By Karon Thackston © 2011, All Rights Reserved

Whether you’re a virtual assistant, copywriter, web design pro or search engine optimizer, keyword research is a useful and necessary service you can add to your lineup to make more money.

Anyone with a website or blog who aims to rank high in the search engines can benefit from professional-quality keyword research.

Why Would Others Pay You to Perform Keyword Research?

Because, as a trained professional, you will gather and evaluate data and make confident decisions. You won’t be an amateur who doesn’t understand the finer points of this craft and guesses at which terms are best to use where.… Read the rest

By Karon Thackston © 2010, All Rights Reserved

It’s a common question.  “What copywriting mistakes should I avoid?”  There are many, but the 3 I chose might surprise you.

Why?  Because while these can potentially cause the greatest amount of damage they are not ones most copywriters talk about.

Why?  Because these aren’t the “sexy” copywriting mistakes.  They aren’t the quick-fix aspects. They require thinking and judgment and… <gasp!>… work!  However, they are the ones that – when implemented correctly – can drastically boost the performance of your copy and content whether that be a blog post, article, web page, email or other forms of text.… Read the rest

By Karon Thackston © 2011, All Rights Reserved

It has become a fundamental principle of Internet marketing. When sending a prospect from some form of trigger (banner ad, pay-per-click ad, tweet, etc.) to the landing page, there must be continuity: the message must flow.

For example, when constructing pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns, there has to be continuity between the ad and the landing page. The use of the same keyphrases, copy that flows seamlessly from ad to landing page and other factors can make or break your campaign. If these elements aren’t in place the disconnect your visitors will suffer will confuse them and send them packing.… Read the rest

By Karon Thackston © 2011, All Rights Reserved

As I read her email I could literally feel my blood pressure rising.  She’d heard me speak at a webinar I did for Wordtracker about ecommerce copywriting where I said keyword density hadn’t been a factor in SEO copywriting for years.  The lump in my throat got bigger as Zoe (not her real name) explained why she thought the myth about keyword density simply wouldn’t die.

“Keyword density is going to remain a hot (contentious) topic. I just read an article in the “New Yorker” yesterday about the new AOL CEO: “Can Tim Armstrong save AOL?”… Read the rest

Interesting post on dot.life on the BBC News site. Someone in the UK is claiming intellectual property rights to the hashtag ‘#uksnow’. Now realizing that the patent office allows patenting life (anyone see ‘Food Inc’?) why wouldn’t they allow patenting this mark? Can you imagine every time you wanted to use a hashtag you had to worry whether someone had patented it first? What about if you built on a tag, such as #uksnowing – is it a new tag or an extension of an existing tag?

Would the large corporations start buying up patents and enforcing them, forcing the small guys into line through the treat of lawsuits?… Read the rest

By Karon Thackston © 2009, All Rights Reserved

Sometimes choosing which company to buy from is about like deciding which brand of canned peas is the best. To make matters worse, the copy on most websites doesn’t offer any help.

There are three major offenders in copywriting that I see constantly on the Internet. The first is generic copy that offers no specific differentiation points — in other words, reasons why the visitor should choose you instead of the thousands of other sites that are just a click away. The second is overused fluff copy that has no substance. And the third?… Read the rest

By Karon Thackston © 2009, All Rights Reserved

During a recent copywriting consulting call with a new client, we discussed her primary concern: having good traffic, but no sales. I’ve seen this a thousand times before. Usually, what I find is a site filled with content that is chock-full of keyphrases and sounds stupidly repetitive. The solution is easy:
Write natural-sounding, persuasive SEO copy that entices customers to buy. But this client’s site didn’t fit the stereotype.

The home-page copy needed some work, but it wasn’t awful. The category and sub-category pages had no copy at all that needed to be fixed.… Read the rest

By Karon Thackston © 2009, All Rights Reserved

It’s a common complaint.  Ecommerce site owners will contact me for help because their product pages don’t get ranked.  Among one of my standard checks is their product copy.  Very often, what I find is copy that was provided by the product manufacturers.  Or, worse yet, copy that is the exact same for a variety of products with the exception of a few words.  Both can cost you in the rankings.

Don’t Use Canned Copy

Using copy provided by product manufacturers may seem like the best way to go.  After all, you get professionally written copy for free.… Read the rest

By Karon Thackston © 2009, All Rights Reserved

Have you ever noticed that ecommerce sites have their own set of challenges when it comes to search engine optimization (SEO)? If you’re a small ecommerce site owner, I’m sure you have. One reason is copy plays such a vital role in the optimization process. Because ecommerce sites typically have significantly less content than many other types of websites, they can face struggles others don’t have.

There are a few elements you, as an ecommerce site owner, can put into practice that will boost your tendency to get ranked highly. However, you’ll need to start from the ground up.… Read the rest

By Karon Thackston © 2009, All Rights Reserved

In today’s economy, where auto and real estate sales are down, most people are focusing more on maintenance of their homes and cars rather than replacement.  That means the do-it-yourself

(DIY) market is seeing a surge as was reported recently in Internet Retailer magazine.  What did the publication recommend?

One suggestion was for auto parts and home improvement / hardware store sites to ramp up the content on their pages to help DIYers do their projects right.  But just how – exactly – do you create a page that assists others and generates sales?… Read the rest