Bluestream Media

Visitors generally don’t come to your website to see the snazzy design.  Informative content is a prerequisite of every business website.  You may have heard the phrase “Content is King”, but what makes it true?

Simply, content is what makes a website useful and the words written on your website may mean the difference between the success or failure of your website.  If your content fails to attract your visitors, just imagine how many potential customers you might be losing each day.

Impressing your visitors is one thing, but you also want to impress the search engines to ensure you obtain a high ranking in the search results.  Content is one of the major things that search engines look at when determining your position in the search results.

Writing effective content is not hard. In fact, it’s very easy as long as you follow some basic rules:

1.  Avoid grammatical and spelling mistakes
Here’s an example.  Let’s say you have a jewellery business and your website design is absolutely stunning.  The layout is perfect and you couldn’t be happier with your site.  When a visitor logs on to your site they immediately see the title which reads “Cheep Jewellery”.  What would be the reaction of the visitor?  Most likely he or she would laugh at you and then immediately click the back button.

That is exactly how many businesses are losing customers.  It is important to be careful and check that your spelling and grammar is correct.  Use a spell checker and take care when using punctuation.  Don’t let people laugh at you!

2.  Make sure your content is concise, clear and easy to read
Most people don’t like to read a lot of text, but they do like to read well written content that is concise and to the point.

Your content should be clear; that means no repetitions and no unnecessary text.  Separating your content into paragraphs will make it much easier to read than if you write from the beginning to the end of the page.  Paragraphs should be short containing around three or four sentences.

3.  Take care of the interest of your visitors
Why do you place content on your website?  Obviously, for the visitors.  Always keep in mind what your visitors expect from you.  They are on your website to gain information and your goal is to fulfill their requirements.  Make sure your content is answering the questions that your visitors are likely to be asking.  This will help them to believe in you and your business, and ultimately help them to become your customer.

4.  Avoid using multiple question marks and exclamation marks
Many people think that multiple question marks or exclamation marks after a sentence will increase the curiosity of the reader.  However, the opposite is actually true.  It will seem odd and overly dramatic, and certainly will not look professional.  The saying, “Less is more” rings true in the case of question marks and exclamation marks.  One will suffice for almost any occasion, so try to keep this in mind when writing your content.

5.  Editing is more important than writing
Once you have written your content, edit your content.  Then edit it again, and keep editing until it becomes perfect.  If there are any mistakes in your content, correct them before thousands of other people point them out.  Check the content yourself for spelling and consistency in grammar and punctuations.  Then have your content proofread.  Only after you are sure that it contains no errors, should your content be displayed on your website.