Technology Toolkit

A website that presents products to consumers is their window into the seller’s world. How consumers view that world depends on the quality of the products offered. However, first impressions are important too. The quality of web page content plays a big role as to whether visitors convert to customers.

It’s vital that Internet marketers spend time creating the right text for each web page. People who search the web make decisions quickly. They give website owners very little time to engage them. The second they’re bored or feel a site is not useful to them, they’re gone.

Many elements make up successful and engaging web content. You can employ several writing strategies to encourage visitors to stay awhile investigating your site. Here are ten things you can do to create compelling web page content:

Think Speed

Make content for a web page shorter then you would for the print medium. Web surfers do not like wasting time. They’re like elite tactical forces, they want to get in and get out. Give them shorter versions of information. You can always provide them a link to more detailed and longer winded information on a resource site.

Talk Your Target Market’s Language

That means knowing all about your niche first. Only when you understand your audience can you speak to them on their level. With a little market research, you can understand your audience’s wants and needs. You can also learn their level of knowledge concerning your products. You then focus your words accordingly so they understand your message.

Write Shorter Sentences

People read slower onscreen then they do when reading print copy. The computer screen is not conducive to long rambling sentences. Readers have to scroll down and follow winding sentences down a page as they scroll. Shorter sentences are more eye friendly and thought process friendly when it comes to the web. Strive for an average of fourteen words per sentence.

Write Shorter Paragraphs

The same goes for your paragraphs. Keep them shorter than you would for your print copy musings. No elaborate and adorned novel type paragraphs for your web page content. Think lean and precise, like your article writing for your article marketing efforts. Think white space every three to five sentences to give readers’ eyes a rest.

Break Content Up

Use headlines, subheads and bullet points. This enables readers of your content to scan a page quickly. When in a hurry they can then isolate important sections to get the gist of the page. They don’t have to read everything if they’re looking for just one thing.

Tone Up

Tone is important when it comes to writing for your website. You have to linger on the border between two distinct tones. One is academic or lecture type exposition. The other is Madison Avenue sales hype. In between is a conversational tone that imparts useful information in a matter-of-fact way. Strive to walk along that borderline so your audience understands and trusts you.

Be Active

Write your web page content in an active, not passive voice. This gives your words an energetic flow. This facilitates easier reading and keeps your audience interested in your message. Passive voice makes for sluggish uninspired reading.

Write for a General Audience Linguistically

Write to your target market but make your language universal. You never know who is going to find your content and from where. Cut out the jargon, colloquialisms and slang specific to a select geographic region.

Consider Overviews and Review Points

Do you absolutely need lots of information on a particular web page? Will this involve your reader spending time scrolling? Then break up text with review boxes. This adds eye-pleasing white space and refreshes readers’ minds on important points. Make these review boxes stand out.

In addition, consider putting an overview box at the top of a page that has extensive content. Those who want to spend the time reading will. Those in a hurry for a general take on a topic will read this overview and move on. You provided for both types of readers when it comes to involved content. Again, consider links to avoid extended page scrolling.

Edit

Plain and simple, check your work. Edit for grammar, punctuation and spelling. Don’t forget to edit for clarity and uniformity of thought. Don’t meander in thought, away from a particulars page’s central theme. You will confuse your reader by going off topic.

The above tips are basic elements of quality web pages. Begin today to implement some of these methods onto your site’s pages if needed. In doing, you will give your online business a better chance to stand out from the crowd.

Your success as an Internet marketer is dependent on driving targeted traffic to your website. Just as you do with article writing, you must employ keywords and phrases on each of your web pages. Doing so will increase the odds that you will rank higher in search results.

You have two goals when composing web copy for your site. The first is to have relevant, useful content that clearly defines your products and services. The second is to get consumers who perform searches to find you before they find other web merchants. Combining these two goals is the best way to optimize your site to gain customers.

It is incumbent upon you to do some keyword research before you begin writing content. The web has several information sites where you can research appropriate keywords and phrases. Upon investigating a few, you will come up with your own list of keywords appropriate for your products.

What do you do with this keyword list? The first thing you do is look at your existing web page copy. Does this copy, written prior to your keyword research efforts, contain any words from your list? If so, great, you are already ahead of the game.

However, you may have written these pages hurriedly many months ago. You did so in a rush to get your website up and running. You now realize your web pages are SEO deficient.

Now you have to roll up your sleeves and get down to the hard work of refashioning your copy. In fact, you may have to discard everything you initially wrote. This means starting from scratch and building content anew. Just approach this writing as you would your article writing for your article marketing efforts. You will have new, original content with appropriate keywords peppered throughout each page.

As you edit or totally rewrite your web page content, you must be cognizant of readability. Make sure your words flow smoothly as you strategically place key words and key phrases. Trying to stuff too many keywords onto a page will make the reading stilted. Visitors to your pages will feel uncomfortable with the content as they read.

It’s as if you are force-feeding those words and phrases. Littering a page with repetitive keywords is unnatural writing. You don’t do this in your article writing efforts for your article promotion campaigns. Consequently, don’t do it on your web pages. If you do, your readers will sub-consciously notice this unnatural lilt. They will become annoyed with your site and probably click off to another web portal.

This you do not want. After all your time and effort performing marketing activities, you want visitors clicking through. You want conversions not visitors clicking away to your competitors.

There’s one caveat to consider when it comes to writing web page content. Do not feel that you have to use the same keywords or phrases on every page. Every page of your website is unique. Therefore, overall content, keywords and key phrases appropriate for one page may not be for another.

Think of it, will your About Us page have the same keyword phrases as your ecommerce Shopping page. A few words may be the same, but overall the content will be different. You have a different focus for each page so you must formulate content and keywords accordingly. Your About Us page will inform your audience. You will educate them about your enterprise. Your Shopping page will promote actual products, using keywords related to those products.

There’s something else to consider when it comes to web page writing. Call it the fruit and vegetable department mentality. You always want your website content fresh. It doesn’t mean you have to change your content every day. It does mean you have to change it often. Your customers do not want the same old, same old every time they visit your site.

You wouldn’t want the same bag of oranges or head of lettuce sitting in your supermarket each time you visit the establishment. You would consider the supermarket unprofessional, irrelevant, old, and stale. That is how visitors will view your website if you don’t keep it fresh.

Constantly strive to have timely, useful web page content interspersed with the right keywords. This is the key to getting higher rankings in the search engines. It’s also the key to building your SEO writing skills. This will aid your article writing and article marketing efforts as well. It will also grow your online income from your website faster.

You wear many hats as an affiliate marketer. One day you’re engaging in an e-mail campaign, the next day you’re commenting on social forums. In addition, you find you have to spend time maintaining your website, while still needing time to post to your blog. Of course, there’s article marketing which you regularly employ as a marketing tool.

You realize that article writing and article distribution is vital to link building. If you perform your own article writing you know it’s time-consuming to research and craft quality articles.

Sometimes you may feel overwhelmed with the pressure to build an inventory of articles. However, unless you pay an article writing service to write for you, you have to make time for writing.

You can perform article writing faster while still maintaining quality. You do not have to trade one for the other. The following are ways to get up to speed producing consistent content that your target market needs.

Know Your Specific Topic

By knowing your topic this means specifically, not generally. You no doubt will be writing on a topic related to your affiliate product. Is your affiliate product a health and wellness product? Then focus your article on one aspect of the products you market.

An article on why vitamins are beneficial for you is good. An article on the benefits of omega-3 fatty acids for cholesterol control is better. It’s specific and highly focused.

This focus will help you concentrate on one message when it comes to article writing. You will not try to tackle too much in one article. You will not stray off topic either. You know your article must deal with omega-3 fatty acids.

Therefore, you will not start wandering into discussions on why vitamin C is beneficial for building the immune system. Your topic is omega-3 and cholesterol. You will focus your research efforts and writing on this topic and therefore make efficient use of your time.

Choose a Title

While some people like to come up with a title afterwards, choosing one beforehand further focuses your thinking. You know every word you write must relate to the title. If your title is “Keep Cholesterol under Control with Omega-3’s” you will make sure every sentence is a natural extension of the title.

Again, you will not waste valuable time on sub-topics. You will also not wander into other health and wellness topics only vaguely associated with cholesterol control.

Outline

Once you have your specific topic, and title, and have performed the necessary research, you can outline. Your goal with an outline is to choose three to five major points concerning your topic. Article marketing as part of an article promotions campaign means writing content of 500 to 800 words.

You can only convey so much information in a short article. When you select your three to five points you have a road map for your article. You simply add an introduction and conclusion to your main points and there’s your article.

With an outline you know each point can only have so many words or your article runs too long. Therefore, you focus on presenting the essence of each major point. You finish elaborating on one point and move to the next according to your road map.

It’s like a road trip to a vacation destination. You have pre-determined stops along the way.

Each point you write about is one-step closer to your conclusion and a complete article. Without an outline you will take too many side trips, often off topic. You either never reach your destination (your conclusion) or take too long to get there.

You also dilute your main message and have to revise extensively to get it back on track. This is where article writing becomes time consuming.

Article writing for submission to article distribution services is something that doesn’t have to take forever to accomplish. You can write faster and maintain quality by adhering to the above tips.

Choose a specific topic. Focus it further with a specific title before you begin writing. Outline so you have a map for your journey with a clear destination in mind. Then put your pedal to the metal and head out on that journey to build your affiliate business through article marketing.