SEO Copywriting – A Guide
The two-prong attack
In an age of ever increasing competition in search marketing, your site needs to please both visitors and search crawlers.

We have all heard the phrase ‘Content is King’ applied to SEO copywriting and web site promotion in general.
As a result, many web masters in Cyprus and the UK will go to great lengths to incorporate just the right percentage of targeted key-phrases into their page content.
Unfortunately, this often leads to extremely bland content; easily indexed by search engines, but completely boring to the human reader.

The two objectives of SEO copywriting

For Search Engine Optimisation copywriting to be truly effective, it must satisfy both the search engine spiders as well as human visitors to the site.
To achieve this goal, content needs to be written creatively and with a solid amount of insight into its subject matter.

The balance in this case is quite fine; if content is too bland, it may satisfy the web crawlers, but human visitors will soon tire of it and look elsewhere.
If, on the other hand, it is too complex and tangled, search engines may fail to classify it properly, whilst visitors to the site may become lost and frustrated.

Ideally speaking then, content should be written with a flowing, easy to read style whilst conveying the necessary information to the search engine spiders.

The magic of Keywords

Although there are plenty of formulas for the placement of keywords within the content of your site, successful SEO copywriting is as much of an art as it is a science.
Simply put, effective keyword placement is essential, as this will provide search engine spiders with concise picture of any given site's or page's topic.

Search engine algorithms are specifically geared to analyse the content of any indexed page and dissect its text content in order to achieve proper classification. Of the major engines, Google has been the most successful at analysing and indexing sites accurately.
Indeed, these days, Google's analysis of indexed content closely emulates the patterns of a 'live' visitor actually reading the page.
Consequently, simply putting down a list of your desired key-phrases without thought or structure will no longer produce any worthwhile results whatsoever.

Keyword Phrases; more advanced magic

The art of copywriting for both search engines and visitors involves more than the use of keywords alone. Well written content should elaborate further on the page's topic.
For instance, if, as is the case with this page, the chosen topic is copywriting, authors would be advised to elaborate further on this. After all, this topic involves so many different facets ranging from advert to editorial writing, not simply SEO copywriting.

Creative and well placed keyword phrases will also help to keep the written text from becoming boring or repetitive and therefore keep human readers more interested.
There are of course other considerations involved in successful keyword incorporation although many writers would consider these to be somewhat trivial.

LSI; fun with algorithms

As buzzwords go, Telcordia's "LSI" or "Latent Semantic Indexing" is possibly not one of the catchiest; from a copywriting point of view however it is proving to be one of the most vital.
Recently incorporated into Google's algorithms, this technology enables the search engine to quite simply 'think laterally' about a page's content in the following fashion.

If a page is being analysed for the keyword 'Football', it would be a logical assumption that somewhere within its content a reader would find the keywords, 'club', 'player', 'ground', etc.
LSI enables Google to cross-reference these related words and ensure that this page is indeed about football and not about something entirely unconnected.

The long term implications of this on poorly written content are obvious and it is predicted that the other major engines will soon follow Google's lead by incorporating similar technologies into their own algorithms.
SEO copywriters need to be ready for these changes unless they wish to be left out in the cold as search engine technology advances further.

The two-pronged attack

Ultimately then, the true goal of successful search engine copywriting is not simply to attract more visitors through properly targeted keyword placement, but to ensure that the visitor's attention is held, encouraging readers to further explore your site for other, related information and to finally convince them to take advantage of whatever your web site has to offer.
By the same token, though badly written content can lead to an increase in the number of visitors to your site, it will certainly create an unfavourable first impression and lead to a lower overall conversion rate, since visitors will seek alternative sources to satisfy their requirements.
Therefore, your site needs copy which is not only concise, but also refined, entertaining and able to convey your own integrity to your visitors.

If applied properly, 'Content really is King'.
SEO Technology benefits from many years of comprehensive experience in the field of SEO copywriting and search engine marketing.
Our accomplished copywriters are able to create targeted content, designed to boost your site's search engine presence, draw the visitor's attention to the merits of your product or service and consequently increase the number of sales and conversions through your web site. Contact us today for a free, no-obligation quote.