Adam Barone is a freelance copywriter from the Boston area. Visit him at http://www.adambarone.com. (c)Adam Barone 2006. All rights reserved. Reprint rights granted as long as the article is published in its entirety, including links.
Website Copywriting: A Recipe For Hard-Hitting Words In Lean Portions
November 21, 2009 by IBI · Leave a Comment
In 10 short years, websites have evolved from business novelty to necessity, perhaps now the most important part of a business’ marketing and branding arsenal. For very small shops to the largest publicly-traded corporations, websites have become both the most preferred and the most interactive way for companies to communicate with their customers and prospective customers. And though many of the same fundamentals of good offline copywriting apply to the online world, there are distinct differences in both content presentation and strategy that are important for anyone involved in website copywriting-whether it be a writer, designer, creative director or client-to be aware of.
1. Website copywriting needs to be shorter
It’s been scientifically proven that readers’ eyes tire quicker reading a computer screen than they do a printed page. But more important than that, website copywriting needs to be short because of the nature of the medium. Computers are all about speed in information gathering, dissemination and understanding. And the amount of verbal content a company presents on its website must take that fact into account. If the concept can be explained in one sentence instead of three, use one. If a simpler word can be used in lieu of a longer, more complex word, go with the simpler. Concentrate on quality without the quantity. It can be done and done very well.
2. Good website copywriting starts with a home page that incites curiosity
On a home page, many organizations wax about how long their company has been in business, how many employees they have and other assorted topics, which do nothing to whet the reader’s appetite. Instead, use the homepage to introduce your company as a solution to a problem your market has. That way, you’re presenting your readers with a valuable reason to continue reading.
3. Customer testimonials are an integral part of great website copy
Often, the best website copywriting doesn’t come from you or your copywriter. It comes from your customers’ personal experiences. Assuming your company has satisfied customers, what they say about you can be much more credible than anything you say about yourself, and they can reinforce the credibility of the claims you do make about yourself.
4. Add a personal touch to complement the facts
A website is nothing more than a computerized, interactive introduction (e-commerce not withstanding) to who you are as a company and what you do. And just like a personal introduction, what often follows the “facts” are topics of a more personal nature. Good website copywriting always includes this type of content in a secondary location of the site-a place not hard to find, but not up front and center either. Why is this important? Because people want to get to know the companies they’re going to work with or do business with. They’re interested in the personalities that run your organization and the culture and philosophy behind it.
Article Marketing and Blogs – a Recipe for Guaranteed Success
November 1, 2009 by IBI · Leave a Comment
Blogging is a great way to get traffic to your website, and if you create a blog for no other reason than that, you are practically certain to get positive results. Blogging and traffic are made for each other, and there are several ways of using blogs to promote products on your site.
The first question is what kind of blog? Wordpress and Blogger (owned by Google)are the most popular blogging packkages on the planet. This offers you four blogging options, and three ways of creating a blog to get traffic to your website.
Why four from just the two blogging packages? Here is the answer to that question, and how if you create a blog using each, you will maximize your earning potential from your products:
Blogger
Blogger is blogging software owned by Google. Most people run their blog from BlogSpot, Bloggers blogging host. When you do that you have less control over your blog than if you operate it from your own IP address. Blogger is very easy to use, and very easy to get started with, and is popular with those who don’t want to worry about templates, plugins and designing their own blogs.
Wordpress
Wordpress can also be run from the Wordpress hosting site. However, where Wordpress scores over Blogger is in the fact that the software can be uploaded to your website, and can be run from there. This enables you to use any of the thousands of Wordpress plugins and templates that provide an almost unlimited degree of functionality in your blogging that will help to drive traffic to your website.
When you create a blog with any of these two different packages, whether run from your own computer or from the blog host, you are able to provide fresh content daily to your virtual website. Because that is what a blog is: it is in effect a web page, in the same way that a Squidoo lens and a page on a website is a web page.
Blogging and Search Engines
Blogging allows you a presence on search engines such as Google and Yahoo, and allows those with little idea of SEO or even of web design, to sell products online. There was a time when blogs were a rarity and something new, but blogging is now a way for anybody that knows how to create a blog can drive traffic to their website or to their blog page and help them make money through free advertising.
Whatever you use it for, howver, a blog has to be advertised to get readers. No readers and there’s not much point in the blog. Blogging is not advertising: it is a means of expressing yoruself and your thoughts. However, you can aslo use it to advertise, not only your feelings, but also your products and your websites if you have any. Now, you might think I am being a bit duplicitous here, stating that blogging is not a means of advertising yet can be used to advertise! Yet both statements are true. Let me explain why.
Is Blogging an Advertising Technique?
Yes and no. You can create a blog in order to get traffic to your website, and in that respect you are using your blog for advertising. You can place a link to your website: your squeeze page, sales page or just a content page. The problem you have, and it is not a diffcult one, is how you are going to get people, not only to read your blog, but also to click on one of the links? The link could be placed at the bottom of every post, and on a permanent page on your blog, but how do yet get traffic to your blog: you have the same problem now as getting traffic to your website!
What you have here is that blogging can be use to promote another site, whether it be a website, another blog or a social networking site such as Facebook, MySpace or YouTube. You can use all of these to promote and sell products. However, how do you get people, to find your blog? Creating a blog is fine, but that is only the start.
Use Article Marketing in Blogging
There is one way, and that is article marketing. By writing articles about your niche or product, and then including a link to your blog in the article, you can use the article to advertise your blog. If you can persuade a reader to click on your link, they will reach your blog on which you provide them with links to your website, your other blogs and your Facebook and MySpace home pages.
Perhaps you can’t write, and maybe don’t know how to use articles properly, or even where to get them. Well don’t worry. If you want to make the best use of the internet than create a blog, get blogging and then use the help provide online to make best use of your blog make money.
Blogging and traffic go together, and it is easy to create a blog to drive traffic to your website or any other online web page (such as another blog). You only need to know how.
I can show you how: check out Article Czar for information on how articles can be used to make money from your blog. You will get a gift for visiting and I will also show you how to set up your Wordpress blog on your website
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