Writing for the web, especially if your goal is for your content to be found in the search results, is really all about the keywords. As a matter of fact it’s where you place your keyword that matters. Let this short article show you how to do effective SEO content writing.

First things first. Forget about keyword density. Based on my experience it does not matter whether your keyword appears in the body of the article or not, because as long as it is in the title then you have done the majority of the job. But that does not mean you can’t optimize your article even further.

Title
As mentioned, your keyword should be placed in the title. But make sure you are writing a title that is always human readable. After all, even though your main goal is to be found by the search engines, it is ultimately your human visitor who would read and judge the quality of your article.

Body
Again, it is not a necessity to include the keyword in the body of the article, however it would not hurt to do so. If your article is 300-words and below, mentioning your keyword twice is a good practice. Just make sure you place it in the first paragraph and the second one can either be in the middle or the last paragraph.

You want three keywords in your article? Aim for a 500-word count.

Post tag
Choose from two to five keywords to include in your post tag and do not overdo it. A simple keyword research using your main keyword as your seed will give you a selection of the best keywords to include in your tags.

Image alt text
Are you putting an image in your article? Optimize it by putting your keyword in the image alt text tag.

All of these tips sound simple and easy, right? It really is and yet most web writers forget it. If you think about it the hardest part is actually knowing what keyword you should use.

Are you thinking of going full-time freelancing? I know how you feel. I was exactly like that perhaps a year or two ago (that’s because I went on an on and off freelancing stint). While I read a lot of blog posts and articles about becoming a freelance copywriter, I still committed a lot of mistakes when I finally gave it a try.

I’m sharing some of my mistakes here and perhaps you might learn a thing or two from them. Keep in mind that these are my opinions and suggestions and none of those listed here can be considered general truth.

1. Save some money first before doing the plunge.

I did do this, I saved about 2 months of funds for my food, bills, and other expenses. The only problem was I should have saved more! I didn’t start to earn a decent regularly income until after my 6th month of freelance writing. Unless you are rich or you have a spouse who has a regular work, consider saving for 6 months worth of what you are currently getting from your job.

2. Consider every preparation that you do as an investment on a business.

I told you about saving funds, right now I already consider it as capital for your business, not just savings. What’s the difference? When you start thinking of your money as capital, you are treating your freelance writing as a business. And it is really a business and you wil do everything to keep it afloat.

3. Start to scrimp on the first few months.

This is the stage in your life when being a cheapskate is a really good thing. During my first few months of being a freelance copywriter, I spent money as if I had a regular job with a regular, scheduled pay. I kept subscribing on Dofus (my favorite online multiplayer game), eat at fast food chains, bought accessories to my car, and other unnecessary spending. It quickly depleted my freelance writing earnings until my girlfriend (wife now) thought me how to put a stopper on my spending ways.

4. Fix your writing rates before going on full-time freelance.

This is one tip that I would always give to anyone who is thinking of becoming a freelance copywriter. You should have a list of your rates so that each time you get an inquiry for your services, you can easily and quickly respond. What I used to do back then was when someone first asked about my sales letter writing rate, that’s just the time when I started doing research on the going rates for such a service. The same thing happened when some asked for me to write a whole article marketing campaign for him.

5. Invest in quality equipment.

Before I went full-time freelance, I bought a laptop whose brand does not really hold a good reputation when it comes to quality. And true enough it went down in less than a year of usage. And all that I worked on that laptop was my writing jobs and online research. Now I have Acer and Asus laptops and a Samsung desktop.

Becoming a freelance copywriter is easy, earning a good income from it is a different matter. You can make your jump into the freelancing world a success if you are more prepared than I did. I wish you all the luck and I hope to hear from your own freelancing story.

When it comes to copywriting, John Carlton is the name to go. Top Internet marketers go to him when they want to learn how to write great copy for their websites, sales letters, and ads.

In this video, John Carlton discusses some important copywriting basics that he thinks all copywriters should follow. He discusses why writing for the web is no different from writing for any other medium.

Copywriting is still all about salesmanship. That is why in the history of advertising and direct marketing, some of the most successful copywriters had experience in selling.

And also, copywriting for the web is basically the same as to the other medium: sales letters, print ads, direct mail, and others.

Disclaimer: This post is for people who are familiar with using an article spinner. And also, on a professional note, I do not use any article spinner whenever I rewrite an article for a client.

Even though I’m a freelance writer, I will not be bashing all those article spinning software. What I will talk about is why many people still end up with rubbish spun articles even after using these tools.

The answer is simple: They only put variations on each word. In other words, they just find the synonyms for each word and put these within the spin tags.

Let us take a look at a sample sentence with variations for some of the words.

Original version: The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.

With spin tags: The {quick|alert|fast|agile|speedy|energetic} {brown|sepia|tan|tawny} fox {jumps|bounces|leaps|hops|hurdles} {over|above|on top of|beyond} the {lazy|apathetic|lethargic|languid|tired|unenergetic} {dog|man’s best friend|doggy}.

Possible spun version: The alert tawny fox hops beyond the apathetic doggy.

Does the possible spun version sound right? Grammatically there’s nothing wrong with it, but the thought or the idea of the sentence is lost. The better ways to spin an article are sentence by sentence or paragraph by paragraph. By doing this, the sense of the article will not be lost in the translation, er… variation.

Of course what I am trying to point out here is the effective way to spin an article with the goal of creating quality spun articles. But I think there are many people who are just after the number of spun articles as long as these cannot be considered duplicate content by Google.

In that case, they are rubbish.

I just would like to share with you guys a few links to my old posts that have something to do with writing. I believe that even though these are quite short posts, they still provide value to the reader.

Leave Text Speak Off Your Blog

Les Paul On Writing

Learn How to KISS

Beating Blogger’s Block

5 Things I Do Before I Write

How to Kill Your Writing Career

Understanding Why We Write

Please, Think Twice (Even a Thousand Times) Before You Call Yourself a Writer

The Michael Phelps Way to Becoming a Good Copywriter

How often have you used the Yellow Pages recently? As for me, I can’t even remember the last time I used it. I’m guessing 7 years ago?

Google is where we go now to look for anything that we want, although the Yellow Pages might be preferred by some because their searches would be made easier because everything was categorized.

These past few weeks, I find that I’ve been constantly distracted by my non-work related online activities. That sometimes while I am writing an article, I will feel the itch to log onto a social website and just waste time (yes, it is often just a waste of time) reading and making my own updates. It maybe a good way to reconnect with friends but should I be doing that every hour?

I am a social addict indeed.

1. Facebook
I don’t play the games on Facebook, I just find it fun to read my friends’ updates about almost anything that’s happening to them and making a comment or two.

2. Mitsulancerph.net
I drive a Mitsubishi Lancer and love that car. That’s why I frequent this Lancer-specific forum because of all the great tips and recommendations that the members give to each other. I’m not yet an official member because to do so I have to attend a number of meet-ups which I can’t fit in my schedule for now. Nevertheless, if you own a Lancer you will greatly benefit by becoming a member of this site.

3. Yahoo!
I use Yahoo! for two things: email and news reading. But what keeps me distracted most is whenever I feel the need to check on Yahoo! to see if they have any new interesting tidbits there. I find their news selection eclectic but definitely fun to read.

As an SEO copywriter, it sometimes falls under my tasks to find or research the best keywords for the article I would be writing. Although often it is the client who would provide me with the keywords.

I enjoy doing keyword research (if I am not heavily loaded with other work) and I am using the Google Adwords free keyword tool. I have tried Wordtracker before, but it is not free. So far Google’s tool seems to be working just fine as my clients have nothing against using only that tool.

However, I have just come across a free SEO tool that looks promising. It’s called Traffic Travis. It even got a great rating from Cnet’s Download site. It is not just for keyword research, as it is primarily a good starter all-rounder SEO analysis tool.

I have yet to use it, mainly its keyword research functions. And I might write about it soon whether it could replace Google’s keyword tool as my favorite or it could just be a good complimentary software.

I’m not a fan of very long domain names. Are you?

I classify a domain name to be too long when it contains more than 2 keywords in it. Just like this example:

familydentalclinicsaginawmichigan.com

Now that’s not a real domain name. In fact, it’s still available (as of this writing). In my opinion, only those who are completely new into buying domain names, Internet marketing or SEO would use such a long domain name. Anyway, it’s just my opinion and I have this one simple reason:

It’s hard to remember.

A very long domain name is not effective when you are trying to build your brand. It’s harder to memorize and it’s easier to get the letters or the words jumbled up. Just imagine telling someone what your website’s URL is and it takes you a mouthful to say the whole domain name. I bet the other person would easily forget it, unless he would write it down.

I brought this up because one recent client bought a domain name just like that. He’s of a different business and profession but the thing is, his domain name was too long, even longer than my given example. Now just imagine how harder it would get when he put up his new website’s email:

info@familydentalclinicsaginawmichigan.com

I would say, good luck with that.

P.S. I advised him to choose a different, much shorter domain name, but he opted with his first choice.

When you are a freelance writer working mostly for online content, you have to learn all that you can about search engine optimization or simply SEO. That is because what good is your written content if people cannot easily find it through the search engines?

The following are the top 3 SEO blogs that I recommend to every fellow freelance copywriter:

1. Matt Cutts

He is the head of Google’s web spam team and the unofficial spokesperson when it comes to anything Google and search-related topics. He is always a fun to read, even with his non-SEO blog posts.

2. SEO Book

Aaron Wall published what is considered to be the first ebook authority on search engine optimization, the aptly titled ‘SEO Book’. Just by that name alone he was able to establish a reputation as one of the top SEO experts and has created a successful business around it through consultancy and an exclusive forum only for paying subscribers.

His blog posts are often lengthy but a breeze to read as well as complete with his insights about the SEO topic at hand.

3. SEOmoz

Rand Fishkin and the guys at SEOmoz are among the most unselfish individuals when it comes to sharing their thoughts, opinions, tips, suggestions, and more about anything that is SEO. It is always a treat to read Rand’s entries as he goes all the way creating graphs and doodles, almost anything just to help visualize his ideas.