How to refresh your website copy
You have probably been told to ‘update your website’ and ‘make sure you copy is fresh and up-to-date’ …but it’s not always as simple as it sounds!
What can you update?
What can you change?
What can you improve?
To make sure you are making the most of all elements of copy on your website, here are five areas to consider and, remember, even small edits can make a big difference to readability, SEO, user experience and time spent on your site.
1. Use your analytics
It is worth starting by looking at some data or analytics related to your website, before making any changes. Make sure you have access to some basic information about your site and its pages, that you understand, including statistics about how many visitors you get, the length of a visit, top visited pages, keyword searches, etc.
Take a look at this and do a bit of analysis. Which pages are most popular? Which are rarely visited? Where are your website visitors from? How do they find your site? What is leading them to you?
Once you have answered these types of questions, consider how you can rework your website content to capitalise on this.
So, for example, if a page is particularly unpopular, would a refresh encourage more visits? Is it that the headings are confusing? Could you offer more links from other page to the unpopular one? Can you help visitors navigating around your website better with clearer calls to action and/or buttons. Equally, it’s worth considering if those pages which are rarely visited may be unnecessary. Is it worth streamlining your site a little or adding the information contained on a less popular page to another page, and condensing the information?
2. Check the accuracy of key information
I think the hardest thing for most small businesses is considering what is the ‘core’ or ‘key’ information customers will want to know and remembering to include it all. Forgetting the absolute obvious happens far too often. I have visited websites for physical places and found it really difficult to identify the location of the place, with a map or address details hidden somewhere at the bottom of a contact page or about us page, for example.
If I visit a website about a café, as lovely as it is to see photos of cakes and a description of the atmosphere, my priority is to find out where it is and when it is open! Make sure this copy is not only on your website but it is easy to find … and, if necessary, repeated.
Think about frequently asked questions you get asked by those making enquiries or by first-time clients. Then consider, are the answers to these questions easily found on your website? If not, make that information more visible.
Website visitors are ‘skimmers’, at best, and you have seconds to grab their attention and put the information they are looking for front and centre. If they can’t find it, they will go back and move on to another site.
Clear signposts are often essential – so check the names of your pages, ‘labels’ or names used in page titles and menu items, as well as headings.
3. Update copy that is outdated
How many of you are guilty of leaving old products or offers on your homepage for months on end? Remember to update any Christmas content early in January, for example. I don’t want to see an Easter offer in July!
It makes your website look ‘unloved’ if you leave outdated information on your site doesn’t reflect well…it is not a good look for a vibrant, engaging, ever-evolving, well-organised small business.
Check other areas of your site for ‘outdated’ pieces of information too – are your opening hours still accurate? Are prices all up-to-date and consistent? Good business practice is to do a price check at least annually – checking competitors and seeing what items could handle a small increase (or perhaps a decrease) to help sales. Is it time for a special offer or January sale?
Also, consider sections like your ‘About page’ – is the information still relevant? A lot of people, when writing an ‘About us’ section, say things like they are just starting out, or state the number of years of experience, or perhaps talk about past experiences. These can become less relevant as time goes by.
The other concern is some website copy is not very future proof – so, for example, if you say ‘Really excited to start x this year’ or something about a product or item being ‘new’, it will date quickly. It’s ok to use this language but you have to make a note that the content will need to be checked and updated regularly.
Finally, what can you add? Have you had been to any events you could mention or want to advertise? Have you won any awards or achieved something which is relevant and should be added to your About page? Have you expanded your business, but not added this to your website? Make sure your content is up-to-date and all encompassing.
4. Proofread and improve readability
A thorough proofread is always worthwhile and if you wrote or had the copy written for your website a while ago and haven’t changed any of the main pages since, you will proofread a lot more effectively. Or get someone else to do it!
Don’t only look for typos or grammatical mistakes, also consider your wording choices. As your business changes and develops, check your style and tone matches where your business is right now. Is your website ‘on brand’ and ‘on message’? Does it match the style of other content you offer, such as social media and email marketing?
Consider the overall readability for each page:
check your sentence length – shorter sentences are better and easy to follow
use short paragraphs – white space (lines between paragraphs) is important between chunks of text…and those chunks shouldn’t be too long (remember how much longer copy will look on a phone vs a desktop!)
include headings and subheadings to help visitors navigate your page and get the key messages/core content quickly
use ‘plain English’ suitable for your audience – you shouldn’t dumb down but ensure your copy is appropriate for your target audience
make button and link text transparent – Google rates ‘clear’ links highly. So if you are offering a hyperlink or a button linking to another page, a download or an external website, make sure it is very clear from the copy you use where your visitor will end up. It will also reduce bounce rate from these clicks.
5. Refresh your meta data
If you don’t have much time, do a quick check of your meta data. This is the ‘key information’ about each of your pages.
Prioritise your main pages, ensuring meta titles and descriptions are optimised and clear, using keywords, and are not duplicated.
You can also look at the file names and alt text for your images. Describe clearly the content of each image to help with accessibility, as well as SEO. It may be ‘hidden’ but it is really important copy for your website.
Is your website copy the best it can be?
Don’t create a beautiful website and then leave it to get out of date. Make sure that every potential visitor has a great experience and finds copy that is engaging, up-to-date and useful. Help them to buy from you with ease.
If you want support with writing, editing or updating your website’s written content, then do get in touch.