Content Writing & Copywriting Blog

Web Copywriting - What Are Those Psychological Triggers Anyway?

Jul 26, 2007 5 Comments »

It just means saying the right things just at the right time and using the most appropriate words.

While trying to gain more and more knowledge of web copywriting and copywriting in general (for me learning never stops) I often come across writings that “reveal” the secrets of copywriting (without revealing them, unless you buy that e-book or that report) that can turn your websites into ”money making machines”. While reading, I find these expressions repeatedly:

• Psychological triggers
• Mesmerizing copywriting
• Action words that sell your product like hot cakes

and a horde of other hyper terminologies. Some of these writing styles may put you off, but surprisingly, they work. Before proceeding further, here are a few things we must keep in perspective about the Internet:

• The other website is just a click away
• A customer, sometimes when gone, is gone forever
• Distractions on the Internet are as many as the bees in a bee-farm
• Trust and personal touch lacks on the Internet
• People still are not comfortable with the technology
• Swindlers galore on the Internet

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7 Steps to great writing

Jul 23, 2007 3 Comments »

Brian talks about them on his copywriting blog. A long time back I had written an article for my content writing website titled The big of short (actually it should have been the long of short, but anyway) in which I had written:

Sales copies are not pieces of literature. People don’t read them because they want something beautiful to read. They often stumble into them while reading or browsing something else. They are often in a hurry. So there is very little time for you to grab their attention and make them understand what you want to say, in the right earnest.

This can be applied to your blog posts too especially if you are just about increasing your readership and your readers are not your die-hard fans. The key to writing well is, eliminate what is not needed and never leave that is needed. As I always say, it’s not about how much you write, it’s about how you write.

There’s nothing new in Brian’s post, but all the points are worth-repeating again and again because most websites and blogs fail to follow them, including yours truly sometimes.

Technorati Tags: copywriting tips, engaging copywriting, writing well

Unblocking the Writer’s Block

Jul 21, 2007 2 Comments »

You can get rid of the writer’s block simply by making small changes in your working environment. Writer’s block is not a mental thing and it doesn’t mean your muse has left you. It’s just that there are some physical and mental walls that are stopping the waves of creativity from hitting your shores.

The writer’s block is a myth. When our brain is full of distractions, when it is stiff with conscious and unconscious thoughts that don’t let us work, we think we’re suffering from the writer’s block. The greatest of writers have gone through similar excruciating phases, and numerous times in their lives, especially after a shock or some sad experience.

As professional writers, copywriters, content developers and bloggers, a writer’s block is a luxury we simply cannot afford, myth or no myth. Don’t feel like writing? Too bad, someone else will. Our clients pay us, so we must write, and write well. Our blog readers expect quality posts day after day, week after week, and if we don’t write well, they move on to other bloggers, perhaps never to return back. Oblivion is the easiest thing to achieve when the world around you buzzes with competition. Recognition and visibility, especially on the Internet, is very hard to attain, and very easy to lose. So writing is a show my friend, that must go on.

Actually what you need are triggers. You are a dynamite of writing talent; it’s just that, sometimes there is no trigger, and very few times things burn on their own. Here are a few triggers you can use to blow up your writer’s block:

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Landing Page Competition at SEOMoz

Jul 19, 2007 2 Comments »

Now that here we’re talking about landing pages (see the previous post), SEOMoz is organizing a landing page competition and the first prize is $1,000. It’s not actually the money but the exposure that this competition promises to the winner that is more important. They have a contest submission page where you can submit your entry (you need to log in). The idea is to get the best landing page for SEOMoz’s premium membership service.

Will I be taking part? I don’t feel confident and motivated, and energetic enough right now. All my energies are directed towards finishing my current assignments and increasing my search engine visibility. I too am experimenting with different landing pages for my content development website and I think this will be a learning experience. You can go and have a look at the current landing page and if you feel up to it, please let me know what you think about it. I’m using this landing page with Google AdWords and after a few days, if this one doesn’t perform well, I’ll try a new page.

Technorati Tags: landing page, adwords, seomoz

Writing content for the perfect landing page

Jul 19, 2007 7 Comments »

Your landing page is one of the most important pages of your website. Don’t let the laws of generalities and guesswork govern it. Pay close attention to what you write and present on your landing page and you’ll see a big change — for the better — in your conversion rate.

A landing page is a web page where your visitor arrives for the first time — from where he or she enters your website. Many think that your index page, or your home page is always the landing page, or should always be the landing page, but it’s not like that. As you grow your content, as you grow your number of pages, different people link to different pages from your website, and the search engines too rank your pages differently. For instance on Google, your index page may appear on the fifth page of the search result pages but one of your subject-specific pages may appear on the first page, or may be at the top. So for that subject, the subject-specific page becomes your landing page and hence, becomes your most crucial page if you want to earn some business off the traffic from Google. But then, if you consider the incoming links from the search engines, you cannot, and I think you should not, consider every page as the landing page. So there are two most important landing pages on your website:

• The page from where your visitors buy your product, or decide to pay for your service
• The page where your visitors arrive when they click on your advertisement appearing on another website (or your own website or blog), for instance, the Google Adwords.

The second kind of landing page too can be a “buy” or “pay” page, but sometimes you just want to provide information on that page. The main point is, a landing page should do precisely what it is supposed to do and it should do it optimally, without any distractions.

There are many things — images, text, layout, videos — that make a great landing page, but since I’m a copywriter I’ll focus on how to write content for a landing page. Here are a few points:

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