7) Testimonials Perhaps best indication of a website copywriter’s ability is customer satisfaction. Don’t be afraid of asking for customer testimonials. A good website copywriter will be proud of their testimonials – so proud, in fact, that they’ll be offering them without you even asking. Look for testimonials from companies you recognise and/or can verify. Anyone can get their great-aunt write them a testimonial. Some will even write their own. If you really want to be sure, ask for contact details so you can give customer a call and hear it straight from horse’s mouth.

8) SEO Copy Skills Approximately 80% of all web traffic comes through search engines, so it’s essential that your website copywriter has proven experience in SEO copy. Ask them their general approach to SEO copy. Do they normally perform keyword analysis themselves? How do they know when they’ve used enough keywords in enough of right places? Can they show you a high ranking site they’ve written copy for? What steps do they take to avoid diluting effectiveness of your primary keyword phrases? Will their SEO copy change text links on your pages? (It should!)

9) SEO Copy at No Extra Charge! Never be fooled into paying more for SEO copy. If you’ve already performed your keyword analysis, and you know where you want your keyword phrases used, writing of copy should take no longer than usual. I’ll say it again… SEO copy is not an extra – it’s how web copy should be written! Do not pay extra for it! The only things you should expect to pay extra for are keyword analyses, adding HTML code for unmarked text links, providing guidance on site structure, sourcing of inbound links to your site, etc. SEO copy by itself should cost no extra.

10) Writing Experience for Online Media Writing for an online medium is entirely different to writing for print. Readers have different requirements and objectives, and reading conditions are very different. Make sure your website copywriter knows how to cater to these differences. Ask them to recommend a maximum page length or word count per page. The correct answer should include some comment on trade-off between problems of scrolling and need for a high keyword count for SEO. Ask them whether they prefer long sentences or short (and hope to hear “short”). Ask them whether they will include lots of text links within main body of copy, and if so, will they appear as regular links (colored and underlined) or will they be unmarked.

Professionally written copy can mean difference between a great looking site and a great looking site THAT EARNS YOU MONEY.

Choose your website copywriter carefully.

* Glenn Murray is an advertising copywriter and heads copywriting studio Divine Write. He can be contacted on Sydney +612 4334 6222 or at glenn@divinewrite.com. Visit http://www.divinewrite.com for further details or more FREE articles.

4) Pick important keyword phrases Don’t include every keyword phrase on every page. Focus on one or two keyword phrases on each page. For your Macs page, focus on “cheap second hand macs”. For PCs page, focus on “cheap second hand pcs”, etc.

5) Be specific Don’t just say “our computers”. Wherever you would normally say “our computers”, ask yourself if you can get away with saying “our cheap second hand Macs” or “our cheap second hand PCs”. If this doesn’t affect your readability too badly, it’s worth doing. It’s a fine balance though. Remember, your site reflects quality of your service. If your site is hard to read, people will infer a lot about your service…

6) Use keyword phrases in links Although you shouldn’t focus on every keyword phrase on every page, it’s a good idea to link your pages together with text links. This way, when search engines look at your site, they’ll see that pages are related. Once again, more text links better, especially if link text is a keyword phrase. So on your “Cheap Second Hand Macs” page, include a text link at bottom to “Cheap Second Hand PCs”. If you can manage it without affecting readability, also include one within copy of page. For example, “As well as providing cheap second hand Macs, we sell high quality cheap second hand PCs”. TIP: If you don’t want your links to be underlined and blue, include following in your CSS file:

Then format HTML of each link as follows:

As well as providing cheap second hand Macs, we sell high quality cheap second hand pcs.

7) Use keyword phrases in headings Just as customers rely on headings to scan your site, so to do search engines. This means headings play a big part in how search engines will categorise your site. Try to include your primary keyword phrases in your headings. In fact, think about inserting extra headings just for this purpose. Generally this will also help readability of site because it will help customers scan read.

8) Test keyword phrase density Once you’ve made a first pass at copy, run it through a density checker to get some metrics. Visit GoRank's Keyword Density Analyzer and type in domain and keyword phrase you want to analyse. It’ll give you a percentage for all important parts of your page, including copy, title, meta keywords, meta description, etc. The higher density better. Generally speaking, a density measurement of at least 3-5% is what you’re looking for. Any less, and you’ll probably need to take another pass.

Follow these guidelines, and you’ll be well on your way to effective SEO copy.

Just remember, don’t overdo it. It’s not easy to find balance between copy written for search engines and copy written for customers. In many cases, this balance will be too difficult to achieve without professional help. Don’t worry, though. If you’ve already performed your keyword analysis, a professional website copywriter should be able to work your primary keyword phrases into your copy at no extra charge.

* Glenn Murray is an advertising copywriter and heads copywriting studio Divine Write. He can be contacted on Sydney +612 4334 6222 or at glenn@divinewrite.com. Visit http://www.divinewrite.com for further details or more FREE articles.