Checklist helps B2B SEO copywriters boost organic search results.

As a B2B copywriter, one of the biggest challenges of writing web content is writing effective engaging content while optimizing it for search.  For me, it’s easier to write the content with the reader in mind first and then optimize the content for search engines.  I use the following B2B copywriter’s seven-step checklist and tweak the content until it’s optimized for the reader and for search engines. 

If this seems a little cumbersome, don’t worry.  As you become more proficient at writing website content, you’ll automatically think “keywords and phrases” and integrated them more seamlessly. 

B2B Copywriter’s On-page SEO Checklist

1. Optimize the page for 3-5 keywords (on a 300- to 500-word web page)
2. Are the keywords in your page title and description?
3. Are the key keywords located up and to the left on the page?
4. Are the keywords located in a headline or subhead?
5. Are some of the keywords in a hyperlink?
6. Are some of the keywords in a bulleted list?
7. Do your images have keyword-rich captions and alt img tags?

More B2B SEO copywriting resources:

Keywords and keyword density Joan Damico’s Integrated Marcom Minute

Body Text: Where to Use Keywords for Better Search Results  by Bill Egan of Interleado

SEO Copywriting:  The five essential elements to focus on by Brian Clark of Copyblogger

The nutrition label lists the ingredients based on volume per package. Items appearing first on the ingredients list are most abundant in each serving. So if you’re looking for cereal that’s low in sugar, then you’ll want to make sure that sugar is low on the ingredient list or that it doesn’t appear at all.

This is where the nutrition label is like SEO copywriting. The keywords on which you’re optimizing your page should be the first few keywords in the meta title and description, as well as in alt image tags and on-page body copy… think up and to the left. This helps search engines determine relevancy of the search query to your web page. (There’s more to relevance than SEO copywriting, but it’s a necessary part of SEO.)

Take a step back, look at your copywriting and ask yourself the following questions:

• For what 3-5 keywords are you optimizing the page?
• Are those keywords located up and to the left on the page?
• Are those keywords located in a headline or subhead?
• Are some of those keywords in a hyperlink?
• Do your images have keyword-rich captions?

Your SEO copywriting is like the cereal box.  Think of the ingredients list as the meta data, which tells search engines what to look for. Make sure that your “ingredients” include the top 3-5 keywords on which you’re optimizing the page. The on-page content is like the front and back of the cereal box; make sure the on-page copy includes those same keywords in the places noted above.

Like a nutrition label, which tells you the percentage of fat and other things you probably shouldn’t have, keyword density tells you the percentage of copy that your keywords should comprise.  It basically lets search engines know that you’re actually writing real thoughts in sentences and not simply stuffing a bunch of keywords on a page to trick the search engine into thinking your content is relevant.

You can use tools such as keyworddensity.com and googlerankings.com, which scan your
page content and assign a density number. Most search marketers recommend a density of 3%-5% and some as high as 7% on a page of about 300-500 words.

When it comes to SEO copywriting, your on-page copywriting should connect with the meta data.  You don’t want to be the box of cereal that boasts low sugar when it’s the first ingredient on the nutrition label.

Keywords are the glue that ties your B2B integrated marcom program together. It’s also good “lead gen juice.” Whether you’re running a branding campaign or a product- or market-specific program, leveraging your keywords in the content you develop can have a greater positive impact on search results and helps you provide content that your target audience is looking for. As a result, you generate more qualified leads. The first step is to know your keywords and monitor them.

Google alerts offer an easy and free way to monitor your keywords and phrases. If you already have a paid monitoring service such as Alterian or Radian 6 you can use that too. What you’re trying to discern is what’s being discussed relative to your keywords and phrases. Having this “insider information” about your keywords and phrases helps you better develop content to address the needs of your audience across all the media in your mix.

So for example, let’s say you’re monitoring for your product category, “widgets” and your brand, “Acme Widgets.” Your keyword monitoring tells you that your target is looking to apply widgets to improve production speeds and reduce production errors. If keyword phrases, “improve production speeds” and “reduce production errors” aren’t already on your list of keywords, then include them, and make sure the content you develop includes them as well.

Now, take a look at your B2B marcom mix and see if your keywords are integrated throughout the mix. While you may not have the resources to go back and change a product brochure or existing print content, you can always adapt your online content to include the right keywords. You can create an online campaign including email, PPC ads, landing page, and white paper offer all focused on a group of keywords or phrases. Remember to also include a blog post or two that includes these keywords, Tweet with your keywords and monitor the social sphere for any opportunities to comment on blogs or other communities using these campaign-specific keywords.

Integrated marketing communications based on keywords and phrases can help you drive more qualified leads into the pipeline—especially as more B2B companies place greater emphasis on online marketing.

“I don’t know how anyone can do competitive SEO without growing their social network experience.” This was a quote from Lee Odden (@leeodden), CEO of TopRankMarketing, at a PRWeb webinar. It got me thinking about B2B SEO; and B2B companies who aren’t active in social media could have what may become a gaping hole in their SEO program.

Google now displays social media content in its search engine results pages (SERP). Failure to make social media participation part of your B2B integrated marcom program could harm your company to the extent that your competitors are participating in social media. (To see if your competitors are participating, set up listening posts Integrated Marcom Minute Sept. 2009) If you’re not commenting on other relevant blogs or actively posting to your own blog, then you could be missing key opportunities to build your digital influence, which in turn influences search. I’m not just talking about blogs and comments, this includes Facebook posts, Twitter Tweets, social bookmarks… everything social.

Does real time search trump PPC?

If you think real time search doesn’t matter because you’ve already bought various keywords in your pay-per-click programs, you may want to rethink. Real time search is what’s happening right now. For once, it doesn’t matter if you or your competitors own a popular keyword or phrase. If people are talking about that keyword or term in the social sphere, the content containing the keyword or phrase will appear in the results.

Does this mean you don’t need to continue your PPC program on a given keyword? No, because you’re still getting 24/7 exposure to the keyword you buy. However, it does raise an interesting issue. The more active you are on the social sphere for a given keyword or phrase, the greater the likelihood you’ll show up favorably in the SERP.

Where is your B2B marcom program when it comes to real search?

Here are a few more resources on real-time search:

How Real Time Search in Google and Bing Can Benefit Customers and Businesses Alike (I like point number 3… People care what others have to say. This is so true for B2B considered purchases.)

Google Real Time Search (Puts real time search into perspective relative to all the social media that B2B companies are beginning to explore such as Facebook and Twitter)

Relevance Meets Real Time Web (Here it is straight from the horses mouth!)

Google Real Time Search B2B (Good article on how Google will force all B2B companies to tweet.)

SEO tips: The Secret to Google Top 10 Real Time Rankings (Good advice on how to rank well in real time search.)

At a very high level, SEO is comprised of linking, on page/meta data content and other website mechanics (e.g. redirects, trusted URL, etc.). This post speaks to the page content element that B2B copywriters need to know.

Start by examining your keywords…

Many B2B companies underestimate the importance of this exercise. From a marketing standpoint, nailing your keywords and phrases is the foundation for your online marketing communications and content strategy. If you need to coach your marcom team on how to develop effective keywords, here’s a link to one of my newsletters on keyword selection where you can download a worksheet to help you decide on the most effective keywords. Make sure you vet your keywords and phrases through a keyword tool such as Google or Wordtracker.

On-page SEO copywriting…

Optimize your website pages for the keywords and phrases—and not all on one page. Group your keywords and phrases so that any given page is optimized for 3-5 keywords. Make sure that your meta title tags and description include the 3-5 keywords/phrases for which you’re optimizing a given page. For more about on-page SEO copywriting, see my article on boosting natural page rank.

Natural SEO copywriting works for blogs too…

Apply these same rules to your B2B blog and watch page visits increase. Include keywords in your blog titles for two reasons… one, it’s good for on-page SEO; and two, the keywords in the title usually become part of the URL (especially if the keywords come at the beginning of the title). That means another boost for natural search.

Then, make sure the keywords in the title are also in the body of the blog. And if your blog post is lengthier (500+ words) break it up with H2 or H3 header tags that include a keyword if possible. But remember, keep it natural. Don’t force keywords in at the expense of good copywriting flow and tone. Start with good content and then see if you can work in a few keywords while keeping the tone and flow natural.

Connect with SEO experts…

Follow them on Twitter and subscribe to their blog posts. I’ve started a Twitter list of SEO folks so go to @copywriter4u/B2B-SEO-pros to follow the list (it’s not comprehensive by any means, but gives you a good start). The following websites have SEO news and information to which you can subscribe:

• www.highrankings.com
• interleado.com
• SEOmoz.org
• searchengineland.com
• seotrafficspider.com

Again, there are many more resources on SEO. I culled the list above as I was learning SEO copywriting and thought you might find it helpful for starters. If you have other resources feel free to add them here.
Thanks!

If you’re thinking about starting another website, remember the domain name is the first place to optimize for search. Read Choosing an SEO-friendly Domain Name.

Akhilesh Gill of SEO Traffic Spider explains whether a dot com is still the best choice, plus shares tips on length and use of special characters.

Testing has shown that the long-tail (more specific) search is usually a good indication of a higher level of interest, which leads to better conversion. That said, the total number of clicks will be much lower for long-tail phrases than for a general term, but conversions drive sales. See an older post PPC Copywriting vs. SEO Copywriting… they’re inverse.

So how can B2B marcom pros boost conversion with long-tail keywords?

Go back to the B2B buying cycle. Prospects who are further along the buying cycle, in the consideration phase, are looking for more information to help them make the right decision. In the consideration phase, you may find long-tail keyword phrases more effective, because that’s when B2B buyers begin narrowing down their searches. They may often search on solutions to specific problems instead of product categories. For example, they may search for reliability maintenance analysis using the Barringer methodology, At this stage an effective B2B marcom mix could include a white paper, webinar, online video (with complementary white paper), and blog posts–all discussing the details of reliability maintenance analysis using the Barringer method.

Taken a step further, your marcom mix should also use the long-tail keyword phrase, reliability maintenance analysis using the Barringer method, in the drivers to the previously described content–drivers being the banner ads, email blasts and Twitter tweets that drive visitors to the content. So your subject line in the email blast should include the keyword phrase as well as the twitter tweet, banner ad, etc. (In the case of a subject line, you may need to truncate the long-tail phrase slightly.)

So when you identify a long-tail keyword phrase that your prospects are searching on, develop an integrated B2B campaign around it to help move prospects closer to the buying decision. You won’t get lots of clicks, but you will get more conversions.

Here’s a good article from Julie Joyce, How to Use Long-Tailed Keywords in Your Linking Campaign.

SEO and the 1-2-3 punch:

Here’s an example that B2B marketer and blogger Tom Pick used to boost organic search. I call it the 1-2-3 punch.

• First, Tom wrote a thought leadership article for an online newsletter.
• Second, he repurposed the article as a stand-alone page on his website.
• Third, he blogged about the article.

Everything was linked, to further boost relevancy and ultimately search ranking.

That’s integrated marcom!

Check out Tom’s WebMarketCentral blog.

Learn more about successful B2B blogging. Listen to a Buzz Marketing for Technology Podcast featuring Tom Pick.

Integrating keywords into your online copy is more than simply plugging them in somewhere on the page. The point of optimizing copy is to boost relevancy in the eyes of the search engines and that in turn can boost rankings. The way to do that is to include specific keywords and phases in the follow strategic areas where possible starting with the meta data:

• meta title — this is the area at the very top of a window with the title of the page. If you’re using Internet Explorer its a blue horizontal line with white knock-out type. If you’re reading this, look up to the top of the window you should see, “Integrated Marcom Minute Blog – Microsoft Internet Explorer”

• meta tag “keywords” — this is where you place all keywords and phrases that your potential customers use to search for your products.
• meta description — this is a brief summary of the content. Some companies use a sentence from the first paragraph of the body copy and add a brief call to action.
  (Note: Although meta data is not visible to visitors, the meta description is usually displayed by search engines beneath the hyperlink when organic search results come up.)

To fully optimize for search, you have to create relevancy between the copy in the meta data, and the body copy that follows:

• h1, h2, h3…h6 headers — these are the html tags that wrap around the bold headers and subheads. For example, right click and select “view source” on this blog post. Notepad will pop up with a bunch of html code. Scroll down and to the right until you see the following header. You’ll see an h3 preceding it and a /h3 at the end.
  

  Quick Tips on Copywriting for SEO

  Note: If your just using boldface copy with no h1, h2 or h3 html tags, it’s not as effective in helping the crawlers determine page relevance.

• body copy — this is the running text that you read

Here’s how writing for SEO works (all data is fictitious):

Let’s say I search for” discrete manufacturing software for automotive manufacturing” and one of the search results is ABC Company.

Meta data:

• meta title — ABC Company ERP for Discrete Manufacturing in Automotive
  
• meta tag — discrete manufacturing, automotive discrete manufacturing, improve cost-effectiveness of discrete manufacturing, ERP plus other relevant keywords and phrases
• meta description — “Reduce automotive manufacturing costs and keep consumers happy with ABC Company ERP for discrete manufacturing. Learn how your automotive operation can operate more cost-effectively. ”

Body Copy:

• H1 — Discrete Automotive Manufacturing Can Be Cost Effective
  Copy: Discrete manufacturing is great… it let’s your customers customize their ride. But discrete manufacturing can also be costly.
• H2 — ABC Company ERP for Discrete Automotive Manufacturing helps you reduce automotive costs and keep consumers happy. (this copy taken from the meta description)
  Copy: I think you get the idea here…

See… it’s not just about sprinkling keywords throughout, it’s a strategy for placing them effectively in the right places. Search engines crawl a page hierarchy from meta data to header tags to body copy identify keyword matches. The more matches the greater the relevancy and the higher your search ranking.

Copywriting for SEO is really a frame of mind. You have think like a search crawler and write with that strategy in mind.

“Weasel Clause”: Good copywriting alone may not boost your rankings. SEO is about integrating relevant copywriting, along with other elements such as a linking strategy. There’s a synergy that takes place when all of these elements come together. The result… better rankings!

If only SEO were as simply as adding a few keywords and phrases to your copy. But many variables interplay with copy to affect SEO – meta tags, reciprocal linking, paid search ads, etc. Optimizing your copy alone won’t make your rankings soar, but it does help. So my advice is this…

Include at least a few keywords and phrases from each page’s meta data in the copy for that page. For example, if your metadata says “write better copy faster,” then the page should include the same keyword phrase where it makes sense. A good rule is to include the keyword phase in one of the H1, H2, or H3 headers as well as in the paragraph that follows. Search engines often determine relevance by the placement of keywords and phrases.