What is SEO Copywriting? What Does an SEO Copywriter Do?

Put simply, SEO content appeals to your target audience as well as Google to put it up high on the SERPs. When learning SEO copywriting, you need not to write only for Google but for users too. Because otherwise you’d unintentionally create a terrible working relationship between SEO and copywriting. Your content won’t convert readers if SEO is terrible or your content won’t rank on the SERPs even if it has potential top-quality writing. This means you want to master both of these sciences or arts, whatever you want to call it.

This blog will tell you what is SEO copywriting and how to do SEO copywriting. You will also learn common problems faced by SEO and copywriting professionals when they collaborate and how to effectively solve these issues.

Read: What is SEO Rich Text? What Are Rich Snippets in SEO?

What Defines a Perfect SEO Copy?

A perfect SEO copywriting integrates not only persuasive text but also right amounts of keywords and backlinks. SEO and copywriting are like a couple. If they don’t align properly, they could tarnish your search engine ranking and your bounce rate would go through the roof. But if the relationship between these two is harmonious, it can do wonders for your website and business. And only for this harmony you need to create strategies that can hook readers right off the bat along with enabling spiders to easily crawl your content for SEO purposes.

How to Write a Copy That is Optimized For Users and Google?

Below we walk you through the step-by-step process of writing content that ranks well on Google and captures the attention of its target audience with ease.

Step 1: Design a Data-Driven Copy Outline

When you start off writing an SEO copy, it’s obvious that you have SEO keywords already with you. Whether they were provided to you by the agency or you have researched yourself, you need to create an outline for your copy in where you easily integrate those keywords. The structure of your copy should also flow smoothly along with perfect keyword integration. We’ll talk about the structure in the second step.

Find Content Gaps

When writing an SEO copy, you can generate its subtopics to get into the detail and write a comprehensive copy. Keywords can help you lengthen your copy as well. So what you really need to do is look out for your competitors’ content and search for the content gaps. You can do it manually by comparing them and seeing what most of them miss and then create a final version that covers all the aspects of that very topic.

Use Tools

There are tools like Grammarly Premium and ahrefs explorer that can help you identify the content gaps in a copy. Go through the procedure and create a robust outline for your SEO copy before jumping on to the second step.

Read: 6 Best Social Media Sites for SEO

Step 2: Structure Your Content Perfectly

Once you have the outline ready, you need to make sure your SEO copy follows the smooth structure. Here you can integrate various copywriting formulas like PAS or AIDA. However, it’s better not to blindly stick to one of these but do a thorough beforehand analysis of your copy to understand what structure it could naturally adopt. It’s also important to give your SEO copy a twisted spin so that it looks unique and hooks the readers right off the bat.

You can also try incorporating elements like personal experiences and various other techniques a SEO website copywriter is aware of. A general rule to follow when writing an SEO copy no matter what formula you use is to follow the inverted pyramid technique.

Pyramid Technique

This means that you would start the copy with the most attention-seeking and relevant information and then come up with the second most important information. The last of your copy should have the information that you would most likely put on the top.

Take Inspiration from High-Authority Structures

Experts recommend one of the best ways to understand a copy’s structure and put the most relevant information on the top is checking out courses on popular platforms such as Udemy, Coursera and Masterclass. Let’s say you’re writing a copy for a digital marketing agency. You can search for a digital marketing course that has good reviews and ratings and see the structure it follows. You don’t want to copy it but understand it to come up with a better flow.

Step 3: Insert Keywords Using the Right Strategy

An SEO needs keywords. You need to use both keywords and keyphrases on the page you’re optimizing. The twist here that goes differently than the past SEO technique is you don’t need to repeat keywords forcefully a number of times to get it ranked high on Google. Unfortunately some SEO professionals still use this tactic only to wonder later why their strategy went in vain. Keywords should flow smoothly in a copy. Failure to do so will not only increase the bounce rate of your page as readers would sense you’re just another time-waster and Google might penalize your website for keyword stuffing.

There’s No Fix Rule for Keyword Usage

We won’t become stringent here by telling you a strategy and calling it the right one. It’s because SEO works differently. SEO professionals also have different frameworks when it comes to the keyword integration in a copy. However, the key is to use them naturally. It’s not bad to repeat keywords but repeating them to a point where it starts to feel unnatural is your red light signal to stop.

What you can do is add the keyword in your main title, the H1, a couple of H2s, H3s and the right amount of times in the text. That’s it. You don’t need to sound stupid by forcing keywords in every paragraph and sentence. However, if it doesn’t disrupt the copy’s flow and doesn’t make it look stupid, you can use the keyword as many times you want. The key here is to sound relevant and professional.

Example of Bad Keyword Utilization

No professional content would read like “Contact us for the best digital marketing services. Our best digital marketing services help you reach your business goals. Our best digital marketing services also help you stand out in the market.” You see how weird it reads just because of overusing the best digital marketing services keyword forcefully. That’s something a sane human won’t like and nor Google would.

Also add LSI keywords to your content to signal search engines about the overall theme of your copy’s topic. You can reach out to our First Growth Agency to create a perfect keyword utilization strategy for your website to make sure it ranks on the top for the right keywords. Because ranking on top for the wrong keywords isn’t something any business or brand wants.

Read: How To Do SEO For Your Images

Step 4: Perform Ongoing A/B Testing

Not every strategy you throw forward to rank well on Google performs well. That’s why ongoing editing and tweaking of your copy is necessary. Sometimes your SEO doesn’t align with its audience’s intent. It’s where iteration is required to recreate the copy. Copywriting for SEO involves stuff like creating different versions of CTA’s and testing them to see which one performs the best. Besides that, you might need to change the keywords in your content in case you first put the wrong ones.

Aim for Featured Snippet

Basic editing is also required where you remove the unnecessary fluff words from your copy to keep it flow smoothly. This process of making your SEO copy straightforward also leads to securing its place in the snippet preview section. The content that search engines put up there in the snippet automatically gets the top ranking along with more clicks from the desired target audience.

SEO and Copywriting Collaboration Problems (And Our Solutions)

Problem 1: Undermining Each Other’s Efforts

SEO professionals often undermine or undervalue the expertise of SEO copywriters, treating them as subordinate instead of collaborators. This approach wastes the opportunity to benefit from their specialized skills and experience, ultimately harming the project.

Solution: Strategic Collaboration

We help you with this problem by fostering a collaborative environment where SEO copywriters and SEO strategists work together as equals. Our approach ensures that the expertise of each team member is respected and utilized to create strategies that align content quality with technical SEO goals.

Problem 2: Keywords Usage Issue

SEOs often provide unfiltered or irrelevant keyword lists, ignoring search intent and usability, which results in ineffective content that doesn’t resonate with users or rank well.

Solution: Intent Based Keyword Integration

Our copywriting SEO services help you with this problem by conducting in-depth keyword research that prioritizes relevance, search intent, and semantic alignment. Our filtered keyword lists include clear categorization into primary, secondary, and semantic keywords, ensuring they support both SEO and user engagement goals.

Read: 5 Non Technical SEO Basics You Need to Master

Problem 3: Forcing Awkward Keyword Phrases

Insisting on the exact use of awkward keywords can compromise the readability and professionalism of the copy.

Solution: Prioritizing User-Friendly Language

We help you with this problem by crafting content that balances keyword optimization with readability. By using variations and semantic alternatives, we ensure the copy feels natural while still aligning with SEO best practices.

Problem 4: Overtrusting Automated Tools

Overreliance on tools like Yoast can result in rigid, formulaic content that lacks nuance and human touch.

Solution: Humanly Optimization

We help you with this problem by integrating tool insights with human expertise. Our team ensures that the content flows naturally while meeting SEO requirements, going beyond what automated tools can achieve.

Problem 5: Misunderstanding Non-Ranking Content

Some SEOs undervalue non-ranking content, suggesting it should be deleted without considering its purpose or potential.

Solution: Innovative Content Evaluation

We help you with this problem by analyzing non-ranking content to determine its value. Our approach includes repurposing, optimizing, or strategically retaining content to support specific business objectives, ensuring no investment goes to waste.

Final Words

Now you know everything from what is SEO copywriting and how to do SEO copywriting. Typically the relation between SEO and copywriting often locks horns, if not guided by precision, right knowledge and smooth workflow. This can involve defining roles for both professionals and working harmoniously together to solve the issues. And in case you require help of SEO copywriters that can rank your copy high on the search engines and drive quality traffic, reach out to us at First Growth Agency.