Copybot

Essential web writing + content marketing advice

A Silly Primer on Search Engines (for Web Writers)

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writing desk with some butterflies because that's what SEO is all about

Listen to this article here: How Search Engines Work Part One and Part Two.

How do people find things on the web? Search engines.

Google, as you probably know, is the dominate search name. There’s also this thing called Bing. Then smaller boutique search engines that specialize in narrow fields. Academic, medical.

The job of a search engine like Google is to find content that matches your query (the question you are asking):

  • How far is the earth from the sun?
  • Who is the leader singer of Led Zeppelin?
  • What is a freemason?

The better it can match your question to a good answer, the better the user experience. [Read more…]

Atlantic Writer Misses What Makes Twitter Truly Great: Social Proof

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Microfilm

Last Monday Derek Thompson (senior editor at The Atlantic) missed a wonderful opportunity to talk about one of the things that makes Twitter truly great.

Let me give you some context.

Less than three weeks after deleting the Twitter app from his phone (part of a slew of 2015 resolutions revolving around better productivity), Derek redownloaded the app. Eventually he discovered a new feature: “View Tweet Activity.”

This got him exploring, asking questions, and digging deeper into analytics only to discover what I thought was a common truth: [Read more…]

Forget Plus Ones: Just Write Freakishly Good Content

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Dylan On Floor

Just like you, I get sucked into this mess. Bewitched by the idea somebody’s cracked the ranking code — looked beneath the search engine hood (and survived).

The most recent carnival show was Cyrus Shephard’s claim that plus ones cause higher rankings. A claim like that is going to get attention.

And attention it got.

Matt Cutts, head of Google+ Web Spam, said, politely, you are wrong.

I’m sure Matt is wary of doing such correction. There is no shortage of prognosticators who believe they’ve cracked the code. [Read more…]

Filed Under: SEO

Has Social Media Changed How We Write Web Copy? Here’s Why I Think So

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Laughing Teenagers

Since 2001 I’ve been writing copy for the web. I’ve been in the web writing world long enough to have mastered the fundamentals of persuasive web writing. I’ve been writing copy for landing pages, sales letters, email newsletter sub forms.

And the rules for writing persuasive copy remain:

1. Clear

2. Concise

3. Compelling

Now I want to offer a new one. [Read more…]

Gimpy Website? 5 Techniques to Creating a Killer One

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Okay. I’m going to go out on a limb and say that if you’re a entrepreneur, copywriter, freelancer or business owner, you probably have a website or blog.

No surprise there.

But let me go even further out on that limb and say you’re probably not sure if it’s a good website or not…

First of all, you’re not sure if people are actually making it to your site. Second, you’re not sure if the people who are finding your website or blog are actually finding what they need.

Am I right?

To make matters worse, it costs money to host your website or blog. [Not a lot. But if you’re not making money, even a little money is hard to lose, right?]

You’ve got two options, really. [Read more…]

Could This Be One of the Oldest Web Copywriting Tricks on the Books?

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View City

Web readers are people on a mission.

Cramped for attention. Bent on skimming rather than diving deep. They don’t go to the web to window shop.

They go there to drive 60 miles per hour—and look at billboards. That’s the unbreakable rule of the web.

So what can you do as a web copywriter to not only catch their attention but give them what they want in less time than it takes to finish reading this sentence?

Easy. Just use the following technique. [Read more…]