Website Writing - Assess Your Web Site Services and Programs Page, and Create a Rewrite Action Plan

This is a website assessment for the content you should include on your Services and Programs page of your business website. Every web site built by a service provider inevitably includes at least one page describing a service or program. Make sure that this page "does the job" for you since it is likely a primary reason that you have a web site.

1. Does your Services and Programs page completely describe a service or program so that a prospect understands everything about it? Often, we don't want to "take the trouble" to completely describe our service or program in writing. This could either be from laziness or failure to understand the necessity. Don't expect a prospect to buy from you without having full information.

2. Does your Services and Programs page answer all the questions a prospect might have? Your objective is to leave your prospects with all the answers they need to know in order to decide to buy. As prospects ask you questions, incorporate those answers into your web copy.

3. Does your Services and Programs page leave the prospect crystal clear on what they would be buying -- without confusion? If your services or program page leaves a prospect confused about any aspect of what you offer, it's very likely they will decide "no", and move on, looking for the solutions to their problem elsewhere. Be sure you clear up anything potentially confusing.

4. Does your Services and Programs page take the prospect "by the hand" and guide them through every detail of your service or program? Make a prospect feel "safe" by giving them a personal guided tour of your service or program. Pretend you're showing a friend around. How would you demonstrate all the details and in what sequence would you describe the process?

5. Does your Services and Programs page create a feeling of trust and trustworthiness? Give enough information that there is no feeling of mystery or ambiguity. Don't do anything "tricky", or imagine that being less than straightforward is smart business. Take the approach that your prospects are smart and be trustworthy with them.

6. Is your Services and Programs page free of "secretiveness" or opaqueness? Don't make the mistake of using too much "salesmanship" or hype or hiding facts of your services or program. Take the approach that hiding or equivocating will only trigger suspicion and avoidance among your prospects. Don't allow that to happen.

7. Does your Services and Programs page have an open, honest, clear and unexaggerated tone? If you truly want to connect with your prospects, be sincere, open, and honest. There are plenty of "hypesters" and con artists in the business world. Don't even take the chance of getting lumped in with them.

8. Does your Services and Programs page take a friendly, buddy-over-coffee approach? If you were talking to a friend over coffee and describing your services or programs, what would you say? How would you communicate? What would you say differently and how would you say it?

9. Does your Services and Programs page detail the process of your service or program step by step? You need to describe each step of your service or program. Tell what happens when and the sequence of steps. "Connect the dots" for them so that the process is totally clear.

10. Does your Services and Programs page take the time to detail everything about that service or program so that the prospect is fully informed? Be sure that you do not leave out any information and that you explain everything a prospect needs to know. Often we become so entrenched that we fail to realize prospects don't know all that we know. Be complete. Ask others to review the page to see that they understand -- and more importantly, don't understand. Incorporate any missing information.

11. Does your Services and Programs page take the attitude that you are helping the prospect to make a buying decision? Rather than doing a sales "number", give them the information they need to know to buy. Don't make it hard for them to decide "yes".

12. Does your Services and Programs page stay focused on the client's perspective -- not yours? What's in it for them? Don't waste this page telling them how great you are. Describe what they can get out of your service or program. Tell them how their life will be improved.

13. Is your Services and Programs page free of technical jargon only understood by others in your profession? Don't use the language you learned when gaining your technical skills. If you need to explain a word or concept, it is probably too complicated for this web page. If the terminology concept or verbiage is only understood by your professional peers, don't use it.

14. Do your Services and Programs have memorable names? It's like naming a sports car. You want the name to be memorable, meaningful, and sound attractive and appealing -- and make prospects want it.

15. Does your Services and Programs page tell the prospect what they need to do during the process? If the prospect has to do certain actions or perform in certain ways to succeed, make that clear. Let them know what your successful clients have contributed to their own success and how they've helped produce their great results.

16. Does your Services and Programs page clearly detail all the benefits prospects can expect to receive? What benefits can prospects expect to get from your services or program? Make these very real world and compelling. Describe as if from the viewpoint of your clients who have already benefited.

17. Does your Services and Programs page describe all the deliverables included, both tangible (books, CD's, MP3's) and non-tangible (seminars, sessions, coaching)? What will they get when they sign up for your services or program? When will they get it? How will they get it? What are the details of the deliverables?

18. Does your Services and Programs page give complete details about the kinds of results they can expect to get? People buy results. What results have your clients commonly gotten? What results can your prospects expect? Are there qualifiers on those results? Give the full picture of results and don't hold back.

19. Does your Services and Programs page include a Call to Action, suggesting what you want prospects to do next? Let them know how to sign up or call you to get started. Give them specific actions to take and make it clear what you want them to do.

When you've finished this assessment, you should have a detailed list to guide you in writing or rewriting your Services and Programs page. Get to work!

Suzi Elton provides business writing that attracts targeted prospects to your service business and converts them into clients for you. She is a Robert Middleton Certified Action Plan Marketing Coach, as well as a professional writer. Her website offers a free series of 8 assessments you can use to analyze your own site.

To learn about her Robert Middleton style Web Site Tool Kit Writing Package, go to http://www.wowfactorwriting.com/services/web-site-tool-kit-package/

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7 Secrets For Writing Effective Website Content

Forget everything you’ve ever learned about writing when it comes to generating copy for your blog or website, kick punctuation and sentence structure out of your house and set fire to all of the pictures of you and it together in effigy, write a nasty bold typed and grammatically inferior e-mail to your high school English teacher and take a baseball bat to the grammar check on your word processor if it tries to give you any guff. Because the truth of the matter is, when it comes to writing effective Internet content…the rules have decidedly changed. I used to be a copywriter before I came to rest here in the hallowed halls of Wpromote. I’ve written more convincing blogs on topics that nobody cares about than I desire to remember. But over the course of my tenure as a professional wordsmith, I learned some essential tips on how to generate copy for websites, and today I would like to share my 7 secret tips for writing effective Internet marketing content.

1. KISS: Perhaps you are familiar with this acronym, or perhaps you are just a massive Gene Simmons fan, either way you know the value of the lowest common denominator (anyone who has every heard Paul Stanley sing can attest to that.) KISS stands for: keep it simple…stupid. As copywriters writing for a website, it is our job to craft a message that will be easily digestible for all visitors to a site regardless of their reading comprehension level. For example, if your website is about real estate, don’t expect to dazzle your readers by using a bunch of industry terms and insider acronyms…when you use that language, you’re much more likely to scare the customer off to the next real estate broker’s website. The one where the copy looks like it was written by a sixth grader without a lot of friends. But guess which one of you is going to be selling a house? Keep it simple, and I guarantee you will have a noticeable boost in your conversion almost overnight.

2. Keywords: We all know how valuable keywords are when it come to search engine optimization, but the majority of people who dive into writing their own website content aren’t really sure where start when using keywords to maximize both search index and general readability. The beginners guide to SEO recommends that the keyword density of a single term in a single blog be anywhere between 1% and 5%. Generally, this translates into using your keywords once in the title, once in the first paragraph, twice in the second and once in the last sentence. Any more than that and your page will start to read like a thesaurus barfed on it. If you are given a choice between writing content to attract a search engine and writing content that someone is actually going to want to read…pick the latter option. The whole function of copywriting is as a method for writing to attract customers…and search engines don’t have wallets.

3. Bold Type/Punctuation/Bullet Points: I call these little syntactic beauties the “the big three tools” of the Internet marketing copywriter’s toolbox, and I exploit them one and all with equal abandon. People will not “read” what is written on a website unless they came there specifically looking for that exact product. People will scan. Therefore, it is essential to make your keywords and call to action stand out! Embolden the main points and keywords that your article is about. Use punctuation…for emphasis!

• Bullet


• Points


• Are


• Your


• Best


• Friends

Fragment sentences are awesome. They get the job done. Like this one. And this one. And even this one!

• If you can use bold type, punctuation and bullet points together effectively…then you can officially consider yourself a qualified Internet marketing copy ninja!

4. Negative Space/Paragraphs: Let your copy breathe. What you don’t write on the page is sometimes almost as effective as what you do write. Less is very often more when it comes to website content. The best practice for balancing the copy on a page is to write out what you are going to say on your site, preview it, and then take five literal steps away from your monitor and look at your content holistically. If the paragraphs look lop-sided and the bold type is too concentrated and the margins are off from five paces away…then it’s going to look even worse when you actually challenge someone to read it while they are sitting at their computer. Balance your paragraphs with plenty of breathing room and allow your words the opportunity to look as nice as they read and you will get results.

5. Headers: Effective use of headings on your page and blog is another SEO 101 trick that every content writer must have down cold if they expect to show up in the SERPS. The HTML protocol for creating headers on a web page entails placing the phrase you want to use as a heading between the opening header tag and closing header tag . Headings are ranked in importance (essentially from most important header to least important) from

through

. Header usage is essential for SEO…but it is equally essential for the actual reader. Headers give the eye something big to rest upon.  Use keywords in your headers to snag those eyes before they click off your page, forever lost in the ether of the rest of the Internet.

6. Lists: Using lists to organize your ideas and attract readers is one of the dirtiest tricks in the book when it comes to generating web content. Think about it, how many times have you clicked on a link simply because it was purportedly to an article about “the Top Five Uses for Floor Wax in Rio De Janeiro” or “Eight Reasons You Should Poke a Beagle in the Face With a Spoon”…? You’ve done it…admit it…it’s no secret…I’ve done it too. Lists speak to a higher human desire to read structured content. Lists make people feel secure in clicking your link; they also effectively arouse our human curiosity. If you don’t believe me, honestly ask yourself whether or not you are now curious to know what the top five uses for floor wax in Rio De Janeiro actually are…see my point?

7. Style: If you’ve made it this far into my tirade on internet marketing copy, it is not because you think I possess some sort of sage wisdom that no one else possesses…I simply do not. I spent countless hours writing words and honing a distinct style of voice on the Internet so that I may effectively sell the products that I was being paid to write about. And over that time I discovered that the content that gets the most consistent conversion on a website is not that which is laden with facts or figures or written by some authority, but the content that would bring a customer into the room with me and let me show them the product myself. Personalize your website content so that you speak to your customer and not at them, and they will respond in kind.

For more copywriting and SEO tips, be sure to follow me at http://twitter.com/#!/CaptainSpaceman

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