If you end up hiring out your web development, we have great marketing copywriters who will craft fantastic content for you with or without an SEO focus.
But, if you are doing it all yourself, you can still create something to be proud of with these guidelines.
Start simple, with one to five pages. A three page minimum can be a great start to get your site up and running, then add as you go along.
Standard content pages can include:
- Home Page
- Product or Service Page
- How it works page
- About us page
- Contact us page
The “Basic Three” are:
- Home page
- Product or Service page
- Contact Us page
A caveat is that retail sites must include a Shopping Cart. Please don't try to sell your wares on the net without an instant purchase method. If someone has to fill out an order form, or call you to purchase your product, they likely won't. Since so much of shopping over the web has become extraordinarily streamlined, ensure that your method is just as user-friendly for your site visitors.
Optional additional pages to add are:
- Success Stories
- Testimonials
- Press page
- Portfolio or sample page
- Newsletter page
- Company History
- Executive Bios
When developing the basic business home page, you want to explain your business and the value you bring to your customers. A good way to do this is to lay out your homepage content with three catchy titles.
Craft your titles by brainstorming a list of up to 10 key benefits. Then, choose the best three and make them section titles on your home page.
Follow each title with a short paragraph of up to three sentences each, explaining what you do for your customers. To develop these paragraphs, answer the following questions:
1. What is your main product or service?
2. What is the best reason for a customer to get excited about your product or service
3. What is the one thing that’s special about your business? i.e. customer service, fantastic products, vast experience…
Put the paragraphs together with your titles and now you have your home page!
Developing your Products or Services Page
On this page of the "basic three", stick to the three paragraphs of content model. Feature or discuss three products or services max (if you have more than three, then use subpages w/ additional details)
Each paragraph should fully describe one product or service. If you can, head each paragraph with a benefit from your original benefits list.
Products page, done!
Pretty easy, huh? It is just a matter of sitting down for a few minutes to write it all down.
An overarching thing to remember when crafting your content is to keep your pages as simple as possible.
Yes, you want good content, for SEO purposes and just to convey the awesomeness of your business, product or service on your site; but web viewers have a very short attention span. So balance this with keeping your text to a minimum and writing your web content like any other marketing material.
If you are starting from scratch with your site and other marketing materials/strategies, definitely get your hands on The Ultimate Marketing Toolkit by Paula Peters for great tips on creating effective marketing materials and writing web content. Chapter 12 is all about writing web site content, and will help you get all your content down, step by step.
