Some thoughts on writing for your business website

Many business owners opt to generate their own website content as a money-saving alternative to hiring a copywriter to do it for them. Results can be mixed, but there's certainly nothing stopping you from producing text that attracts sales and success. I'm going to share with you some thoughts on a few pieces of received wisdom.

Keeping it simple

Shorter sentences and paragraphs, a straightforward argument structure and few jargon terms are generally considered the key to writing good internet copy. Your Internet audience isn't unsophisticated by any means, but keeping information simple ensures no-one clicks away before the message is received.

To prepare for this, most internet writing has the 'upside down pyramid' structure that has long been associated with newspaper journalism: put all the most important information in the first paragraph, and put the least important stuff at the end. This is a rule certainly worth observing on sales-pages, but it's worth writing more creatively for blog-posts and other general content. Where the worry isn't that your key points will be ignored, you have the luxury of worrying whether people are going to read what you have written.

Whilst you should avoid jargon, doing so obviously creates a conflict with simplicity. Good jargon exists to simplify complex ideas but it still excludes people outside an industry. It is usually safest to assume that people don't know such terms, but when creating a business to business website, jargon may be appropriate. If in doubt, be cautious.

“You, you, you”

Business websites exist to serve potential and existing customers, not solely the business for which they are created. Good copy therefore engages the reader by placing them in it. Instead of describing what a company does, describe how the company can fulfil the customer's needs, all with reference to the all important 'you'.

Like everything in written language, there are limits to how far you can take this. Keep the customer's needs at the heart of your content, but don't sprinkle 'you, you, you' over the text like the SEO keyword of the moment.

Search Engine Optimisation

Speaking of which, Switchplane believe that whilst keywords, meta-tagging and all those other coding 'tricks' have their place in an optimised website, the best way to make a site relevant to Google and the people who find you through it is to generate worthwhile content and regularly update it. Businesses will always benefit from up to date case-studies and testimonials, as well as blog posts and integrated social media links. Obviously, this is all easier said than done, but all the SEO tricks in the world won't work if they don't actually lead users to anything useful.

Write what you know?

You've probably heard this cliché before and whilst there is a grain of truth in it, it's important to remember this is largely a guideline for literary writing. Copywriting is often a web-design extra people think they can do without. After all, virtually everyone can write, so the specialist stuff is surely in the visual design and markup of a website. The problem with taking this view is that written content is the most important element of your web-presence, so why would you avoid getting it professionally written? Considering this (and not forgetting my own less-than-vested interest here), you shouldn't be afraid to outsource your content: copywriters are routinely asked to write about companies and industries they have never been part of, in a voice that fakes years or maybe decades of business experience.

Whilst a copywriter will never have the same level of inside knowledge that a business owner could bring to their content, this is not necessarily a weakness. Skilled copywriters will often get to what is genuinely unique about your company, relating to your business and thoroughly researching your competitors to know what to work against. As a business owner, it can be difficult to extract unique selling points from the everyday realities of operating.

Forget the guidelines.

Yes, even the ones on this page. Well, except this one. I'm not recommending actively working against every piece of advice out there, I'm rather saying that you should absorb as much advice as you can and keep it at the back of your mind. The worst thing you can do is write copy mechanically against a check-list or framework: over a series of pages your lack of energy will show, and even in a standalone piece, your writing will feel manufactured and lifeless. People who have compiled better lists than this have routinely ignored their great advice without compromising writing quality.

Don't have the time or confidence to generate your own content? Get a professional result for your website and contact us to find out more about our copy-writing service.