10 Valuable Skills Every SEO Copywriter Should Have

It takes commitment and dedication to become a professional copywriter. And as much as we want to become one overnight, this is nearly impossible. You need to acquire different skills to be an effective SEO copywriter. And this means you have to expose yourself to different experiences and learnings. Bear in mind that an SEO copywriter is not only about writing articles or captions. One needs to persuade the reader, and that is the gauge whether the copywriting is successful or not. 

What are some of the most valuable skills that an SEO copywriter should possess? This article will share with you 10 of the most important ones. Likewise, we will provide tips to improve your skills so you can achieve being an elite SEO Copywriter.    

1.Critical Thinking 

Most people think that writing is mostly about creative thinking. At some point, that’s true. However, SEO copywriting entails critical thinking to be effective. You have a specific niche and target market to persuade. It means that after reading your article or written words, they will know exactly what you want them to do. In e-commerce, for example, you want them to check out your website and buy your products. 

So how are you going to improve critical thinking? There are multiple ways to do it, and you must put it in practice whenever you can. For one, always ask questions. Try to figure out what knowledge you already have. Look at a different perspective. Get more information to prove or invalidate your views. And be open to new ideas. 

Also, make sure that you are aware of how you process your thoughts. Understand why you have such ideals because we naturally tend to get biased with our thoughts. Try to remove these biases so you can practice critical thinking when writing.  

2. Perfect Grammar 

An SEO copywriter needs to understand perfect grammar, most especially if your writing objective is to spark interest and influence readers. 

Imagine a copywriting that has numerous grammatical errors. Do you think you will trust the brand? Probably not, right? Chances are, you will think that the company is not keen on details, and this negligence translates on how they operate. That’s already a lost business opportunity. 

One of the best ways to improve your grammar is to read. You can also look for a mentor who has an advanced grasp of grammar. That way, they could provide insights and tips as well. Also, SEO copywriters use tools such as Grammarly, and it can help improve your skill. 

3. Keyword Research

An effective SEO strategy largely depends on how good your keywords are. In most cases, companies hire SEO and Keyword specialists. But, it would help if you know how to do it on your own. That way, you can easily create an outline for specific topics.

This is another specialized skill that you have to learn to level up your SEO copywriting skills. It includes understanding your niche, knowing your company goals, listing relevant subtopics, identifying seed keywords, using the right tools such as Keyword Tool, studying the search intent, finding the long-tail keywords, and checking what your competitors do.        

4. Write for People

As writers, we sometimes get too excited to write that we forget whom we are writing for. Naturally, we were trained to express ourselves. But when you do SEO copywriting, the case is different. Your approach should feel like you are talking to your target market. So if the brand you are working on right now is for teens and you are in your 30s, you have to wear a different hat. Or perhaps the market is the older generation, then you have to stay away from using ‘millennial terms.’ 

The trick here is to expose yourself to different materials. Read books for children, teens, mothers, fathers, or even seniors. And you can go as far as reading content for more special niches. Understand their language and use words and phrases that they will likely appreciate. By doing so, you immediately form that connection, and it will be easier for you to persuade them through your copywriting.    

5. Substantial Content  

If you will notice, there are millions of contents online. In fact, on average, there are around 4.4 million new blog posts every day. The sad thing about this is that most content are repetitive. They provide little to no real value at all. And that’s what you have to stay away from. Make sure that yours stands out by adding facts, statistics, and research. This will make your article even more credible.   

6. Research Related Facts 

In relation to the previous section, we also recommend that you research more information, not just about your central topic, but other related subjects as well. This gives your article a different touch, and at the same time, it offers more valuable content that cannot be seen from other posts with similar topics. 

7. Long-Form Writing 

Since the advent of social media, it seems like people are more interested to read micro-blogs or short content. To some extent it works. However, long-form writing is still best if you want to target and persuade the right market. There is no strict definition of how much words should a long-form content have. It could be from 700 to 1800. And so for most people, long-form content should be around 1200.  

Make it a habit to write longer contents if you want to become a good SEO copywriter. Yet again, always value quality. Remember to do your research and write without personal biases. 

8. Headline Writing 

For some people, headline writing is easy. The thing is, they are only a very minute part of the population. More often than not, a lot of writers are challenged to write a compelling headline. Just imagine, you only have a small margin for error when creating headlines. If you fail to spark interest, don’t expect readers to pause and read the entire content. 

First of all, stop using clickbait. It might work for now, but you will eventually lose readers. Always use simple language, include keywords, and add numbers in your headline.  

9. Project Management Skills 

It’s not just writing that you have to be good at when you want to become a professional SEO copywriter. You also need to balance and manage your time. Since you will be working with brands and companies, there will always be a deadline. No matter how good your writing is, if you always miss your deadlines, they will look for another copywriter. Remember, they work on a strict timeline, and your content should always be relevant.

This is true with our team, Content Fuel. We have diverse clients with strict deadlines, and that is why our SEO copywriters are trained with project management skills among many others.  

10. Willingness to Improve 

And lastly, even if you already have the best clients for SEO copywriting, you must always have the passion to learn and improve your skills. SEO, in itself, is a growing concept. Whatever techniques you are using right now will probably change five years later. You need to be equipped with the latest trends, read updates, and apply these on your SEO copywriting projects.