How do you approach creating content that not only drives traffic but also converts readers into leads or customers?

New Content

 

First things first, if you are only starting content production, and conversion is your main goal, you need to start with the "bottom of the funnel" content.

 

That is, first cover all the keywords and topics that have commercial intent attached to them.

 

90% Of the businesses we’ve helped grow online already had an audience looking to buy what they were selling. That’s the audience you need to harvest first before you even think of addressing the unaware and uninterested.

 

If you blog up from the bottom of the funnel, you get to revenue faster. Message me if you need help creating a professional content plan for any purpose.

 

Published Content

 

The easiest fix for improving the conversion rate of your content is to actually add calls to action throughout your blog posts.

 

We’ve done this both while producing new content and optimizing existing blogs - and it always gets the number up.

 

You’d be surprised at how few businesses insert relevant and organic calls to action into their blog posts consistently.

 

Here’s a couple of best practices to follow:

 

1) Don’t wait until the end

Don’t just have one call to action at the end of the text.

Like it or not, very few people scroll until the end of your post. 

Have a call to action early on, and have several of them later.

/I already had one at the beginning of this post!/

Ideally, every meaningful section of the article needs to end with a call to action.

 

2) Customize everything

Don’t use generic calls to action and repeat “click here”, “sign up” or “visit our store” in every post you publish. 

Instead, always urge your readers to do specific things they’ve just read about. 

If you are writing about hotel booking, tell them to book a hotel in 5 minutes now.

If you are reviewing kids’ bikes, tell them to download a printable kids’ bikes' features checklist to capture their email.

 

3) Short and clear

While longer posts may perform better SEO-wise, they usually suck conversion-wise, unless they are super-informative thought leadership pieces.

So, publish short, focused, and specific content properly segmented into meaningful topics (we can help with that), get right to the point, and use specific calls to action early on.

 

Give it all out for free.

 

Now to the more strategic stuff: publish 98% of your expertise for free.

 

First and foremost this concerns service businesses, but if you sell products you can still apply this logic. It works both with blog posts and downloadable content you use for lead generation.

 

This tip seems counter-intuitive to beginner business owners, but you will get more conversions if you give all your secrets out in your free content.

 

The reason is the people who hire you need someone competent and transparent to do the job. They can often do it in-house, but they have chosen to outsource it.

 

No matter how simple your processes seem when you lay them out in the open, you will still be getting orders from the people who want you to untie their hands. 

 

And frankly, that’s how you filter out the best clients too. You don’t really want to work with those that are looking for magic pills and secret methods, because chances are, they will never be satisfied. 

 

Experienced businesses want to work with those who are transparent and do simple things consistently well.

 

This has worked for us at WebCopyLand - once we prioritized answering all pre-sales questions in great detail, run free calls and evaluations, we started closing more deals for content planning and strategy research.

 

If you need any help with your content strategy, be it planning, audits, or anything else - we'd be happy to help, just send me a message!

Here's the thing, driving traffic is important, but converting that traffic is where the magic happens. So this is a great question. Generating leads and increasing subscribers are two essential data points for your investment in content.  

Here's how I recommend finding a balance between the two:

1. Tailor your content to match the different stages of the buyer's journey - awareness, consideration and decision-making. Make sure you understand what users are looking for and align your content to their goals.

2. Have clear calls to action (CTAs). It should be super easy for users to take the next step in the journey. Every piece of content should include a clear purpose and call to action. (note: I like to see these in the Content Brief.) 

3. Provide value. Most people want to either solve a problem or get educated about a problem. When you want to convert more traffic into leads know the pain points of your target audience and speak to them.

4. Lead magnets are golden. Offer visitors exclusive content in exchange for their contact info. It's a fair exchange that allows you to build your lead database while still providing value.

5. Combine SEO and CRO (there are so many acronyms in digital marketing today but these two are important). Optimize your content for search engines (SEO) to drive organic traffic and also for conversion rate optimization (CRO). Always include user-friendly design (inline with your brand) and compelling calls to action. 

Make sure you tick each box and track your metrics. Then rinse and repeat to upscale your content creation results.