how to write content writing for websites

WEBSITE ESSENTIALS

10 tips for creating awesome website content that drives traffic

• Jennifer Kaplan

When it comes to using a website builder and making a website , your content should be your main priority. You don’t have to take our word for it though, you can look at the facts: Over one-third of visitors will stop engaging with a website if the content or layout is unattractive.

Great website content is written with both the readers and SEO in mind. And if you want to capture the attention you rightfully deserve, you’re going to need to put in some effort.

What is website content?

Website content includes all written and visual elements present on your site that provide information about your business, products or services to your site visitors. This includes, but is not limited to, text, images, videos, infographics, audio files, PDFs and various forms of interactive content.

Examples of text focused website content includes headlines, page copy or body text, blog posts , product descriptions, and downloadable content like eBooks or whitepapers. Examples of visual driven website content includes images, videos and infographics, all of which help to break up your website's text while engaging users.

Good website content should be relevant, valuable to the reader, and optimized with keywords for search engines to improve visibility. It should always reflect your company's brand voice and be consistent in style and quality across all pages. This means it will need updating regularly too.

Learn more about how to start a blog , with a blog maker.

10 tips to write engaging website content

We’ve compiled the following 10 tips on writing website content that will help you boost your traffic and conversion rates:

Get to know your audience

Provide value with your site content

Optimize your website content

Factor in website links

Keep content short and simple

Apply the inverted pyramid method

Avoid using jargon

Vary your word choices

Use calls-to-action

Make your content visually pleasing

01. Get to know your audience

Having an understanding of who you’re speaking to is something that you might’ve addressed back when you decided to start a business . Establishing how you will voice your offerings when you’re writing for the web takes that effort one step further. These words are meant to sell something, whether that’s an idea, product or service. And in order to do that, you’ll have to talk your audience’s language.

Consider your target market: What do they look like? Where are they from? What is their age range? What are their common interests? Write the answers to these questions down so that as you go through the proceeding tips and perfect your website content, you can keep this community at the front of your mind.

02. Provide value

It’s not enough to be a great writer who transcribes elegant text. You need to be able to provide value through your chosen words and copywriting. And now that you know who your audience is, you’ll want to speak directly to them and their interests. Ask yourself, “Would my targeted visitors care about this sentence?” for each and every line you write. Restructure your words to align with their desires, to fix their problems, and to spark their curiosity.

You should also consider the current Internet trends of content from relevant and popular blogs. Use these publications as inspiration for your own work - whether that’s your homepage text or your written blog posts. Find a way to do it better than them. In turn, you’ll become a natural salesman.

03. Optimize your website content

A great website full of targeted, valuable content is interesting and visually appealing but it’s unfortunately not going to get you noticed. Why? It’s apparent that you’ve worked so hard? What could you have possibly forgotten?

Enter, Search Engine Optimization, or SEO. SEO is the process of using several techniques to get your website ranking higher in specific keyword search results on search engines. These SEO tools will support you in your mission to befriend Google and users alike.

You’ll want to focus the grunt of your efforts on keywords. First, figure out what your keywords are and then make them your soulmate. In other words, do keyword research to discover the popular terms associated with the theme of your website, such as “fashion boutique” or “artisan pies.” Then, drop their name into sentences whenever naturally possible. Even mention them in the places where it might seem like no one is listening, such as your website’s description, your blog posts’ meta data and the alt text of your images.

04. Factor in website links

While we’re on the topic of SEO, you’ll want to also understand the power of linking. Linking to outside traffic sources (external linking) will help these search engines validate the credibility of your web content. It will also help you make friends with other site owners on the web, and improve the chances that they will want to link back to you.

Don’t just link to anyone though. You’ll want to first of all link to credible sources. Secondly, you’ll want to link to them only when it amplifies the strength of your content marketing strategy. For example, linking to stated facts and statistics, which will go far in legitimizing your content.

Through another process known as internal linking (or linking to your own pages), you’ll also experience great benefits. You can simplify your content and encourage readers to navigate the depths of your site by referencing blog posts and different site pages from one to the other. This will allow you to avoid saying too much in one area, which you’ll see in the next section can unfortunately deter favorable engagement rates.

05. Keep content short and simple

You’ve probably browsed at least one personal blog in your life with an ‘About’ page that’s a lengthy personalized summary. You might even mistake it for a short novel. Unless that was your BFF’s page, you undoubtedly skimmed it in a few seconds or disregarded it completely.

Let’s be frank. We all do love to write about ourselves and our businesses. We are proud and have so much to say about everything we stand for and all that we’ve accomplished. Yet, many of us tend to go on rants, which can be put an end to our high traffic hopes. No one wants that. So work on your content writing and make sure it is direct and straightforward to heighten the chances that it will get read all the way through.

Know that you don’t have to say everything here. In fact, in blog articles alone, 75% of readers prefer that posts are under 1,000 words . And likewise, you should keep things tempting by leaving your readers always wanting more.

06. Apply the inverted pyramid method

The inverted pyramid starts with the most important pieces of information, and then slowly declines in the order of priority - just in case your readers are lazy scrollers. So, begin by ranking your content to understand how to apply this method to your own work.

When you formulate your structure, still take into account organization and logic. Think of a story: Your title, your intro, and so forth. If done correctly, you’ll reap the rewards. This method is known to grab attention fast and keep it.

07. Avoid using jargon

Jargon is the inside jokes between you and the other parties in your industry. It’s specific to you but meaningless to most website visitors. Assume that the people who land on your site have never heard of your brand before or anything slightly related to it. Speak to them with words that are simple and easy to understand. This will enlarge the size of the potential audience that will read your content. With this in mind, writing evergreen content with topics that maintain consistent interest and search volume over time is a great way to ensure your material is relevant and appropriate for years to come.

08. Vary your word choices

This tip is as straightforward as your content should be. Readers don’t want to hear the same thing said over and over again. So except for your consistent use of keywords throughout your website content, change up your wording choices. For example, you don’t always have to say “buy,” you can sometimes say “purchase,” or “shop.”

To make sure you didn’t favor one word more than the rest, it’s best to have a friend or colleague go over your almost final content and look out for repetition. Also download one of our favorite Chrome Extensions , Power Thesaurus , so that you always have your alternative word choices available on hand.

09. Use calls-to-action

This step ensures that your content is effective. In fact, it’s so powerful that it’s the mission your words are driven behind. A CTA is the action item of what you want readers to do after you get them on your site, or the shiny button that you’ll want them to click on.

For instance, if your mission is to get readers to your newsletter, the microcopy on your CTA could read “Subscribe to our mailing list.” If it’s to get them to buy something, your CTA could be “Shop our store.”

As you can see in these examples, the CTA is very straightforward. You’ll want to use language of this sort, while potentially also evoking emotions through your own flare. Don’t stray aware from your brand’s personality though. It’s important to stay authentic throughout.

10. Make your content visually pleasing

The clock is always ticking, and time is of the essence. Why does that matter for your web content, though?

Grab attention with intriguing design. Beginning with your words, break them up into paragraphs, bulleted and numbered lists,and add in white space to allow it to breathe. Then consider your overall site’s layout. Always be on the lookout for trends, and browse your favorite websites to understand what’s working these days, from oversized fonts to split up screens and more. Understand what kind of images users respond to - infographics , for example, is also important here.

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How to Write Content for Website in 4 Simple Steps

By: Gaurav Sharma | 2 Comments

Updated On: June 21, 2021

Category: Content Marketing

Word Count: 3123 words | Est. Reading Time: 21 mins

How to write website content is a concern for most content creators and marketers.

And why wouldn’t it be?

Websites are at the heart of digital marketing. Even with many new customer-facing channels opening up, websites remain an important touchpoint for brands. An impressive website speaks volumes about the site owner’s credibility.

And contrary to popular opinion that website design inspires credibility, it’s actually website content that fosters trust. No matter how well a site is designed, if it serves sub-standard content, it’s going to bounce visitors sooner or later.

Great content, on the other hand, keeps visitors hooked and moves them along the sales funnel seamlessly. That’s why it forms the backbone of content marketing.

Moreover, content quality is a key ranking factor for search engines, as mentioned by a senior search strategist at Google.

Good quality content keeps website visitors on-page longer, which is a good sign for search engines. When this happens on a regular basis, search engines push up your rankings, which helps drive more organic traffic. More traffic means more conversion opportunities, and eventually more revenue.

What’s more?

Great content tends to garner a lot of shares on social media platforms, which helps build your brand awareness in a big way.

But to get all of these benefits, you need to first write exemplary website content.

Is there a catch?

Content consumption habits of users keep changing, which impacts web copywriting styles as well. Copywriters need to educate themselves on how to write website content that satisfies searcher intent and abides by latest best practices.

To that end, we’ve broken down the website content writing process into four broad steps that cover everything from SEO to readability. Check them out below.

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Disclaimer: This content contains some affiliate links for which we will earn a commission (at no additional cost to you). This is to ensure that we can keep creating free content for you.

Table of Contents

How to Write Killer Website Content in 4 Simple Steps

Creating content for websites is not an easy task. You have to compete with thousands of websites, deal with ever-changing search engine algorithms, and cater to the needs of a fickle target audience. Still, it’s not impossible.

All you need to do is follow this strategy step by step:

1. Set Goals for Your Website

You must have set some goals when you first decided to start your website . It’s time to revisit them when you start creating your web content.

Only when you know your goals can you create content that helps attain them. Not only that, goal setting facilitates content testing as well. You can test your content objectively only when you know exactly what you aim to achieve with that content.

So, start the content creation process by identifying your website’s goals. Do you aim to increase your sales or attract new customers? Or, do you want to redirect traffic to your brick-and-mortar stores? Define your website’s objectives so that you know what to write and how.

2. Understand Your Audience

Now that you know your goals, it’s time to understand the goals and interests of your audience.

Because your website content should fulfill both goal sets.

While researching your audience, you need to look beyond their age, demographics, and niche. Dig deeper and unearth hidden parameters, including their:

• Attribution path: Visitors who land on your site after clicking on ads will have different expectations than those who come from search results.
• Expertise level: If your visitors are technically savvy, you can write sophisticated web copy for them. But the same copy might fail to engage technically-challenged people.
• Search intent: Your visitors’ search intent (transactional, navigational, or informational) will govern the kind of content you will serve them.
• Content-consumption habits: Do they like long-form or short-form content? What kind of content do they share on social media? By answering these questions. You can create engaging and share-worthy website content for yourself.

You can use analytics tools like Alexa’s Audience Overlap to identify platforms where your audience is spending most of their online time. It also highlights their topics of interest by comparing their engagement on different kinds of content.

You can also conduct surveys or dig into your CRM data to find qualities common in your frequent website visitors.

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3. Analyze Your Competitors’ Content

To create standout website content, you need to keep an eye on your competitors’ content strategies as well.

Because competitive analysis:

• Gives you a competitive advantage.
• Reveals industry trends in content writing .
• Helps benchmark your website performance.
• Inspires new content ideas.
• Discover profitable traffic sources.

In short, you understand what kind of website content you’re up against. Armed with that business intelligence, you can create a superior product. Moreover, you can exploit weaknesses in their content to outrank them on search engine results.

To gather competitive insights, you can use analytics tools like SimilarWeb and Semrush .

4. Start Writing Content for Each Page

Now that you’ve done all the legwork, you are in a better position to start creating content for your website.

So how do you get started?

Just follow these steps:

Step 1: Identify Your Key Pages and Their Goals

Though websites differ widely in design and architecture, most of them have these five or six key pages:

• Products/Services
• Pricing (Optional)
• Blog/Resources (Optional)

In addition, you may also have a few landing pages (with a single, well-defined goal). They prompt your website visitors to perform a desired action, such as:

• Submitting their contact information
• Purchasing a product/service
• Clicking-through to another web page

Your task during this stage is to identify your key pages and landing pages and arrange them in a rough framework. Determine the goal of each web page and plan how the webpages will be linked to each other.

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Step 2: Find and Use Target Keywords

Keyword optimization is an integral part of website content writing. It makes your content more discoverable and helps attract traffic organically. In fact, moving up by one spot on the SERPs can improve your CTR by 30.8% . That’s huge, by any standard!

To create crawler-friendly web copy, follow these steps:

To find seed keywords, think from a potential searcher’s perspective.How would they search for a site related to say digital marketing? Either they will type the keyword directly in search engines, or use Google’s auto-suggestions, or pick terms from “Related Searches” at the bottom of the search results page.

Another way to go about it is by comparing your traffic sources. Figure out which topics/content pages are driving maximum organic traffic to your website. Target these keywords and capitalize on the authority you’ve already created.

You can also take inspiration from your competitors’ SEO strategies . Simply pick the keywords they are ranking for and create better content to beat them at their game.

Narrow down your list of keywords by comparing their keyword difficulty and competition.

• Now, we come to the most important aspect of SEO content writing: keyword placement. Where and how should you place keywords strategically so that they don’t look stuffed but still catch the attention of crawlers?

• Page titles and subheaders. Front-load your titles with keywords and try keyword-enriching one or two H2s as well.
• Meta descriptions. Introduce keywords as early as possible in your meta descriptions. Avoid boilerplate (repetitive) descriptions for related pages.
• Meta titles. Instead of using vague titles like “home,” craft descriptive yet concise (under 60 characters) titles. Branding your titles is also essential.
• Body content. Incorporate main and side keywords into your content as naturally as possible. Look for semantically-similar keywords to bring variety.
• Image alt tags. Crawlers can’t capture context behind images if not told explicitly through tags. Don’t exceed 125 characters since screen readers can’t read beyond that.

Pro Tip : If your page allows, include an FAQ section in it. FAQs are an opportunity to include long-tail keywords in question format. This way, you can capture voice search queries, which tend to be questions, longer than textual queries.

Additionally, if you pick questions with a high search potential, crawlers can feature your answers in the “People also ask” section of the SERPs as well.

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Step 3: Determine Content Length and Write Readable Content

Should your content be long-form or short? While there’s no cookie cutter answer to that question, HubSpot’s research proves that long-form content (with a median length of 2,529 words ) is the best for lead generation.

However, content length actually depends on page goals, page type, and topic complexity.

If your page is an infographic, you can’t go overboard with content length. Your content should be crisp and to-the-point. Blog posts, on the other hand, should be detailed and insightful so that they offer value to readers.

Whatever be your ideal page length, ensure that the content is high on readability. The best web content is written with humans in mind , not Google algorithms.

To write easy-to-read content, follow these best practices:

• Break heavy content into digestible chunks by using bulleted lists and paragraphs.
• Use proper H1s and H2s, and include a ToC in blog posts so that readers can skip to sections that interest them.
• Catch readers’ attention by highlighting important information.
• For actionable content, include a powerful call-to-action (CTA) at short intervals.
• Write in an active voice and conversational tone to connect with readers on a personal level.
• Stay away from jargon. Internal-link technical terms to informational pages.

One more thing…

Don’t forget the power of visuals in web content. They can help break the monotony, beautify your site, and engage website visitors. Moreover, people can retain and recall visuals better than plain text since the human brain is programmed so.

And here’s the cincher. Images, videos, and infographics are also known to increase conversions.

Need evidence?

53% of online shoppers say that images drive their purchase decisions .

But rich media can make your pages sluggish and slow to load. To keep them from disrupting the UX, you can try our image compression tool .

That said, let’s come to the crux of web content writing: content quality.

While visuals and white space can enhance your content’s presentation (and that matters a lot with click-happy web users), they can’t make up for content that lacks depth. Thin and duplicate content can turn off users, no matter how well it is packaged.

For online writing that delivers value at one glance, here are some things you can do:

Focus on Benefits, not Features 

When promoting products/services, highlight how they will benefit end users. It’s no use listing a million features if you aren’t going to explain how they help simplify users’ lives.

Keep Your Page Goals in Mind

Remember, the page goals we discussed earlier? Bring them back to focus and write content that drives users towards fulfilling them.

Use the Inverted Pyramid Theory

Deliver the most important information first because netizens have short attention spans. For instance, if you manufacture cameras, explain the USPs of your product first. You can always elaborate on lesser important things like how your camera works later.

Write Persuasive Copy

Using consumers as a vantage point, write content that they are looking for. What kind of concerns can they have regarding your products/services? Why should they buy from you? Then, create content that addresses their concerns. To do this, use social proofs (reviews and testimonials), refer to successful case studies, include an FAQ section, etc.

Push Your Limits

There are no hard and fast rules for web content creation. If required, you can stray from grammar rules or write titillating headlines. Even a micro-element like a call-to-action can make a huge difference to your content performance. So, experiment with all your website elements until you find standout content.

Write Action-Oriented Content

The whole exercise of writing web content will be futile, if it doesn’t prompt action from consumers. To avoid that, use plenty of action words like click here, get started, book a demo, etc. Use internal links to guide users towards your conversion goal smoothly. If nothing else, ask users to leave comments or share your content on social media.

Proofread, Proofread, Proofread

Typos and misspellings are blunders you need to avoid at all cost when writing content for your website.

To avoid them, use online editors like Grammarly to proofread your content. It not only flags wordy sentences and spelling errors, but also scores your content against global benchmarks (in premium package only). Plus, it pinpoints content’s grade level and suggests better word choices, simplifying your editing process to a great degree.

A/B Test Your Content

There’s always scope for improvement in content writing. Test your content rigorously and constantly.

Create iterations of each landing page headline and call-to-action, and test them on real users. Or, you can use a headline analyzer tool like CoSchedule to test your headlines instantly. You’ll be surprised how much difference a single word’s replacement can make to your overall content performance.

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Q1. How do I write content for my website?

A. Here is a four-step strategy to write great content for your website:

• Identify the goals for your page.
• Understand your audience’s search intent.
• Analyze your competitors’ website content.
• Find target keywords and use them strategically in titles, URLs, and meta descriptions.
• Write catchy headlines and test them using a headline analyzer tool.
• Use white space, numbered lists, and paragraphs to break content.
• Deliver important information first.
• Incorporate visuals into your content in relevant places.
• Focus on explaining your product’s benefits to end users.
• Use compelling CTAs.
• Test your content rigorously.
• Proofread again and again.

Q2. How do you write content?

A. Online writing can be simplified by using a step-by-step approach.

• Identify a content topic with a decent search volume and low competition.
• Check the best-performing content for your topic to analyze the competition.
• Conduct keyword research and create keyword-rich content titles and URLs.
• Write readable and high-quality content, with ample visuals and social proofs.
• Proofread and test your content.

Q3. What are the basic contents of a website?

A. While website structure can vary widely, most websites contain these key pages:

• Products/Services/Features
• Pricing (optional)
• Resources (optional)

Q4. Which content is best for a website?

A. Great website content has the following qualities:

• Readable: It is scannable.
• Keyword-optimized: It is searchable.
• Unique: It offers new information or a new perspective.
• Valuable: It delivers value to readers.
• Authentic: It’s information is conceptually correct.
• Compelling: It has sufficient social proof.
• Action Oriented: It prompts readers to perform a desired action.

Q5. How can I write effective content for a website/blog?

A. To write effective content for your website or blog, follow these steps:

Q6. What makes good content?

Q7. How important is website content?

A. Website content is a gamechanger for digital brands. It fosters consumer trust and helps convert random website visitors into loyal customers. Not only that, great content keeps visitors engaged and enhances the UX, which helps improve search engine rankings in a big way. That’s why content quality is an important ranking factor for search engines.

Q8. Why is website content important for SEO?

A. From an SEO perspective, website content plays an important role in boosting your search performance.

One, keyword-rich content boosts on-page SEO, raising overall search rankings.

Two, quality content keeps visitors engaged and reduces bounce. Search engines perceive this as a sign of good UX, which is a key ranking factor.

Three, good content provides interlinking opportunities which helps boost weak content and stretch dwell times.

Q9. What is the most important part of a website?

A. Content is undoubtedly the most important part of a website. Authoritative, useful content has the potential to boost your search engine rankings. At the same time, the importance of content presentation can’t be undermined. Great content, if packaged unattractively, will fail to engage website visitors.

Q10. How do you write attractive content?

A. Attractive content is easy on the eye and easy to digest. To create it, implement these tips:

• Use proper H1s and H2s.
• Break chunky text into paragraphs and lists.
• Use ample white space.
• Use formatting and typography to catch attention.
• Intersperse text with visuals.
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Final Thoughts

To sum up, start the content-creation process by goal setting. Try to align your business goals with searcher intent. Next, analyze the content that already exists on the web. Then, proceed with keyword research to figure out what to write about. Last, start writing content, keeping best practices in view.

Once you practice our four-step strategy again and again, you should be a pro in writing website content. Don’t forget to share the challenges you faced, in the comments section.

About the Author

Gaurav Sharma -

CEO/Founder @ Attrock Gaurav Sharma is the Founder and CEO of Attrock , a results-driven digital marketing company. Grew an agency from 5-figure to 7-figure revenue in just two years | 10X leads | 2.8X conversions | 300K organic monthly traffic | 5K keywords on page 1. He also contributes to top publications like HuffPost, Adweek, Business2Community, TechCrunch, and more.

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Javier Ayele

18 August 2021 12:11

Hi, I do think this is an excellent blog. I stumbledupon it 😉 I’m going to come back yet again since I bookmarked it. Money and freedom is the best way to change, may you be rich and continue to guide others.

Gaurav Sharma

26 August 2021 12:28

Thanks a lot for admiring my post :)

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The Complete Beginner’s Guide to Starting Your Website Content

Pamela wilson.

You have a brand-new website. Congratulations!

You may be wondering exactly how to write website content, though.

It’s a big job. Where do you start?

If you’d like tools and tips for how to make your writing faster and easier, scroll to the bottom of this post for a helpful video.

If you’re ready to write your website content, let’s get going!

First, it’s important to understand the difference between static, unchanging website pages like your: 

• Contact page
• Commerce-style pages like Store, Products, Services, or Work with Me

And website pages that update frequently like your:

• Blog or podcast content

As we tackle this topic of how to write your website content, we’re going to focus on getting your static pages created first. We’ll get them done, published, and working for you, and then we’ll work on how to write a blog post and other frequently published content.

First, a reality check, my friend. If you’re feeling slightly terrified at the thought of writing all that website content, I get it.

There are few things more intimidating than looking at a big, blank website that you have fill with content. 

Never fear: This post will cover how to write a content for your website, even if it’s brand-spanking new.

How to write website content when your site is new (and blank!)

The way to tackle this job is to prioritize what you’ll focus on.

Here’s how to write website content, in order of priority:

• Create a Home page where people can land.
• Create an About page so visitors know who’s behind the website.
• Create a Contact page so people have a way to reach you.

Once these three pages are complete, you’ve covered the basics.

Now you can focus on adding pages that take longer to create.

The next website content you’ll focus on writing depends on where you are in your business growth.

If you already have products or services to sell, you could create what I call a Commerce page. This is a page that offers links to your products or services. It can take a variety of forms. It might be:

• A Store page which displays all of your available products with links to purchase them
• A Services page which explains the services you provide with links to find out more
• A Work with Me page which details the kind of clients you help, how you work, and shares a way to take the first step toward working with you

If you don’t have anything ready to offer, no worries! You can skip directly to the next area of focus, your Content section.

By definition, this is the part of your website that will be updated frequently.

The most common content type (and the easiest kind to start with) is a blog.

If you’re wondering how to write a blog post, you have come to the right place! I’m going to cover that in detail in the next section.

What should be included in a blog post?

If you’ve never written a blog post before, the process can feel like a big mystery.

You may know a good blog post when you read one, but you may not be sure how to re-create it yourself.

I’ve written blog posts consistently since 2010. My work has appeared on some of the most high-traffic sites on the web, like Copyblogger , Duct Tape Marketing , Smart Blogger , and Problogger .

And I’ve written two much-loved books on content marketing, Master Content Marketing and Master Content Strategy .

I’ll let you in on a little secret that might surprise you …

For decades, I didn’t think I could write.

I was a graphic designer by trade.

I was naturally drawn to the visual side of marketing and became very good at creating logos, publications, brochures, annual reports, and newsletters.

But I was determined to build an online presence. To do that, I knew I had to figure out this “content marketing thing.”

That meant learning to write, even though I didn’t think I’d ever be good at it.

In order to learn from the masters, I started paying attention to the best blog content on the web. Over time, I began to see a pattern emerge.

I discovered that great blog posts — and effective content marketing — contained the same seven elements, over and over.

You can learn to master these seven essential elements of content marketing and use them in all the content you create for your website.

I’ll use a blog post as an example, but the same seven elements can be used to structure a podcast episode, a video (vlog) piece, and other frequently updated content.

Master these seven elements and you’ll know how to write website content that performs well and helps to grow your online business.

How to write a blog post: The 7 essential elements of effective content marketing

The best blog content contains all seven of the elements below.

Each section needs to be strong so it pulls its own weight and does the job it needs to do in your content.

1. Write a compelling headline

Want your blog to be clicked on and read?

Spend lots and lots of time (way more than you think) working on an engaging headline.

My favorite tools to use when I’m working on headlines are:

• A plain text document where I can brainstorm 10-25 headline ideas
• A site that allows me to “grade” and compare my best headline ideas. I like the Sharethrough headline analyzer .
• Coffee! (Or tea). Seriously — writing headlines is hard work. Caffeinate as needed.

Headline resources:

• My book Master Content Marketing has a whole chapter on writing headlines and includes 50 fill-in-the-blank formulas to help you create winning headlines. Get Master Content Marketing .
• Read How to Write Magnetic Headlines on Copyblogger.
• Register and download Headline Hacks from Smartblogger.

2. Craft an inviting first sentence

The very first sentence of your blog post is a make-or-break moment.

Keep it short, snappy, and casual. Write it like you’re writing to your best friend.

It needs to be inviting. It should be intriguing.

If it’s not, readers will click away and look elsewhere for their information.

First sentence resources:

• 10 Ways to Hook Blog Readers With Your Opening Line by my friend Amy Harrison .
• My book Master Content Marketing has a whole chapter on writing your first sentence. Really! Get Master Content Marketing .

3. Add an intro section

You may not have noticed that most blog posts have an intro section.

The intro section serves as a transition between your first sentence and your main content.

This is the first place on the page where you’re asking the reader to settle in and commit to reading what you’ve written.

Use it to summarize what they’re about to learn. Give them a preview of why you’ll make it worth their while to consume your content.

Intro section resources:

• The Ultimate Guide to Writing Blog Post Introductions by Neil Patel
• Master Content Marketing has a chapter on crafting blog post introductions. Get Master Content Marketing .
• 7 Ways to Write Better Opening Paragraphs for Your Blog Posts by Barry Feldman on Orbit Media.

4. Write attention-getting subheads

Subheads are one of the most important ways you can make your online content easier to consume.

They serve as “signposts” that move the reader through your blog content.

(The podcast or video equivalent to subheads is the short introduction to a new section of the information being presented.)

In written content, subheads give people who are skimming through your written content a general idea of what it contains.

Subhead resources:

• How to Write Subheads that Hook (and Re-hook) Your Readers on Copyblogger
• The No-Nonsense Guide to Writing Online Headlines and Subheads by Enchanting Marketing
• My book Master Content Marketing includes a chapter on writing subheads, too. It includes information on how to format subheads and shares a compelling reason to write your headline and subheads before you write the rest of your content. Get Master Content Marketing .

5. Fill in your main copy

What do I mean by the “main copy?” It’s everything else.

It’s all the writing outside of the sections above and the sections below.

It’s the heart of your content, where you deliver the value you’ve promised.

Main copy resources:

• The best tip for writing your main copy from my book Master Content Marketing ? Write it fast. When you’re working on the first draft of your content, get your ideas down as fast as possible. Don’t re-read, edit, or polish. Get Master Content Marketing .
• Day Two: How to Fill in the Details of Your Winning Piece of Content on Problogger

6. Wrap it up with a summary

Here’s another content section you may not have noticed before, but the best content features it.

Toward the end of your content, it’s smart to summarize the topic you covered and move readers to the final content element — the call to action.

Your content summary is a way to look back and say, “Here’s what we covered.”

It’s a last opportunity to reinforce the information you shared so your reader retains it.

Summary resources:

• How to Summarize an Article on WikiHow
• Here’s what I share about writing a summary in Master Content Marketing . First, refer back to something mentioned at the beginning. Remind your reader about what they learning. Reinforce how they’ll benefit from having consumed the content. Get Master Content Marketing .

7. Add a call to action

Content marketing and blogging serve a business purpose.

Creating content helps your website get found on search engines. It attracts prospects to your business and it gives you a way to develop a trust-based relationship with them.

But if you don’t ask your readers to take action, you might as well skip the whole exercise!

Your call to action — placed at the very end of your content — will do this for you.

Call to action resources:

• Powerful Calls to Action: How to Get Your Reader to Take the Next Step on Copyblogger
• In Master Content Marketing I say “Your call to action is where business happens.” Your “CTA” doesn’t have to ask for a sale — you can request that people leave a comment or share your content on social media. Either way, make sure your call to action is convincing and direct, like this: Get Master Content Marketing .
• Call to Action: Five resources to help improve your CTA on MainWP

How to write website content like a pro

I hope that this simple breakdown was helpful. You don’t become a content pro overnight.

Take it day-by-day and build your website content in this order:

First, create the foundational pages that won’t change often

• Build a Home page that explains who you help and how you help them
• Create an About page so visitors can learn more about the person or people behind the website
• Build a Contact page so people can reach out

Have something ready to sell?

Have something to offer? Build a Commerce page next.

Use this page to offer your products or services. You can add to it over time. And if you haven’t developed any offers yet, skip this step and get started with the next one.

Finally, begin publishing regular content

Once you have the basics in place, focus on creating and publishing content on a regular basis. The seven essential elements to include in each piece of content are:

• A compelling tagline
• An inviting first sentence
• An intro section
• At least three subheads
• Your main copy
• A call to action

Now that you know how to write website content, do me a favor? (And yes, this is a call to action!)

Click one of the colorful social sharing buttons here and share this content on your favorite social platform.

Improve your online business writing skills — 5 favorite tools and tips

When I started my online business in 2010 I didn’t consider myself a writer.

I taught myself how to write for an online audience by learning and practicing — writing web copy and blog posts. Lots of blog posts!

Since those early days I’ve written three books and many thousands of words on my own site and sites like Copyblogger. If I can do it, so can you, my friend.

Subscribe to my YouTube channel to get all my latest videos, hot off the digital press! Here’s the list of tools I mention in the above video:

• 750Words.com
• Hemingway Editor
• SendCheckIt Subject Line Tester
• Sharethrough Headline Grader
• Writesonic (affiliate link)

Remember, they’re only pixels

You may have always wondered how to write content for a website that’s brand new.

Staring at those blank web pages can feel incredibly daunting. But think of it like this — a blank page is an opportunity to carve out your own little corner of the web.

Remember, pixels are easy and fast to update. Don’t be afraid to create content and hit publish with the website content creation tips here.

NOTE: The illustrations in this post are taken directly from Master Content Marketing and were created by the brilliant D.J. Billings .

• Content Marketing & Copywriting , Online Business , Website Best Practices

Return to blog homepage

I’m Pamela Wilson

In 2010, at the age of 45, I started this site and grew it into a business that offers freedom, flexibility — and consistent revenue.

The Master Content Book Series

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How to Write Impactful Website Content: 8 Proven Techniques

Effective website content writing is vital for building a strong online presence. It's more than just conveying information—it's about connecting with your audience and delivering value.

In this blog, we'll explore eight essential guidelines to help you create compelling website content. From understanding your target audience and setting clear objectives to writing engaging headlines and optimizing for search engines, we'll cover the key components that can enhance your website content.

What is website content writing?

Website content writing refers to the creation and development of written content specifically for websites. It includes the planning, editing, and optimization of textual content that appears on web pages. Website content can take various forms, including articles, blog posts, product descriptions, About Us pages, and more.

Website content writing is also a fundamental element of digital marketing and online communication. It plays a crucial role in engaging, and retaining visitors, ultimately driving the success of websites and businesses.

FYI: StoryChief eliminates the need for various tools such as social media, automation, AI tools, SEO, and analytics. Start publishing for free today . 🙌

Why is website content writing important?

Website content writing is crucial for several key reasons, playing a fundamental role in the success and effectiveness of a website. Here's why it is important:

• Informing and educating : Website content provides valuable information and insights to visitors, educating them about products, services, or relevant topics.
• Establishing credibility and trust : High-quality content helps build credibility and trust with your audience. When visitors find valuable and accurate information on your website, they are more likely to perceive your brand as trustworthy.
• Encouraging conversions and sales : Persuasive and strategically placed calls to action (CTAs) within your content can drive visitors to take desired actions, such as making a purchase, subscribing to a newsletter, or filling out a contact form.
• Enhancing search engine visibility : Well-optimized content improves your website's visibility in search engine results. By incorporating relevant keywords, meta descriptions, and other SEO strategies , you increase the chances of your website ranking higher in search engine queries, leading to more organic traffic.
• Feedback and improvement : Through comments, reviews, analytics, and customer feedback tools , website content provides valuable insights into your audience's needs and preferences.

Guidelines for writing effective website content

1. understanding your audience.

Understanding your audience is a critical step in effective website content writing. It involves gaining insight into the individuals who will be visiting your website, their characteristics, and what motivates them to engage with your content. This knowledge helps tailor your content to meet their specific needs and preferences.

Additionally, mapping a buyer's personas can better help in identifying your target audience.

For instance, if you run a fitness website, you might create a persona named "Annie," who is a 30-year-old yoga enthusiast with a busy schedule. She values health and relaxation and prefers content that fits into her active lifestyle. Creating such personas helps you understand what "Annie" would be interested in and how to create content that appeals to her.

2. Setting clear goals & purpose

Setting clear goals for your website content is a crucial aspect of content strategy . It helps you stay focused, measure success, and ensure that your content aligns with your overall business objectives.

Similarly, the purpose of your website content gives you the reason why you are creating and publishing content on your website. This purpose can vary depending on your business and industry. Common purposes include:

• Inform : Provide valuable information to educate your audience about your products, services, or industry.
• Entertain : Creating engaging and entertaining content to keep your audience interested and coming back for more.
• Inspire : Motivating and inspiring your audience, perhaps by showcasing success stories, achievements, or innovative ideas.
• Convert : Encouraging visitors to take a specific action, such as making a purchase, signing up for a newsletter, or filling out a contact form.

It's important to clearly define the purpose of your content to ensure that it serves a specific role in your content strategy and aligns with your broader business goals.

3. Planning your content strategy and content types

A well-structured content strategy is essential for creating a consistent and engaging website. It involves defining the types of content you will create, organizing your content hierarchy, and implementing a schedule for content creation and publication.

Different types of website content can be created such as:

• Homepage : The homepage is the first page visitors typically see when they arrive at your website. It should provide an overview of what your website offers and guide users to other relevant sections.
• About us : The "About us" page is where you can tell your story, introduce your team, and explain your company's mission and values. It's an opportunity to build trust and connect with your audience.
• Services/Products pages : These pages offer detailed information about the products or services you provide. They should highlight the features, benefits, pricing, and any other relevant information that helps visitors make informed decisions.
• Blog : The blog section is where you can regularly publish informative and engaging articles. It helps drive traffic to your website, establish thought leadership, and engage with your audience on a more personal level.
• Contact us: The "Contact us" page should provide clear contact information, including a contact form, email address, phone number, and physical address if applicable. It should make it easy for visitors to reach out to you.

Tip: Collaborate with your team to create, optimize, approve, and publish landing page content. Analyze results and identify top-performing channels from one platform.

4. Writing compelling headlines

Headlines are critical elements of website content writing as they serve as the first point of contact with your audience. They are the first things readers see, and they play a significant role in whether a reader decides to engage with your content or move on. You can use the following effective techniques for crafting compelling headlines:

• Use action words : Incorporate action verbs that encourage readers to take action or engage with your content. For example, "Discover," "Learn," "Master," or "Unlock."
• Pose questions : Questions in headlines can Evoke curiosity and prompt readers to seek answers. For example, "How to Boost Your Productivity?" or "Are You Making These Common Mistakes?"
• Create intrigue : Use curiosity to intrigue readers. For example, "The Secret to Success They Never Told You" or "Unbelievable Facts About..."
• Numbers and lists : Include numbers in your headlines to indicate a clear and structured approach. For example, "10 Ways to Save Money" or "5 Essential Tips for..."

Tip: StoryChief’s AI writes compelling headlines for you. Start creating your headlines today - it’s free !

5. Crafting engaging introductions

Crafting engaging introductions is crucial to capture your audience's attention and encourage them to continue reading your content. The purpose of introductions is to draw readers into your content and provide them with an initial understanding of what they can expect. Creating compelling intros involves using various techniques to hook your audience and keep them engaged.

Some effective techniques include:

• Storytelling : Share a relatable story close to your topic. Stories can create an emotional connection with readers and make the content more relatable and engaging.
• Quoting statistics or facts : Use relevant statistics, data, or compelling facts to highlight the importance or urgency of the topic. This can help establish credibility and create a sense of relevance for the reader.
• Offering a solution or benefit : Clearly outline the potential benefits or solutions that your content will provide. This helps readers understand the value of engaging with your content and motivates them to continue reading to learn more.

6. Make your content scannable

Creating scannable content is a vital aspect of website content writing. Scannability refers to the ease with which readers can quickly skim and find the information they're looking for in your content.

Employing various techniques such as bullet points, subheadings, and short paragraphs can significantly enhance the readability and overall user experience. Utilizing bullet points allows you to present information in a concise and easily easy-to-understand manner, making key points stand out.

Similarly, subheadings can break up the text into separate sections, making it easier for readers to scan the content and find the information they are looking for. Short paragraphs help prevent overwhelming the reader with large blocks of text, making the content more approachable.

7. Encouraging user engagement

Encouraging user engagement is a critical component of web content writing. Engaged users are more likely to interact with your content, stay on your website longer, and take desired actions.

User engagement can include a wide range of activities, depending on your website's goals, but it typically includes actions such as leaving comments, sharing content, signing up for newsletters, making purchases, or contacting your business.

Here are some key components and strategies for encouraging user engagement:

• Clear calls to action (CTAs): Include prominent and persuasive calls to action throughout your content and website. CTAs prompt visitors to take specific actions, such as "Sign Up Now," "Learn More," or "Contact Us."

• Interactive content: Incorporate interactive elements like quizzes, polls, surveys, and calculators to engage visitors and provide a more personalized experience.
• Comments and discussion : Encourage users to leave comments on your blog posts and articles. Engaging with user comments and developing discussions can build a sense of community and keep users returning for more.
• Live chat and support : Offer live chat or support options for users who have questions or need assistance. Providing immediate help can lead to higher user satisfaction.

8. Mobile-friendly content

With the increasing use of mobile devices for internet browsing, having mobile-friendly content is essential. It involves making your website and content easily accessible on smartphones and tablets.

The following practices can be used to ensure mobile-friendly content:

• Utilize responsive design techniques to ensure that your website adapts to various screen sizes, and provides an optimal viewing experience.
• Use font sizes that are easy to read on smaller screens without requiring users to zoom in. Ensure that the text remains readable even when the screen is resized.
• Optimize images and videos for mobile viewing to minimize load times. Compress images to enhance loading speed.
• Optimize your website's loading speed to ensure quick access to your content, reducing bounce rates and enhancing the user experience.

Understanding and implementing these guidelines for effective website content writing can significantly enhance the quality, engagement, and performance of your content, leading to a more successful online presence and improved user experience.

Streamline your website content writing

To sum up, effective website content writing is integral to building a strong online presence and engaging with your target audience. It involves creating and optimizing content that informs, engages, and converts visitors into customers.

By following the guidelines outlined in this blog, including understanding your audience, setting clear goals, and creating a well-structured content strategy, you can significantly enhance the quality and performance of your website content.

Tired of juggling multiple tools for content marketing? Join 5,000 marketers who manage website content, social posts, videos, webinars, podcasts, and whitepapers - all from one central content marketing calendar .

Frequently asked questions

Q1) what are web writing skills.

Ans: Web writing skills refer to the abilities and techniques to create effective and engaging written content for websites and online platforms. These skills are crucial for creating content that informs and persuades online audiences, whether on blogs, websites, or various digital platforms.

Q2) What is good web content?

Ans: Good web content is engaging, informative, and easy to understand. It effectively communicates a message, provides value to the reader, and encourages interaction.

Q3) Can you use ChatGPT to write content for the Website?

Ans: Yes, you can use ChatGPT to assist in generating content for your website. ChatGPT, and similar AI-powered tools, can be valuable for various content-related tasks such as generating Ideas, drafting content and grammar, and proofreading.

SEO score is generated by our copywriting assistant and helps us rank higher on search engines.

B.S. in Digital Marketing

Writing for the Web: A Beginner’s Guide

Strong web writing skills are a key component of successful digital marketing strategy and effective search engine optimization (SEO). Though writing for the web encompasses a wide variety of different content, crafting the right kind of content is especially important for blog and website platforms. Writing for the web has its own set of best practices and style guidelines, especially because readers interact with web content differently than traditional text. For example, only around 16 percent of site visitors read web content in full . And according to the Nielsen Norman Group, about 80 percent of site visitors scan web content rather than reading it word by word.

How to Write for the Web

Add to these statistics the fact that most only scroll to the halfway point on a webpage , and brands have their work cut out for them in terms of connecting with the reader through content marketing. Why spend the time and resources to craft high-quality content if no one is reading it? This is the challenge facing marketers today. The good news is that there are ways to effectively reach modern readers — and hold their attention. It all starts with keeping copy concise, scannable and objective. The following are some of the key features of successful web writing.

Inverted Pyramid Structure

Arguably the most important element of writing for the web is presenting information in a way that makes sense for the reader. Inverted pyramid structure, long used by journalists because it gets to the point quickly, puts the primary information first. Supporting information comes after, and the least important elements are at the end of the text. “Journalists have long adhered to the inverse approach : start the article by telling the reader the conclusion … readers can stop at any time and will still get the most important parts of the article,” the Nielsen Norman Group says. This means that writers should leave “deep content” for the relatively small number of readers who make it to the end of a piece, Moz says. This approach allows writers to prioritize information, and readers to choose how much detail they need on the topic: “Very interested readers will scroll, and these few motivated souls will reach the foundation of the pyramid and get the full story,” the Nielsen Norman Group explains.

Scannable Content

In addition to presenting the most important information first, web content should be easy to scan. Users rarely read to the end of content, so it is important to format text in a way that allows them to find the information they are looking for quickly and easily. Elements like headers, bold and highlighted text, bulleted lists, graphics, captions and more accomplish this. Enchanting Marketing offers the following (helpfully, bulleted) list of questions to evaluate whether your content is scannable to readers :

• Does your headline communicate what you’re about?
• Does your image caption communicate a message?
• Do your sub headlines summarize your key points?
• Do easy-to-scan bullet points reduce wordiness?

In general, “Your web visitor is hunting for information or products. Ensure he can understand your most important information by just glancing at your web page,” the same post says.

Concise Text

Because readers are looking to find information as quickly as possible, writing concise text is another key component of successful web writing. Users don’t stay on a page for very long. This is why marketers measure “bounce rate,” or the percentage of visitors who navigate away from content. To hold reader interest as well as maximize time on site, be as concise as possible. According to Buffer, the ideal length for a blog post is seven minutes , or 1,600 words. And for posts that incorporate many photos or other graphic elements, the average word count should be closer to 1,000. Though research varies from site to site , this gives content creators a good idea of what to aim for. Once again, Enchanting Marketing has provided a helpful checklist for keeping content short and sweet:

• Use short paragraphs
• Use short sentences
• Skip unnecessary words
• Avoid jargon
• Avoid the passive [voice]
• Avoid needless repetition
• Use the word “you”

Aside from actually writing less content, a good way to keep readers’ attention is to break up text into short paragraphs that can be easily scanned and digested. This works in tandem with concise text to ensure the user views as much content as possible.

Objective Language

Users want content to be easy to understand, and another way to accomplish this is by writing in a conversational, informal tone. Ensuring that your tone is objective makes information easier to process. Avoid overly promotional messaging because it makes users question the credibility of the content itself : “questioning the credibility of promotional statements seems to distract users from processing the meaning,” the Nielsen Norman Group says. This is also why Enchanting Marketing warns against using “clever phrasing.” Web writing should be as simple and easy to follow as possible. “Web visitors quickly glance at your web page before guessing whether they’re in the right place or not,” Enchanting Marketing says. “They just want to make a quick decision.”

One way to make your content more readable without sacrificing valuable information is to incorporate hypotext. According to Dejan Marketing, hypotext is “a way of revealing content on-demand. It acts like a traditional link, but it doesn’t interrupt user experience by sending readers to another page. Once clicked, the extra information is injected into a desired spot in the page. Another click hides it away.” By showing the most important parts of the content, readers can create their own experience. The same article provides several benefits of hypotext:

• Supports easy scanning and better content overview by removing visual clutter
• Encourages content consumption through low word count
• On-demand information retrieval enables interactivity and personalization
• Users stay on the page they’re reading, which minimizes interruption

From a content strategy perspective, hypotext also allows the writer to include more detailed information as an option while remaining concise.

As effective web writing becomes more and more important to overall marketing strategy, the volume of content being created is increasing at an unprecedented rate, according to Dejan Marketing. From blog posts to advertorials, opinion pieces and lists, the web is home to a wide variety of content competing for user attention. But if marketers can incorporate the best practices covered here, they stand to benefit from the world of opportunity that content marketing presents.

Creating optimized, high-quality content is one of the foundations of modern marketing strategy. If you are interested in topics like these that are relevant to the marketing industry, consider Concordia University, St. Paul’s online marketing degree program.

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The 11 Golden Rules of Writing Content for Your Website

• Website Tips
• February 6, 2019

Capturing readers’ interests with good website content can be really challenging. Most visitors will spend just a few seconds on a web page before deciding what to do next.

Good website writing is the key to beating these odds. Well-written content that’s optimized for the web rises to the top of search results and holds readers’ attention.

Some writing tips apply regardless of whether your text appears on screen, in print, or carved into a pyramid wall. Other tactics are especially relevant for professional writer/author websites and online stores . Follow these 11 principles to make sure your website content gets the attention it deserves.

Learn how to start your website today!

1. know your audience.

It sounds simple, but so many writers put pen to paper—or finger to keyboard—before thinking about who it is they’re trying to reach. Before drafting content, ask yourself these questions: Who is my primary audience? What about a secondary audience who can influence and inform my primary audience? How will they find my site online?

For example, say you’re creating a coaching website or an online portfolio . Your primary audience might be existing clients. However, your secondary audience is much broader and could include other professionals, reporters, or anyone who might need your services in the future. You’ll need to make sure your content is both accessible and interesting to all of these audiences. What kind of questions might these groups ask about a particular topic? Where are they most active online? What kind of information do they need?

Audiences find web content through many different paths—social media sharing, links from other websites, email sharing, and search engines . That last method is especially important when you write for the web. Text could be extremely well-written and informative, but if it’s not optimized for search engines, chances are few people will find it. Think of your audience again: what search terms would they type into Google? If you’re posting a resume online or making a website for your freelance work , what kind of jobs are you looking for? Make sure to include those terms in headlines and sub-headers.

2. Follow the “inverted pyramid” model

Web readers have short attention spans—they’ll decide whether your site has the information they need in seconds. Structure your content like an upside-down pyramid or cone. The most important messages go at the top of the page. Then, gradually drill down to the more specific, supporting information.

For example, say you’re creating a web page about a conference. The most pertinent details—a description of the theme, date, and location—would appear at the top of the page. Supporting details like speakers and their lecture topics would follow. The less important information—such as conference organizers, the history of the conference series or a list of related resources—would appear at the bottom of the page.

Bring your business online with Jimdo.

These two graphs helped guide our own  website makeover  and can help you conceptualize the structure of your site.

3. Write short, simple sentences

Long sentences are for Charles Dickens—the short attention span of today’s reader demands sentences of 35 words or fewer. So website content that’s accessible and easy to read will naturally reach a wider audience.

Focus on using nouns and verbs. Use adverbs and adjectives sparingly. Don’t use words like “equanimity” or “obfuscate” when words like “calm” or “confuse” will do.

If you’re not sure how to judge your own writing, then it’s useful to check how your texts score with an online readability tool. Most of the popular models are based on the length of words and sentences in a text. Your text’s readability is then scored by a number or an education level. These three tools will scan your text and score its readability:

• The Readability Test Tool
• The Readability Calculator
• Microsoft Word

Can your text be easily understood at a 7th to 9th-grade reading level? Check how it scores on the  Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level  to find out.

4. Stick to active voice

Use active rather than passive verbs, and specify the subject of the sentence. For example, rather than writing “products can be ordered on our website,” say “You can order products on our website.”

Active voice helps create succinct, reader-friendly sentences. It’s also more direct; when you speak directly to the audience (“You can do it”) it’s more engaging than saying “It can be done.” This is important on your website FAQ page as well.

5. Show, don’t tell

Don’t limit your prose to generalities and high-level statements. Specific, real-world examples help readers better understand and visualize your messages. Consider these two descriptions:

This is the best dog toy money can buy.

We made the “Rough Rover” dog toy from durable, 100 percent natural rubber, designed to resist punctures and tears from even the most dedicated of chewers.

Which version gives you a clearer picture of the type of toy you’re buying? Specific details in the second description show readers the dog bone rather than tell them about it.

As an added bonus, more specific, descriptive product information helps your website’s SEO and gives customers the information they need to make those purchases.

We love the product descriptions on Zingerman’s website—they explain in mouthwatering detail why their gourmet foods are the best choice. Here are more tips to writing great product descriptions for your online store .

6. Nix the jargon

The web is for everyone—not just technical experts. So make sure information is understandable for the educated non-specialist. Spell out acronyms on first reference. Avoid insider language. Explain complex or niche terms. And provide hyperlinks to other articles where readers can get more background information on a particular topic.

Consider this sentence:

The journalist grabbed a SOT from the MOS, drove back to the station and put the story in the can.

Many of these terms are comprehensible only to broadcast journalists. A reader-friendly revision would be:

The journalist interviewed a bystander about the incident, and recorded her statement to include in the story.

This tip is especially important if you work in a technical industry, but want your website to attract non-expert customers. Remember that you need to write for your audience (see point #1) and not for your colleagues. Using accessible language will help you come across as approachable and open—just what you want to convey to future customers.

7. Mix up your word choice

Words are like cookies—we all have our favorites. But when it comes to keeping your visitors interested, variety is key! Word clouds are fun to use and can help you vary your word choice by visualizing which words you use the most. Just copy and paste your text into a free word cloud tool to generate your cloud. The more you use a word, the bigger it will look in your cloud. Have you overused a certain word? Type it into Thesaurus.com to find new synonyms to enhance your text.

Negative words standing out in your cloud? Now you know exactly what to tweak for a more positive tone. Keep an eye out for your website keywords as well: these should appear several times in your text, so it should be easy to recognize them in a word cloud.

Here’s the exception:  keep key terms consistent across your site to avoid confusing your visitors. For example, if you’re a photographer, don’t offer “photoshoots” on one page then call them “photography sessions” on the next.

Make a list of terms that describe your company and group together any words you use to mean the same thing. Pick your top choice and stick to it everywhere on your website. Like this:

Use: invoice .

Use: photoshoot

Not: photography session, photo appointment, shoot

Do you call your customers clients, patients, or users? Do you refer to services, packages, or plans? Once you have this list or glossary, you can use it to review any text before you publish it.

8. Make text scannable

In addition to putting the most important information up top, make sure text is easy to skim. Most web readers will scan the page to find the specific piece of information they’re looking for—if they don’t find it easily,  they’ll move on .

Don’t believe it? Try paying attention the next time you open a webpage you haven’t seen before. Are you reading every word beginning to end? Or is your eye jumping around, looking for the information you want?

• Instead of text-heavy paragraphs,  use bulleted or numerical lists . Instead of one long page of text, organize content into labeled tabs.
• Always include “white space.”  This is the empty space that surrounds paragraphs, images, and other elements on your web page. Though it may seem like this is just wasted space, it’s actually a web designer’s best friend. Comfortable amounts of white space around text make it more legible , and more enjoyable to read.

• What Is Climate Change?
• Drivers of Climate Change
• Current and Projected Impacts of Climate Change
• Solutions to Reduce Emissions

These sub-headers not only help readers navigate the page, they’ll help search engines find your content.

9. Incorporate multimedia

Research shows that most the human brain is visual, and people process visual information many times faster than text.

An easy-to-read chart or graph can also do a better job of explaining a complex topic than text alone. If you’re not a graphic designer by trade, there are lots of ways to use visuals on your website and some great services out there to help you make graphics yourself, like Canva and Piktochart.

Images also help break up text, making your page easier to read. We recommend having at least one image on each page of your website. Here are more tips for how to optimize your website images .

10. Layer website content

The great thing about a website is that it’s easy to direct readers from one page to another. Help readers find more great content by hyperlinking certain words or phrases to other relevant resources, especially those on your own website. This will help keep people engaged with your content and moving through your site.

For example, say this sentence appeared on your cooking website: Ratatouille is a low-fat dish that consists of seasonal ingredients like eggplant, squash, and tomatoes. You could hyperlink “low-fat dish” to a page with other blog posts on healthy eating.

Building these internal links within your own site also helps your SEO, but keep in mind that links should always be relevant and helpful. Visually, if you overload your text with links, people won’t know what to click on.  Google recommends  keeping the amount of hyperlinks on a page to a “reasonable number.”

11. Leave them wanting more

Here’s an example of what a call-to-action button can look like on your website.

Good websites end each page with a strong  call-to-action  (or CTA for short). Is there a person a reader should contact for more information? An interesting video they should watch? How about a related blog post they can read or a report they can download? This strategy helps direct readers to other areas of your website and encourages them to promote your content to their friends and family.

Keep these calls-to-action succinct, and start them with action verbs like “Download,” “Share,” “Join,” “Sign Up,” “Learn More” or “Watch.” And of course, make sure to include a link that actually allows readers to fulfill the action you’re asking them to take.

Writing, in general, is hard work—writing content for your website, even more so. But remember, you don’t need to write perfect texts first time around! Once your content is live, you can do  monthly website checks  to monitor and optimize its performance. With these tips, you’re prepared to create effective content that resonates with even the most flighty and time-pressed of internet readers.

And once your content is written,  read this checklist for designing easy-to-read text  on your site.

• productivity , web-design

Jimdo Website

Content Writing Tips for Beginners: A Step-by-Step Guide

Everyone has to start somewhere. With content writing, the place to start is with writing. While many content writers go to school for English or Marketing, or even a Writing-specific degree, it's certainly not necessary. There are plenty of successful content writers out there who have never had a day of writing-focused education, and many whose first language isn't English besides.

It's possible to be a successful content writer without training and certification, but it requires one thing: experience.

I consider myself a fairly proficient content writer, though I don't know that I'm among the best of the best. I'm knowledgable enough to distill some tips for you, though, and I can help you become a better content writer. Here are my tips!

Read, Read, Read

You aren't alone. You aren't writing in a vacuum. Every writer, and indeed virtually every creator of any kind of content, will tell you that the number one thing they do to keep themselves going is consuming media. Authors read. Video producers watch movies, TV, web videos, and streams. Illustrators take the time to consume art.

It's important to read with a critical eye, but also to read for pleasure. Read because you're interested in the topic, and read with an eye for the intricacies of writing. What perspective does the writer use? What tone have they adopted? How long are their sentences, their paragraphs, their sections, and their posts? How natural is their language? You can learn a lot just from reading.

Here are some key reasons why reading other content is essential for writing your blog posts:

• Inspiration: Reading other blog posts can inspire you by providing new ideas or perspectives on a subject; this can spark your creativity and help you think about how to approach your blog in a unique and engaging way. Inspiration doesn't have to originate from the content you read; I've thought of specific questions and topics after reading something that has nothing to do with the article I'm reading, and I wrote a blog post about it!
• Knowledge and expertise: Reading content from other sources helps you stay informed about your niche or industry. This knowledge can be invaluable in developing well-researched and credible blog posts. It also helps you better understand and address your target audience's needs and concerns. Trust me; writing confidently about a topic is challenging when you don't have much expertise. Reading content by other experts can speed up this process.
• Identify trends: By reading content from various sources, you can identify emerging trends and topics gaining traction in your niche; this enables you to write timely and relevant blog posts that cater to your audience's interests.
• Improve writing skills: Reading high-quality content exposes you to various writing styles, techniques, and structures; this can help you improve your writing by adopting effective strategies, refining your voice, and learning new ways to communicate your ideas.
• Understand audience preferences: By analyzing the types of content popular among your target audience, you can tailor your blog posts to meet their preferences; this can help increase engagement, readership, and overall satisfaction with your content.
• Learn from successful bloggers: Observing the practices of successful bloggers can help you identify what works and what doesn't; this can help you avoid common pitfalls .

Reading also gives you useful insights you can use in your own writing later. You accumulate facts, which you can pull out and use as citations later. You learn clever wordplay, new words you can use to spice up your own writing, and terminology common amongst professionals in your industry. You gain insight. So: read!

Know What You Want to Write

Depending on why you want to write, you may already have a goal in mind. I generally see people in a few categories.

• The people who want to start a blog because it's a way to make money, but have no guidance or goal in mind.
• The people who have a passion for a topic, and want to start a blog to turn that passion into something more.
• The people who have the ability or talent for writing (and have been told as much through their schooling years) and figure they might as well make a career out of it.

The first group is difficult because they have to spend time developing a niche, a topic, an interest that interests them. Choosing what to make a site about is very difficult, and it's even more difficult when you have to learn every aspect of the craft along the way.

The second group is people who already know their stuff and just might need help putting their thoughts into writing. This is the kind of group most of my article here is aimed at, but everyone can get some use out of it.

The third group doesn't generally need help with the technical aspects of writing, but transitioning from the stuffy world of academic writing to the free-flowing world of content writing can be a shift that not everyone is equipped to deal with.

In any case, you need to know in a broad sense what you want to write about for your site, and in a narrow sense what you want to write about for a given article. I often start with some keyword research to develop a topic idea , write a killer title for that topic , and then create my outline for the article based on those search phrases and that topic.

It's worked well enough for me so far - writing articles that match real searches and catering to those searches is a great roadmap to getting your articles found.

Write, Write, Write

Believe it or not, I didn't start out writing great content. I spent years writing some pretty mediocre content , and I only stood out because a lot of the people also writing content in the same arena were so, so much worse. Like, you'd be surprised just how bad some of the people out there writing content are. Go to Textbroker and spend a few bucks on some 3-star articles and you'll see what I mean. Content mills are generally a wasteland.

Part of successful content writing is just practice . The more time you spend writing, the more familiar you'll be with the process. The more details you'll be able to stick in your mind as you write. The better you'll be able to formulate posts as you go along. A post that might have taken me two or three hours to write a few years ago, I could write better in less time today.

Writing a lot and writing consistently is often cited as a key factor for blogging success. I'm not sure it's 100% necessary from a marketing standpoint, but I can tell you that it's extremely beneficial from a technical standpoint.

They say that practice makes perfect, and while there's no such thing as perfect, practice is always important.

Keep Tone, Voice, and Perspective Consistent

One thing I often see novice writers struggling with is perspective, tense, tone, voice , and all of those other subtle technical elements of grammar that come naturally with practice.

Here are some examples:

• Shifting between "I", "We", and "The Company" as self-referential signifiers. Know who you're representing when you write. If I write something for a client, I'll use a different voice than when I write something for myself.
• Shifting between the personal and the impersonal, as in going from "we recommend X" to "X is generally recommended." There's a time for different levels of formality; know which one you want to use.
• Referencing industry terms incorrectly. I see this a lot with freelancers who have to write for multiple industries; using terminology incorrectly makes people who know what they're talking about recognizing that you don't.

It doesn't really matter which perspective, which tone, which voice you use. What matters is that you keep it consistent throughout any piece you write.

Care About Keywords

A huge part of successful content writing online is caring about keywords . Keyword research is the core of every good blog post, most paid advertising, and a whole lot else besides. That's just how powerful Google is these days.

I'm not going to go extremely deep into keyword research here. It's a very detailed topic, and there are a lot of great guides out there already written to help people of all skill levels get started.

Suffice it to say that, in my mind and in my experience, keyword research is an essential part of good content writing. Knowing how Google interacts with keywords, how to use keywords appropriately, and how to write around awkward keywords is essential.

Don't Care Too Much About Keywords

Look, I know what I just said, and I know what I'm saying now.

The fact is, keywords are a lot less important than they were five or ten years ago. Back then, you needed to figure out exact, specific keywords and write posts with specific levels of keyword density to make sure your content thrived. Pick the wrong keyword and your content never shows up for high volume web searches . Use the keyword too little and Google doesn't think the post is relevant. Use it too often and you get dinged for keyword stuffing. It's a fine line to walk.

We create blog content that converts - not just for ourselves, but for our clients, too.

We pick blog topics like hedge funds pick stocks. Then, we create articles that are 10x better to earn the top spot.

Content marketing has two ingredients - content and marketing. We've earned our black belts in both.

At least, it was. Then Google introduced a bunch of machine learning and semantic indexing features to their index. These days, Google will show you search results that don't even include a phrase you used when searching but are still relevant. They understand things like synonyms, variations on keywords, and so on.

That's why these days, I don't worry too much about specific keyword usage - at least, not within the context of my articles . I use keyword research to guide the topics I choose to write about, and I might sprinkle in a specific keyword here and there when I find a way to work it in, but I'm not going to double over backward to include specific long-tail keywords in every post I write. Over-optimizing your posts like that can have the opposite effect:

"The idea is basically to try and level the playing ground a little bit. All of those people who have sort of been doing, for lack of a better word, 'over-optimization' or 'overly' doing their SEO, compared to the people who are just making great content and trying to make a fantastic site, we want to sort of make that playing field a little bit more level."

Heck, here's an example. This blog post uses "start content writing online" as its primary keyword. You can tell this because they use the phrase a couple of times throughout the piece when it's awkward to type the whole thing. You can also tell it because it's in a different font than the rest of their content, though I'm not sure that's intentional. Just… don't be that awkward and obvious about it, right?

When In Doubt, Add More Formatting

One key insight that most content writers have at some point is that web readers don't actually read the content. You might notice this behavior in yourself, or you might have it pointed out to you by a marketer, but it's pretty true. People who see posts on social media, half the time they don't even click through, they just read the title and the snippet and make assumptions based on that.

For people who click through and see content, they still skim . They read the first paragraph or two, then they skip through it looking for value. It's up to you as a content writer to provide that value. You just have to know how to do it.

The easiest way, beyond making sure your writing is, you know, valuable, is to add formatting.

Add subheadings as much as possible. This helps break up your content into digestible chunks. Add formatting like bold and italics to emphasize certain points. Add gaps in between paragraphs and sentences to emphasize points. Add bulleted or numbered lists to build up, well, lists.

Formatting enhances the user's ability to skim and extract value from content. Even if there are better resources out there, if yours is the most readable, it's the most useful.

Strive to One-Up the Competition

A lot of content writers, when they first get started, find it very hard to figure out their place in the world. They come up with an idea, then they see that there are 10,000,000 Google search results for that idea already and that the top five results are all that idea done better than they would do. It's easy to get discouraged looking for that one unique piece of content.

I'm here to tell you that you don't need to be unique to be valuable. This article you're reading right now? Dozens of other people have written other articles on the same topic, some of the same points, and some with other tips and hints as well:

Here's what you do. You find something that already exists, and you do it better.

There are three main ways you can out-do existing content .

• Take content that is broad but shallow, and add depth to it. This involves more research, more data sources, and more critical thinking to find conclusions the data leads you to.
• Take content that is narrow but deep, and add breadth to it. A deep dive into one subject in one industry is narrow, but it's an opportunity to tie another related subject or another industry into it.
• Take content that is old and make it up to date . A lot of old content these days is kept up to date by the initial author, but if it's left abandoned, you can try to supersede it by writing the same basic content with newer information.

Keep in mind that when I say "do what they do" and "you don't have to be unique", I absolutely do NOT mean you can just copy their content. You still have to write unique and original content, but you can cover the same topics and similar points.

Don't Be Afraid of Tools

I've known a lot of writers over the years who pride themselves on their precise knowledge of technical grammar, and who end up focusing more on their grammatical accuracy than on the quality of their content.

To me, this is hilarious. You're priding yourself on a skill that is easily replaced by a free online tool.

With the rising popularity of AI tools like ChatGPT , there are tons of content and blog writers that can help generate outlines, blog topics, and provide inspiration for your own writing.

Don't be afraid to use the tools you have at your disposal. Use a spelling and grammar check. Crank up the settings in MS Word. Use keyword research and topic ideation tools.

Here are some of my favorite tools:

• Ahrefs. I wrote a good breakdown of Ahrefs and similar tools .
• Grammarly. Proofreading and grammar checking is super important. If you run a WordPress site, you can even embed Grammarly into your site automatically.
• Clearscope . Clearscope can help you find opportunities to improve your content. I use it to help me discover things that I may have missed, as well as easy opportunities to include relevant keywords. I wrote a guide comparing Clearscope and Marketmuse here .
• WordPress plugins. There are a lot out there; here are some of my favorites , as well as a seperate guide for PageSpeed plugin recommendations .

There are tons of tools out there to help you be a better content writer, and there's absolutely no shame in using them.

Finish With a Proofread

When you finish any given piece of writing, go through it with a fine-toothed comb looking for errors . I know I just told you that tools can do a lot of that for you, and that's true. I make a lot of typos and minor grammatical errors as I type, and you know what? I have a few different autocorrect rules in place to fix them for me. Until you develop your own library or process, make sure you're proofreading everything.

Now and then an error will slip through. That's fine. If you notice it, fix it. If someone else notices it, fix it. If no one notices it, it's not really going to do you any harm. Even still, it's important to get a proofread in on your content before you finalize it and publish it.

Develop a Style

Over time, as you write, you can develop a style . That style will develop naturally, as you find your voice. You find the way you like to express your ideas. The way you like to use lists and formatting. The perspective you use to cover various topics and make analogies. Your style is built up over the years and it comes about from experience.

Your style will also change over time. After you've been writing content for a year or two, if you go back and look at the early content you've written, it will read like something written by someone else entirely. Don't worry; an evolving style is perfectly fine. Developing a style that's unique to you is the important part.

Keep at it. Content writing is a long-term investment, and it's a skill that never stops improving. The more you keep going, the better you'll become.

James Parsons is the founder and CEO of Content Powered, a premier content marketing agency that leverages nearly two decades of his experience in content marketing to drive business growth. Renowned for founding and scaling multi-million dollar eCommerce businesses through strategic content marketing, James has become a trusted voice in the industry, sharing his insights in Search Engine Watch, Search Engine Journal, Forbes, Entrepreneur, Inc, and other leading publications. His background encompasses key roles across various agencies, contributing to the content strategies of major brands like eBay and Expedia. James's expertise spans SEO, conversion rate optimization, and effective content strategies, making him a pivotal figure in the industry.

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August 12, 2020 at 9:38 am

Hi James, this was super helpful! I've read a lot of guides besides yours and yours is the only one that left me with some takeaways that I can actually use. I didn't realize how important (and also un-important!) keywords were, and your Grammarly screenshot inspired me to try it out. I'll also be way more mindful of who has already written about a subject before I start writing, that's something I haven't really done before, at least, not in a detailed way. Thanks again!

August 12, 2020 at 11:20 pm

Hey Faeeza, thank you for the very kind words!

This post was aimed at beginners, if you're interested in reading more, we have a handful of other posts you might find useful/interesting in our "Blogging" category: https://www.contentpowered.com/blog/category/blogging/

Topic ideation and competition research are easily the two biggest overlooked things when it comes to beginners and blogging - master those two things and you'll be far ahead of the curve!

August 30, 2020 at 8:16 am

I have been using the inverted pyramid approach to my writing style as it’s more easier to write long form content with this tactic and I can easily formulate my subheadings.

August 30, 2020 at 5:33 pm

Hi Sonny, thanks for sharing with us! It's good to know what's working for others. I think the fundamentals of the inverted pyramid are sound, if the bulk of your content is legitimately useful and actionable information, then your content is already off to a good start.

October 05, 2020 at 8:32 am

Hi James, This helped me a great deal, just wanted to say thank you. You really know your stuff with blogging. I'll be reading your other articles too.

October 05, 2020 at 7:59 pm

Thanks for stopping by Nur and for the kind words!

January 08, 2021 at 12:04 am

Hi James Your post helped me a lot. Thank you for this amazing work. God bless you more.

January 08, 2021 at 9:08 pm

Hey Adila, you're very kind, thanks for that! Very happy it helped you.

March 07, 2021 at 9:45 pm

Hey,James. This is my first time going through an actual content writing beginner tips article, as I am thinking to start writing online. Thanks for giving me some valuable pointers which I will keep in mind when I find my interest. No, I will no be doing this,initially, for money (but money is required to sustain, right?) but to search where my interest lies. Baby steps!! Wish you good luck 🤞, from India.

March 12, 2021 at 12:44 pm

Hey Ipsa - thanks for hopping on live chat with me, and I'm very happy this helped you out!

Revenue certainly helps. Being able to hire people to help you grow your blog will amplify your results, and it's hard to do that without any cashflow.

That's what's so great about blogging - you can bootstrap it at first until you're up and running. If you can give your readers enough value, customers will usually follow. It's a great way to draw people into your orbit.

March 09, 2021 at 7:36 am

This is never an easy job! Besides putting in the actual work, you need to have passion, patience, and time otherwise you’ll give up. I remember back in the day that I was on the verge of dropping my blog completely, and I did pause for a bit. A few months later my traffic was skyrocketing, all organic traffic to my blog posts. That has made me a believer ever since. It just takes a while to start working, but once it does it goes HARD.

March 12, 2021 at 1:00 pm

Hey Matt, thanks for your comment!

This sounds similar to my story - my first blog was over 10 years ago for a free flash game site. It had ads on it and was making a few hundred bucks a week, so I started reinvesting that into the content. I probably did a dozen or so blog posts, waited a month, then gave up.

A year or so later, they were the highest traffic pages on my site and were generating the lion's share of my AdSense revenue. I sold the site shortly after, but I think that's what made me a believer in blogging as well. It does require a good deal of patience and putting love into your content, not rushing it or skimping out. Man, Google's algorithm has really changed a lot since then, as has WordPress.

What brings you here today, just brushing up on the basics? 🙂

May 19, 2021 at 3:32 am

This is a great post. I appreciate your skills. Thanks for sharing.

May 19, 2021 at 11:35 am

Thanks Frisco! I appreciate it, glad it helped you.

May 24, 2021 at 10:38 am

Hi James! Your article is superb. I love it. It helped me a lot.

May 24, 2021 at 1:28 pm

Hey Fatima, really appreciate it! I'm happy it helped you 🙂

November 28, 2021 at 2:58 am

Hi james, thank you so much. The article has really helped me alot

November 29, 2021 at 1:58 pm

Love to hear it! Thanks, Brenda!

June 04, 2021 at 9:16 am

Hi James, i just started learning how to write articles. But it is not an easy task. Your article is good and gave some nice information.

June 04, 2021 at 2:34 pm

Hey Pankaj!

I really appreciate that, thanks for taking the time to say that. It makes writing these worth it.

Keep it up, if there's anything I can do to help point you in the right direction, please let me know!

June 06, 2021 at 5:18 am

Thank you so much! You've actually encouraged me to give content writing a try. This is really helpful.

June 07, 2021 at 10:32 am

Hey Ginnie! That was my goal, so I'm very happy to hear that. Thanks for stopping by and good luck!

July 07, 2021 at 7:58 am

Hi James, Thank you so much. It very helpful. I am very interested in content writing but the area that I have passion in is what I can't figure out, I think will give a try. Thanks

July 08, 2021 at 2:12 pm

Thanks Peter! Good luck 🙂

July 12, 2021 at 8:19 am

Hey Mr James, Nice article especially for beginners like me... Hope to hear more from you.

July 12, 2021 at 4:29 pm

Hey Ezekiel, thanks for the kind words and for stopping by! I hope it convinced you to start a blog of your own 🙂

July 29, 2021 at 7:04 am

Awesome post, simple and informative. I liked this line,

“Keep Tone, Voice, and Perspective Consistent”.

Super important to succeed in this, if articles are boring to read it's hard for anyone to be fulfilled.

But it was nice to read this. Thanks for writing this useful content.

July 31, 2021 at 4:33 pm

Thanks for the comment, Mohammad!

I couldn't agree more. Thank you for your words of encouragement.

January 30, 2022 at 6:48 pm

Super effective, practical, and easy to apply / follow article.

I love your simple yet powerful writing style. It seems you are taking a live class!

I recommended your link to at least 15 people. They are all so grateful! I, too, am fascinated.

You are a trustworthy, excellent content writer and mentor. Thanks from the heart.

January 31, 2022 at 2:02 pm

Thanks Ahmed!

Wow, that means a lot. Thank you for your heartfelt comment on my post, and I'm so happy it's helping to make a positive difference.

This is why I do what I do 🙂

March 13, 2022 at 10:29 am

Thanks, James. Your post was helpful and detailed. It helped to clear a lot of concepts for me.

March 15, 2022 at 6:39 pm

You're welcome, Suhail!

March 28, 2022 at 10:15 am

I'm really impressed and happy with these tips! You are a great mentor!

March 31, 2022 at 8:23 pm

Thanks Oluwasola! That's very kind of you to say.

April 07, 2022 at 7:55 am

waoh, this is very informative, guess I've found what I've been waiting for to become a content writer. Thanks a million James Parsons.

April 07, 2022 at 3:00 pm

Thanks, Ruth! Love to hear it.

August 25, 2022 at 6:34 am

Thanks, James. I'm just about to start content writing and your article was the first I have read. It really feels like I'm in it already, and I hope the tips grabbed would do me much help in my pursuit. Please, if you have more articles for a total beginner like me, I would appreciate it. Thanks many times🙏

September 01, 2022 at 2:08 pm

Thanks Olivia, love to hear it!

Here's are a couple of articles that I recommend next:

https://www.contentpowered.com/blog/blog-optimization-tips-seo/ https://www.contentpowered.com/blog/tips-beat-competitors-seo/

This is a great one too; small changes to your user experience are reflected across all of your pages and will help your site perform better overall: https://www.contentpowered.com/blog/improve-user-experience-website/

Feel free to reach out any time if you need pointing in the right direction 🙂

March 11, 2023 at 9:18 am

Amazing blog article!

March 11, 2023 at 12:13 pm

April 26, 2023 at 10:10 pm

Hey James, I retired from my job a couple of years back. Did try my hand at a couple of things. But always wondered what do I do with some exclusive work experience I gained during my employment. Then it struck me that I should start writing a blog and discuss various aspect of the commodity I worked on during my job. I saw many YouTube videos on how to write blogs and also read many online articles available on the net, as mentioned by you. Honestly, found your article to be very crisp and clear. I will surely follow your guidelines and start reading/researching/writing earnestly.

Thank you very much James.

April 29, 2023 at 11:47 pm

Absolutely. It's incredible what reach blog articles have on the internet, even on subjects that you wouldn't think would get much traction. In some cases, ESPECIALLY on subjects you think wouldn't get much traction.

My best advice is focus on having a great website and try to create content that is 10x better than anybody else. Do that, stick with it for years, and you'll be rewarded!

The reason most people's blogs fail is because they think they are creating great quality content, but aren't. Or, they don't stick with it long enough. Knowing that will help you succeed.

It's hard work, but it's rewarding and well worth it.

April 26, 2023 at 11:54 pm

Hey James! Thanks for the Guide. Which is better for blogs in your opinion?

April 29, 2023 at 11:45 pm

I'm a sucker for WordPress.

It doesn't get much better than WordPress for internal/external link management, optimization, SEO, custom development, automation, etc.

April 27, 2023 at 10:19 pm

Nice Article

April 29, 2023 at 11:43 pm

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Writing for the Web | 19 Expert Tips for Writing Online

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We don’t want you to join them.

We’re here to make sure you soar over the common trip hazards, and set you on the path to creating stunning online content. Beat your competition, dazzle your readers, and breathe new life into your website with our in-depth guide.

We’ll cover the most important rules of writing for the web, and bring you exclusive insights from real experts who rely on producing stellar content for a living. 

Even web writing pros can stumble and lose their readers’ interest. Whether you’re starting a blog, writing copy for your business website, or managing social media accounts, this guide will give you actionable advice for improving engagement and increasing conversions.

Our first, unofficial tip is to keep introductions short – so we’d better move on to the good stuff!

Our handy infographic shows all 19 steps you need for writing for the web. Feel free to save it, share it, and go back to it whenever you need some helpful writing tips!

If you prefer a good old-fashioned list, here’s each of the steps again:

Top 19 Rules for Writing for the Web

Now you’re fully armed with our 19 simple steps, read on for a full breakdown of each, plus some exclusive bonus tips from the experts!

Further Information

• Check out our Website Builder Comparison Chart if building a website is your next step – it compares the best builders around!
• Are you going to use our expert web writing tips to start a blog? You might find our review of the Best Blogging Platforms helpful.
• Looking for something a little more specific? Our How to Write a Call to Action guide has some expert tips on creating persuasive copy.

If you’d rather watch than read, our video run-through of our top 19 rules for writing for the web is the perfect solution!

Before You Start

Tip #1: Research Your Reader

Tip #2: Know Your Enemy

#1. Research Your Reader

Before putting pen to paper – or, rather, fingers to keyboard – you need to get inside the mind of your readers. It’s essential to know your audience so that you can grab their interest and fulfil their needs. Ask yourself: why are people coming to my site? What are they looking for?

Once you have the answers to these questions, there’s only one thing to do: give the readers what they want. 

Readers are fickle, impatient, and flighty creatures – use the wrong language, or give them the wrong information, and they’ll be leaving your site before you can say “please don’t go.” Here are a few tips for keeping the customers satisfied:

• Create personas – try to make between three and five personas that represent different sections of your audience. You can do this through interviewing real-life readers, using demographic data from your site analytics, and sneaking a peek at your readers’ social profiles.
• Tailor your writing to your target audience – use the same language as your readers. If you’re writing for an older demographic, don’t use teenage slang words, and if you’re writing for an English or American audience, make sure you’re using the right language and references.
• Don’t stop asking questions – even once you’re releasing regular content, don’t assume you know what your readers want. Keep checking and researching to make sure your readers are happy.

Advice from the Experts

“One of the most essential elements of writing for the web is knowing your audience. Four years ago, we were attracting just over 100 organic visits to our blog per month. In a shift in tactics, we began to write regular, quality, optimised content targeted at the interests of our website visitors, and we now generate 2,500+ organic visits per month.”

#2. Know Your Enemy

Once you know your readers like they’re old friends, it’s time to research your competitors. You need to know two crucial things: who your competitors are, and what they’re doing .

Competitor research is essential for understanding what you need to do in order to get readers to choose your site over anyone else’s.

First, you need to identify your main competitors. Try to list your top ten rivals – if you have no idea, you can find out by Googling your main service, product, or topic, and seeing which other sites pop up the most.

Now you know who you’ve got to beat, settle in for a virtual stake out. Look at what type of content they’re producing – is it videos, blog posts, news stories, or downloads? What’s the level of quality? How frequently are they publishing fresh content?

Once you’ve got a good profile of your competitors, you can ask the most important question: what can I do better? 

Luke Budka , Director at TopLine Comms

“Understand what your prospects are searching for and why they’re searching for it; take a look at the content that appears when you search for what your prospects are searching for; then write better content – in that order!”

More Information

• Interview with Kentucky Native Plants Project : See how this online resource creates content tailored to its audience and market

Don't Scare Your Reader Away

Tip #3: Use Headings

Tip #4: Hook Your Reader

Tip #5: Keep Language Simple

Tip #6: Tell Readers Where They Are

You might have heard of the comparison of web users with wild animals , and that’s exactly what we’re talking about here. Today’s online readers are hunting for information, but they don’t want to waste tons of energy taking down the web equivalent of a giant buffalo. Just like a lion picking out its prey, they are constantly on the lookout for content they can easily digest.

If a reader isn’t happy with what they see, you can bet they’ll be gone in seconds. Harsh, right? Luckily, there are ways you can send all the right messages so you don’t scare your reader away.

#3. Use Headings

The best way to instantly put a reader at ease is to use headings. This gives a clear indication of your page’s content, without the reader actually having to, well, read any of it.

When’s the last time you read a web page from the beginning to the end, without jumping ahead or scanning sections? We bet it wasn’t any time recently.

Headings make it easy for readers to quickly get the gist of your content and head to the section they most want to read. Think of headings like sign posts, catching you reader’s attention and waving them in the right direction.

Headings also make your page look more inviting. There’s nothing worse than being confronted with a huge block of text when you’re browsing the internet!

#4. Hook Your Reader

How do you grab your reader’s attention and get them to read your article, instead of hitting the back button ? You need to create a hook. 

We all love a bit of drama. Controversy, mystery, surprising facts – they all draw us in with one key effect: we want to know more . If you can start your content with a fact, a question, a controversial comment, or even an anecdote, you stand a good chance of getting your readers’ attention.

#5. Keep Language Simple

While in school you’re encouraged to expand your mind and reach for the thesaurus at every possible opportunity, writing for the web is a little different. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. 

You should keep your writing simple – around the level you’d expect 12 year olds to easily understand. That’s right, you need to imagine you’re writing for seventh graders!

Using simple language doesn’t mean “dumbing down” your excellent content. In fact, it can actually take more talent to make simple writing sound good. (At least, that’s what we like to think!)

Simple language is more scannable, makes your content more accessible to a wider audience, and helps people understand your message much faster. 

❌ 1: Writing in uncomplicated, comprehensible language is imperative when creating content for an online audience, due to the reading patterns and habits most often portrayed by online readers, which differ massively from the tactics applied when reading other types of published materials.

✔️ 2: Writing in simple, user-friendly language is key when writing for the web. This is because people don’t read online content like they would read a book.

Which example are you more likely to engage with? Especially when you’re on your phone, checking this article in the spare five minutes between meetings at work? Whether you like it or not, “simple” is the universal language of the web.

#6. Tell Readers Where They Are

Something a lot of web writers forget is that your readers might have no idea what your site is about. Unlike books, there’s no beginning, middle, or end, and your content needs to reflect that.

Never assume your reader has been to your homepage or explored your about page – it’s likely they’ve only just stumbled across your site and expect answers straight away.

If you’re writing a series of connected blog posts or related guides, make sure you link to the previous one so your reader can go back and get some context. If you’re reviewing something, make sure to quickly recap what it is first.

You get the idea. We always start out our reviews and comparisons by briefly explaining what a website builder is, how drag-and-drop works, or what hosting is and why you need it, before getting into the meat of the article.

People who know these things already can skip ahead, but including this information makes sure you don’t alienate any readers who were looking for those answers.

Keep Your Reader

Tip #7: Front-load Information

Tip #8: Be Direct

Tip #9: Use a Conversational Tone

Tip #10: Be Active, Not Passive

Tip #11: Keep It Short

Tip #12: Be Generous With Visuals

Once you’ve managed to grab your reader’s attention, you need to keep them on your page. This is easier said than done. On average, people will only read around 20% of the words on a web page . (So, if you’re still reading this article – congratulations!)

Here are some simple tips and tricks for getting the most out of your readers’ limited attention spans.

#7. Front-load Information

Did you hear that the average human attention span is now shorter than that of a goldfish? We’re more distracted than ever before, losing concentration after just over eight seconds. 

This is why it’s vital to front-load your information , placing the key takeaways at the beginning of your piece rather than waiting until the conclusion.

This isn’t an Agatha Christie novel where you build suspense and give people the answers right at the very end. Instead, you need to give out the most important information as soon as possible.

You may have noticed that at the start of this article, we outlined what we would be covering and then immediately listed the key takeaways. This assures the reader they will be getting actual answers, removes any feeling of being dragged along, and even acts as a teaser.

For example, if you’re writing a comparison piece, don’t wait until the end to reveal the winner. Think about what you’d want if you were the reader – give answers straight away, then encourage them to keep reading to find out the “why” behind your argument.

By giving a summarized version of your content, you can open up your reader’s curiosity – you’ve proven you know what you’re talking about, and now they want to know more!

#8. Be Direct

When one is writing for an online audience, it can be hard to connect. There are so many voices, how do they get their words to stand out from the crowd?

You might be feeling a little confused right now, because we just stopped using direct address. Direct address is where you actually address the reader as “you.” Don’t get muddled up with the ambiguous “they” or the outdated “one” – save that one for the characters in Downton Abbey.

Use “you” to address your reader, use “we” to speak from the point of view of a company, and use “I” for an individual voice. 

This is more direct, and immediately sets up a relationship between you and your reader.

There are exceptions, such as news reports, but on the whole this is an important rule to stick to. Even banking and legal websites use direct language to appeal to their audiences, and you’ll see it all across the web – those “About Us” pages are all using direct address!

#9. Use a Conversational Tone

Question time: do you prefer chatting with your friends, or being lectured by someone using formal, lecturey language? We’re guessing we know the answer, and that’s why we write in a pretty conversational tone of voice.

This doesn’t work for all websites, but if you can use chatty language, we recommend it. Using familiar words, asking questions, throwing in recognized sayings, and inserting some personality can go a long way in engaging your reader.

Think about your favorite brands, websites, and blogs – what sort of tone do they use? Do they make use of everyday language and make their sentences playful? If so, that’s because they’re aiming straight for their target audience and creating a personal reading experience.

And that’s exactly what you need to do. Sometimes, it means bending a few of the rules you learned in high school. This can feel weird at first, but once you get a taste of that freedom, you’ll struggle to go back!

Here are some examples of ways you can make your writing less ‘college paper’ and more ‘catch-up chat’:

• Break up your sentences: You can chop up your sentences a bit. You know, for emphasis. Like we’re doing now!
• Start sentences the “wrong” way: Grammar lovers everywhere, look away, because when writing for the web you can start sentences with “and,” “but,”, “so,” and “because.” Go on, we know you want to.
• Put special sentences on their own line: If you’re making a point, stressing a certain phrase, or want the reader to remember something, put it on its own line. This can also be effective in controlling pace and humor.
• Be a little bit casual: You can use noises like phew , strikethroughs ( like this) , and even share your own anecdotes to connect with your readers. Be careful of going overboard with these, though – ration them carefully!
• Let your voice shine through: Your writing should reflect your company or brand, but that doesn’t mean your own unique style can’t add value. Trust us, your readers will appreciate the personal touch!

These techniques will help your writing sound more human, which in turn will help people connect with what you’re saying. Don’t be faceless – let your readers feel like they know you.

Advice from the Expert

Andy Golpys , Co-founder and Creative Director at MadeByShape

“My first and most fundamental tip is to be yourself and represent the personality of your brand. If you’re an informal agency who is direct and concise – go for it. On the other hand, if you’re a very serious, formal company who wear suits everyday then the language on the site has to represent this.”

#10. Be Active, Not Passive

This is a nifty writing trick that may sound technical but is actually easy once you know what to look for.

It’s time we introduced you to active versus passive writing . To be technical about it, when you write in the active voice, the subject of the sentence performs the action, whereas when you write in the passive voice, the subject receives the action.

That sounds a lot more complicated than it actually is, so let’s use an example instead. Let’s take the famous phrase, “the cat sat on the mat.” This is written in the active voice. If we rewrite it so that it’s passive, it would go: “the mat was sat on by the cat.” Not quite so catchy, is it?

You should always try to write in the active voice. This is because it’s a lot easier for readers to process – it takes less effort for our brains to understand, meaning we’re more likely to read more of it.

The passive voice is much less direct and personal than the active voice, making it more tactful – this makes it useful when emailing a colleague or drafting a complaint.

For example, saying “you didn’t finish the project on time” could lead to some uncomfortable office dramas, whereas “the project was not finished on time” is a lot less accusatory.

Writing in the active voice also helps to keep things clear, concise, and impactful. Passive writing can be vague and wordy, and risks confusing the reader rather than delivering your message clearly.

#11. Keep It Short

It’s one of the main rules of writing for an online audience: you need to get your point across in as few words as possible . Long sentences may have worked in the hands of Ernest Hemingway and James Joyce, but sadly they’re a big no-no when writing for the web.

And it’s not just sentences, either. Simple words, short sentences, and snappy paragraphs are the golden trio of successful web writing. 

Short sentences and paragraphs help you stay concise, and stop your reader drifting off halfway through your point. It’s all about keeping your reader’s attention and making the most out of every word.

A great way of testing whether your web writing is too wordy is to use a readability tool. These scan your work and pick out words and sentences that are too long.

We’d recommend Readable , which you can use for free. It’ll tell you which words and sentences are too long, where you’ve used the passive voice, and even whether your tone is more formal or conversational. You also get an overall grade – aim for a B or above.

#12. Be Generous With Visuals

Articles with images get 94% more views than those without. Yep, it’s not just your writing that’s important when you’re creating online content – you need visuals, too. 

Whether it’s photos, videos, infographics, or diagrams, visuals help people process information and grab their attention.

Why are we so drawn to images? Well, our brains are pretty much hard-wired for visual processing, meaning humans find it easier to process images at high speed than text. So, pictures aren’t just there to be pretty – they’re essential for keeping your reader engaged. 

Try to use images that are relevant to both your topic and your target audience. For example, if you know you’re writing for college students, don’t use images of pensioners enjoying their retirement.

You don’t have to spend a lot (or anything at all) on professional images. You can download free, high quality images from sites like Unsplash, or pay for credits from Adobe Stock.

A good way to up the impact of your visuals is to use pictures of people. It’s been found that people pay more attention to images with faces than those without – for example, photos of people on Instagram are 38% more likely to receive likes than faceless pictures!

Faces help to create feelings of empathy in your reader, and can even influence where your reader directs their attention.

Eye-tracking studies have found that we follow the gaze of people in images. So if you’re trying to get your readers to pay attention to a subscribe button, for example, this could be a good tactic to try out!

Don't Leave Anyone Out

Tip #13: Write for Screen Readers

Tip #14: Layer Your Writing for Skimmers and Scanners

Tip #15: Leave Out Jargon

The internet is there for anyone and everyone, no matter their technical ability or experience. When you’re writing for the web, you need to make sure your wonderful words are suitable for everyone to enjoy!

#13. Write for Screen Readers

A screen reader is a program that takes on-screen content (such as text, images, and links,) and puts it into a format that people with visual impairments can easily take in, such as speech or Braille.

It’s important to remember your writing won’t just be looked at by your readers – below are some easy things you can do to make your content more accessible to all types of readers:

• Structure your headings – screen readers often use headings to navigate pages, so make sure you’re being clear and structured with your page’s layout. A structured system would be H1, then H2, then H3, then back to H2 if needed. Don’t jump around between H1 and H6, for example, as this will be confusing for a screen reader.
• Be descriptive in your alt text – when you can’t see an image, you’re reliant on descriptive alt text (the image’s description, which will appear when you hover over it) to tell you what the picture is showing. Alt text is important for SEO too, so you should be doing this anyway, but make sure it’s giving users the full picture.
• Make your links clear – think about whether your links make sense on their own. “Click here” doesn’t give any idea of where the user might end up!
• Be careful of autoplaying videos – if a screen reader is turning text to speech, and then a video starts autoplaying on your page, it’s going to be confusing and unhelpful for the user. At least provide an option to turn off autoplay.
• Don’t be vague – be careful and think about if your page will make sense to someone who can’t see it. For example, in forms don’t just say “Tick box to confirm you have read this.” A screen reader may have skipped the form – instead, reiterate what the user is agreeing to, such as: “Registering now will confirm your attendance. Tick box to confirm you have read this.”

Why not try navigating your site with a screen reader yourself? This will give you the best idea of how accessible your content is to visually impaired people, and show you where you’re acing it already!

For more information on what you can do to make your site more accessible, read this article: I Used the Web for a Day Using a Screen Reader

#14. Layer Your Writing for Skimmers and Scanners

It’s sad, but true – not everyone is going to settle down with a cup of coffee, put their feet up, and read your piece from beginning to end. Most of your readers will be skimmers or scanners. 

Skimmers and scanners are looking for particular information, as quickly as possible. Skimmers are trying to get an overall feel for what the page is about, and if it’s something they’ll enjoy or find useful. Scanners pay a bit more attention – they have a specific question in mind, and are on the hunt.

‘How dare they treat my writing like that!’ you might be tempted to shout – but don’t. Skimmers and scanners deserve a great reading experience, especially as they make up the majority of your audience.

We’ve outlined a few key things you can do to make your text ‘skimmable’ and scannable. (And we’ve put it in bullet points, for all you skimmers and scanners out there!)

• Use headings – again, headings are your best friend!
• Use bold – use it sparingly to highlight key facts or important phrases
• Use white space – white space surrounds paragraphs and images. It’s important to break up your page and let your text breathe – it lets your reader’s brain breathe, too
• Use lists and bullet points – they’re easier for readers to digest!
• Use boxes – you can break important information into boxes to draw the reader’s attention

Don’t feel like all your detailed, in-depth copy is going to waste, however. If nothing else, Google smiles on quality, long-form content, so creating beautiful web writing will help your site rank well.

#15. Leave Out Jargon

Just. Don’t. Use. Jargon.

At least, if you can avoid it!

There’s no way to lose readers faster than making them feel stupid with niche technical terms.

There are times when it’s unavoidable to use jargon, especially if you’re writing about tech, medicine, or business. Here at Website Builder Expert, we write about website builders, hosting, and even coding – we’re no strangers to jargon!!

When you do have to include jargon in your writing, make sure you always explain it clearly for your reader first. The first time you use an acronym or abbreviation (for example, SEO,) give the proper name and explain it so your reader knows what you mean.

Never assume your reader knows what you know. That way, you don’t exclude anyone who may have missed the jargon memo.

(Oh, and SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization, just in case anyone was wondering.)

Post-Writing Tips

Tip #16: Proofread Properly

Tip #17: Don’t Neglect Your Microcopy

Tip #18: Take Care Over Your Metadata

Tip #19: Say Hello to Social Media

The sad news is that’s all for our tips on writing your actual web copy – but the good news is the fun doesn’t end there: we’ve got four more steps for you to master so you can dazzle your audience. 

You’re so close to becoming a web writing master, so we’ll get straight to it – there’s no time to waste!

#16. Proof-read Properly

Read your writing through. Then read it again. Then take a break, have a coffee, go for a walk, and clear your head. Then read it through again .

Proof-reading is a crucial step. If any spelling mistakes or errors sneak through into the final version, it can seriously impact your reader’s trust in what you’re saying. It doesn’t come across as professional or reliable!

We recommend getting at least one other person to read through your work before publishing. It’s good to get a fresh pair of eyes as it’s easy to become blind to any small errors when you’ve been working on a piece for a while.

#17. Don’t Neglect Your Microcopy

Microcopy describes the small bits of copy that help users navigate a website. Error messages and link buttons are both examples of microcopy.

Below are our main tips for crafting good microcopy:

•  Address your reader’s concerns – you’ll see this on subscription forms when companies promise not to spam you or share your data.
• Be specific – with error messages, don’t just say “form incorrect, please try again.” Instead, be specific, and give an exact suggestion: “Your password is incorrect.”
• Provide action – microcopy can be the last barrier between your reader and the exit button. Always give them a next step – for example, if they can’t log in to their account, provide a link to recover their details or get help.
• Keep it short – it’s called microcopy for a reason!
• Follow through – button labels should match what happens when the user clicks on it. Users shouldn’t receive spam if you’ve promised no spam. Build trust by following through on your promises.

Microcopy is small but mighty. Don’t underestimate its power to impact your user’s decisions – good microcopy can be very persuasive, while bad microcopy can have your readers running for the hills.

Hannah Whitfield, Content Manager at Website Builder Expert

“Word for word, your website’s microcopy is its most important content. It helps your users navigate through your site, and builds trust to enable them to take the desired action (or, ‘convert’) with confidence. Take the time to get it right. Look to brands you admire for inspiration, and use tools like Optimizely and Hotjar make sure you’re always testing, learning and improving.”

#18. Take Care Over Your Metadata

Metadata may sound like one of the robots from the Transformers films, but it’s actually just the page information that displays on the search engine results page.

It’s important to pay close attention to your metadata, because it affects how well your site ranks in the search results, and also impacts how many people choose to click through to your website, instead of the results listed above or below!

When you search in Google, you’ll see a meta title and meta description appear. The meta title is the blue heading which you click on to visit the site. The meta description is the little paragraph that appears underneath to tell you a bit about the page.

Meta Titles

Your meta title needs to be short and clearly tell the user what to expect from the page they’re about to visit. You should include your keywords in the meta title to help your page rank higher.

Your meta title shouldn’t just appeal to Google, though – you also need to persuade users to click on your link. There are a few tactics you can use to make your meta title more appealing and eye-catching than your competitors’, including:

• Use numbers – using numbers is especially good for guides, for example, “How to Get Your Dream Job in 5 Easy Steps.” It’s a good idea to use odd numbers when you’re trying to catch people’s attention – don’t believe us? Check out this case study on Odd vs Even Number Psychology .
• Use power words – carefully choose relevant power words to build trust, ignite curiosity, and generally make people want to click on your link. Example words include “amazing,” “exclusive,” “save,” and “top secret.”
• Include the date – you don’t have to do this, but it’s a good way of showing people your content is current and up to date.

Meta Descriptions

Unlike meta titles, meta descriptions don’t directly affect your rankings in the search results. However, they have a massive impact on whether people want to visit your page , so it still deserves love and lots of attention.

Meta descriptions shouldn’t be too long, but you want to cram lots of persuasiveness and information in there to entice visitors to your site. Be clear what the page is about, hint at what the visitor will find, and try to throw in a call to action as well , such as “start your blog today.”

#19. Say Hello to Social Media

We’ve come to the last step in our guide to writing for the web. Social media is a great place to share your writing with the world, but it’s also a platform that involves its own writing rules and pitfalls.

You shouldn’t try to share across every social platform that you can . Instead, pick the best ones for you and your target audience, and commit to producing some quality content for those channels.

It’s usually pretty obvious how you should write on social media – for example, everyone knows to keep it short on Twitter because it actually caps your character count – but there are a few little tips we think might help you out.

The first is to keep hold of your voice. Whether you’re an individual blogger or writing for a large corporation, your voice needs to be consistent across all your channels. That includes your site’s content, emails, and social media (get the most out of emails by learning how to increase your email open rate ).

The second is to keep your posts relevant. If you’re a legal firm, be careful about sharing cat videos or using abbreviations. Yes, these things are widely accepted on social channels, but aren’t so accepted for serious brands.

The third is to know exactly what you want to get out of your social media posts . Do you want to gain followers? Get people to click through to your website? Encourage existing followers to convert? Having this goal in mind will help focus your posts and keep your sharing relevant.

Writing for the Web: Roundup

Congratulations! You are now a fully fledged web writer, ready to create your own quality online content!

We’ve skimmed, scanned, dipped, and dived through the 19 steps you need to follow to beat your competitors and dazzle your readers. Let’s have a quick refresh of those steps.

Top 19 Steps for Writing for the Web

• Research your reader
• Know your enemy
• Use headings
• Hook your reader
• Keep language simple
• Tell readers where they are
• Front-load information
• Use a conversational tone
• Be active, not passive
• Keep it short
• Be generous with visuals
• Write for screen readers
• Layer your writing for skimmers and scanners
• Leave out jargon
• Proof-read properly
• Don’t neglect your microcopy
• Take care over your metadata
• Say hello to social media

From those early days of researching your readers all the way through to sharing your work on social media, you’ve come a long way.

We can’t wait to see what you’ll do with our tips – you’ll even come up with your own expert tips as you start to write your own web content. If you want some more advice, check out our copywriting techniques for actionable advice on writing better headlines, introductions, and more.

Now go forth and write, but come back to let us know how you get on!

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Written by:, related posts.

How to write amazing content for a website

by MarketKeep | MarketKeep

18 Tips on how to write content for a websit e

If you operate a small business website you understand the importance of writing creative and attractive content for your site. If you are just starting out though, you may be asking yourself well how do you write content for a website? What separates the pages that rank from the pages that don’t? Successful content appeals to two audiences. Your target audience and the search engines that crawl it. Catering to both can be intimidating, but it doesn’t have to be. 

Here at MarketKeep, the digital marketing agency for small businesses, we have compiled a list of helpful tips on how to write content for a website. These tips will help to enhance the appearance of your site. Increase your readability score, and help with your overall search visibility online. If you follow these tips when writing your website’s content you should be able to reap the rewards of quality content writing, and better user engagement.

Our 18 Tips on how to write content for a website

Do not plagiarize!

When you are starting a new site from scratch it is helpful to look at other websites and see how they have developed their sites. It is not helpful to copy them though. Plagiarizing content from other websites will only end up hurting you. Search engines will penalize your site, or even remove it from their search engines. Instead, take a few minutes to figure out what you really like from the sites you have visited. Write down some notes and form your own opinions. Not only will help you avoid an SEO penalty, but you will create original content in the process. 

Avoid run-on sentences

Short and sweet sentences are best online. It is easier to read for humans, and easier for search engines to understand. If you have a lot of content to share break it up into easily scannable chunks.

Use the K.I.S.S. Method 

Don’t overcomplicate things by trying to use fancy words. Use the K.I.S.S. method, and just keep it simple stupid. The best advice we ever received was to write at an 8th-grade level. That way whoever visits your website will be able to fully understand it, and it will increase your user engagement.

Don’t write never-ending paragraphs

Try to keep your paragraphs short too. Remember most website visits now happen on a mobile phone. Keep your paragraph lengths short, and your sentences even shorter. Try to incorporate bullet points, lists, and images to help break up your text and make it more user-friendly. 

Keep it fresh

Don’t write about the same topic in 100 different ways. Try to write content that users will appreciate and want to engage with. 

Avoid selling yourself

One of the most important things you will learn about how to write content for a website is to avoid over-selling yourself or your site. High-quality content involved a delicate balance of promotional and non-promotional content. A website’s goal is to promote what you are offering, but not in a way that beats it over the head of your users. Provide your target audience with value. If you create informative content that they can appreciate, you will start to see reoccurring website traffic. 

Write for your target audience

Write content that your target audience is searching for. Make sure to write content that meets the needs of your site visitors, and is information they are looking for. If you do this your website visitors will turn into long-time customers. 

Don’t steal photos online

Finding images you found online and putting them on your website without permission is a terrible idea. If you take photos yourself, if you can’t there are plenty of free online resources such as pixabay , Shopify Burst , or stocksnap.io . 

Have a goal for each page you create

When you develop content for your site, think about the goal your user should have. Are they supposed to purchase a product of yours? Should they sign up for a newsletter? Make sure to write your content in a way that points them in the right direction, whatever that end goal may be.

Avoid ban anchor text

Have you ever been to a website that has a bunch of “click here” links littered throughout the site? Avoid those at all costs! If you want your website visitors to click on a link do one of two things. 

• Create a clickable button
• Create an anchor text that is descriptive, inviting, and useful

Use Call to Actions

Just like anchor texts, a CTA is an inviting button, link, or image that encourages a site visitor to participate further with your website. If you write great content, but don’t have any Call to Action what is the point? CTA’s are effective in converting visitors into consumers. 

Organize Your Thoughts

Sounds silly write, but the worst thing you can do is just to start writing. Take some time to create an outline for your website page, post, or blog. Have a strong sense as to what you want to say, and organize it in a way that will meet your intended goal.

Write for humans not bots

Remember in the very beginning how we talked about in order to write content for a website you need to have a delicate balance between writing for humans and bots? Well, when in doubt write for humans! In the end, humans are the ones who end up converting into customers. 

Get creative with your layout

Try to use items such as bullet points, numbered lists, engaging headers, and images to help break up text. It will make your website page look more interesting and readable.

Write content users need

Ask yourself this question, how can your services or products help a consumer out? Why should they turn to you? Provide your customers with the answers they are looking for. Remember you are the expert so your website visitors will expect to find some answers! 

Organize your paragraphs

You should have only one idea or key element per paragraph. Each paragraph should start off with the subject, and only that subject.

Pages should be easy to scan

Most website visits only last a few seconds. Make sure to leave an impression fast! Create content that users can find instantly and not have to dig deep to search for.

Review Your Work

Remember to look over your work before publishing your content. Look for errors or missing information that needs to be added. 

About MarketKeep

MarketKeep is a digital marketing agency for small businesses and start-ups based in Towson, Md. Our goal is to help small business owners plan, place, and optimize their digital marketing strategies. MarketKeep is proud to offer our clients the following services:

Website Design –  As a website design company we build websites that represent you and your brand and instantly builds a connection with your customers online. To learn more about our website design capabilities please contact our website designers.  

SEO Company –  As a Maryland SEO Company , we partner with small businesses to help grow their organic presence online through on-page, off-page, and reputation management techniques. To learn more about our SEO services for small businesses please contact our SEO team . 

Pay Per Click Experts –  As your SEM Agency MarketKeep will plan, place, and optimize your SEM campaigns so that you are maximizing your SEM campaign. To learn more about our SEM Services please contact our SEM team . 

Social Media Management –  Tired of running your social media accounts on a daily basis? Not sure what to post? As your Social Media Marketing Assistants MarketKeep will plan, place, and optimize your social media strategies. To connect contact our Social Media Management Team today. 

Local SEO –   So many of us rely on our phones to find businesses and products that are close by. Don’t miss out on an opportunity to connect with customers in your backyard. As a Local SEO agency MarketKeep helps to position your business online to acquire Local SEO searches. Learn more by contacting our Local SEO Agency Team . 

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SEO Content: Complete Beginner’s Guide

Written by Brian Dean

This is a complete guide to creating SEO content .

In fact, the techniques I’m about to show you helped me rank #1 in Google for competitive keywords like “ SEO campaign ”:

And “ on page seo ”:

So if you want to learn how to write content for SEO , you’ll love today’s guide.

Let’s get started.

What Is SEO Content?

SEO content is online content designed to rank in search engines (like Google). Also, content written for SEO is typically optimized around a specific keyword.

And when it comes to search engine optimization, make no mistake:

Content is KEY.

In fact, HubSpot reports that businesses that regularly publish blog posts get 350% more traffic than those that don’t publish content on a regular basis.

Google has even come out and said that content is a SUPER important part of succeeding with SEO. Specifically, they confirmed that “content” is one of Google’s top 3 ranking factors .

And I can speak from firsthand experience that content marketing can help you get LOTS of organic traffic.

In fact, I regularly publish content on my blog that’s specifically designed to rank in Google.

And this SEO-focused content strategy is one of the main reasons that my site gets 449,058 search engine visitors every month.

With that, here’s exactly how to create content for SEO.

How to Write SEO Content

Step #1: choose a topic.

Your first step is to come up with a topic for your content.

Specifically, you want to cover a topic that your target customer cares about.

Here are 3 quick ways to come up with awesome content ideas:

• Reddit: Head over to active subreddits where your target audience tends to hang out. And look for topics that tend to come up again and again. These can be GREAT topics to cover in a blog post or video.
• Competitor Blogs: Look at popular blog posts, videos and infographics from your competitors’ blogs. What do they have in common? What can you emulate (or improve)?

For example, my target audience is made up of people that do marketing full-time.

A while back I noticed this discussion on the SEO subreddit.

So I decided to create a post that answered that specific question:

Step #2: Find a Keyword

Now it’s time to find a keyword for your content.

To be clear:

Keyword research is a HUGE topic. So I can’t cover everything there is to know about finding keywords here.

But I can give you a handful of quick keyword research techniques that are working great right now.

First, use Google Suggest to find long tail keywords .

What’s cool about this technique that is you get to see keywords that people are searching for right now. Which means these terms aren’t super competitive (yet).

Second, use Ubersuggest .

This free keyword research tool helps you come up with new keyword ideas. It also lets you know how many people search for that keyword in Google every month.

Finally, type a few different words and phrases into AnswerThePublic .

Unlike most other keyword tools, AnswerThePublic focuses 100% on questions. So if you want to create content optimized around question keywords (like: “Why is content marketing important?”), this tool is a goldmine.

And if you want to see a lot of these strategies in action, I recommend checking out this short video.

Go ahead, I’ll wait 🙂

Then, move on to step #3…

Step #3: Write Comprehensive Content

Here’s the dirty little secret about SEO content:

If you want your content to rank in Google it needs to be AWESOME.

In other words:

“Quality content” isn’t enough. Your content needs to be the best result for a given search… or it’s not gonna rank. In fact, amazing content is the key to SEO success.

How do you do that?

Write comprehensive content.

In other words: publish content that gives someone searching for a keyword everything they need.

For example, few years ago I published this complete guide to mobile optimization .

Now I could have written something like: “5 Mobile SEO Tips”.

But I knew that comprehensive content had a MUCH better chance of ranking #1 in Google than a short post.

And I was right!

A few months later, my guide hit the #1 spot for my target keyword:

As you might expect, comprehensive content tends to be MUCH longer than your average 400-word blog post.

In fact, our Google ranking signals study found that the top 10 results for most keywords tended to be 1,447 words in length on average:

Why does long content rank better?

• Longer content helps give Google more information about the topic of that webpage. This makes them more confident that your page is a relevant result for that keyword.
• As I mentioned earlier, long-form articles can cover A LOT more than a 300-word blog post on the same topic. This means long articles answer searchers’ queries better than short content.
• Long content tends to attract more links and social shares than shallow content.

For example, the mobile SEO guide I mentioned earlier is 4,330 words.

Was that piece of content easy to write? Heck no!

The first draft alone took over 20 hours.

That said, writing long-form content can be a competitive advantage for you.

Your competition is probably too lazy to write in-depth pieces. This means that you’ll instantly separate yourself from the pack when you start publishing insanely-thorough stuff.

With that, let’s move on to our next step in the SEO content writing process.

Step #4: Optimize for Users

Now that you’ve written a piece of content, it’s time to optimize it for users.

Specifically, you want to make your content SUPER easy to consume.

Because the fact is this:

If your content isn’t easy to read and understand, it WON’T rank.

(Even if your on-page SEO is PERFECT.)

That’s because Google now uses “User Experience Signals” (in addition to traditional ranking signals, like backlinks ) to figure out which results deserve to rank #1 in the SERPs.

So if people LOVE your content, it’s going to get a rankings boost.

With that, here are some SEO copywriting tips that you can use to make sure your content satisfies users and search engines.

First, make the first few sentences of your content REALLY short.

Research shows that people prefer to read short sentences. Readers also don’t like wide blocks of text that spread from one end of the screen to the other.

That’s why you want to make the first few sentences of every article and landing page on your site super, super short.

Also, crunch those first 5-10 sentences between huge margins so that people’s eyes don’t have to dart back and forth as far.

I follow this rule for every post:

Second, I recommend adding lots of multimedia to your content.

In other words: use video, audio, diagrams, charts, interactive media, quizzes, games and infographics.

When you have quality multimedia in your content, you satisfy a larger chunk of the people that come to your site Google.

People that like videos will sit back and watch your YouTube video.

People that like to read will skim your blog post.

And audio junkies will put on their headphones and listen to your podcast.

In fact, a Google Quality Guidelines document told reviewers to consider pages with “supplementary content” (in the form of calculators, downloads and diagrams) higher quality than text-only pages.

In short, using multimedia is worth the extra effort.

Last up, use H tag subheadings to break up your content.

This is especially important for long-form content.

A good rule of thumb that I follow is to include at least one subheader for every 200 words of content.

For example, you can see that I use lots of subheadings in all of my posts:

Which makes them easy to read (and skim).

Step #5: Keyword-Optimize Your Content

This step is all about making your content SEO-friendly.

And this video walks you through the entire step-by-step process:

Now that you’ve watched the video, here’s an example of how I optimized one of my blog posts: “ How to Create an Effective SEO Strategy ”.

First, I made sure to include my main keyword in the first 100 words of my page.

This is known as “Keyword Prominence”.

Why is this important?

The higher up on the page a keyword first appears, the more Google considers that page about that keyword.

This makes sense if you think about it:

If you’re writing an article about a topic, why wouldn’t you mention a word related to that topic (in other words, a keyword) right off the bat?

Second, I added internal links to other content on my website.

Last, I embedded a long tail keyword in my title tag.

My target keyword for that page was “SEO Strategy”. That keyword gets 2.4k searches per month (and has a CPC of $15).

As you may expect, it’s going to be a while before I’m going to rank for a tough keyword like that.

That’s why I ALSO optimized my page around the long tail term: “SEO Strategy 2021”.

That way, I was able to quickly rank for the less-competitive keyword:

And as I build links to my page, I’ll eventually crack the top 10 for my main keyword.

Step #6: Share on Social Media

It’s time to promote your content on social media.

How you promote depends a lot on your niche.

For example:

If you run a cooking blog, you’ll want to focus on Pinterest or Instagram.

But if you’re in the digital marketing space, a platform like Twitter makes more sense.

In my case, I like to share my post on Twitter the day it goes live:

I also use a boosted Facebook post to get my content in front of more people.

Step #7: Build Links

There’s no doubt about it:

Link building is HUGE.

In fact, a 2019 search engine ranking factors study found that links are still “ incredibly important ” for ranking highly in Google.

The question is:

HOW do you get people to link to your content?

Your first step is to check out this video:

In this video you’ll learn about the strategies I’m currently using to build backlinks to my site.

And here’s an example of how I used one of the strategies from the video ( Broken Link Building ) to get bloggers to link to my content.

A while back I published a huge list of 190+ SEO tools .

Then, I found dead links on websites in the blogging, SEO and social media space.

I emailed each of these bloggers to give them a heads up about their dead links. I also sent them my new blog post.

As you can see, it worked like a charm 🙂

Step #8: Analyze Your Results

Your last step is to see how your content performed.

To do that, I recommend tracking your page’s search engine rankings:

And Organic traffic (using Google Analytics ):

You can also look at “Impressions” in the Search Console :

One thing to keep in mind is that SEO can take time.

Even if you follow these steps EXACTLY, it can still take 2-3 months for SEO to “kick in”. So don’t expect a brand new piece of fresh content to rank in Google the next day.

For example, I published this SEO case study some time ago.

Even though my content was optimized for users and SEO, it took about 60 days for that page to hit the first page of Google.

I hope you got a ton of value out of my SEO content guide.

Now I’d like to hear what you have to say.

What’s the #1 tip from today’s post that you want to try first?

Are you going to test out long-form content?

Or maybe you’re ready to try Broken Link Building.

Let me know in the comments section below.

Thank you so much for such valuable and ACTIONABLE information! I feel like an SEO expert now! Seriously, I appreciate your hard work-this is so helpful. I’m going to be starting a blog related to SEO and will definitely be linking your site and content.

Hi Robin, you’re welcome. I’m glad you enjoyed this post. If you want to become an SEO expert, I also recommend reading this guide: https://backlinko.com/seo-expert

Hey Brian, love the guide as always but I have a question. How does content length impact service pages? It is easier to write long form, informative content when writing about a subject such as ‘link building strategies’ or something similar on a blog. But what about service pages on websites. What length does that have to be? Also, have you got any tips on making service pages more easy to read, user friendly and ultimately rank better? Lots of great tips here for blog content. But what about ranking your higher intent pages? Let me know. Thanks Paul.

Hi Paul, good question. In that case it’s more about matching your service page to that person’s search intent: https://backlinko.com/hub/seo/search-intent

Hi Brian, Thanks for the guide and all the other great content. How can an ecommerce store use these tactics for SEO? I mean how many pages of content would it need and how can we get links to stores? Most advice out their seems geared to niche and blogs sites

Hi Reece, I recommend reading this guide: http://backlinko.com/ecommerce-seo

first of all thanks for the great effort you put into that work. I increased my trust flow and my domain authority better than all my competitors for a webdesign agency in my area (Munich Germany) but i still don´t get any results. The competition is high what can i do to increase my rank.

I’m currently in Asia (Ho Chi Minh,Vietnam), and as a whole, most of the SEO work being done here is still heavily towards Black Hat Methods. What advice would you give to re-educate the masses (marketers) here?

White hat methods are effective anywhere around the world and I want to show people a way to build value long term with their brands.

I am completely new to SEO and I find your content extremely refreshing in how easy it is to digest and understand even if you are not a “techy”. Thank you for that.

As I am slowly consuming your entire SEO videos series I was wandering how do you apply your does your advice about eliminating “zombie pages” and duplicate information from your website? The reason I am asking is because I watched a fair amount of your videos, and although I find every bit of it valuable there does seem to be a considerable repetition in content (even though the titles and focus may change). For example, even this very page we are on seem to be an older version of your brilliant “New Google SEO Guide” ( https://backlinko.com/google-seo-guide ). But why have them both? isn’t that something you advise to refrain from doing?

Thanks in advance for your wisdom!

Good question, Sivan. ‘Duplicate information” doesn’t mean zero overlap. For example, a site about fitness is likely to mention the facts that deadlifts are great in articles about strength, improving posture, building back muscles etc. And that’s perfectly OK. As long as you’re not just regurgitating the same stuff over and over again, you’re good.

Thanks for the fantastic article! It’s so in-depth and well-structured.

I would also add that good SEO content should also be unique and grammatically correct. There is no doubt we all know the best grammar checker out there so I won’t even bother dropping a link to it 🙂

Well, it’s interesting to hear about keyword density. Yes, it’s an old-fashioned way to create content and has proven itself to be wrong, but we all agree that the number of keywords we use should stay within some limits? What I mean is some writers tend to overuse keywords when you give them a list. In headers, inside of the text, etc. So it’s still important to keep in mind keyword density when you review/publish new article, righT?

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Table of contents

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• Portfolio Tips

24 Content Writing Samples Examples & How to Create Yours

Can you show us some samples of your writing? If that’s something you keep hearing but cannot say a confident yes to, you’re at the right place. We’ll show you 24 examples of how others write and present their content writing samples and answer some of the most frequently asked questions.

So the next time a potential client wants to see your samples or HR requests them for your job application, you won’t have to worry about it anymore. You can just send your writing portfolio over with all of your best projects included.

Looking for a quick and easy way to build your portfolio? Try Copyfolio and create a stunning website that’ll look good on every device. It’s free, no credit card required.

Read until the end, because we added free content writing sample templates for you!

Content writing sample examples

1. Kevin Anderson

Kevin created a page for his writing samples that's both visually appealing and informative. It shares details of the project while also allowing you to actually read the piece. He built his content writing portfolio using Copyfolio .

2. Shanice Perriatt

Shanice displays her social media content samples with screenshots and mockups.

3. Astor George

Astor used Copyfolio's "Charcoal" color palette to let the images shine, and added CTA buttons under each sample's description for better conversions.

4. Allana Schwaab

Allana did two things to present her content work for Hilton Supply Management: she wrote a short summary of the project and she also included large images of the final piece. Allana featured these writing samples on her portfolio website, built with Copyfolio .

5. Margaret Reeb

Margaret created a case study page for all her meditation-themed blog posts. She starts with a short explanation of their background and her process, then introduces and links out to each of them.

6. Sera Ozkivanc

Sera created neat visuals of browsers and mockups to illustrate her writing samples on her project page about her work for Loggle. She created it using Copyfolio .

7. Hazel McLaughlin

Writing samples that Hazel did for the Governor of Alabama. She featured them on her portfolio website made with Copyfolio , including all important details as text next to images showing the content.

8. Julie Yuen

A screenrecording scrolling through Julie Yuen's content writing portfolio, clicking on one of the project thumbnails, which opens a PDF writing sample on a new tab.

9. Halle Snavely

Similar to Shanice, Halle features multiple samples on one page, including screenshots and summaries, linking out to the full pieces. She created her content sample page using Copyfolio and the "Letterpress" template .

10. Robin Catalano

A magazine piece sample Robert wrote, with a little bit about the project background.

11. Tania Lewys-Lloyd

Blog samples by Tania, with a link to the blog and some background information.

12. Caitlin Wright

Caitlin follows the summary and a screenshot with a button linking to the piece published online.

13. Nidhi Pathak

Nidhi chose to add her content sample as a PDF with its preview and short summary.

14. Kelsey Ray

Kelsey listed multiple samples categorized by industry —and included a case study for more information.

She also wrote about the objectives and gave some additional information about the projects.

15. Angela Rodgers

Angela wrote short case studies for each of her samples, and displayed the finished results as screenshots.

16. Hannah Smith

Hannah included the excerpts of her content writing samples on her site as blog posts, with a link to the full article.

17. Leah Presser

Leah also added her writing samples as PDFs —each on their own page, with a short summary included.

18. Paul Maplesden

Paul added a screenshot with a title and short description to display his samples in his portfolio, followed by links to more of his blog posts.

19. Marijana Kay

Marijana writes a comprehensive case study when adding her writing samples, giving you a good idea on how the content she writes performs.

20. Laura Howarth from left field.

21. Yvonne Reilly

Similarly, Yvonne also added each project as a card, linking out to the pieces on different websites.

22. 3rd.Life

The content writing samples on the 3rd Life website pop up in lightbox windows, so you can take a better look and read the whole piece.

23. Julie Gabriel from Copywriter.world

Julie displays her writing samples with different CTAs depending on the format: some are linking to the published piece, while some offer a PDF download.

24. Shoaib Marfatiya

Why do you need to have content writing samples?

Okay, yes, these are great… But why do we need to have the content writing samples again? Isn’t it enough to just list all the previous clients and work experiences?

Not really.

Even if you worked with some big brands, it doesn’t mean that your next client or employer will like your writing style. Or that they’ll think you can adjust your tone of writing to their brand’s.

Getting to see multiple samples of your work in your writing portfolio , even if they’re not very long, will help them decide if you’re going to be a good fit or not. It’s kind of like trying an exotic new dish. You like how it sounds, but you’d still want to try it first before you can say that you actually do like it.

And that’s all the more true with clients working in complex industries. When it comes to highly technical topics, people like to see that you not only thoroughly understand it but can explain it in an interesting, easy-to-understand way.

What kind of jobs do you need content writing samples for?

First of all, you’ll need them if you’re a freelance writer, offering copywriting, or content writing services. Your prospective clients will want to check out your writing style before they hire you, that’s for sure.

But if you’re applying for an in-house or agency position that involves content writing, you will also be asked for it. It can be called a copywriter, content writer, SEO writer/specialist, or even a digital marketing position. So make sure you check the job description carefully and get your samples ready before you hit apply.

Types of writing pieces to include in your content writing samples

Now that you’re pretty sure you indeed need to collect your content writing samples, the next step is to decide what type of writing pieces you want to collect. If you’re an experienced writer, this will be a given.

But if you’re just getting started, choosing certain types of writing for your samples could help guide your projects later on. Because logically, for example, if you have a lot of podcast script samples, you’ll feel like a great candidate for the podcast writing gig. Just as a client would happily hire a writer to write for their blog if the said writer has loads of amazingly written article samples.

Blog posts and articles

One of the most common and popular types of content to write nowadays are blog posts and articles. As content marketing is becoming more well-known amongst companies, the need for writers who can write highly converting content is on the rise as well. So you’ll find that most content writers have blog posts or articles as samples in their writing portfolios.

Long-form webpage copy

Another type of written content all businesses need is copy for their website. With everyone trying to get their pages to rank on Google, if you can write SEO-optimized content for websites, you can get yourself ahead of the competition. Knowing at least the basics of SEO is a valuable skill for writers, so if you have it, don’t be afraid to show it off.

Content for social media

Do we even need to get into why businesses need to have an active social media presence? We all know that by now. But what many people often don’t think about is that writing content for social media is not something that just about anyone can do.

Yes, many social media platforms focus on the visuals - but without outstanding copy to go with it, even the best visuals will fail to convert. You need to know how to reflect on the consumers’ pain points and how to lead them to take the action you want them to take with the right CTAs.

So if you know the popular social media platforms and their requirements like the back of your hand –and can write content for them that will convert… Consider social media specific getting content writing samples and creating a social media portfolio .

Scripts for podcasts or videos

Blogs and websites have been around for ages, but it was in the last couple of years that the popularity of podcasts took off. So much so that now many podcasts are looking for writers to help out with their scripts, especially when they are starting a video podcast series . Since scripts for those need to be more versatile and well-thought-out. And the same goes for video content too.

It’s an exciting new genre, but also one that requires lots of time and effort. Podcasts tend to be quite long –and in most cases, you’ll have to do some research to be able to write a whole podcast script on a topic.

But if that’s something you’re interested in, add podcast or video script pieces to your writing samples to establish yourself as a promising candidate for these types of projects.

If you don’t mind ghostwriting (meaning that your name won’t be displayed as the author), writing eBooks for businesses that sell them is a great way to earn money as a writer. Similarly to podcasts, they’re lengthy and require lots of research –but the compensation usually matches the effort.

So if you’ve written eBooks –or want to get into writing them–, then samples or case studies to show your expertise will come in handy for your writing portfolio website .

How long should your content writing samples be?

The length of your samples will depend on a few things. Let’s start with the easiest.

If you’re adding a piece that was a previous project, the length is what it is. Although, for your portfolio, you can choose whether you want to showcase and publish the whole thing, or just an excerpt of it.

And that’s the second factor. Whether it’s a finished project or you’re just writing it now for your portfolio, you can always include just an excerpt of it. If it’s good enough that it shows your writing style, and your expertise in that specific type of writing, your sample doesn’t have to be thousands of words long.

Of course, if reading the whole piece is needed to assess your skills, write and publish it all. But showcasing only an excerpt can make reading it less overwhelming for the viewer. And as we all know, HR managers and potential clients often don’t have much time to review each content writing and copywriting portfolio . So making it easier for them by keeping the reading material shorter is a great idea.

How to format your content writing samples – a guide for freelancers and in-house content writers

This is another “it depends” kind of situation. Why?

Because if you’re applying for an in-house or agency position, the writing sample requirements might be very specific. They might ask you to send a certain number of samples that have specified length and format too. Or might even ask you to write something replying to a prompt or topic they gave you.

But if there are no such requirements, or you’re just putting your content writing portfolio together, you have more freedom in choosing the format. Our recommendation? A portfolio website , with each sample a separate project page.

Having your personal website with all of your content writing samples on there won’t only make you feel instantly more professional, but will also make it super easy for anyone to review your samples.

When each of your writing samples has its own project page, you have space to not only showcase the finished product but to also talk about how it came to be. Oftentimes the background information such as

• what the initial brief or your task description was,
• how you researched the topic and went around writing it up, and
• the impact it made, the conversions it drove,

...are just as important – and this format will enable you to write about all that.

Free content writing sample presentation template s

To make it even easier for you, we put together two free content writing sample templates. These templates will show you the ideal structure that a content writing sample project page should have.

If you follow one of these templates, your projects will be easier to review, will give insights into and background information on the project, and will convert better.

Create content writing sample pages based on this template easily with the help of prompts and guiding questions, and the super-fast page builder in Copyfolio — get started for free today, it's free, no credit card required!

This first template is for previous projects that are already published. Start out with your project title and follow up with a screenshot. It doesn’t have to show the whole piece, just that it exists and it’s out there.

People often simply link to the blogs and websites where their writing was published, but they forget one thing. It’s not guaranteed to stay there forever, unchanged. It happens that a company goes out of business, unpublishes some blog posts, or decides to change things in the copy you originally wrote. See how just linking to it becomes problematic?

But by providing a screenshot you can prove that it’s a real project that was published online.

Following the screenshot, write a few sentences about the project background. What was the task you were given? The brief or prompt you got? Who was the client you wrote for? Then, if you can, go into the creative process too.

In the end, show the final result. You can add large-enough images containing the content you wrote so that people can read it there - or even type it out. Additionally, you can link out to the live version of it online.

To maximize your conversions, always end with a clear CTA and your contact information. For example: “If you liked my writing and would like to work with me, email me at [email protected]”

This template is for you if you’re writing samples just to go in your portfolio. Because if you do that, you won’t be able to start out with a screenshot of your writing published online. You can still add a photo to make the whole page less overwhelming and easier on the eyes.

Next to the image, write a few sentences about its background and your process. Even if it’s a project you made up, you can still write about why you chose that topic and format, and how you got around to working on it.

For the final result, feel free to just type it out, or attach a screenshot of the document you wrote it in.

Collect your samples and add them to your portfolio with Copyfolio

The easiest way to create an online writing portfolio where you can add your content writing samples is using a website builder like Copyfolio.

Copyfolio was designed specifically for writers and will not only let you create a stunning website with just a few clicks but will help you with prompts and questions to write your case studies.

Just choose a template, write the copy, add your projects and you’re ready to go! Start building your professional writer website with Copyfolio, sign up today!

Dorka Kardos-Latif

Digital marketer & portfolio expert, the face behind all content on Copyfolio 👋

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SEO Writing: How To Write SEO Content (12 Easy Tips)

Learn how to create SEO-Optimized content. Follow our tips to write SEO-friendly content that users love to read.

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What Is SEO Writing?

Why is seo writing important, how to write seo content, key learnings, learn more about seo writing.

Writing for SEO is an art. The job of an SEO writer is to write content for search engines and users. To do that successfully, you must know how to apply basic SEO content principles in practice.

In this guide, you’ll learn everything you need about SEO writing. I will explain what SEO writing is and give you 12 SEO content writing tips to ensure that each content you write is search-engine friendly.

SEO writing is the process of writing content to rank high in search engines like Google, for related keywords.  This is done by doing keyword research and writing SEO-optimized and helpful content relevant to the user’s search intent.

SEO writing is also known as SEO copywriting or search engine optimization writing.

SEO writing is important because if you want your content to get traffic from search engines, it needs to appear in the top positions of the SERPs. According to studies, the majority of search engine traffic goes to the top 5 positions.

Another reason is growth. If you consistently write content that keeps users and search engines happy, it will have a positive effect on your Google trust and you’ll be able to rank for more keywords.

Over time, you’ll experience a steady growth of organic traffic with numerous other benefits for your business.

Follow these rules to start creating optimized SEO content.

• Find Your Primary And Secondary Keywords
• Craft Your Page Title And Meta Description
• Create An SEO Friendly URL
• Satisfy Search Intent
• Create Helpful, Unique Content
• Use Keywords In Your Content
• Create Meaningful Subheadings
• Add Internal Links With Relevant Anchor Text
• Optimize Content For E-E-A-T
• Optimize Content For Featured Snippets
• Add And Optimize Images
• Make Your Content Easy To Read On Mobiles

1. Find Your Primary And Secondary Keywords

The first step before writing new content is to decide which keywords to target.

This process is known as keyword research, and it’s very important for a simple reason. You need to write content around topics that people search for and keyword research will tell you that.

When you do your keyword research, the outcome will be a set of SEO keywords both head (or primary keywords) and long tail keywords that people type in search engines.

The easiest way to do this is to:

• Go to Google and search for your chosen topic (general).
• Visit the top 5 pages and analyze the type of content they provide.
• Take each URL and, using Semrush or other tools (Ahrefs, Ubersuggest, etc), find out for which keywords those pages are ranking and the traffic they get.
• Then, depending on the results, decide which main keywords you will target in your content.
• Take those keywords again and, using a tool, find out the associated long-tail keywords and related keywords.

Here is an example of how I followed the above steps when writing this post:

I did a general search on Google using “write for SEO”.

I analyzed the first results using Semrush and found out that the keyword that has a high volume for my chosen topic is “SEO writing.”

I then used the Keyword Magic tool (utilizing the advanced filters feature) of SEMRUSH to find other related long-tail keywords.

If you take a closer look at the content, you’ll see that these keywords are used in different places throughout the article.

By following this process every time you write new content, you help search engines understand your content better, and if your content satisfies what users want, this will eventually translate to higher rankings, social media shares, and more incoming links.

2. Craft Your Page Title And Meta Description

The next step is to start thinking about your page title. Choosing a good page title is critical for the success of your content, so allocate the necessary time to come up with a title that:

• Includes your target keyword
• It’s unique for your website
• It’s interesting for users to click
• It’s around 60 characters
• It’s not the same as the existing titles on the first page of Google.

Don’t omit any of the steps, especially the last one. Before deciding on your title, go to Google, type your target keyword, and analyze the first 10 titles.

Your goal is to create a title that is unique. Otherwise, you limit your chances of getting a top-10 position. Google rarely shows pages with the same title in the first 10 results.

Do the same when crafting your meta description . Make it unique, and try to describe your content in 160 characters or less. Include keywords so that users can know if the content matches their intent.

For example, look at the title and meta description below and notice how the keyword ‘learn digital marketing’ is used naturally in both.

3. Create An SEO Friendly URL

The next step is very easy to implement. When creating the permalink of your post, ensure it includes your target keywords and eliminates any unnecessary words.

Look, for example, at the URL of this post. By default, it was the same as the page title, i.e.

https://www.reliablesoft.net/seo-writing-how-to-write-for-seo-12-easy-tips/

But I have shortened it down to:

https://www.reliablesoft.net/seo-writing

Aim for having exact match URLs where possible. Read our guide on SEO-Friendly URLs for more details.

4. Satify Search Intent

After finding your target keywords, the next step before writing the content is to examine what kind of content users like to consume for the particular keywords. In other words, you need to find the search intent behind each keyword.

To do this successfully, search for your target keywords on Google and examine the top-ranking pages. What kind of content is ranking in the top positions? Are they short-form articles, long-form articles, or listicles? What is the average content length? How are the pages structured?

Also, look at the ‘People Also Ask’ section, which shows users’ common questions about a particular topic.

For example, let’s say you’re writing a post on “blogging tips”.

If you perform a search on Google, you can easily make these assumptions:

• Most articles have a list of tips, so the appropriate format for this keyword is listicles .
• For each tip, they give a summary and links to learn more.
• The average article length is 3000 words.
• Top-ranking articles have many custom-made visuals.

If you follow the above guidelines and provide content that is unique and useful, you’ll have more chances of achieving a high ranking.

Another example. If you are writing an article about ‘SEO tools,’ you will notice that almost all results are about lists with ‘Free Tools.’

This means that Google has found out that when users search for tools, although they don’t include the word ‘Free’, they intend to browse lists of Free tools.

This also means that if you target this keyword, you must adjust your title and content accordingly. Otherwise, you minimize your chances of rankings for that term.

Pro Tip: Make sure you research on both desktop and mobile, as the results are presented differently.

5. Create Helpful, Unique Content

Now it’s time to get your hands dirty and get into content writing .

You already know what your competitors have published, you have your title, and you know which keywords to include in your content. What else do you need?

You need content that has the following characteristics:

• People-first – content produced to provide value to people and not search engines.
• Original – content that is not a copy of existing content.
• Unbiased – content that is not biased but presents both sides of a story.
• Complete – content that provides a comprehensive description of a topic.
• Better – content doesn’t have to be perfect, but it has to be better than what is already published.

Follow the checklist below, every time you start creating content.

What is the ideal length of content?

I’ve mentioned above that you must make your content comprehensive enough so that users can get accurate and in-depth information about the topic.

Despite what you might have read, there is no magic number when it comes to word length.

It all depends on the topic and keywords. For some topics, you might need to write articles that are over 2000 words. For other topics, you can provide a comprehensive answer in 800 words.

Content length alone is NOT a ranking factor. What matters is the quality of the content and how well it can satisfy the user’s real intent.

To avoid any confusion, several studies have shown that the ideal article length for SEO is around 1800 words, and this is true for many cases.

Longer articles allow you to use more keywords (without keyword stuffing), and they tend to do better in social media.

But, this is a general guideline and not applicable to all cases. My recommendation is to find the average length of the first 10 results and try to provide a bit more content but better than what has already been published.

There is no reason to write a 3000-word article if you can have the same result as a 1500-word article.

6. Use Keywords In Your Content

Here is a nice tip that most SEO writers fail to follow. Once you are done with the first draft, you need to go back and revisit your post introduction.

Your goal is to make sure that your target keyword is included in your opening paragraph .

The reason is that Google always considers that content that is above the fold and high on a page is more important than content found down the page.

Adding your keywords in the first paragraph gives Google a big clue as to which keywords to associate this page with. It’s also good for the users since you can help them understand that they are on the right page.

With the introduction of machine learning to Google search algorithms (known as RankBrain), Google is trying to truly understand what the searcher wants by using natural language processing.

This means that for a given keyword, Google will look for the deeper meaning of the query and not just for exact match keywords.

For you as an SEO copywriter, it means that you need to add related keywords in your content to help them during this process.

Related keywords are keywords that have the same or similar meaning. You can find these keywords using tools like Semrush. Here is a screenshot of the related keywords for “SEO writing”.

So, you need to return to your copy and enrich it with these keywords naturally. You may have to rephrase some of your sentences, but it’s a step that can improve the relevance of your content.

7. Create Meaningful Subheadings

One of the characteristics of SEO-friendly content is that it’s easy to read by both search engines and users, and headings help in that direction.

Don’t be surprised but the majority of users won’t read your content, they will scan through it. Having meaningful headings helps them find the part they want faster.

Search engines follow the same pattern, especially for long-form content. They scan the page and look for certain elements to understand how it is structured and what topics or keywords the content covers.

To make their job easier, you can use predefined heading tags in your HTML, like the H1 tag , h2 tag, and h3.

Usually, a page has only one H1 tag, which is used for the title, and then the rest of the content has H2 for the main headings and H3 for the sub-headings.

To further improve the SEO friendliness of your copy, try to use some of your long-tail keywords in the headings. Take a closer look at the headings of this article and notice how I have added long-tail keywords in my headings.

8. Add Internal Links With Relevant Anchor Text

One of the SEO principles most SEO content writers tend to forget is internal linking . An internal link is a link that points to a page on the same website.

Why is it important?

When you publish a new page, it has to match your site’s topics. This improves relevancy and rankings. One of the ways to ‘tell’ Google that your content is relevant to the rest of the site, is to use internal links.

Although internal links are not as powerful as SEO backlinks, they are still used by Google to understand what the linked page is about, especially if the right anchor text is used in the link.

They also help users learn more about a topic (look at this article again and notice how I have used internal links to give users a way to find out more information about a topic).

Last but not least, internal links are followed by search engine crawlers, and this leads to better crawling and indexing of more site pages.

9. Optimize Content For E-E-A-T

A lot of content is published on the Internet, and to protect the quality of their search results, Google algorithms can detect which pages demonstrate Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness on a given topic.

In the SEO world, this is known as E-E-A-T and is a critical factor of SEO content and an indicator of content Quality.

Here is the relevant quote from Google’s guidelines on content quality.

How can you improve your SEO copy for E-E-A-T?

Follow these simple guidelines:

• Every page should have the author’s name and bio published (see how I use this on all my posts).
• A page should have outgoing links to trusted sources.
• A page and website, in general, should have incoming links from other trusted and related websites.

As an SEO copywriter, you cannot control the last guideline (incoming links) since this has to do more with the content promotion part, but you can control the first two.

So, revisit your content again and ensure that it links to other trusted websites and that the author bio is clearly shown on all pages.

10. Optimize Content For Featured Snippets

Another important tip for making your content more visible to search engines is optimizing for featured snippets .

A featured snippet appears on position ‘zero’ of the organic results and has a higher CTR compared to normal listings. Here is an example:

For every piece of content you publish, you should analyze the SERPs to find what kind of featured snippets Google shows for your target keywords and optimize your content accordingly. The most common types are paragraphs, lists, tables, and videos.

11. Add And Optimize Images

Before you hit the publish button, ensure your content includes optimized images.

Adding images to your content makes it more interesting and easier to read. While this is not directly related to SEO writing, it can help in many ways:

• Users are more likely to share content with high-quality images in their social media networks than content with no images.
• You can use the image alt text to give search engines more clues about your content.
• When you properly optimize your images , you have more chances of appearing in Google image search for your target (or related) keywords.

12. Make Your Content Easy To Read On Mobiles

When writing content, ensure it is optimized for reading on mobile devices. This means:

• Use a font that is big enough.
• Breaking the text into short paragraphs.
• Use lists where appropriate to make the information more digestible.
• Use responsive images that adapt to different screen sizes.
• Ensure that the main content is not confused with ads.
• The page loads fast and has no annoying popups.

Anyone can learn to write for SEO. It’s a skill that can be easily mastered through practice and by following some basic SEO principles.

If you work as a freelancer , you can apply for many SEO writing jobs. If you’re doing SEO for your website, learning how to write content for SEO will make your content get found on Google .

What you should not forget is always to put the user first. Your primary concern is providing content users want to read and then optimizing it for SEO.

This is why I have separated the process into several steps that involve writing the content naturally and then revising it for SEO.

• Best SEO Writing Courses
• SEO Certifications Guide
• The Complete SEO Course

Alex Chris is a digital marketing consultant, author, and instructor. He has more than 18 years of practical experience with SEO and digital marketing. Alex holds an MSc Degree in eCommerce and has consulted with Fortune 500 companies in different industries. He blogs regularly about SEO and Digital marketing, and his work has been referenced by leading marketing websites. Connect with Alex on Twitter and LinkedIn .

32 Comments

July 8, 2014 at 7:52 pm

this article is very useful. As iam a new learner so it helps me a lot. Thanks for all this information 🙂

November 6, 2014 at 7:19 am

Thanks for explaining in detail about SEO Friendly Content, this will be helpful.

January 10, 2015 at 2:37 pm

Great article for content writing and seo optimization..

May 25, 2016 at 8:30 am

Thanks for this wonderful post. SEO is an great part of blogging, and helps to get constant flow of traffic over long periods of time. Both on page and off page optimization are equally important, but I have been trying to learn more and more about on page optimization. Learned quite a few rocking tips on how to write SEO optimized posts.

Thanks bro.

May 25, 2016 at 10:47 am

Thanks for commenting. Glad you find my post useful. You can also check https://www.reliablesoft.net/ebook/wordpress-seo-guide/ for more actionable tips and advice about on-page and off-page SEO.

All the best Alex

January 29, 2017 at 7:19 am

Thanks i read it alreally. Really usefull for my site. Thank you so much bro.

July 15, 2016 at 8:46 am

Great little article! Giving the basics of SEO in an incredibly light and informative way. Very easy to read and understand thank you for your help!

July 16, 2016 at 10:49 am

well..informative blog..I am planning to rewrite content for one of my websites.I would like to ask about keyword density. please guide for the same..thanks in advance ..

July 21, 2016 at 8:01 am

Great article, many thanks.

July 22, 2016 at 6:23 pm

Great tips Alex! Writing for SEO without sounding like an SEO is easier these days. Ridiculous keyword stuffing is redundant and luckily Google is better penalizing for it. I’m generating ideas on my next piece of content with keyword tools. I like search suggestion tools like Answerthepublic.com or sg.serpstat.com but being organic in your writing isn’t something you can acquire with a tool)

January 19, 2017 at 4:31 pm

You are write Alex. If you wanna have frequently visited web/blog, you must have a well prepared showcase.

January 20, 2017 at 1:43 pm

Very well said! Prepare your content from the beginning so that it’s ready and in good shape once the traffic starts to flow in.

Thanks Alex

January 23, 2017 at 9:37 pm

Really amazing information with full detail but in point 5 you have a spelling mistake “big fun” instead of” big fan”. Thanks Alex

January 23, 2017 at 10:33 pm

Thanks for your comment. Spelling mistake corrected.

April 6, 2017 at 1:23 pm

This is my first comment here so I just wanted to give a quick shout out and tell you I genuinely enjoy reading through your posts. Can you recommend any other blogs/websites/forums that deal with the same subjects? Thanks a lot!

April 19, 2017 at 8:54 am

Thank you for your advice. I have a question for you: my blog is new, how to develop content the most effectively and get more traffic with content marketing.

April 20, 2017 at 1:40 pm

Take a look at these two posts: https://www.reliablesoft.net/how-to-write-content-that-actually-deserves-to-get-links/ and https://www.reliablesoft.net/seo-friendly-blog-posts/ . They describe the process I use to create new content and increase my traffic.

October 27, 2017 at 4:15 am

Hey Alex, your article is awesome. You start easy and basic and I think everyone can follow your step by step description. What do you think is the worst mistake one can make while writing friendly SEO content?

October 27, 2017 at 8:40 am

Keyword stuffing. SEO Friendly content has to be written naturally without exaggerating with the use of keywords.

December 20, 2017 at 9:24 am

Impressive article on SEO. Very easy to read and understand thank you for your help!

January 11, 2018 at 10:58 am

hey Alex, your post is excellent and so informative. it is really helpful for a beginner blogger like me. keep up the good work. i have a question, what would be the minimum word limit of the article??

June 7, 2018 at 7:05 pm

I am a beginner in the blogging industry. I really benefited by your super reach article. That helps me to write an SEO optimized post. Do I have some question, How to write a perfect SEO title and meta title? and how to find the best keyword? please help me, sir…..

November 6, 2018 at 2:04 pm

Can you please let me know that if I use an image for which I don’t have copyright like images from direct Google search.Then what will be the effect to my website?Are there any risk of penalized my website by Google.

March 26, 2019 at 10:55 am

You should always reference the source of the image by adding a link to your content. There is no Google penalty from using images from Google search.

Hope this helps Alex

October 10, 2019 at 4:18 pm

hi there, informative clear updated thanks for the detailed explanation with a presentation, it will be really helpful to enhance in-depth knowledge about Content Writing Skills.

November 23, 2022 at 3:28 pm

Thanks! Glad I could help.

November 1, 2019 at 3:29 pm

Best article for a beginner to kick start with basic SEO for a blog 2019. I am a beginner and it’s very helpful to me.

January 3, 2021 at 9:27 pm

Hey Alex, thanks a lot. This is a very informative post and you have written all the things about SEO in a very easy way. Thanks for sharing this kind of nice content.

Regards Mohit

May 25, 2021 at 2:23 pm

Writing a content with SEO tactics is not an easy task, but here you wrote a wonderful post which make easy to write SEO friendly content.

September 2, 2021 at 5:54 pm

Wow Very informative article Alex as usual. Thanks for sharing.

November 23, 2022 at 3:29 pm

Thanks a lot for commenting.

January 2, 2024 at 8:58 am

Thank you for this incredibly helpful guide on SEO writing! Your 12 easy tips provide a clear roadmap for creating SEO-friendly content. The breakdown makes it so much simpler to understand and implement these strategies. Grateful for the valuable insights that will surely improve content creation. Much appreciated!

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About Reliablesoft

Online training.

Understanding AI writing tools and writing assistants

Use AI writing tools, such as those in Word, to improve your writing, get work done faster, and minimize mistakes.

How can AI help me write?

AI writing tools refine content by checking spelling, grammar, and tone and making other suggestions for improvement. An AI writing assistant takes it a step further by helping generate content through prompts. 

What do AI writing tools do?

Generate content

Save time writing with an AI writing assistant. Simply tell it what you’d like to write about, specify the length you want, and include any relevant subtopics you’d like covered.

Check for spelling and grammar

Most popular word processors have a spelling and grammar-checking feature built in to flag errors in your writing.

Predict what you’re going to say

Word processors with an auto-complete feature will guess what you’re about to type before you type it, which speeds up writing.

Summarize lengthy text

When researching background information for a topic you’re writing about, ask an AI writing assistant to summarize useful articles you find, so you get straight to the main points.

Improve your writing

Regular use of an AI writing tool can enhance your writing skills. As you become familiar with the spelling and grammar corrections it suggests, you'll start to remember and apply these rules in your writing beforehand, ultimately becoming a more proficient writer.

Make personalized recommendations

Depending on the AI writing tool you’re using, it may offer tailored recommendations that take your writing history and goals into account.

What features does an AI writing assistant have?

AI writing assistants vary in the features they offer. Here are some examples of what to look for when researching features:

• Writing style and tone adjustments. Different audiences are best reached by adjusting your writing style and tone to speak to their needs. Be sure to choose an AI writing assistant that has the flexibility to use different tones—for example, professional, academic, plain language, or playful. 
• Help with brainstorming. Writing doesn’t always come easily. Sometimes just seeing a list of ideas can jump-start your own creative process, even if none of the ideas are quite right. For example, if you ask an AI writing assistant for a list of ideas to name a new product, you might not like any of them enough to use. But by taking this first step and seeing what doesn’t work, it can help your brain focus on what does. AI writing isn’t made to return perfect results every time, but to assist you in getting the process going.
• Search engine optimization (SEO). If you’re writing for the web, you probably know how necessary it is to use the right keywords so your content is findable in search results. Ask your AI writing assistant to suggest relevant keywords to help with SEO.
• Summarization. Some writing requires a fair amount of background research. An AI writing assistant can help you get to the main points of an article quickly by summarizing it for you, which reduces time spent researching. 
• A plagiarism detector. Having a built-in plagiarism detector is a major benefit when writing with AI. Because AI writing assistants pull information from many online sources, it’s important to not only fact check any content generated but also make sure it’s original. 
• Language translation. As you research background information for what you’ll write about, translate relevant articles in other languages to incorporate broader perspectives into your work. 
• Voice-to-text conversion. If thinking out loud is a natural part of your creative process, this feature is for you. Choose an AI writing assistant that allows you to dictate your thoughts and convert them to writing.
• Text analysis. After you’ve written a piece—with or without AI help—consider using AI to analyze it from different perspectives. For example, maybe it’s a sensitive topic, and you want to make sure the tone is balanced and doesn’t sound like any unintentional bias is creeping in. Ask your AI writing assistant to analyze the piece for potential bias.
• Data visualization. Sometimes the best way to talk about data in a piece you’re writing is by showing, not telling. Help out visual learners by asking AI to convert a set of statistics into a pie chart or bar graph.
• Compatibility with other business apps. Having an AI writing assistant on its own is valuable, but having one that works with the other productivity apps that you use daily (for example, your email, chat , and slideshow apps) is a game-changer that opens up endless possibilities for how to get work done more efficiently.

What are the most used AI writing tools?

One of the most popular AI writing tools is something you may not think about as being AI— spellcheck and grammar check . This is a great example of how long AI has been helping people in ways they don’t always consider. By drawing on a large database of grammar and spelling rules, the AI uses sophisticated algorithms to analyze text, compare it against common errors, and suggest changes.

More recently, AI-generated content has also become a popular AI writing tool. And it’s easy to understand why. Much like how spellcheck and grammar check can accelerate the review process by preventing many errors, an AI writing assistant also cuts down overall time spent on writing. 

That said, AI isn’t meant to be a replacement for humans. There’s simply too much nuance, exceptions, and specialized expertise that go into writing that call for human judgment. Think of AI as a powerful tool in the bigger picture of your role rather than something that can write perfectly without any oversight needed.

How do I use an AI writing assistant?

Short-form writing

This type of writing includes advertisements, article titles, product names, and email writing . Here are some example prompts:

• “Write an email to my team about our top priorities for next quarter based on this file: [file link].”
• “Suggest 10 compelling taglines for the new product discussed in this file: [file link].”
• “How can I more concisely describe time management?”

Long-form writing

This type of writing includes reports, articles, blog posts, white papers, and presentations. Here are some example prompts:

• “Create a presentation about how to effectively volunteer for a nonprofit organization with a slide about how to evaluate impact.”
• “Draft a business plan outline for a sustainable marketing company.”
• “Write a white paper about design thinking.”

Background research

Though not a form of writing, background research is often a big part of the writing process. Here are some example prompts:

• “What does this article say about executive roles and responsibilities?”
• “What font should I use to make this more readable?”
• “What arguments does this document make?”

Explore more about AI writing tools

Microsoft copilot for microsoft 365.

Get more done faster with an AI assistant in your Microsoft 365 apps, documents, and meetings.

How AI is changing content creation

Discover ways that AI can aid in the content creation process besides writing.

Prevent writers’ block with AI

Follow these tips to unstick yourself when writing isn’t coming naturally.

Write a research paper with AI

Make the process of writing a research paper smoother, more precise, and less time-consuming.

Frequently asked questions

What are ai writing tools.

AI writing tools help improve and speed up your writing by generating content and proofreading for writing basics , such as spelling, grammar, and punctuation. They can also summarize lengthy content as you research background information for the topic you’re writing about.

What are the benefits of using AI copywriting tools for content creation?

Some benefits of using AI copywriting tools for content creation include:

• Writing more quickly.
• Generating lists of ideas.
• Unblocking writers’ block.
• Playing with different writing styles and tones to decide which is the right fit for your audience.
• Receiving automated writing help for spelling, grammar, and punctuation.

Can AI writing tools replace human writers entirely?

No. AI writing tools are a powerful way to get work done faster, but human oversight and editing are key parts of the AI writing process. It’s crucial for someone to review AI-generated content to make sure it’s accurate and well suited for your needs.

How do AI writing tools avoid plagiarism?

Some AI writing tools have built-in plagiarism detectors that flag content that isn’t original by checking against what’s published online.

What are the disadvantages of AI writing tools?

The main disadvantage of AI writing tools is sometimes they get things wrong. This is why it’s important to always fact check any content that AI generates.

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17 Best Writing Sites That Pay Daily (Get Paid Instantly!)

Writing is an incredibly lucrative freelancing field. And even with the rise of AI, plenty of brands and publications are willing to pay talented writers to produce content.

However, one downside of this side hustle is that you often get paid monthly. If you need fast cash, this just won't do. And that's why this post is covering some of the best writing sites that pay daily to let you write and get paid instantly.

Pro Tip : Get my Freelance Writing For Freedom eBook to learn how I went from $0 to $100,000+ in writing income.

The Best Writing Sites That Pay Daily

As a full-time freelance writer , I've been earning income online with content for 5+ years at this point. Here are some of the top writing websites that pay daily that you can use to get started too:

Upwork is one of the largest freelance marketplaces in the world. It's also a great place to sell your skills online as a writer and to find fast-paying clients.

What's nice about Upwork is that you can bid on projects. There's plenty of jobs for beginners and experienced writers alike, and I've actually earned over $10,000 on Upwork over the years:

Upwork also lets you charge hourly or a set-rate for a certain project. So, you can find some short and easy projects, complete them in a day, and then request a payment from your client.

There's a weekly billing cycle on Upwork. But you can technically complete an assignment in a day, get approval from the client, and have the funds deposit in your account to process on the next pay cycle.

2. FlexJobs

FlexJobs is one of the leading remote job websites out there. It's also an excellent resource for finding part-time, one-time, and flexible writing gigs that pay quickly.

I've used FlexJobs in the past to find writing gigs and various digital marketing side hustles . And I like that it has thousands of job postings at a given time, including many that are hiring urgently.

FlexJobs starts at $2.95 for a 14-day trial. It has affordable weekly and monthly plans as well. And even though you have to pay to use this job board, the amount of time you save by only getting high-quality postings makes it worth it in my opinion.

You can also find longer-term projects and full-time jobs with this site. But if you're looking for flexible remote gigs, I'd start here.

Try out FlexJobs today!

3. ProBlogger

ProBlogger is one of the longstanding writing and blogging job boards. It's also a great place to find quick writing jobs that pay daily or instantly depending on what the client is looking for.

Bloggers and website owners post their content gigs on ProBlogger. From there, you submit an application and bid on the gigs for free, similarly to Upwork. From there, the job poster can reach out if they want you to write the content.

What's nice is that ProBlogger lets you and the blog owner work out payment terms. So, it can be a writing site that pays daily or even instantly if you agree to use a payment processor like PayPal or Stripe after you submit the content.

New jobs get posted all the time as well. I suggest bookmarking this site and bidding on gigs while expressing your interest to get paid daily or upon article submission.

4. Reddit r/HireAWriter

Reddit is a popular website for finding memes and internet news. But did you know you can also make money on Reddit as a writer and get paid instantly?

That's right: Reddit has unique subreddits where people post content writing gigs. Hire A Writer is one example, and website owners post all sorts of writing gigs here. Writers can also post a “Hire Me” post and outline the services and rates they offer so clients contact them.

Gigs pay anywhere from a few pennies per word to $0.25+ per word, so there's a nice range of work. You also work out payment terms and scheduling directly with the client. So, you can potentially write and get paid instantly if the client agrees to pay following content submission.

Like Upwork, Fiverr is another popular freelancer marketplace where you can post your article and story writing services. From there, clients can seek you out and hire you to complete various gigs you offer.

If a client hires you, you complete the assignment and then submit it for approval. After approval, the funds deposit in your account and take 14 days to clear.

This isn't exactly getting paid instantly for writing. But if you only take a day to complete an assignment and have it approved, the funds deposit in your account and the money is basically yours.

Fiverr is also popular because the clients come to you. So, if you build up positive reviews on your Fiverr profile, you might have enough business coming your way without having to endlessly pitch clients.

Extra Reading – The Best Free Online Jobs That Pay Daily .

6. TextBroker

TextBroker is one of the most popular content writing mills out there. It's also a popular place for beginner writers to gain experience and build their portfolio.

I've actually used TextBroker on the hiring side to pay for content for a niche blog of mine. And the process is very simple and writers always get paid quickly.

How much you earn per word on TextBroker depends on your writing skill, which is determined in a test and over time. As for payments, you can request a payment anytime as long as you have at least $10 in your account. Payments process twice per week so you can get paid daily or within a few days depending on your timing.

7. Contently

Contently is a popular content marketing platform that helps business owners and bloggers get content writing help.

You can sign up as a freelancer on a separate Contently webpage. You begin by setting up your portfolio so clients can potentially find and hire you. Alternatively, you can scroll through Contently's gig page and big on projects that are a good fit.

Contently's clients need help with everything from blog writing to email marketing help. Gigs don't necessarily pay daily or instantly, but you can communicate with clients and work out a payment schedule that works for everyone.

8. WriterAccess

WriterAccess is another job board and network of freelance writers you can join. Signing up is free and you can connect with your LinkedIn profile. From there, you can find a range of gigs to apply to.

What's nice is that there's a range of writing jobs on the website. Some popular ones include writing blog posts, short stories , email newsletters, resumes, brochures, eBooks, and general website copy.

There is a screener test when you sign up. How you perform also determines the types of projects you can apply to and your general rates. But as you improve and get positive reviews from clients, you can earn more.

WriterAccess pays freelancers twice per month through PayPal, and ACH payments are on the way. However, you can write and get paid instantly if you pay a $7 fee to cover PayPal's fees.

Extra Reading – How To Make Money Writing Reviews .

Even More Sites To Write And Get Paid Instantly

The above sites are some of my favorite ways to write and get paid instantly. However, there are plenty of other sites offering daily or instant payments:

• The Barefoot Writer : This is a premium writer's club where you can pitch stories to get paid and also learn how to find high-paying writing gigs.
• Craigslist : This local classifieds website sometimes has freelance gigs, including content, creative writing , and story writing.
• Listverse : This site pays you to write trendy lists and pays you $100 via PayPal if your story is accepted.
• Verblio : Another content writing network that pays writers weekly.
• Longreads : This platform pays you per submission and looks for essays and stories that are non-fiction.
• Scripted : Yet another popular freelance writer network you can join to find clients.
• iWriter : Submit a quick application to iWriter to join its network of freelancers.
• PeoplePerHour : Another massive freelancer network where writing jobs are quite common.
• Medium : A free blogging platform where I've earned over $1,000 by writing stories and blog posts.

Also note that you can always create your own portfolio and then pitch clients directly. This is how I got my start in the personal finance writing niche, and I've found my most successful writing gigs by doing this.

I cover this process and how to properly pitch clients in my Freelance Writing For Freedom eBook . And it's currently on sale if you want to check it out and learn how to land high-paying writing gigs.

Final Thoughts

I hope this guide on the best writing sites that pay daily helps you find your start as a writer without having to wait ages to get paid.

As someone who makes all of their income by writing, let me tell you: it can take a while to find your feet. But as you gain experience, things get easier. And with a good portfolio and persistence, there's no reason you can't find success.

For me, writing has changed my life. It's let me become location independent , traveling the world making money with my laptop . And I found my writing start with some of the websites on the list or just by pitching clients directly.

So, put yourself out there and start hustling! You never know where your writing career will take you if you stick with it.

Want even more money-making ideas? Checkout :

• How To Make Money Copywriting .
• The Best Writing Jobs For Teens .

Tom is a full-time blogger and freelance writer with a passion for side hustling, passive income, and making money online. His work has appeared on dozens of personal finance websites like Money Crashers, The College Investor, Forbes, and more.

Tom also founded the blog This Online World – a finance site dedicated to helping people make money online – in 2018. After 6 years, that site merged with WebMonkey, with the goal of helping even more people earn their first dollar of online income.

Tom also founded the blog This Online World - a finance site dedicated to helping people make money online - in 2018. After 6 years, that site merged with WebMonkey, with the goal of helping even more people earn their first dollar of online income.

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How to write API documentation for optimal user success

API documentation can be daunting to write, but it’s worth the effort. Learn how thorough documentation empowers new users to answer their own questions.

• Development →

In our ebook, learn how visual development enables strong cross-team collaboration and frees up precious developer resources.

Thorough API documentation provides a reliable shared resource that empowers users to answer their own questions.

Creating documentation is essential when working with an application programming interface (API), but writing it is initially daunting. However, all it takes to get started is time, a sound process, and answers to a few basic questions. You identify who your API documentation is for, why they need it, and how you can fulfill those needs. Then, you define and implement a robust process that slowly but surely shapes your documentation into a thorough guide for its users.

Learn how writing and maintaining effective documentation can enhance user success and streamline your company’s internal knowledge management.

What’s API documentation?

An API is a software interface that enables programs to exchange information like traffic and survey data. API documentation is similar to a how-to manual — it serves as a comprehensive guide for programmers forming queries to the API.

Although many APIs use the standardized OpenAPI specification, no two APIs are the same. That’s why you need to maintain documentation so your users can properly interact with an API. If a user queries for data in an unrecognizable format, the API won’t recognize it and will return an empty response.

An API example is the U.S. National Weather Service (NWS), which makes weather data publicly available to everyone for free. Weather apps like Weather.com query the NWS database in real time to provide weather information to their users. To accomplish this, they program their application to query the database in adherence to the NWS API documentation’s standards.

The benefits of documenting APIs

Documentation’s primary function is to describe your API’s features and how to work with them. Without it, no one but you can use your interface.

Beyond this, keeping thorough API documentation also provides the following benefits:

• Rapid onboarding. Proper documentation accelerates onboarding time for new users, whether they’re employees in your organization or third-party developers picking up your API for the first time. Providing a resource about what to expect from your API helps users quickly determine whether your API suits their needs and how.
• Efficient user support. If your documentation is comprehensive, you can direct users to it for quick and clear answers to their questions. You only need to send them a link to the relevant page and let them problem-solve independently.
• Enhanced user journey. The user experience improves when users have a go-to resource where they can learn everything they need to know about your API. Samples show the API in action, tutorials guide them through setup, and all the reference material is there to answer their questions. And great documentation uses cross-links, indexes, and glossaries that provide relevant information, like methods and definitions when and where needed.

Types of APIs and their target audiences

The first thing to identify before writing your API documentation is who you’re writing it for. If your API is strictly for in-house developers, it’ll look very different than an open API meant for a broader audience. Here are some distinct user targets for your API and its documentation.

Internal APIs

Data-sharing APIs, communication channels, and analytics platforms are all common examples of internal APIs. They tend to be exclusively for your organization’s use to distribute information and programs in a dependable, fast channel. Typically, these APIs use an intranet connection to share and exchange data securely.

Partner APIs

Companies develop partner APIs so their clients can interface with their data and programs. Examples include payment processing services like Google Pay and big data firms like Oracle . These companies provide services, databases, and programs that clients can access by calling their API with a voice request. The organizations’ documentation is highly detailed to help specific clients troubleshoot potential error codes.

Open APIs are accessible to anyone with the know-how to use them (the NWS is an excellent example). These services and databases exist for a broad audience, so they may lack strict security and clearance regulations. Open APIs need thorough and straightforward documentation because there’s no telling who will use them.

Things to consider before writing API documentation

Before you commit to writing your own documentation, consider your audience.

If your API is only for your internal development team, your documentation has a narrower scope, so it’s worthwhile to write. But if you’re hosting an open API for a wider audience, you might need to use an API documentation tool to ensure your documentation is thorough and accessible to a wide audience. And partner APIs typically need their documentation written in-house because they often use proprietary authentication methods and expect unique variables from their clients.

Next, assess whether you have the resources to create your documentation. Even if you leverage automation , documenting takes considerable time and effort from at least one developer. You also need to maintain the documentation in the long term, which often requires a dedicated writer.

If you don’t have the time or staffing power to create and maintain your own API documentation, consider alternative solutions. Some services like Stoplight and ReadMe automatically generate, host, and maintain documentation so you can avoid the hassle.

But if your team has the bandwidth to write their own documentation, it’s a worthwhile process that bridges the gap between your development team and their audience. API documentation maintained by the developers themselves is often more accurate, detailed, and useful. As with anything, the closer a writer is to the source material, the better the outcome.

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How to write API documentation: 8 steps

Before creating your own documentation, familiarize yourself with typical API structures. Here are a few well-established examples to help you understand how yours might look and feel:

• Webflow Designer APIs
• Apple REST API

When you’re ready to begin, follow this eight-step plan for guidance.

1. Create an outline

Start by developing a detailed document outline. Consider it the table of contents and include headings you expect to write for each section. Add as much detail as you feel confident covering at this point. Try not to include anything that’s still in flux, like references to error codes or functions that might become deprecated soon.

A typical outline includes the following parts:

• Introduction
• Authentication
• Endpoint definition
• API reference
• Troubleshooting

Pro tip: Use a style guide for your documentation to refer to while writing it. You can make your own or select one from a well-established brand like Google or Apple.

2. Select a platform

Typically, developers opt to keep their documentation on a website that they share internally or externally. This is a great option when striving to impress partners and third-party developers. Consider using Webflow’s tools and resources, which make it easy to craft reliable, impressive websites at any scale.

Pro tip: If you aren’t familiar with HTML or Markdown, don’t fret! Webflow offers visual development solutions to kick-start your site without a single line of markup.

3. Write the introduction

On your chosen platform, write an introduction that addresses the audience and clarifies the documentation’s goals for both this audience and yourself. Make sure to mention use cases for your API, highlight its features, and describe the documentation’s intended use. Remember, your writing doesn’t have to be perfect yet — you’ll return to polish it later.

Pro tip: Often, over explaining concepts makes them less clear to readers. Opt for simple, straightforward explanations that describe what you mean in the fewest possible words.

4. Create samples and tutorials

Next, collect working examples of your API in action. Grab all the code snippets you need to demonstrate precisely how your API functions and how to integrate it. Then, write some tutorials that explain how the samples work.

Pro tip: Use interactive examples that guide the user through writing their own queries, which can help build confidence.

5. Explain authentication and endpoints

Now that you have working samples, consider the details of how your API handles authentication and what endpoints it expects. Provide examples and use plain language. This should be as concise as possible so users can quickly find and understand the necessary answers.

Pro tip: If documenting a partner API, include a table where partners can look up how to write their unique variables like gateways and merchant IDs. This will allow them to copy and paste what they need, reducing the possibility of common syntax errors.

6. Write the reference material

Your API reference material is where you detail the functions, classes, and arguments that make your API work. Keep it simple and searchable, and use anchors that help users easily navigate the content. Your aim is to reduce the time the user spends scrolling the page for a particular section.

Pro tip: Use consistent formatting to make the page easier to scan. For example, if you’re writing in HTML, use the <pre> element to ensure all your JSON, XML, and Python snippets appear orderly.

7. Troubleshoot

Document all the common issues you expect users to encounter, like syntax errors and query failures. If your API has known issues like incompatibilities or strict rate throttling, also devote a page to those. This section doesn’t need to be extensive yet. When your documentation is live, you’ll undoubtedly receive suggestions on what to add.

Pro tip: Refrain from creating an FAQ page. If a question is common, you should make the answer easy to locate in the documentation. This encourages users to look for answers in the right places.

8. Clean it up

Now that all your pages are in place, clean up sections that need polishing or expanding. Revise every section to add context where needed and remove anything redundant. At this stage, you can add cross-links to help users navigate the document more efficiently, and include helpful hints and notes where appropriate. Imagine you’re reading the content for the first time, and add anything you think would make the experience smoother.

Pro tip: Before you launch your documentation, ask your peers for feedback. Their fresh perspectives will be invaluable to discovering any errors or improvement opportunities.

Finally, you can launch the documentation and introduce it to your audience.

Maintain your API documentation with Webflow

With your documentation live, it’s time to craft a maintenance plan . Maintenance plans differ based on how many users the API has and how quickly it changes. These factors determine how regularly the documentation needs updating and how your team will capture takeaways from common support cases.

You’re in good hands if you host your documentation with Webflow Enterprise . The platform provides powerful features that simplify updating and maintaining your site, like page branching, Quick Stack elements, and reusable components. And the many documentation templates available make pivoting your site design quick and seamless.

If you want a helping hand, Webflow University hosts all the guides and support options you need.

Webflow Enterprise gives your teams the power to build, ship, and manage sites collaboratively at scale.

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How to Use ChatGPT to Enhance Website Copy

In the new generation of emerging AI technologies, every task can be efficiently done using AI tools. Using AI both time and effort can be saved. The most strong contender among all the AI tools is OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

ChatGPT can perform multiple tasks that enhance our productivity and provide premium results. It can be used to write content, perform research, make comparisons, solve academic questions, find things online, and find solutions for coding problems. ChatGPT can also be used by writers and businesses to Enhance Website copy.

What does Website Copy mean?

Impact of website copy, 1. content optimization, 2. fixing grammar, 3. summarize content, 4. create catchy taglines, 5. proofread the content, faqs – how to use chatgpt to enhance website copy.

Website Copy is the content that we see on the website’s home page, about page, and other description pages. These texts provide the users with information about the services offered across the website. It is important to have the best Website copy to attract more audience and promote your website. Here are tips to use ChatGPT to Enhance your Website Copy:

It is quite difficult to write the perfect Website copy. Many aspects like tone, language, grammar structure, and taglines need to be taken care of while writing this. On the basis of this, users create their first impression about the site. It is extremely important to have an impactful first impression to catch audience attention.

Your Website content should be SEO friendly and should provide quick but effective details about the site. It should highlight websites main features and aspects that make it more useful than others. The language and content you publish on your website encourage users to take actions and select your business for availing the service.

Things to Avoid:

One should avoid statements that miss communicate the ideology followed by the business, or provide false information about the features. This impacts relationships with the customers and affects sales.

Many errors can go unnoticed by the human eye and can later create a lot of troubles. To prevent this and enhance the quality of content you can use AI tools. You will get an extra helping hand and also get results with great precision. ChatGPT is one of its kind AI tools that can help you in various aspects of writing. Lets see how we can use ChatGPT to enhance Website Copy.

You can take help of AI Chat bot ChatGPT to enhance your Website Copy and make it more influential. Here are some tips to use ChatGPT that will save you both time and effort:

You can use ChatGPT to write your Website copy completely. You will be providing ChatGPT details about the service offered, Product details, organization’s ideology, offers that you want to display and pricing. You can also mention some extra information that you want to be added to the website.

But the Copy written by ChatGPT completely lags human touch, so it is preferred that you should provide your own inputs or provide some samples that ChatGPT should refer.Another tip would be writing your own Website copy and then providing it to ChatGPT for optimisation.

Prompts that can be used:

“Write a website copy for Home page, the brand name is [ Mention Name ], Details that need to be added are [Write details]. Use the given blog as reference and create a similar Copy. Keep the tone friendly and innovative. [Add the reference blog]”.

“Optimize the given article to be more attractive to users and keep the tone convincing [ Enter you Website Copy]”

Being a human it is obvious to make mistakes. While writing website copy it is common to make grammatical mistakes like small spelling errors, punctuation, spacing, or some sentence structure. But you can simply fix these using ChatGPT. You just need to copy paste the text to ChatGPT and command it to correct grammatical errors. Content written with correct grammar rules makes a better experience for users, the website looks more professional and legit.

Prompt that can be used:

“Fix all the grammatical errors in the given text and rewrite it without any errors [Enter your website copy]”

We often have a lot of ideas for our website copy, but not all can be written in it. We need to provide precise and effective content only for our website. But it is quite difficult to cut short the whole content. For this you can take help from ChatGPT. ChatGPT will summarize the content. This precise content will deliver your message to the users easily.

You can also use this to divide some large content into points for easy human understanding. You can also mention the key words or main idea that need to be focused while summarizing.

“Summarize the given content in around [word limit you want] words [Enter your text]”.

“Sum up the given text in 10 points. Highlight [ enter the key word ] and focus on [ Write topic name ] topic while summarizing. [ Enter Text ]”

To grab viewers attention you must have catchy taglines that they remember even after exiting the site. Your slogan must be unique and short at the same time. Tagline should promote your service and highlight your main features. Using the AI tool ChatGPT you can simply create various taglines in just a few clicks. You need to provide the basic information about what the product is or what your site offers and it will provide you with numerous options that you can select from.

“Create 2-3 catchy taglines for my product [ Enter product name ]. Keep the tone enthusiastic.”

“Generate 5 slogan samples for my website [ Website name] , The main service provided by us is [ Enter details of the services provided by you ].”

It is extremely important to Proofread your website copy before publishing it. Proofreading prevents any unintentional content or errors to be published in the final phase. It is extremely helpful to get another pair of eyes to help you with this. You can use ChatGPT to proofread your text. This will help you save time and will prevent any human error.

“Proofread the content provided and highlight any errors if found. Also correct those error and provide a error free copy [ Enter your text ]”

In the competitive market where multiple websites get published each day, you need to make a bold statement to stand out between the crowd. Your website Copy makes a huge impact on how your business is going to perform. It is the point of interaction between your customers and the organization. With multiple AI tools available in the market it becomes difficult to rely on one. But one of the most known and used AI tools in current time is ChatGPT. With the help of AI chatbot ChatGPT you can enhance your website copy.

ChatGPT can help in various ways to optimize your content and give a precise message to the users. Website copy includes content shown in various parts of the website. You can use the tips given in this article to use ChatGPT to Enhance Website copy. After this you can see visible growth in your business. Users will interact more with your website when they have a good impression about the services provided by you. To convey a clear message you can use AI optimizations.

How do I use Chat Gpt to write a better copy?

You can use ChatGPT in various ways to write a better copy. You can use it to correct grammar, proofread content or create catchy slogans. All these will make a visible impact on your website visits.

How to use Chat Gpt to improve a website?

You can use ChatGPT in numerous ways to improve a website. You can improve and enhance the content shown on your websites by using ChatGPT. You can use it to provide proper coding structure for backend development of a site, You can also use it to improve styling for your site.

Can ChatGPT copy writing style?

Yes, you can ask ChatGPT to refer to a certain writing style. You can provide reference and to chatGPT and provide the topic about what you want the content to be. It will take reference and imitate the writing style.

Can I use ChatGPT content for my website?

Yes, you can use ChatGPT to write the content for your website. You can provide chatGPT with basic information and details about your website and ask it to write a website copy.

Is it ok to use ChatGPT for copywriting?

Yes, you can definitely use ChatGPT for copywriting. You can use it to brainstorm ideas and modify the existing content.

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Close up stock photograph of a mature man studying a see-through computer monitor that’s displaying ... [+] text provided by an AI (artificial intelligence) chatbot.

The launch of ChatGPT 17 months ago is considered by many to be a technological inflection point as significant as the launch of the integrated circuit, the internet, and the iPhone. As with any such disruption, each novelty brings out legions of detractors and supporters.

To address both sides of the issue, let’s examine the positive aspects of ChatGPT and, as a cautionary tale, allay the concerns of the detractors.

Generating content

As soon as ChatGPT came out, students started using the technology to do their written assignments which led to charges of cheating as this article by Michael Nietzel indicates. Businesspeople, too, started using the technology to do their daily work—emails, reports, marketing communications, product/service descriptions—and while businesspeople are not likely to be charged with cheating, the practice does have the downside of coming across as either bland, generic, or flowery. The title and subtitle of an article in The Atlantic says it all: “ChatGPT is Dumber Than You Think: Treat it like a toy not a tool.”

Instead, set an honor code for yourself. Never use generative AI tools to generate content from scratch. First, do a rough draft of your own. Then turn to the bot as a productivity tool and prompt it for a draft. Use any ideas or phrases from the bot and work them into a second draft of your own. Be sure you keep both drafts separate to maintain the integrity of your honor code.

Editing content

Read that second draft, now focusing on the language. To heighten the accuracy and color of your description, query the bot again for synonymous words or idiomatic phrases. You can also use dictionary.com, thesaurus.com, or Google’s Power Thesaurus, but if you give ChatGPT a sense of what you’re looking for, its natural language can provide closer suggestions. Don’t just cherry-pick from the list; use your native intuition to make the choice that fits best.

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As you develop your text, look for additional information that supports and adds depth to your ideas. If the information you find is lengthy or complex, copy and paste it into the bot and prompt it to simplify. Read the simplification and then work the information into your original draft using your own words.

During the process, be sure to double check the accuracy of your research. ChatGPT is often not only inaccurate but as this New York Times article reports, can provide misinformation.

Polishing content

Continue to review your text. Remember that one of the most frequently cited adages among professional writers is “Writing is rewriting.” With each review, you should be implementing a practice known as “Spaced Learning,” or walking away from your text. It’s a human technique that predates ChatGPT. For context, the opposite of Spaced Learning is cramming—need I say more?

In using ChatGPT and other generative AI tools this way, you will be implementing “error-driven learning,” a practice drawn from technology that enables and improves human thinking. In a recent Wall Street Journal article , Professor Charan Ranganath who runs the Dynamic Memory Lab at the Center for Neuroscience at the University of California, Davis, references the work of two cognitive psychologist in 1990 who noted that “neural network models of artificial intelligence learn through trial and error.” Professor Ranganath then ran an experiment in his lab that “used neural network models to simulate what happens in the hippocampus—a critical brain area for rapid learning.” His results found “that the human brain can learn and retain far more through trial and error.”

So go ahead and use ChatGPT to help you generate, edit, enrich, and polish your content, but be sure to keep your hand on the tiller by using an equal measure of your own human capabilities.

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