You can have the most awesomely designed website on the planet, loaded with all the latest in web design technology, but if you lack quality content… good luck in making it into the search engines. Search engines (and especially Google) have a thing for relevant content. They strive to give people what they’re looking for when they type in their keywords, or phrases. This means that you want to have your content actually relate to the keywords you’re using on a given page. I’ve seen websites where every page will have the exact same meta tags (keywords and description), yet be totally unrelated to the content on the page. Either the web designer was too lazy to make sure each page was optimized for best possible results with the search engines, or truly doesn’t understand SEO.
When writing your content, whether your write it yourself or hire it out, keep in mind that websites are economical and not limited by size. This means a small business can present as large or creative of an image on the Internet as their larger competitors. A website also allows easy and safe communication between the consumer and you. Unlike communications that originate from other forms of advertising, consumers who send emails don’t have to deal with aggressive salespeople, or have to worry about calling during business hours, or deal with those annoying voice mail messages just to get information. This is also another reason why you want as much information on your site as possible… or even an FAQ page. Think of all the time and energy you can save by having an FAQ page on your site.
Don’t just write for the search engines — write for your customers and clients… with SEO in mind. Be concise and let people know “what’s in it for them.” Focus on your audience. After all, no one else matters! Put yourself in the their shoes and focus on the key benefits of your product or service up front (“above the fold” on the web page) so that’s the first thing they see when they land on the page.
Websites are truly a unique marketing tool when you provide your potential customers/clients with quality, and useful, information.
