics or tips. 2. Once you have your list, search for similar lists online and double check to make sure you're covering everything that they include as well. 3. Once you have a solid list, try to condense the most important facts and sound advice on each point while keeping each one short and easy to read. For example, we put together a list of the top places to find guest posts and included in our guide; How Do I Find Blogs Which Accept Guest Posts 5. Use Longtail Keywords Tapping into a new set of keywords that haven't been targeted by other marketers puts your brand in a unique position to thrive in its own lane, with less competition. Here are some steps you can take to achieve this:
Many brands have boosted their popularity by inventing new buzzwords that didn't previously exist, so that's another idea worth considering.
6. Utilise Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI)
If your brand isn't yet taking advantage of LSI, it's time to get started as doing so will help you rank for obscure terms that you might be completely overlooking. 1. Study this guide on LSI. 2. Implement, rinse, and repeat. LSI is now common practice among leading SEO agencies after becoming a hot topic following the Panda and Penguin updates that placed an emphasis on content quality. We hope you've picked up some new techniques! Let us know in the comments below. Do you have something to add?
8 Comments
Cheryl
4/12/2017 17:41:27
Awesome! Thanks for sharing I'll check it out.
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Cheryl
5/12/2017 10:50:50
Thanks for stopping by! Glad it helped :)
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Daniella
5/12/2017 10:29:02
Great tips, thank you! I've started building a list for my blog, but I didn't think about searching for keywords and doing the sentacr thing on google. Going to try it now!
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Cheryl
5/12/2017 10:52:19
Using Google to find keywords and new content ideas is the best way to ensure more traffic from them! Seems so simple, but it works. Good luck!
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Cheryl
10/12/2017 12:50:55
Awesome!! Happy to hear this post helped you out :):) Keyword research has gotten a lot trickier over the last few years hasn't it. Luckily new tools are coming through to help!
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AuthorWritten by Cheryl A Clarke Chief Happiness Officer & Content Marketing Freelancer @ Ginger Marketing (unless stated otherwise) Blog CategoriesPopular content marketing postsTop Udemy Courses*Archives
October 2022
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