How To Manage Content On Your Website
When you’re speaking to someone face to face, it’s easy to understand what they’re saying. After all, we don’t only speak with our mouths. We actually communicate using our bodies too. When face to face, you can read someone’s hand gestures, body language, tone of voice and facial expressions. All of this makes it very easy to understand what the person is saying.
The content on your website is a whole different ballgame. When you’re communicating with someone via the text on your blog, email, forums or even videos it’s not always so easy. It’s difficult, if not impossible, to read any of the above mentioned expressions.
However, by following a few simple content tips and rules you can make the content on your website much easier for your audience to understand.
FREE Download: 5 Step Content Strategy
Make The Content On Your Website Work For You
Good content is not only important to get to the top of internet searches, it’s also important to help make you money once people get to your website. If they show up and find badly written content, they’ll probably just leave before they can click on links or buy any products. They figure if you can’t create website content that isn’t high quality, then your products and services are going to be pretty low quality too.
When you create good content on your website, it encourages your visitors to stick around longer and builds faith in the quality of your site.
Good content should be written specifically for your target audience. If your customers are newcomers to your niche, you don’t want to use technical jargon that they won’t understand. Similarly, if you’re marketing to seasoned professional, you want to use more specific terms and ideas so they view you as a reliable source of information.
Write Clearly
It’s often difficult to write down what is actually quite easy to say. But writing in a long-winded way can be confusing to the reader. Instead, as a website content writer, think about what you mean to say and write in short, clear sentences. Sentences dotted with punctuation can be read in a variety of ways and may confuse the reader. Stick to short, clear sentences.
It also helps to close your message with a little humor or other “nicety”, such as more information or further reading (there’s a free Website Content Strategy Checklist at the end of this article!). This will help stop your overall message from appearing dry. It’s very easy for people to confuse direct and to the point with brashness when reading.
Learn ‘Netiquette’
Online there are different rules of politeness. Did you know that writing in all capitals means you’re shouting? This is an easy mistake for a newbie to make and one you’ll want to avoid.
Also, using too many exclamation marks can make your message appear irrational or a bit over the top, too. And on the other hand, very overly direct sentences without the use of humor may appear harsh or unemotional. Try to strike the balance between using expressive punctuation like exclamation marks and not using them at all.
You can also use emoticons online to express how you’re feeling. A happy face at the end of a direct message can make a big difference to the overall impression of the reader 🙂
However, if you’re writing in a more professional manner or would like your message to be taken seriously, too many emoticons, such as happy faces, may make you appear unprofessional or someone not to be taken seriously. Again, it’s all about striking the right balance.
Explain Yourself
Particularly when dealing with outsourced freelancers or virtual assistants it’s important for them to know right from the start that when you’re writing a business message you may do so in a very direct way. Ask them not to take it to mean anything other than what’s written on the message.
You simply may not have time to include a chatty message with each and every email or communication. Explain that your direct messages don’t mean that you’re upset or anything – you’re just communicating about the job at hand.
Make It Readable For Humans
It may seem obvious, but don’t put content on your website just to attract search engines. Many websites just have content that is written with lots of keywords to attract the attention of the search engines. But if it’s not readable to a human, people aren’t going to stick around your website very long. And that means your website probably isn’t going to generate much revenue for you. Plus, you’re probably not going to be able to get anyone else to link to your content or share it on social media.
Many internet marketers focus on keyword density when looking for content. They require a certain quantity of the words they want to be search engine keywords. While this can work, the problem is that when you try to use specific words so many times it becomes repetitive and lowers the quality of the writing. Good content writers can deliver articles that use the words enough just by writing an article on a specific topic. If you have quality writers, you don’t need to worry about keyword use.
Free Checklist: 5 Step Strategy To Create Content For Your Website
No matter how much you love being an online entrepreneur, some days the thoughts just don’t come. You stare at a blank screen and struggle for content creation ideas. But when you have a system in place that takes the guesswork out of every step of the content research, creation and delivery processes, those days don’t happen.
Download my Free Checklist, Writing Effective Website Content to discover a proven 5-step website content template to plan, create and put good quality content on your website.