On Writing Content for Websites: Content Matter’s Approach
Website copywriting is what we at Content Matter do for a living. This is our job, our skill, and our passion. We write content for technology companies because technology is something we know very well. We’ve designed website structures and written content for RubyGarage, Yalantis, SteelKiwi, Tallium, Integra Sources (in progress), and MadAppGang. These are all software development companies. We’ve also written copy for landing pages of mobile startups like MorningPages and LiveToday.
In this article we’ll tell you how we approach our copywriting projects so you know what to expect from working with us.
How we work
When it comes to websites, our work process is pretty easy. We’ll do a call to discuss your needs and requirements and get down to work. The process will look like that:
- Tell us what you need
- Give answers to our questions
- Receive content via Google Drive
- Give feedback
- Receive a final revised version
Quite often we also manage the website design process. To design your website we either work with your design team or collaborate with our partners.
Now let’s talk about how we achieve quality in our work.
Our approach
Copywriting is a big part of marketing. The goal of all our writing projects is to turn visitors into leads (and customers). We aim at getting people to contact your company or buy your products after they’ve read what you said on your website. To do that effectively the first thing we do is learn who your customers are.
Who’s your target market?
Our job isn’t that much about writing copy as it is about knowing who is going to read it. Because, you know what? The best messages come from the people who have bought your products or services or are likely to buy them. We need to get into your prospect’s head to understand what matters to them and how you can improve their life. This will turn into words that will influence your prospect’s buying decisions.
In our copy, we make your desired customer see him or herself reflected on your page. That's why we use the words they use and target them specifically with our messaging.
To know your target market we’ll study your customers. We’ll learn about their pains, motivations, and needs. Our target market research we’ll also consider your visitor’s state of awareness. The state of awareness is the extent to which the people arriving on your site and reading your copy are aware of:
- Their own pain or desire
- The availability of a solution for that pain or satisfier for that desire
- The availability of your solution as the best for that pain
With less aware visitors we’ll spend more time educating so the copy will be longer. We need to help them recognize their pain or desire, understand that there is a solution, and persuade them that this solution is you. For highly aware visitors, we’ll spend more time persuading to choose you, and less time educating. If you want to target different audiences on your website, we will write landing pages targeted to various states of awareness.
Our clients often serve the needs of a huge pool of customers. These people have different backgrounds, come from different countries, and work in different industries. They have less things in common than a washing machine and a pair of shoes. In this situation there is one important thing to say:
We can’t write for all 300 of your buyer personas.
We need to write for your most desired segment of visitors. These visitors are people who you’re most likely to sell to, feel comfortable working with, and have a good chance to succeed with. Writing for everyone will result in converting no one.
Writing for everyone will result in converting no one.
Having researched your target audience, what do you think we’ll ask next?
What does your business have to offer?
Before writing a word, we need to get to know you. This will require a bit more than a conversation over a cup of coffee. We’ll need you to have a thoughtful look at your own business. Here are the questions you will need to answer:
- What do you sell?
- What category are you in?
- Who do you sell to?
- Why do these people buy from you?
- What do they pay their money for?
- How can you prove what you promise?
- What makes you different from others?
You will get a Google Spreadsheet with a list of questions to answer, and will spend the next couple of weeks doing just that.
Think this over for a while: What can you do that others can't ? What do you provide that other don't? What results do you achieve that others can't achieve?
If you’re a software development company, go ahead and take a look at our questionnaire that we designed specifically for your type of business.
What keywords do we need to rank for?
SEO. Love it or hate it, it’s here to stay. If you want to make your website visible for search engines, your pages need to rank for your target keywords. The top positions are achieved by using a bunch of SEO tactics, one of which is a good page structure and target keywords in the text. We take care of both.
To make your website SEO-friendly the first thing we do is analyze your online competitors. In other words, we research the web pages that show up in the top 10–30 results of Google search for your target commercial keywords. We look at their structures, content and keywords, and use this knowledge in our work. Our goal here is not to copy your competitors’ SEO strategy, but rather to discover what they do well, and do it better.
When creating a website for SEO, target keywords matter. But a proper page structure matters even more.
SEO analysis lays at the foundation of the website structure. It helps us decide what pages and structure you need to be able to rank high on Google.
How do we create content for websites?
When all our explorations are done, when we know your customer, your business, and what Google wants, we start doing what you hired us for. We start creating website content.
Any writing project needs an outline. The same is true for websites. We build a mind map of your future website first. It will provide an overview of the top-level and lower-level pages on your website. And then we create prototypes for each page. Prototypes outline the page structure: the contents of blocks and their titles.
We come up with ideas for blocks based your target customer’s expectations. This means we create a list of items that your target customer would expect to see on your web page. This might include your competencies in a particular field, facts that prove your level of expertise, certain specialists on your team, methods and tools you use, and even your lifestyle. A lot of this is creative work. Very often we come up with interesting ideas that your customer doesn’t expect but would be amazed to spot on your website.
The best way to approach website content is to look at it as a list of customer expectations, or items that are important to your audience. When you have those items addressed, you will get more conversions.
When the prototypes are done and you like the page structure we propose, we start writing copy. We always work in Google Docs — they’re very convenient for collaboration.
We’ll send you back the results in Google Drive and wait for your approval. Only when you’re happy with the content do we finish our project.
*All our texts are copy edited by a professional English native speaker.
What makes writing great?
We just went through how we ensure quality of our work. But we haven’t yet touched one more significant item. It’s knowledge. The rule is simple: you can only write great copy if you understand what you’re talking about.
Knowledge is particularly important because of the niche we work at. Technology is a complex subject. To know technology means to not only understand different tools, platforms, and products but also to know how they’re used in different industries, and how they’re applied for various use cases.
We’ve been in technology for quite a while to understand it well enough. Because we love technology just like we love writing, we keep being curious about it. And when people are curious, expanding knowledge takes care of itself.
About Content Matter
Content Matter is a website copywriting agency that works as a separate business unit of Kaiiax, a marketing consulting company. As a copywriting agency we write the following types of content:
- Content for websites
- Content for landing pages
- Case studies
- eBooks and white papers
- Microcopy for web and mobile applications
If you’re looking to create a great website, send us a letter at hello@kaiiax.com.
