Web content is key to all Website success stories. This series explores Web Content and its impact on Website success – examining the characteristics and pitfalls of bad Web content – along with effective Web content and its importance for the success of your Website.
Bad Web Content Makes Purchasing Easier
How can bad Web content make purchasing easier? As a typical online customer, I love to comparison shop. I search for a product or service by sorting through the highest ranked Websites – and many Websites have kindly provided me with a simple strategy for removing them from my shopping list. I just scratch off the sites with inferior content, and send these companies a silent “thank you” for helping streamline my selection process.
Just as you can evaluate companies by the effectiveness of their phone communications, you can evaluate companies by the effectiveness of the written messages on their Websites. In the same way you eliminate companies that don’t return your calls, you can eliminate companies that communicate poorly through their Website copy – good for you – bad for the companies with poor copy.
Why Your Message Has To Be Crystal-Clear
Website content can cost you credibility points. Your readers are busy people. They don’t want to waste time ploughing through content that has no clear meaning. When readers encounter writing that has a muddled message or no message at all – they assume you’ve loaded your Website with low quality, “filler” material – giving no thought to the needs of your audience. They also assume that you’ve put the same amount of thought into your products, your services, and your organization.
Why You Have To Change The Way Your Reader Feels
The ultimate goal of content writing is to evoke a strong emotional response in your reader – because emotion is the key to action. Your Web content can be grammatically accurate and its message crystal clear, but if it doesn’t generate any emotion, your reader won’t be compelled to do anything – you’ll receive no calls, no emails, and no purchases. You have to change the way your readers feel by writing copy that has emotional impact.
Web Content Has a Limited Shelf Life
Whether you write the copy yourself, or have someone else write it for you, it is vitally important that you read your Web content periodically – to make sure it’s still unique, effective, and relevant to your organization’s values and goals. Remember, in the digital age, readers’ opinions change rapidly, attention spans are shorter, and people crave novelty. The creative, original copy on your Website written not too long ago may have been copied by all of your competitors by now and become a cliché – making you a me-to company in the eyes of your readers. How do I know this can happen? I’ve found my content on my competitors’ Websites.
Coming Soon – The Test Kit For Web Content
