Over 89% of marketers say search engine optimization (SEO) is successful — so it’s no secret that this strategy can drive powerful results for your business when done correctly. To do SEO correctly, it’s important to keep in mind one of the most integral parts of your SEO’s success — copywriting.

SEO copywriting impacts how search engines rank your page, and further, who sees your pages. If you don’t publish high-quality content, you’ll miss a prime opportunity to rank in relevant search results.

On this page, we’ll answer the following questions:

1. What is SEO copywriting?
2. What are the most important elements of SEO copywriting?
3. How can you create an impactful SEO copywriting strategy?

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What is SEO copywriting?

SEO copywriting is the process of optimizing your content for search engines. Google uses the information on your pages to determine your site’s ranking in search results — based on target keywords, internal linking, and more. Successful SEO copywriting helps you create highly-ranking content that is valuable and helpful for your audience.

4 critical elements of SEO copywriting

When you create SEO-optimized content, there are a few key elements you need to ensure your content ranks in search results. Here are a few elements to keep in mind for effective SEO copywriting.

1. Keywords

Keywords are a critical component of SEO copywriting. If you want your pages to rank in search results, you need to optimize your pages for relevant terms.

When users search for relevant information, they use keywords to help them find the information they need. To drive the right traffic from search results, you need to find applicable key terms for each page.

To find the right keywords, start by conducting keyword research. You can use a keyword research tool like KeywordsFX to help you find relevant terms for your page.

You can incorporate numerous keywords into your pages to help you rank in multiple search results. Utilizing these keywords will help provide context for your page, so search engines can appropriately rank your SEO-optimized content.

2. Headings

When users click on your listing in the search results, the first thing they’ll see at the top of the page is your heading. You want to ensure that you’re catching your audience’s attention as soon as they click on your page.

Your heading will help your audience determine if your page is still relevant to their search query after they’ve clicked to your page and search engines will also use this element to determine your page’s relevancy to a specific search.

Here’s an example of a good heading:

This heading example tells users exactly what to expect on the page — it’s a beginner’s guide to creating your workout plan. The heading is clear and provides context for search engines and users.

Not to mention, this title fits with the original search query of “how to create a workout plan.”

If you want to write SEO content that ranks, you need to have a compelling and informative heading that encourages your audience to stay on the page.

Additionally, make sure you integrate your core keyword into the headline so that users and search engines know your page is relevant!

3. Content

The breadth of SEO copywriting is your actual content. Your content is the information you provide to your audience when they click on your page.

Your content should always be informative and offer value to your audience. Avoid writing content just to fill a page with paragraphs and excessive keyword usage just to try to get it to rank. The only type of content that will rank well in search results is content that offers your audience value.

Focus on delivering information to your audience that’s valuable and concise. Get straight to the point and tell your audience what they want to know.

Not only does SEO writing involve the quality of your content, but also the presentation of your content. If you have long paragraphs of text on your pages, you’re less likely to rank in search results because users will have a bad experience on your site.

For that reason, ensure that your content is broken down into paragraphs with 2-3 lines each.

Elements like bulleted lists will help you provide an even better user experience, and when you add visuals, you’ve got yourself SEO optimized content that provides a great experience and can rank better in search results.

4. Links

The last element of SEO copywriting we’ll look at is links. Links play a critical role in helping your site rank better in search results.

When you optimize your writing for SEO, you want to ensure you include internal links on your pages. Internal links are links to other pages on your site.

The links are valuable to your SEO because they help search engines discover and index pages it may not have found previously. As a result, more of your pages will have the opportunity to rank in search results, which means more traffic for your business.

To add internal links within your SEO optimized content, you need to link to pages that are relevant to your selected anchor text.

Take this example from Moravian College:

Each link in this section goes to a relevant page on their website. For example, the anchor text “classic college down” goes to a page that details the college’s surrounding area in Bethlehem, PA. By internal linking, Moravian College will help search engines find and index other pages on their site.

So, as you’re writing SEO content, find places to integrate relevant internal links to help your pages rank in search results.

How to create impactful SEO copywriting that ranks

Now that we shared some important SEO copywriting elements, let’s look at how to write SEO content. Here are some tips to help you create SEO content that ranks!

1. Write content for humans first, search engines second

When writing for SEO, it’s important to remember that you’re writing for humans first and search engines second.

Many companies focus so heavily on optimizing their content for search engines that they forget who’s actually reading their content: humans. You need to create content that’s great for users first.

Search engines like Google are smart enough to comprehend whether your site is relevant to a search query, and if your audience has a positive experience on your site.

You don’t need to fill your page with jargon to sound knowledgeable and professional — you just need to create SEO copywriting that your audience can understand easily. Remember, your audience isn’t filled with experts in your field — that’s why they’re turning to you, since you are!

2. Look at search intent to ensure you’re delivering the right information

Before you add SEO optimized content to your site, make sure it fits the user’s search intent. If your content doesn’t match what your user wants to find in search results, your pages won’t rank well.

To ensure you’re matching search intent, search your key term on Google first. See what other people have written about that topic since the results can help guide the direction of your content to ensure you’re providing your audience with relevant information.

However, you don’t want to copy your competitor’s pages word for word. Be sure to add your own unique flare so you can stand out from the other site’s trying to rank in the search results!

3. Focus on long-tail keywords

Keywords are a critical component of SEO writing. When you’re trying to optimize for keywords, though, you want to ensure you’re choosing highly relevant keywords so your pages can drive relevant traffic.

When you conduct keyword research, focus on long-tail keywords. Long-tail keywords are keywords that contain three or more words. An example of a long-tail keyword is “best pizza places in Los Angeles.”

Long-tail keywords are specific, so you know when someone searches it that they’re looking for your business. If someone searches “best pizza places in Los Angeles,” you know they want to find information about different pizza places in the Los Angeles area that are considered the best.

A search like “best pizza” isn’t as straightforward. You don’t know where searchers want to find the best pizza or if it the best type of pizza or the best pizza place. The search intent is less clear so then you wouldn’t drive as valuable traffic to your site.

Long-tail keywords will drive the best results for your business by driving more qualified traffic to your site.

4. Ensure your site loads quickly so users can access information fast

Another critical component of SEO optimized content is your site speed. Users want to access information fast. Users expect your site to load within two seconds.

If your site takes too long to load, users will bounce from your site. As a result, your site won’t rank in search results, which means less traffic and leads for your business.

When you have a lot of elements on your pages, it can bog down your site.

To ensure you’re delivering the best experience with your SEO optimized content, use a tool like Google PageSpeed Insights to analyze your site’s current load time. This tool enables you to see how quickly your site loads and provides suggestions to speed it up.

Some common suggestions for improving site load time include:

1. Optimize image file sizes
2. Minimize HTTP requests
3. Reduce redirects
4. Use browser caching
5. Host videos on an external server

It can be a laborious task to optimize your site’s backend, especially if you don’t have coding experience, so you may need to consider investing in page speed services.

By improving your site’s load time, you’ll drive more traffic to your page to read your SEO copywriting.

Get started with SEO copywriting

Writing for SEO is crucial if you want your pages to rank in search results. Now that you know how to write SEO content, you can start optimizing your pages to perform better and reach more people looking for your business.

If you need help with your SEO copywriting strategy, look no further than WebFX. We have a team of over 250 SEO experts that can help you craft copywriting for your site. We’ve been doing it for 20 years, so you can feel confident that we have the knowledge and experience to create pages that drive results.

Not to mention, we’ve driven over $2.4 billion in sales and over 6.3 million leads for our clients in the past five years alone.

Ready to start with SEO copywriting? Contact us online or call us today at 888-601-5359 to speak with a strategist about our copywriting services!