Online Copywriting Tips for Writers

Do you have questions about writing for the Web? If so, you've come to the right place. In this copywriting tutorial, you'll learn how to write high-quality content for websites, blogs and other online formats.

Part 1 - Online Copywriting Defined
Part 2 - The Basics of Web Writing
Part 3 - Types of Website Content
Part 4 - Web Page Checklist

Part 5 - Blogs and Blogging
Part 6 - Search Engine Optimization
Part 7 - Additional Resources
Part 8 - About the Author

Welcome to my online copywriting tutorial. Below, you will find dozens of copywriting tips to help you get the most from your web writing projects. I've designed this as a "living document," which means the page will be updated on a regular basis. I hope you find these copywriting tips helpful, and I wish you well in your online writing efforts.

Online Copywriting Defined

First let me say that copywriting is not a legal process. That would be copyrighting. They are similar words with entirely different meanings. Many people confuse these terms, and I know this from the questions I've received over the years. So let's kick things off with a clear definition:

Online Copywriting -- The act of writing copy for some kind of online publication, such as a blog or website.

This tutorial is a perfect example. I wrote this list of copywriting tips and published it on the web, so I was engaging in online copywriting. "Copy," by the way, is an advertising term for written content. The designers create the artwork, the writers create the copy, and the two things are combined to create an advertisement (or a brochure, or a magazine, etc.). These days, you don't hear the term "copy" used much outside of the advertising industry, not in this context anyway.

With that definition out of the way, let's move on and discuss some of the fundamentals of writing for the Web.

The Basics of Web Writing

When you write information for a blog or website, you have to treat it differently than a magazine or a newspaper. Reading online is harder than reading print material. You cannot hold a website and angle it suit your eyes, as you would do with a magazine or newspaper. Because of these differences, some best practices of web writing have emerged over the years. Here are some tips to keep in mind when writing online.

Keep your paragraphs short, like the one above. Large blocks of text are hard to read online -- much than a book or newspaper. You can strain your eyes trying to read dense text on a web page. Respect your readers by keeping your paragraphs short.
Use headings and subheadings to break up your page. This also lets the reader scan the page to find the information they want. When you put keywords in your headings and subheadings, you'll also improve your search engine visibility (more on this to follow).
Link between pages as needed so your readers can find related information with the click of a mouse. This is good for website usability, and it also keeps people on your site longer.
Write with a purpose and keep it short. Long-winded content, or content with no purpose, does not do well online. Write as much as you need to accomplish your goals for a given page, but no more than that.
Work hard to create good content. This is the most important online copywriting tip in this entire lesson. It's also what separates successful websites from those that fail. Your website content needs to help your readers in some way. It must educate, entertain or enlighten. And it has to be well written to achieve these things.

You can apply the best practices listed above to any type of web writing. How many types are there? Good question! Let's talk about the many "flavors" of website content.

Types of Website Content

There are many different types of online copy or content, and they should all be handled in slightly different ways. With this list of copywriting tips, I'll focus on three formats in particular -- websites, blogs and email newsletters. You can think of these as content "containers." Within each of those containers, you could find many different types of content.

Informational Content -- This is one of the most common types of content you'll find online. You're reading an informational article right now. Informational content is designed to educate the reader in some way. It comes in many forms, such as articles, tutorials, glossaries, etc.
Instructions Content -- This is a special type of online copywriting, and it's harder than you might think. In fact, there are "usability" companies who specialize in this type of writing. The goal here is to move the reader forward through some kind of process, like an ordering process.
User-Generated Content -- This is when your website visitors create the content themselves. You'll see this in online forums and other social-based websites. As you can imagine, there are certain pros and cons associated with user-generated content. It removes the writing burden from your shoulders, but it gives you less control over quality and scope.

Here's the copywriting tip you should take away from this section. Before you write a single word of content for your blog, website or email newsletter, ask yourself what kind of content it is. What purpose does it serve? What is the end goal? What do you want your content to accomplish? Answer these questions before you start an online copywriting project, and you'll have a much easier time. I promise you that much.

Web Page Checklist

Within this context, a web "page" refers to any single page of website content. So this would also include your blog posts. You may not need all of the items on this list for every one of your web pages. Different pages have different purposes, so the necessary ingredients will vary from one page to another. With that said, here are some of the items you might need include (and why).

Title or Headline -- Regardless of what it's about, every web page should have a title or headline at the top. This title should be clear and descriptive. Readers should be able to look at the title and instantly know what the page is about. You can also include keywords in your page titles to improve search engine visibility (more to follow on this).
Introductory Paragraph -- This is optional but can be helpful on long pages, such as this one. It's a quick and easy way to summarize the content that follows. You almost always see this used with online news articles. It will often appear as a short paragraph, bolded and/or italicized, at the top of the page. You can see an example at the top of this page.
Body Content -- This is the main section of your web page or blog post. It should be written clearly and completely, in a way that supports the specific goals you have for the page. Revisit the list of tips under "Basics of Web Writing" above. Apply those tips to your body content.
The Next Step -- What do you want people to do after they read a particular page? Do you want them to read more content in your online library? Move forward into the ordering process? Contact a representative for more information? You need to identify this next step and guide the reader toward it from the page they are currently reading. In marketing terms, this is referred to as the call to action.

As we move forward in this list of online copywriting tips, keep this list of page elements in mind. You'll see how these things work together to create more effective website content.

Blog Writing Tips

Blogs are a great tool for publishing content online, because they make it so darn easy for you. Once the blog is set up, all you have to do is type your information into a box, give it a title, and click the "publish" button. The blogging program will take care of the rest. Because of this simplicity, you can publish new content on a regular basis. This is why blogs have become so popular — they are usually much more fresh than regular websites.

Many of the copywriting tips covered previously also apply to blogs. After all, they are just another type of online "container" for your content. Still, there are some differences when it comes to writing for your blog. So let's address some of those.

Keep your entries short and to the point. People usually read blogs to get quick updates about a certain topic. This rule doesn't always apply, because every blog has its own purpose. But in general, shorter is better with this medium.
Write new entries on a regular basis — daily if possible, or at least once a week. This will make your content more useful, which in turn will keep people coming back.
You can create blog posts quickly and easily, so take advantage of this to pull in search engine traffic. Write your posts around key phrases and topics that are important to your key audience. More on this in the SEO section.
Need topic ideas to fuel your blogging efforts? Use Google News to see what's happening within your industry. Use a keyword-research tool such as WordTracker.com to generate a list of relevant topics.
Check out this list of blog ideas for even more content generators.
Include keywords within the title of each post, whenever possible. Blogging programs will typically use the title you create for the HTML title element of the blog post, and this is important for search engine optimization purposes.
Make your blog engaging and useful. Work hard to create valuable content that people will find helpful. This is one of the best online copywriting tips I can give you. It will help you improve your traffic levels, your search engine rankings, and your conversion rates.

Search Engine Optimization / SEO Copywriting

You can't talk about online copywriting without addressing the topic of search engine optimization, or SEO. The two things go hand in hand, because the content you create for your website directly influences your search engine rankings and traffic.

Primarily, SEO success revolves around two things — (1) keyword-rich content and (2) links from other websites. Since this is a collection of copywriting tips, I'll focus on the first item.

Before writing any new content for your website, spend some time doing keyword research. This will help you identify the topics and phrases that are most frequently searched by your audience. WordTracker.com is a good place to start, and so is Google's keyword tool.
Build a keyword list from the research mentioned above, and use this as the blueprint for your content plan. By doing this, you are writing your content around phrases your audience is searching on a regular basis. That's just smart writing!
Key your web pages focused around a certain topic / phrase, and create extra pages as needed to address other topics. In terms of search engine ranking, it's much better to have ten pages about ten different topics, than to compile everything into one page. One phrase - one topic - one page.
On each page, be sure to spread your keywords naturally throughout the content. Pay particular attention to title elements, page headlines / headers, sub-headers and links.
Avoid "over-optimizing" your content by repeating keywords ad nauseam. This will degrade the quality of your writing, which will turn off your readers. Integrate keywords naturally, not forcibly. For example, note how the phrase copywriting tips appears many times throughout this page, but in a natural way.
Write about popular topics (related to your business) in order to pull in more search traffic. You can use Google News and the keyword-research tools mentioned above to identify topics. You should also read the kinds of publications and news sources your audience is reading, to find out what they might be researching online.
Publish new web content on a regular basis. This will help you improve your traffic levels over time, simply by covering more topics and phrases. A blog is an easy way to do this.

Additional Resources

I've given you quite a list of online copywriting tips to absorb. But wait ... there's more! Here are some additional resources to help you write great content for your website or blog.

How to Create a Content Plan for Blog Writing (www.ceoblogwatch.com)
Persuasive Online Copywriting (book by Bryan Eisenberg, Amazon.com)
Tips on Writing for the Web (Saint John's University)
SEO Learning Center (www.austinseoguy.com)

About the Author

Brandon Cornett is the owner of Cornett Communications, an Internet publishing company. He has held writing positions for a handful of direct mail and Internet marketing companies. You can find his articles all over the Web, and you may reach the author by visiting www.CornettCommunications.com.