SEO Copywriting. A Complete Guide

What is SEO Copywriting? Definition

SEO copywriting is on-page content created to be appealing to users and search engine robots. A crucial element of this type of content is using keywords that describe a given page and have the greatest potential to boost organic traffic and increase visibility in search engines.

Good SEO copywriting should bring unique and valuable content that is in line with Google’s ranking algorithm. Content should be created for each type of page: homepage, product, category, or service pages (depending on your type of website) and blog articles.

Copywriting & SEO – What Do They Have in Common?

As I mentioned earlier, SEO copywriting is created to give valuable content to users, but not just that… The key goal of creating SEO copywriting is to rank highly in organic search results for relevant target keywords. This increases the opportunity to boost web traffic.

What’s important, many people tend to confuse the two terms: content writing and SEO copywriting. However, you should keep in mind that although they seem synonymous, they don’t share the same goal. While a content writer focuses mainly on creating engaging web content aimed at marketing personas and presenting the brand as an expert in a given area, whereas the main objective of an SEO copywriter is to enrich the website with search engine-friendly content that draws the attention of Google.

Best SEO Copywriting Tools

Before you get down to producing SEO-oriented content, I’ve prepared a list of tools that will definitely be a huge help to you when preparing, creating, and analyzing SEO copywriting. And here they are:

SEO Copywriting Guide: How to Prepare It?

Preparation is actually a super important stage of SEO copywriting. If you skip this part or neglect it, then most probably your content won’t deliver the desired results and your hard work will be wasted. So devote some of your time to prepare to create engaging and valuable copywriting.

And here are the most important elements of preparing for SEO copywriting:

1. Do Keyword Research

This is practically the foundation of SEO copywriting. You should choose the keywords that have the most potential to increase your visibility in search results and then drive web traffic.

When doing keyword research, stick to these rules, and you will definitely do it right:

• choose only relevant keywords – after all, you don’t want to appear in search results for keywords unrelated to your brand or offer,
• consider your audience – target your keywords to the right customers, not all customers,
• choose keywords that have a sufficient search volume – if you choose keywords that virtually no one searches for, you are missing a huge opportunity to increase your visibility, also avoid keywords with massive search volume (e.g. 50000 or even higher), especially if you run a small business,
• focus on long-tail keywords – these are more specific and detailed (usually much longer) keywords that have high conversion value.

If you want to learn more on what mistakes to avoid when doing keyword research, visit our blog!

2. Identify Search Intent

Search intent is one of the most powerful marketing trends of recent years that has totally revolutionized SEO. In a nutshell, search intent is the reason for a given search engine.

Let me show you an example that perfectly illustrates what search intent actually is.

I simply entered “bulb invention” into Google and the search engine immediately guessed the reason behind my search. I wanted to find out who and when invented the bulb and that is exactly what I got. So, basically, that’s what search intent is all about.

There are 4 main types of search intent:

1. Informational: responds to users’ searches for information on their questions, e.g. “What is SEO copywriting”;

2. Navigational: users already know what site they want to visit, they enter the exact name of the brand or domain, e.g. Delante, Facebook, Pull & Bear;

3. Transactional: users want to make a purchase online and for that reason, they search for a particular product, e.g. “buy Netfix gift card” or “Amazon coupon code”;

4. Commercial investigation: users are already sure they want to make a purchase, so they search for more detailed information, and they need to be convinced to choose your offer, e.g. “best SEO agency of the year”.

3. Conduct Competitive Analysis

This preparation stage should never be neglected. If you want your website to appear on top of the search results,  then you should check out who your strongest competitors are.

The best strategy is to:

1. Enter the most important keyword in the search engine.

2. Analyze the top 10 search results.

3. Explore what these pages have in common. Focus on:

• content length,
• metadata,
• keywords used in their content,
• SEO parameters.

4. Try to fill the gap that your competitors are leaving.
Of course, the competitive analysis doesn’t necessarily need to be carried out at this point – you may analyze your competitors when doing keyword research. This is a good strategy as well!

SEO Copywriting Guide: How to Create It?

Now that you know how you should prepare, you can finally get to work and create a nice piece of SEO-optimized content. And remember – the most important goal of SEO copywriting is to impress not only the users but Google crawlers as well, so a massive part of your work should be devoted to optimization. Just follow my guide and I will tell you how to create and optimize your SEO content to perfection.

1. Choose Type of Content

When it comes to SEO copywriting, you have a rich variety of content types. Most often copywriters create product, category, service or brand (for homepage) descriptions. But the list of content types doesn’t end with descriptions! A much more creative task is creating SEO-optimized blog content. You can write, for example:

• checklists,
• how-to articles,
• guides,
• case studies,
• reviews,
• Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ).

2. Write Good Introduction

How to tell if a piece of SEO copywriting is good? By checking its introduction! A good introduction should capture your readers’ interest right away and make them want to read more.

There are some well-proven ways to create a compelling introduction. You can:

• start with family-friendly (not vulgar!) humor,
• keep your sentences relatively short,
• write one or two sentences on what your content is about,
• address your readers directly (use the word “you”),
• make an emotional connection with your readers.

3. Use Your Keywords

SEO copywriting without keywords would make absolutely no sense. In the preparation phase, you’ve already chosen the most important keywords – now it’s time to use them. However, remember the most important rule – avoid keyword stuffing! Don’t add your keywords in every sentence, that’s a waste. Google doesn’t care how many times you use a keyword in your post or description, so one or two times is completely enough.

Google gives the following examples of keyword stuffing:

• unnatural repeating of keywords in every sentence,
• listing the cities you want to rank for,
• listing phone numbers without added value.

What’s interesting, if you’re using WordPress and have Yoast installed, this awesome plugin will tell you if the keyword density is correct:

4. Divide Your Content into Sections

No one will be willing to read a long piece of content without any logically structured division. That’s why it’s a good idea to provide the right content structure. How to do it? Introduce headings that will break up text and indicate exactly what given sections are about. What’s more, headings indicate to users and Google crawlers which parts of the content are more or less relevant.

The recommended heading structure is as follows:

• use only one H1 heading – H1 should be, depending on the type of page, the name of your categories, products or the title of blog articles;
• include at least two H2 headings – they indicate important sections in the content;
• you can add H3-H6 headings as well – this is not obligatory, however, these subheadings are a great way to introduce specific topics within the H2 section.

Here is an example of the correct heading structure:

5. Use Visuals

Try, if possible, to add some visuals, such as video, infographics, images or photos, to your content. According to a study by Vennage, in 2019, 74% of marketers stated that they used some visuals in their content. The reason for this is quite simply: users just love visual content. It is so eye-catching, it captivates and makes people more engaged.

Speaking of engagement, you should keep in mind that great visuals encourage users to share your content on their Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn profiles. This increases your traffic and, most importantly, great user engagement sends a strong signal to Google that you offer high quality, engaging content. As a reward, your website will display high in search results!

6. Proofread Your Content Before Publishing

Once you’ve written a great copy, it’s time to proofread it. And please, never forget that stage – I know from experience that there are always some errors left in the text, so proofreading is absolutely a must-do.

How to edit your SEO copy to perfection? Stick to these golden few rules:

• read your copy out loud – sometimes it is only then that you realize that some sentences just sound bad and you may want to rephrase them,
• read your piece of content slowly – it’s the best way to find typos, spelling and punctuation errors;
• focus on editing sentences and only then on whole paragraphs – once you have found all the errors in your sentences and checked them for readability, you can start improving your paragraph structure;
• give yourself some time – if you have such a possibility, come back to your copy after a few days or even after a week, so you can take a fresh look at your content.

7. Optimize Your Content

That’s my favorite part. The trust is: if you don’t optimize your content, your work will simply go to waste. Here’s what you need to do to publish your SEO-optimized copywriting:

Check use of keywords

You’ve already mentioned it, but I think it’s worth reminding that once again: don’t overuse your keywords. Put each keyword in your copy once or twice and that’s completely enough. For keyword stuffing, you may get a Google penalty!

Prepare the perfect title tag

When it comes to SEO, it’s the most important structural element on each page – not only does it appear in search results, but it has a major impact on your ranking. So make sure your title tag:

• is unique,
• contains the most important keyword,
• is of the right length: 55-60 characters,
• matches your copy.

Optimize the meta description

Together with the URL and title tag, the meta description is the element that users always see in search results. A well-optimized meta description will encourage users to choose your page, which will increase the CTR. The flawless meta description should:

• be of the right length: 140-160 characters,
• briefly describe the page,
• call to action,
• contain keywords.

If you would like to learn more about the power of meta tags in SEO, read our article: Meta Tags – How Do They Affect SEO?

8. Update Your Content

Here’s something that many copywriters and content specialists tend to neglect. For Google, the important rule is that the content on web pages is always up-to-date. Therefore, from time to time you should check whether your copy has become outdated and react quickly. For example, if you created a great piece of content with the top SEO tools for 2020, why not review that article again in early 2021 and simply update some of the information.

Well, unless you create evergreen content, i.e. content that lasts forever and consistently drives high web traffic. As “non-aging” content, we can usually consider:

• guides,
• charts,
• checklists,
• frequently asked questions (FAQ) sections,
• case studies,

Conclusions

SEO copywriting should be an integral part of your optimization process. And believe me, good SEO-optimized copy can do wonders: it will increase your rankings for the target keywords and boost organic traffic. And that’s what you want, right?

If you are looking for a professional SEO agency that will prepare engaging SEO copywriting for your site, contact us and let us be your partner. We have many years of experience in preparing custom copywriting strategies for local businesses and international enterprises.