How To Write Content For Your Website That Sells Your Services and Products

I speak to many advertisers and many potential advertisers in and around Cardiff who tell me that they’ve got a website supporting their products and services. That’s great news.

I also speak to businesses owners who pay internet companies to take care of their websites for them. They entrust these expensive internet companies (sometimes in another country), who know nothing about the business they are writing for, to drive people to their door. This isn’t so good.

Here’s the problem:

Creating content for your website isn’t easy. It takes time out of your day or money out of your pocket if you’re getting someone else to do it. But ask yourself this:

Is the content of your website actually helping you sell your services or products?

Most business owners will reflect on this and go quiet. They realise that their content is not driving people to their website and converting potential sales.

If they do decide to create some content, they’ll pick a topic about their industry at random and write about it. They will then post the article to social media and maybe send out an email to their mailing list.

Ultimately though, they will then hope that people who have come across their article will, by some stroke of luck, be sufficiently interested enough in a particular (and usually non-related!) service or product. Sound familiar? I know I’ve done it a lot in the past, I can guarantee you that!

Here’s the solution:

It’s an old cliché, but one that we here at Living Magazines have embraced since we launched our magazines for the Cardiff community back in 2007 – and that is ‘Content is King’. We don’t stuff our magazines with adverts – we like to think that our readers have a bit more class than that.

Adding relevant content to your website, if you have one, is a powerful way of converting potential customers to actual customers.

So if you want to produce content that supports and sells your products and services, here’s how to do it.

Think of the END RESULT and work backwards.

a) Begin by asking yourself which of your services or products you want to sell
b) Decide on who you think would buy this service or product
c) Break your target audience down even further into smaller categories
d) Put yourself in their shoes and think about what questions they might have about your service and product
e) Pre-empt them by answering those questions and writing this down as your content
f) Add a link to the content that will sell your service or product, or at very least, put them in touch with you
g) Add relevant and specific keywords, especially in your heading and the first line of your content to supercharge your Search Engine Optimisation

Ta-da! That’s it!

Case Study

Let’s say that you run a bike shop in Cardiff and you’re looking to create some content for your website.

Here’s the process in action:

Example 1

Focused Target Audience: People wanting to buy a first bike for their child

Questions they may have for you:
• How much might they have to pay?
• What’s the safest type of bike to buy for a child?
• Why should they buy from you and not from a major retail outlet?
• What is the quality of your bikes?
• Are there any other things they will need to buy? (helmets, safety gear etc.)
Link: Click here for our range of children’s bikes

Example 2

Focused Target Audience: People who want to cycle to work

Questions they may have for you:
• What kind of bike would suit me?
• What kind of bike would best suit the lovely Cardiff rain?
• Am I able to carry my laptop and lunch to work on it?
• How can I secure it once I’m at work?
Link: Check out our latest electric bikes and locks

Start the process by thinking about what you want to sell.

Stuck for questions that you think potential customers might have?
• Ask your current customers
• Write a FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) page
• Check out a competitor’s FAQ page
• Search for your keywords online

Decide on what you want to sell and write your content around that specific service or product! It may take an hour or so but the reward will be more potential customers connecting with you. Don’t waste time (or money) writing about things with no purpose.

Find out how you can reach the people of North Cardiff through our award-winning magazines here