So what is a good copy? I don’t propose to be definitive but my intention is to open a discussion about what good website copywriting is about.

Website copy should evolve with time

Writing copy for the web is not a one-off exercise, for several reasons. Firstly, your business and customer base will evolve over time, so your copy needs to adapt to reflect this. Secondly, life is not static, so you will need to build and modify your web content to cater for the demands of a heterogeneous audience. Thirdly, not every bit of copy you write will hit the nail at the first go – in this case, you will need to use web analytic tools to identify which pages are driving traffic and those with a high bounce rate. And then of course, there is SEO, a source of much heated debate, which has to be catered for.

Purpose of website copywriting

Good copy always has an end goal. Without purpose, the website copy is not targeted which in turn means that you will have no means to measure its impact. Before creating content for the web, decide what you want to write, why you want to write and for whom you want to write.

Consistency in web copy

The website copy should support the overall content strategy in terms of marketing messages, tone, and language. If one page is conversational and the next is formal, it can break the rhythm and put people off. If you have multiple contributors to the website, you can have a sort of style guide so that they write in a way that strengthens your brand.

Directive

Make it easy for people to take relevant actions. Ensure strong visual signposts for key calls to action. Within the content, text link to appropriate action pages, for example, retailers should link to products where possible to encourage product viewing and adding to basket.

Accuracy

Copy that has spelling mistakes and grammatical errors looks clumsy and sends the wrong message about your brand. If you can’t be bothered about ensuring the quality of your web copy, how effective would be the services you provide?

Relevance

Make sure you think through what your customers would want to read and how it can help them make decisions during the buying cycle. You could run a quick customer poll or survey to identify opportunities for new content and also analyse analytics to identify pages with higher bounce rate.

Optimised web content

Finally, let us not forget the search engines – after all we want to attract relevant traffic. Whilst your customer facing web content must be written to appeal to customers, it should also be optimised in line with the keyword strategy for that page.

India is a leading destination for outsourcing services including content writing services. Outsourcing your content writing requirements to a country like India has many benefits. Over-stretched resources and extensive workload can leave you without in-house support to meet important timelines. Content writing companies in India can provide skilled team of copywriters and content writers who can work as an extension of your team and provide powerful, well-written and relevant piece of content that provides value to both your business and the clients or web visitors that eventually consume it.

There are individuals and businesses that are apprehensive outsourcing content to content writing companies in India. However, it is important to point out that English is one of the official languages in India and so most copywriters and content writers are fully conversant with the language and can match tone and style to provide what you are seeking for your specific content and copywriting projects.

If you are looking for content writing companies in India, we can help. We understand that every client project is different from the next which is why we take the time to understand and document exactly what your deliverables are. Whether you are looking for newsletters, press releases, SEO content, website copywriting or blogging services, we have the expertise and capacity to handle any size project or task.

At a time when every business is under pressure to generate cost efficiencies and optimise asset value, we at Ocean Blue Communications can bring a new dimension to content writing services by employing an enviable combination of industry expertise, highly skilled people and rigorous quality standards, to help you reduce costs while maintaining the highest level of quality for your copywriting and content writing projects.

It has generally been observed that people simply place the manufacturer’s product descriptions on the web pages. While this process is easier, a more personal touch and the right sales pitch in product description copywriting can help the product pages stand out and really sell their benefits.

Why product page copywriting matters

SEO benefits: Customized product descriptions allow you to provide more text and keywords for search engines to index. While many of your competitors are using the same manufacturer’s descriptions, you can optimize your product descriptions sales copy to stand out in search engine result pages.

Conversions: Then there is the psychological factor at play. Just the sense that a real human being has written a sales-driven product copy inspires more faith and sets the website apart from the rest of the competition.

So what makes for a great product page copy?

Though there is no hard and fast rule for products copywriting, it should be able to fulfill the following parameters.

Uniqueness: The copy of the product descriptions should be unique to the particular website. Customers will appreciate that the page and its contents focus on the information related to the product they are searching for. As said above, the product description copy should also be search engine optimized so that the page is visible to the potential customers.

Convey knowledge of the product: If the reader gets a sense that the copywriter knows the product well, then this makes the copy all the more trustworthy.

Maintain a balance with keywords: Retailers definitely wish to ensure that their target keywords are woven into the product descriptions, but if there is overstuffing, visitors will be put off. A professional copywriter should be able to add the keywords without making them very obvious.

Formatting: Product descriptions should be easy to read. Customers don’t want too much text that makes information hard to scan or digest. The better option is to use short paragraphs, bullet points, and images that make the copy more appealing. If there is technical information involved, it is best put in a tabular form.

It is the content of your website which serves as your sales person and introduces your products and services to the world. If it does not grab readers’ attention and result in conversions, the very purpose of the web content is defeated.

Unlike general writing, web content writing is a blend of creativity, sound marketing knowledge and SEO expertise. Because of the unique nature of web content, it is important to hire professional copywriters to do the job and if you are looking for high quality content at competitive prices, outsourcing can be a good idea.

In today’s age, having a web presence is not a matter of choice – rather it has become a necessity. However, having a website is not enough; you also have to ensure that it is visible to your potential audience. For this, it should show up in search engine results when people search for your products and services using specific keywords.

For your site to rank high on search engines, you need to constantly update it with fresh content. Maintaining a blog is another option – not just for ranking but also to inform and engage with your target audience. You also need to get quality back links (external links) from high quality websites and one way to achieve this is to post articles in article directories such as EzineArticles, ArticleBase etc.

All of the above means content and more content, which in turn means more budget and more time. Challenged by increasing complexity and the need to do more with less you are forced to juggle current and future agendas. Outsourcing non-core issues like content requirements to affordable destinations like India helps you to free up your resources and achieve more for less.

By outsourcing your content writing services to India, you can team with highly skilled copywriters and reduce costs and improve efficiencies.

Here at Ocean Blue Communications, we understand the importance of having high quality, relevant content on your website, with benefits including higher conversion rates, enhanced search engine exposure, and a more professional feel to your website, press release or marketing material.

The main restriction or limitation that many businesses face is time and budget, with quality content taking a long time to plan, write and check, but this is where we come in! We have a team of content and copywriters in India that specialise in a vast range of different subject areas, allowing us to do the writing for you and let you allocate time and resource to other projects.

Our articles are written by professionals who understand search engine optimisation and the importance of keyword-rich, relevant and unique content - maximising the effectiveness for your website and eliminating the risks.

1. Make your blog an extension of your website: A visitor’s first experience with your company can be through your blog page so it is a good idea to ensure that the design and navigation mirrors your main site. You could also maintain the blog as a subdomain of your main domain rather than putting it into a separate domain entirely. This way you can ensure all inbound links to your blog will flow back to the primary domain.

2. Solve problems/share information: A blog should be a platform to share your resources or solve the problems of your customers. Too many businesses use their blog as a repository of press releases and other marketing-speak. The better option is to address customer queries and write about matters that concerns them. One good way is to use inquiries or frequently asked questions to understand what problems your customers are facing. Encourage conversation and engagement by responding to comments, even if they are negative ones.

3. Blog regularly: Though you don’t have to blog every day but it is a good idea to maintain a schedule that is sustainable for you. If you are a reluctant writer, you could hire a freelance copywriter or staff writer to help you keep it updated with regular content.

4. Keep the blog posts punchy and concise: A blog post should focus on a single idea. Think bullet points or short paragraphs and make sure to highlight important information. Open with a declarative sentence that sums up the key idea. You can also add a graphic, image or a video to the copy of your blog to make it more appealing or better explain your point.

5. Pen a killer title: Each new blog post creates a new page on your site, and every new page creates another opportunity to boost your ranking for one of your targeted keyword phrases in search engines. Your blog post title becomes your web page title, so titles do matter!

6. Offer subscription services: Allow your visitors to subscribe to get regular updates to your blog via RSS and e-mail. Essentially, every time you publish a post, the subscribers are notified to check it out. Plug-ins to allow subscription options are likely available for your blogging platform of choice.

7. Promote your blog through social media: The more traffic you attract, the more opportunities you have for conversions. So be sure to add with social-sharing icons, particularly Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. This encourages your visitors to share your content and allows you to reach your network’s network, which is a key attribute of social media. Also, talk it up in e-mail newsletters, in print collateral and on other marketing materials.

Copywriters or online content writers are different from other writers in that the copy they create is not to entertain, report, or tell a story – rather it is to sell and persuade – and if no measurable action results, then a copywriter’s job is not really done.

So what are the qualities of a good copywriter? Here I have identified the following seven.

Creative: A good copywriter can examine almost any subject from different perspectives in order to give the copy the right tone and the right message.

Good communicators: They can pinpoint the key benefits of a particular product or service and have the ability to express them clearly, concisely, and in a tone that is appeals to the target audience.

Smart: Great copywriters have an insatiable thirst for knowledge, an unstoppable curiosity about how things work, and they like to research each subject thoroughly.

Congenial: They are empathic to the needs of the people and can quickly recognize both ends of an argument. They have remarkable observation abilities and are fascinated in what makes them tick.

Trendy: They love to stay up to date and keep their eyes open all the time to actively search for new trends and interesting fields.

Good readers: Copywriters not only love to read books but also content written by other copywriters to actively study a wide variety of styles.

Disciplined: Professional copywriters are able to multitask. They are also detail oriented and always keep their deadlines.

As a closing note, a good copywriter is one who is at all times, open to learning and flexible enough to adapt to the changing needs of a changing audience.

With that said, even people who write well for the print media can come unstuck with website copywriting. This is because writing for the print is different from writing for the digital mindset.

In fact, it is this mindset that influences how visitors respond to a web page. As a web copywriter you need to know about the psychology of how people read online and you must write with this in mind.

“Once I was a scuba diver in a sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a jet ski.” This is how one technology writer described the change in his relationship between offline print and online words.

Online reading is more about instant gratification – print reading is more gentle linear reading. Perhaps this is why copywriting for a digital mindset so different. Spending time online is tiring – you are constantly staring at the screen. It is also stressful – you need information and you need it now.  And finally, it is addictive – you find it impossible to switch off.

Most website visitors are on an information quest. They have something very specific in mind. They know that the answer is out there and so they are willing to scan headlines, keywords and images in the hope of finding it.

According to a research, 79% of online visitors don’t read – they either scan or skim, 16% read word for word while the other 5% usually move on. Understandably, most web copywriters focus on making their web pages highly scannable to appeal to the 79% and make the mistake of overlooking the more important 16% who could actually bring in the conversions. So, the 16% figure should be the target audience and as a copywriter, your aim should be to keep them glued to the page and make them stick around by making their reading experience as pleasant as possible.

Here are some ways you can achieve this.

• Use web writing approaches to suit topic, market and audience.
• Use short sentences and words with a low syllable count.
• Add the right copy cosmetics: bold, font, italics, size, color etc.
• Change and vary tone and style.

A freelance content writer offers more flexibility

If you cannot afford to hire commit to an inhouse one, then a freelance content writer is a good option. Even if you can afford to hire a copywriter, you might want to match different copywriters to different projects, scale your content writing resources up and down, or get fresh perspectives for your own text. Finally, you may not have a steady stream of work for your inhouse writers to fit a ten-to-six role.

Of course you also have the option of using someone with another role to double up as a copywriter, or write your own stuff. The problem with this is every day work will keep getting in the way and the content will never be produced.

It has generally been observed that even marketing managers find it hard to give copywriting the time and importance it needs. And as with everything else, compromised commitment leads to compromised results.

Freelance copywriter can bring in fresh perspective which is different, refreshing and revealing.

Retention of learning

It could be that you hire a content writer and then train the person to suit your business and retain the ownership of the writing know-how. However, your inhouse content writer can leave anytime. If this happens, you lose all the company-specific experience you had imparted and also the technique that the person had developed. Worse still, the content writer may take the knowledge straight to your competitor.

Diversity of ideas

Freelance copywriters work with different clients and are exposed different ideas and different approaches to their work. They can repurpose or adapt their diversified experience to your line of work. With time, freelance writers gain experience in more and more sectors, which is why choosing an experienced freelance copywriter can prove to be worthwhile.

Commitment to quality

You might expect that a person outside your organization to care less about it than some one who is part of it. However, a freelance content writer depends on positive reviews and good referrals and so it becomes all the more important for him/her to deliver. Freelance copywriters are only as good as the last job which is why for them each assignment counts. Professional freelance content writers work hard to keep their client relationships strong and stable.

 I hope I have argued convincingly in favour of freelance content writers- working with a freelance copywriter means that you can tap into more enriched experience and you can be sure that you get high quality content within the timelines.

Most SEO specialists would agree that a higher bounce rate means lower engagement and vice versa. However, there is another interpretation for a high bounce rate, which is that people found what they wanted on the landing page and didn’t feel the need to explore the other web pages. While this is true, businesses usually prefer the visitors to go through the other web pages also, just in case they find other products or services equally interesting or they mark the information for future use.

So the effort should be to aim at a lower bounce rate. This can be achieved by ensuring that the content on your website is relevant, engaging and informative.

The need to provide relevant web page content can not be over emphasized. While writing web content, SEO copywriters need to think from the readers’ perspective and then answer all the questions that they might have. Relevant content can also be described as something that is easy to understand and not too high on technical terms, and written in the language that the readers speak. If

The second thing is to provide enough content. Now, the ideal length of a web page is debatable. Instead of focusing on the number of words, an SEO copywriter should focus on expressing what needs to be expressed. Or in other words, the thought process and the information should be complete so the reader is not left with unanswered questions.

With this said, if you have to write a lengthy article, it is better to break it down into small paragraphs and use bulleted points, where ever possible. Also, make sure to give subtitles and include relevant keywords in them.

One of the reasons visitors leave a landing page is that the information presented there is inaccurate, irrelevant or outdated. Therefore, it is necessary to keep updating your website with fresh content. This is not just to give updated information to your visitors and thereby reduce the bounce rate . Fresh web content is also fodder for the search engines and so the more content you add, the higher the chances of your site showing up in search results.

For those not familiar with snippets, these are the few lines of text which show up on the search results. The purpose is to give the readers an idea on how relevant the page is to the information they are searching for.

With the new update, list snippets will differ by reflecting “the structure of the page, rather than just showing two lines of text.”

Accordingly, the spiders will crawl through the web pages and then show “a list of three relevant rows or items underneath the result in a bulleted format.”

Google is also considering the inclusion of an approximate count of the total items listed on the page.

For the SEO copywriters, the latest update would mean rethinking their strategy while embedding keywords and phrases in the article so that the web pages show up in search results.