What exactly is web content writing?

Jan 19, 2006

A few people in the writing group I’m a member of have been asking what web content writing is and what exactly a website content writer does. Instead of sending them different replies I’ve decided to post this blog explaining what website content writing is.

It all started with Google attaching an unprecedented importance to the textual content of web pages. It was a simple logic: if your website (or web pages) deals with a particular topic, then you should have lots of content regarding that topic. I’m talking about “optimized website content” here. The content is specifically written to convince Google and other search engines that this website contains lots of information that deals with the expression being searched for. So if someone looks for “wooden furniture” and your website contains lots of information on “wooden furniture” then there is a great probability that your website will get a higher ranking and will show among the top 5 or top 10 results. Take for instance my website: http://www.amrithallan.com. If you search for “content writer” on Google, my website comes up among the top 5 results – it has been there for the past 6 months and if it has vanished or moved down it means I’m not taking care of my own website.

Considering that there are thousands of websites that come up for this term, I can say that my website is optimized better than thousands of other websites. A lot of webmasters want to achieve similar results for their websites because this can significantly enhance their business prospects. A website content writer writes such content. This is one aspect.

Getting traffic to your website is not enough. If you write website content just to entice search engines and not much action happens on the business side you are just digging the mud out of a hole. There are three things that separate you from normal, run-of-the-mill content writers: [1] you have to get traffic to the website; [2] that traffic should be relevant to your website; and [3] the traffic should eventually culminate into business. If you can deliver these three things, there is no dearth of work for you as a website content writer.

Actually getting traffic is easy because no matter how smartly the search engine algorithms work, some smart-ass so-called SEO experts manage to generate traffic and hoodwink webmasters. They are only bothered about their fee and not at all bothered about whether the webmaster successfully does business from his or her website or not. These types of people don’t get repeat work and they continuously have to scrounge the Internet for gullible clients.

So you not only have to be a content writer who can get relevant traffic, you also have to be a copywriter who can convince the visitors to do business with your client. That’s where your real power lies as a website content writer. It all boils down to how much money your writing makes.

With the same stroke you have to write for search engines and also for the visitors and only those content writers can achieve this who have some good writing skills. The keywords shouldn’t sound nonsensically repetitive and still they should appear enough times to satisfy the calculations of the search engine robots. The visitor doesn’t even realize that the keyword is being repeated again and again and you have to do all this while selling the business idea to the visitor.

Gradually the website owners are realizing this and hence are getting their content professionally written. It’s not about knowing the language – majority of my work comes from the US and the UK where English is their native language – and sometimes I do make mistakes that my clients and visitors point out. So sometimes when a client writes:

I just want to let you know that you are amazing. Ever since I hired you to rewrite my index page I am getting sales on my candle site. I upped the google adwords daily budget so I hope to get more sales as days go by.

This is just a quick note to tell you that the articles you wrote are excellent and you’ve captured the exact essence of the topic. I’ve been in this field for two years but just in a week you researched the topic in such manner that I got to learn so many things more.

I know that I’m moving in the right direction even while fumbling here and there sometimes. And it is just a beginning.