13 Techniques of SEO Copy Writing

Are you bringing in a ton of high-converting organic traffic?

No?

Let me tell you the harsh truth:

Without SEO copywriting, you’re going to fail in two ways…

1. Your content won’t rank for quality keywords
2. Your content won’t turn visitors into buyers

That’s why SEO copywriting is one of the most impactful things you can learn today for your business.

In this post, I’m going to go through some of the best examples of SEO copywriting on the web, show you direct comparisons of copy performance in A/B tests, and give you 13actionable takeaways you can use right now to help boost rankings, increase engagement, and convert more readers into buyers.

But first…

What is SEO copywriting?

Copywriting in SEO is the art and science of striking a fine balance between content that persuades and content Google can find.

You’ll notice you don’t rarely see spammy titles and descriptions in Google results anymore. For example, you’re way less likely to get a title that says ‘Removal Service Boston Removal Service Florida Removal Service’ than you are a genuinely compelling and readable title like ‘Find the cheapest Boston removal services’.

On one side, there’s on-page SEO – the part of SEO that’s relevant here: the practice of understanding which signals the Google algorithm uses, and helping it rank your content for the right keywords:

(Source)

On the flip side, there’s copywriting. Copywriting has been around for centuries, and has been refined by advertising greats like David Ogilvy and John Caples as well as living legends like Gary Bencivenga.

Put simply, copywriting is writing to persuade, convert, and sell.

Good copywriting gets clicks, shares, and opens. Bad copywriting gets swept under the rug:

Now we’ve got our definitions out of the way, let’s break down what you’ll learn in this article:

Why should you care?

As I said before, thin, spammy, unoptimized content is pretty hard to find these days. That’s because it might as well be invisible.

But, let’s look a little deeper…

Why is copywriting in SEO so important?

Let’s say it’s a perfect world. You’re ranking high for your target keyword and have great copy on display…

What happens?

Well, you’re pushing your ideal market towards an action you want them to take. That could be signing up to your mailing list, engaging with you, or even straight-up buying your product:

To be clear, you’re using the terms your buyer is searching for (SEO), hooking them with the perfect content (copywriting), and then getting results ($$$).

If you’re more of a visual person, this simple diagram from Neville Medhora over at Kopywriting Kourse sums it perfectly:

Bottom line:

Putting the right keywords in the right places in your content can have a direct impact on rankings and traffic…

While changing just a few words on a page can have a HUGE impact on your conversions.

Here’s an example of a small copy change that had a big impact on the bottom line:

Highrise boosted conversions by 30% with a single headline tweak

It’s a time-tested copywriting truism that the most prominent element on the page should be the most persuasive.

So, instead of simply calling the visitor to action and then burying the offer in the 2nd line, Highrise showed visitors they obviously have nothing to lose by creating an account.

Here’s version A:

Here’s version B (+30% conversion!):

By using a guarantee and making the user feel as if they’re not going to lose out, Highrise held the extremely limited attention of the reader for long enough to get more conversions.

If you’re running copywriting A/B tests, the headline is the most impactful place to start. As David Ogilvy said, 80% of people only read the headline.

(Source)

Let’s keep this train moving…

Brian Dean lifted organic traffic 45.52% by changing an article title

Even if you do manage to get content on the first page, there’s no 100% guarantee you’re going to outperform other articles vying for the searcher’s attention. While it’s often thought that getting the #1 spot is a surefire way to rake in a ton of targeted organic traffic, Brian Dean shows us all that it’s not the only thing that matters.

Here’s the two test variables he set up:

By using emotional triggers and curiosity (and still keeping the ‘seo campaign’ keyword), Brian Dean saw a big lift in clickthrough rates for his article after just 7 days:

Starting to see the whole little-effort-big-results thing yet? 🙂

Check out this next one…

California Closets improved lead generation by 115% by matching their ad copy and landing page copy

A massive part of copywriting is playing up to your user’s expectations. When they read your ad copy or title, they expect to get a certain information, offers or products on the page they click through to. If there’s a disconnect, the user will be confused, and confused users don’t buy.

This A/B test from California Closets proves that claim perfectly.

Here’s version A (matched messaging with ad copy):

Here’s version B (generic copy):

The copy on version A matched the ad copy exactly, so when readers landed they realized they were in the right place. This is a very subtle tweak, that generated a significant increase in conversions.

Here is another great example of message match from the folks over at GEICO. Take a look at the language used in both the title tag and meta description:

And now look at the strong message match on the landing page:

There is an important lesson here, even for the most experienced search and conversion rate experts – the sales funnel consists of many different elements and touch points, making them work together is critical to success.

Ok, let’s take a closer look at how you can use SEO copywriting techniques to get more leads, conversions, and sales.

SEO Copywriting Technique #1: Use the ‘inverted pyramid’ technique to drop your bounce rate

You can instantly spot when a blogger has come straight out of college and into the world of writing for attention, not marks:

They write steadily, weaving arguments together and only get to the point near the end of the argument.

This is great for the academic world, but no good when people have attention spans of a few seconds, and need to be hooked instantly.

The idea is simple:

You don’t end with the conclusion, you start with it. No one can be bothered to wait around for you to get the point.

(Source)

Let’s take a look at how this works in practice:

NNGROUP’S Eye-Tracking Study Reveals How People Read Your Content

Take a look at these heat maps that show the places readers eyes will go most often when they land on a website:

The thing that they all have in common is that readers will lose patience within the first two paragraphs, if you’re lucky. After those paragraphs, they’ll start to scan and see if anything attracts their attention further down.

Let’s highlight the points in each where the reader starts giving up:

Now you know the harsh reality, you need to roll with it and create content structured in a way where readers could still read in this F-shaped pattern (squint at the heatmaps), understand the content, and get hooked in to read more.

The usability masters at NNGroup recommend three ways you can do this:

• Understand readers will never read your text properly, so don’t bury the lede
• State your most important information in the first two paragraphs
• ‘Front-load’ your title, subheads and sentences with key information

But there’s another way from a source you’re probably more familiar with…

Use Brian Dean’s “APP” Method to Write a Compelling Intro

There’s no denying that Brian Dean’s posts are among the most readable on the web. And that’s no accident.

He has a pre-defined winning format for pretty much everything SEO, and writing intros is no different.

It’s what he calls the ‘APP method’:

First up, you write a paragraph the reader will agree with. Usually this will be outlining a problem they’re having if they’re reading your article.

Then, you make a promise. You say how you’ve used these same tactics to blast your conversion rate up by a million percent, and how it totally works.

Then, you give them a preview. This sentence will start with ‘In this article…’

Check it out in action:

This method works like the time-tested sales letters of the ol’ direct response age. In fact, it’s exactly the same!That particular framework was honed over almost a century, and is used even now in formats such as landing pages, blog posts, and, of course, paper mail.Here it is in the wild in a classic sales letter written for Agora Financial:

Saying ‘it works’ is so obvious it’s a truism. It’s become a refined formula over the years, and — if you can use it properly — it proves that long copy sells.

SEO Copywriting Technique #2: Write a Kick-Ass, Optimized Title Tag

Quick riddle: What do 100% of people read but 80% of people disregard instantly?

Your headlines!

Don’t worry, that’s not an insult or comment on your ability — just the simple truth.

Let that statistic sink in and motivate you to write an incredible headline that:

The tricky thing about copy is that it seems so simple. When it’s done well, you don’t even notice because you’re focused on the action it wants you to take. When it’s done badly, you don’t even notice because you’ve tuned it out.

Let’s look past that and really start to pick apart some search optimized headlines, and why they work.

Simply Additions: “The Best Lawnmowers Exposed”!

As effective as this headline is, I’d be lying if I said it didn’t make me chuckle:

Even with the dullest subject matter on Earth, this title manages to make it juicy. It’s as if these lawn mowers were previously a secret weapon of all grass enthusiasts but now they’ve finally been revealed for you.

Check out that description, too. Simply Additions has managed to make something sexy and scandalous out of the a pedestrian garden upkeep tool.

Copywriting techniques used:

• Brand name-dropping (Lowes, Home Depot)
• Power words (Best)
• Sensationalism (dirty secrets, exposed)

Look at it this way. The page is from 2012, has a drastically lower domain authority and isn’t as well optimized for the exact search term as the others on the page.

Despite all this, it’s outranking Amazon. It could well be that the high click-through rate is keeping it there against all odds.

According to Moz, “title tags have long been considered one of the most important on-page SEO elements”.

They directly impact SERP engagement metrics which are becoming a more heavily weighted ranking factor in search algorithms:

Zendesk: “Beautifully Simple Help Desk Software”

Now let’s check out the messaging as it shifts between the user’s intent in Google, and their intent on the landing page:

From the success of this search result for the keyword ‘help desk software’, it shows the two different titles and the two different frame of mind users are in when they’re reading them.

The first — from the Google search result — is “Beautifully Simple Help Desk Software”. Zendesk is playing on the misconception that help desk software is ugly and hard to use with this title.

The second — from the landing page — is “A better customer experience starts with better help desk software”. This title inserts the keyword elegantly, and promises a benefit — a better experience for your customers.

Balancing the benefits of a product against the features is a time-tested copywriting technique. It’s all about finding what works between explaining what your product can do, and what your buyer can get out of it.

People have little interest in purchasing a bed. What they want is a good night’s sleep.

Gregory Ciotti
Helpscout

Basically:

People have little interest in having to get an extra piece of software to communicate with customers. What they really want is a better customer experience without the hassle of difficult-to-use software.

SEO Copywriting Technique #3: Write a Compelling Meta Description (that Includes Your Target Keyword)

Meta descriptions are the next thing people read after the title. It appears under every search result, like this:

Why is it important?

If you have written an awesome title, and your meta description is trash, you’re killing your chances of getting the click.

Want to know why?

Because not only are you failing to persuade the searcher that your link has the most value, you’re actually telling Google that your link doesn’t deserve its ranking.

Let me phrase that differently:

For every link that gets clicked on the first page that isn’t yours, it hurts your ranking potential.

And it doesn’t stop there.

Meta descriptions like this:

(Source)

Will often appear when people share your content across other websites and social media channels:

As you can see, meta descriptions not only have an impact on engagement across organic search results, it also impacts engagement across other areas of the web.

Bottom line:

Don’t just take your chances on whatever Google decides to pull up from your article as the meta description. Use a tool like Yoast to give yourself full control over it for every post and page you create:

Yoast also analyzes your content for keyword optimization and helps you stay within the character limits.

According to Neil Patel, meta descriptions should be:

Let’s try and find some great examples.

Live Bold and Bloom: How to Stop Procrastinating

This meta description ticks most (if not all) of the boxes:

It’s descriptive because it tells you how many ways to stop procrastinating will be in the article. It’s persuasive because it sells the benefits of its teachings (be motivated, more productive, get things done).

And most of all, it’s in line with the searcher’s intent.

It’s not how to stop procrastinating and walk the dog. It’s not how to stop procrastinating and buy a printer…

It locks in with exactly what the searcher wants, which is to get more done!

While meta descriptions are not a ranking signal for Google, they are an important element of the search experience, directly impacting SERP engagement. Imagine how much trash we’d accidentally read without them!

Plus, if your keyword is in there, Google will bold it.

Take a look at the average SERP. Apart from the knowledge graph and rich snippets, the title tag, URL and meta description are the three components that make up your search result, and are the 3 elements searchers use in deciding whether to click through to your site or not:

(Source)

The meta description takes up the most space, contains the most information, and will be read longer. Don’t waste the real estate!

This is eye-catching for a skim-reader, and quickly shows them that your article is relevant. This increases SERP click-through rates, which does impact rankings.

As Dr. Pete Myers wrote back in 2012:

The first metric I think Google makes broad use of is direct Click-Through Rate (CTR) from the SERPs themselves. Whether or not a result gets clicked on is one of Google’s and Bing’s first clues about whether any given result is a good match to a query. We know Google and Bing both have this data, because they directly report it to us.

Dr. Pete Myers
Moz

Both Google and Bing look at and report on this data:

As Myers puts it: “Relevant results drive more clicks”. 

A couple more examples to highlight the importance of a good meta description:

Good example – “best burgers in London”:

(Source)

The target keyword is highlighted in the description, “mouth-watering” descriptive language is used to hook the reader, and the fact that experts have tested the food implies credibility in the article.

Bad example – “best burgers in London”:

The target search term is not bold, negative language leaves a bad taste in your mouth (no pun intended), and it fails to align closely with the search intent – people don’t care about the history, they want to know where they can sink their teeth into a delicious burger right now.

Action item:

If you’ve left your meta-descriptions up to chance in the past, it’s time to install a tool like Yoast or All in One SEO and get optimizing! It’s well worth it when you can stop your meta-descriptions looking like this:

Improve your meta description, boost your CTR and climb the rankings.

iSPONIAGE: Adwords body copy A/B test

I’m going to prove now that meta descriptions do matter for SEO copywriting with some cold, hard facts:

iSpionage published the results of an A/B test where they changed the body copy and kept the headline the same.

Here’s the two variations:

Can you guess what happened?

The top variation outperformed the bottom one by 42.86%.

Why do you think that is?

At a glance, the top ad gives you the benefit right away. One glance and you know that iSpionage helps you find profitable keywords faster. A direct benefit to the end user.

Surely that’s more valuable than why PPC experts trust and blah blah blah. Apparently, it’s 42.86% more valuable 🙂

SEO Copywriting Technique #4: NEVER overlook the importance of the first sentence

Listen to Joseph Sugarman. He’s one of the best copywriters of all time, and here’s what he says:

Your copy should be a slippery slope.

(Source)

Your copy should drag readers down the page, enticing them, giving them value, and keeping them from bouncing.

Your readers should be so compelled to read your copy that they cannot stop reading until they read all of it as if sliding down a slippery slope.

Joseph Sugarman
Expert Copywriter

Here is a famous example from legendary copywriter John Caples published in the 1920s:

(Source)

A descriptive image and a headline that sucks you into finding out what happens next. This open loop leads into a compelling story that would appeal to anyone wanting to learn how to play the piano.

A more modern example of Ramit Sethi’s Zero to Launch course:

(Source)

The breakdown:

Ramit starts with a powerful headline that grabs your attention. It then pulls you further down the page with a compelling subheadline, and agitates the pain point many people have – ditching the 9-to-5 and creating a more flexible lifestyle where you aren’t selling your time for money.

Not to mention he uses some pretty compelling social proof to hook the reader 🙂

Pretty cool, right? 

Here’s a more simplified version of Noah Kagan’s Monthly 1K course:

Who doesn’t want to create a $1,000 month business?

The headline is clear, the sub headline agitates a pain point of entrepreneurs who have failed in the past, and hooks the reader by proposing a proven formula for success that can be applied to any industry or business type.

Kudos to the Sumo crew!

BUT…

Headlines aren’t the only way to get your readers on a slippery slope…

Another great way to hook ’em early is write a bad-ass first sentence, like this:

Who could refuse that, right?

As Dean Evans says, an opening line exists purely to draw your eyes to the second line, and the second line’s job is to make you read the third.

Here’s why you should care about this from an SEO perspective:

If you don’t hook your reader within 15 seconds — probably the time it takes to read the first sentence and look at the header image — they’re gone. And when Google notices a reader dropping off your site without reading the content, they’ll drop you.

Dean Evans advises you to make sure your opening sentence uses one of the following devices:

• Curiosity (“You’ll never guess what happened to me this morning, before I even had my coffee…”)
• Question (“Did you know there are just two things you can do to avoid getting penalized by Google?”)
• Empathy (“I bet you wish you were a super hero.”)
• Surprise (“Everything you’ve ever heard about how much sleep you need is wrong.”)
• Statistics (“16% of startups don’t make it past the first two years.”)

And another good tactic he uses is to just delete your first paragraph. Depending on how you edit your content, you might spend the first few lines rambling and get to the good stuff later. See what works for you.

I’ve already looked at Brian Dean’s scary-good first sentences, so here’s another example:

Hiten Shah’s bombshell opener

“Two tweets about raising money was all it took to get 81 email responses and 53 customer development calls with founders…”

*explosion sound effect*

If that doesn’t make you go “how the hell did he do that?!”, I don’t know what will.

This fantastic opener uses statistics, surprise, and curiosity to deliver an absolute bombshell. It makes the readers ask what the tweets were, who all these people are, and what’s the rest of the story?

The title draws people in who feel vulnerable about their ability to raise money, and then the opening line establishes Hiten Shah as a true authority who really knows what he’s doing.

After all, Hiten has started three SaaS companies – KISSmetrics, Crazy Egg and Quicksprout.

The article also uses storytelling, which is an important copywriting element every human being on the planet can relate to.

In fact, it’s in our DNA to enjoy stories and it’s something we’ve been doing since we learned to etch animal drawings into caves in France 30,000 years ago.

SEO Copywriting Technique #5: Use message matching (or get a huge bounce rate)

Lunch time? You’ll love this analogy:

Writing for WordStream, Raphael Paulin-Daigle explains message matching brilliantly…

Let’s say you’re hungry and want burritos. You leave your office and take a stroll down the street to find a place to eat a burrito. You find one, but as soon as you step inside, you get a surprise: the odor of alfredo sauce and pizza dough. Turns out the restaurant, advertised as a burrito shop from the outside, is an Italian restaurant inside. Bummer. Doesn’t make sense, does it? Disappointed, you leave to go find something else.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle
SplitBase

If you’re giving off the wrong signals in your title and meta description, you’re basically being the burrito shop that doesn’t serve burritos. And you better believe that place has a high bounce rate.

Wrike: Mismatched messaging for competitor keywords

You’ve seen this one before:

Type any product name into Google and you get their competitors buying ads and slamming them.

Here’s Wrike trying to catch Basecamp leads:

The landing page on its own is fine — a classic example that makes no mistakes. The PPC ad that took me there, however…

Well, just check the URL. The slug is basecamp-vs-wrike. When I land here, I’d like to at least get one reason that I shouldn’t choose Basecamp! And don’t think I’m trying to distort the truth either, because what I’m showing you above is 100% of the landing page.

In my opinion, that’s not how you steal leads off Basecamp. People searching Basecamp are already moving beyond the middle of the funnel. Navigational keywords indicate the searcher has an idea what they want, and why they want it, so they’re not going to fall for a platform that doesn’t attempt to differentiate itself in the slightest.

Plan.io: Message matching done right (in the simplest way possible)

How can you avoid confusing and alienating visitors, you ask?

It’s stupidly simple…

Use the same copy on your ad as you do in your landing page.

Plan.io knows the score:

While the copy isn’t broken up into chunks for readability, you can quickly scan it and realize that you’re just being sold on the same features you wanted when you clicked through on the PPC ad.

It’s a technical and specialized product, so it’s written for people who know what they want and optimized for people who search workflow knowing full well what features they’re looking for. The copy under the button is also top notch, because a common limitation with SaaS product free versions is that the features are locked out. Anyone who was unsure about hitting that big green CTA has had their worries put aside.

SEO Copywriting Technique #6: Mimic your ideal customer’s language

It’s obvious…

If you know the language your ideal customer uses, you’re going to be able to make a connection with them that other marketers aren’t.

It’s not just for keyword research. Using language that rings true with your market helps persuade and convert.

It’s simple to find the language your target market uses. As the old marketing rule goes, you just need to find the place they hang out.

Here’s a few:

• ​Forums (use a forum search engine like BoardReader)
• Reddit (search their list of subreddits)
• Blog comments
• Quora
• Twitter

Brian Dean noticed while browsing SEO forums that people often asked ‘why does Google hate my site?’. Being the smart guy he is, he capitalized on this by writing a post targeting those keywords.

If people are asking a question in a forum, you can be pretty sure they didn’t get a straight answer from the search engines.

In short, it’s a gold mine.

Let’s look at the example:

Brian Dean: “Google Hates My Site”

Brian is known for going after big keywords.

Things like ‘backlinks’ and ‘SEO tips’. He eats them for breakfast.

So why did he target something low traffic like ‘Google hates my site’? The answer is because he saw that the exact niche community he targets uses that phrase regularly in forums.

Check this out:

The thing is…

Brian didn’t then go and write a post to target that little keyword. Instead, he noticed it whilst writing another post about TrustRank. He optimized the title tag so he could both rank for his target term and draw in that niche SEO audience he noticed on the forums.

SEO copywriting at its finest. Not only does it catch the first page for its target keyword, it also hits the emotional triggers and pain points of the searcher:

SEO Copywriting Technique #7: ALWAYS call the reader to action

Here’s a simple one that a lot of people seem to overlook:

If you don’t ask for something, you’re not going to get it.

Not using a call to action in your title, description, landing page, or blog post? Your reader won’t know what they’re supposed to do next.

You’ve put a ton of work into the copy, and by the end of it, the reader is sold and looking to click a big button saying ‘GIVE ME THIS!’… What if it’s not there? Are they going to spend more than 5 seconds looking for it?

No.

They’re going to press back, go to the next Google result and hit that call to action somewhere else instead.

Now, there aren’t a lot of tests done into whether using a call to action increases conversions of not, because people smart enough to A/B test are smart enough not to leave their money on the table. I did, however, find this:

A/B Test: Using a Call to Action vs. No Call to Action

Let me tell you… the results of this test are no surprise whatsoever.

Variation A tells you what it is you’re clicking on. Variation B, on the other hand, tells you why you should click it, which is much more effective — especially with a call to action to learn more at the end.

The outcome? Version B boosted clicks by 2666%!

Mention: Get more shares by Asking for a tweet

In all of their posts, Mention extracts the key points and then sprinkles ‘click to tweet’ calls to action throughout.

It’s not just passive sharing buttons on the right-hand side of the page, but several targeted calls to action throughout meaning that readers have a chance to tweet a quote that resonates with them.Tweeting quotes is a popular thing to do because it makes users feel like they’re gaining the respect of their peers, and helps them build self confidence.

But, don’t just stop there…

Add sectional share links within your articles:

This makes it easy for readers to share your content continuously as they are reading down the page. This tactic has helped me generate over 20,000 social shares with just 15 blog posts:

Apart from the engagement signals, the increased social sharing helps get more eyeballs on your content, which often leads to more traffic and links.

SEO Copywriting Technique #8: Use battle-tested formulas for your headlines and subheadlines

You know the best place to find SEO copywriting?

Google search results and landing pages.

We’ve looked a lot at Google search results so far, but now we’re going to focus on landing pages.

You don’t have as many words at your disposal on a landing page as you do in a blog post, so you had better make them count. Especially since landing pages need to be the most high-converting pages on your site.

Let’s take a look at a couple of examples first to get an idea of the anatomy:

Elements:

• Benefits
• Call to action
• Image that conveys value

Elements:

• Benefits
• Features
• Call to action
• Image that conveys value

From these two examples, you’ve pretty much got the idea of what a landing page consists of. A quick glance at the product, some finely tuned copy on the benefits, and a call to action.

In a study of 87 SaaS startup landing pages, Benjamin Brandall found that while landing pages do share some major similarities, most make a few grave mistakes:

1. 61% of headlines do not sell the benefits of the software
2. 42% of headlines contain jargon
3. 80% of headlines use no social proof

More importantly, however, the study found that every single landing page headline in the data set could be boiled down to 9 formulas.

The 9 Proven landing Page Headline Formulas

SEO Copywriting Technique #9: Skyrocket Time on Page and Engagement

You have the attention span of a goldfish.

Ok, that might be a little harsh, but it’s not so far from the truth.

As soon as you (or anyone who visits your blog) sees a block of text they can’t instantly skim, it’s likely they’re going to bounce like a rubber ball dropped off the Eiffel Tower.

Check the difference:

What you’re looking at here is the difference between scannable text (2) and something very few people have the patience to read (1).

The features of scannable text include:

• One sentence paragraphs
• Short enticing lines that draw the eye further down the page (Well…)
• Questions
• Bullet points
• Ellipses

But it’s not all about the copy. (As much as copywriters would love to believe.)

Buildzoom increased Time On page by 150% by using multimedia

This really is one simple trick that will improve your search rankings. Since Google looks to bounce rate and time on page as an indication of quality, you need to be taking advantage of the lessons learned from this A/B test:

While working at PRWeb, Jiyan Naghshineh Wei found that pages with multimedia outperformed pages without by about 30 seconds (from 2:18 to 2:47). As well as this, he found that 90% of bloggers and journalists reported that images improved the reception of their media releases.

Taking these lessons and applying them to BuildZoom — a marketplace for contractor jobs — he first started by replacing the generic image people get when they don’t have a profile picture with building-related stock images, like this:

This increased time on page by 10%, but he wasn’t satisfied yet…

Since BuildZoom had started to build a library of remodeling images, they implemented a widget that showed visitors examples of remodeling work in their area.

Here’s the amazing part:

It rocketed time on page by 150%! 

SEO Copywriting Technique #10: Don’t Stuff, use Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) keywords

What if there was a way to rank for more targeted, long tail keywords with just a tiny bit more work?

Well, here’s the thing:

Google has a system where it secretly associates your terms with other keywords, and if you can target those keywords you’re signaling that your content is the perfect fit for the search.

Check this out:

Google’s algorithm has flagged ‘sparkling water’ and ‘carbonated water’ to be semanticallysimilar and is treating them as exactly the same thing.

So, in short, you can use LSI terms to rank for a wider variety of keywords.

It gets even easier, too…

You can instantly generate LSI keywords with LSIGraph:

After that quick job’s done, just go ahead and make some edits to your article. Don’t constantly refer to SEO by its acronym, write ‘search engine optimization’ at some point. It’s really easy to just sprinkle these keywords into your finished article and should only take about 5 minutes to squeeze a few in.

Let’s take a look now at an article that uses LSI keywords and check the long tail keywords it’s ranking for.

‘List Building’ LSI Long Tail Keywords Ranking

In my 2015 blog post I targeted the keyword ‘list building’, but sprinkled LSI keywords throughout, such as ’email list building’, ‘list building strategies’ and ’email marketing’.

See what happened?

As a result, I managed to scoop up a ton of extra long tail LSI keywords. All of those volume 10 keywords really start to add up.

SEO Copywriting Technique #11: Use numbers in headlines to skyrocket CTR

Which sounds better?

• Tips for growing better organic vegetables
• 7 tips for growing better organic vegetables

The thing is, our clicks are valuable.

No one wants to dive headfirst into an article not knowing whether it’s just 2 tips or 100 tips. What if I don’t have time for 100 tips! What if 2 tips isn’t enough?!

It makes people nervous if they don’t know exactly what they’re getting.

And that’s why using numbers in headlines is one of the best ways to boost your CTR in Google, and social share count.

Check this:

The facts are obvious: numbers in headlines have the highest correlation with preference, preference meaning the gold dust of internet marketing: clicks.

Bonus Tip:

As you will see in the next section, there has never been more content competing for your reader’s attention – more content, more channels, more publishers all competing for attention and mind share. This means readers are extremely picky on what titles they decide to click on in the SERPs.

Humans don’t like uncertainty.

So:

To increase CTRs and engagement, you should also remove ambiguity from your headlines:

(Source)

For example:

Using the data above, instead of writing a heading like “What are natural remedies to remove cellulite?” (question headlines are least preferred)…

Try something a little more concrete like this one from the folks at Health Ambition:

There is zero ambiguity in the headline. The readers knows exactly what they will get from the article.

BuzzFeed has found a tremendous amount of success with this headline formula:

You only have to use a tool like Ahrefs’ Content Explorer to see what I mean:

Finding Winning Headlines with the Ahrefs Content Explorer

For this example, I’m going to use one particularly internet marketing-related niche, and one niche that isn’t anything to do with it.

I want to show you that numbers in headlines aren’t just the stuff of conversion-mad marketers, but something that gets everyone everywhere excited. Here’s the top results for ‘ecommerce’:

Again, people like to know what they’re getting. It could be that these articles are from popular domains where everything they write gets a good amount of shares, but it also could be because the headline itself is magnetic.

Here’s a non-marketing related topic: iPhone tips…

Again, it’s the same story.

If you want more proof, why don’t you check the share counts of Buzzfeed’s headlines. Love them or hate them, Buzzfeed has become an enormously successful media outlet, all because of its snappy headlines and tell-it-like-it-is content:

Yeah, those share counts are downright ridiculous. And most of it is about something pretty mundane: home life.

Numbers, numbers, numbers.

Numbers also get you links. Check out the characteristics of the four most linked ‘productivity tips’ posts:

They are all very specific about what the reader’s going to get if they click through. Even James Clear’s post, which technically doesn’t have a number, promises that there is just one productivity tip.

In the book Made to Stick, Chip Heath and Dan Heath found based on their research that ideas stick for 6 reasons, one of which is that it’s concrete. That’s part of the psychology behind why numbers in headlines work so well.

Peep Laja from ConversionXL puts it well:

People won’t remember vague stuff. What helps people understand new concepts is concrete language. Concreteness is an indispensable component of sticky ideas. Don’t say ‘fast acceleration’, say 0 to 60 mph in 3 seconds.

Peep Laja
ConversionXL

So, remember. To get a reaction from your copy, whether it’s the opening line or a headline, there should be a number in there.

SEO Copywriting Technique #12: Stop “Skimmers” in their tracks and boost reader engagement

Steve Krug said it best in his book, “Don’t Make Me Think“:

We don’t read pages. We scan them.

Steve Krug
Author, “Don’t Make Me Think”                 

Truth is:

Humans are now believed to have a shorter attention span than goldfish.

The days where people read your article from start to finish are all but gone. In fact, only 16% of people will read every word in your article.

And:

Every man and their dog knows that in order to make text more readable, it should include images, be broken out into shorter sentences and include easy-to-scan subheadings.

So, what’s the big deal?

There is nothing inherently wrong with scanning content. I do it all the time.

But, remember:

Your goal is to engage readers and keep them on your site as long as possible. 

One of the easiest ways to do this is use subtle visual cues to stop readers while they are in scan mode.

Krug recommends using a billboard style design within your content – use language, layout, media and color contrasts to draw the eye, capture attention and stop the reader.

In other words:

Don’t try and be like Wikipedia, unless you are Wikipedia.

Instead, follow the example of large publication sites like Gizmodo:

And other successful sites in your niche:

My friends Gael and Mark from Authority Hacker use a range of visual formatting elements to capture and keep the attention of their readers, including images, banded call outs, checklists and action boxes.

Here are a few subtle visual cues you can use in your articles:

Quote Boxes

You’ve seen them throughout this post:

And on other notable websites:

Quote boxes provide an easy way to create color contrast, and use influential figures to capture the attention of readers.

Interactive Assets

The folks over at Ahrefs have some pretty compelling data to back their product:

And while big bold text is effective, there are other ways to highlight compelling data points:

See what I did there?

Rather than just skim over the text, a reader might stop and wait to see where the counter ends.

Watching the number grow is a powerful way to quantify value and capture the attention of your readers.

Action Boxes

Most readers love content that is actionable.

Not only do “Action boxes” create another opportunity for color contrast, they imply value. Readers can quickly find the meat inside the post.

Sectional Banners

Use media to break up key sections in your content. This technique is particularly effective if you have long form content or list posts like this one:

Or this one:

It does require a little extra leg work, but the end result is a much more professional, cleaner looking piece of content that will stop the readers eye multiple times as they scan down the page.

Pull Quotes

You don’t always need to create custom images or interview an expert to break up text. You can leverage existing content, but just present it in a different way.

Smashing Magazine uses “pull quotes” to stop skimmers:

Now:

Don’t get pull quotes confused with block quotes. 

Pull quotes are short excerpts from the presented text. They are used to pull a text passage out of the reader’s flow and give it a more dominant position in the post or the article.

A simple way to break up text and draw the eye of your readers.

SEO Copywriting Technique #13: Make it easy for readers to find exactly what they are looking for (FAST)

Think about how you use the web – you search for specific information, and if you don’t find it (easily) you click away from the page.

Moral of the story?

Make it dead simple for your readers to find exactly what they’re looking for.

The easiest way to do this:

Descriptive jump links:

It’s like a traditional table of contents that allows your readers to quickly navigate to a section of high-interest in your content. This strategy feeds into readers scanning behaviors (mentioned above). Use it to your advantage, not against it.

For example, I used one in this list building post to make it easy for readers to find specific list building tactics they were most interested in learning:

Rather than scroll through thousands of words trying to see if there is something of interest in the post, I make it easily for readers to find what they are looking for in seconds.

But, here’s the real kicker:

You need to get creative with your jump link text.

Build excitement or curiosity to compel people to find out more. Check out #23 above (“The Great Pixel Land Rush”), it creates a sense of curiosity.

How about #4 below (“How to 4x your email subscribers in under 5 minutes”)? Yes please!

Get to work right now on these SEO copywriting tricks

You’ve read the article, so now it’s over to you.

Step 1: Tweet this article.
Step 2: Leave a comment telling me which technique you’re going to implement.
Step 3: Go and implement the technique right now.

Talk to you in the comments below.