If you regularly fill your website with content, sooner or later, the point comes when you have to optimize texts. Sometimes you need a fresh update that adds current aspects to the reader. You may want to improve linguistic precision or performance in search engines. We’ll tell you why text optimization is worthwhile and why even professionals revise their texts several times.
Optimize Texts: Not Only For The Search Engines
Do you want to polish your old content thoroughly? When revising your content, first think about the reader behind the screen. And try to make reading as pleasant as possible. For example, shortening a text and deleting filler words may make sense. Other copy lacks stylistic sophistication. Before you set out to optimize your readers, you should clarify the why:
#1 Better SEO
You put much effort into a text, but it’s invisible in search engines? Search engine optimization is the most common motivation for a text revision. For blog posts, website texts, or landing pages to appear in Google’s rankings, they must meet specific SEO criteria. That’s why it can make sense to enrich a text with critical terms (keywords), synonyms, and topic-relevant phrases afterward.
Have you just started to deal with SEO? Click here for our SEO guide for beginners.
#2. Supplement Texts
Is your content outdated or too superficial compared to the texts of your competitors? Text optimization often aims at upgrading the content of the text and creating more added value for the reader. The basis for such an “upgrade” is thorough topic research to find all relevant aspects and new arguments.
#3 Stylistic Revision
The advertising messages are convincing, but the style could be better. If, after a thorough reading, you find stumbling blocks such as
- Marketing phrases
- tapeworm sentences
- spelling mistakes
- or empty filler words,
you should formulate your texts better. This will make your content more readable and attractive to your target groups.
#4 Reuse Texts
Do you have strong ad copy that you’d love to use repeatedly? Sometimes reworking a text is about rephrasing it so it can be used again as unique content. It’s also possible to transform proven content into multiple texts that can then be distributed through different channels (content seeding).
#5 Include A Call To Action
During the creative writing process, it can be easy to forget to tell the reader what to do next. You can do this by placing a call-to-action at the end of the text. For example, you can
- offer further information on the topic
- present a specific offer (newsletter, free initial consultation)
- or make it easier for them to contact you.
Optimize Texts: Perfection On The First Try? No One Can Do It!
No one shakes brilliant texts out of their sleeve – not even professional copywriters. Only text revision brings out the best in a text project. Compelling content is the result of a well-thought-out planning process. The result is the optimization of the raw text, without exception. You, too, should take the time to write good copy and allow for a work phase in which you fine-tune your content.
To optimize a text, you need distance. That’s why it’s advisable to let the content rest for a while before you hit the keys again. The revision phase is about reading your text with other people’s eyes. Empathize with the people you’ve written for. If you think about the text from the perspective of your target audience, you’ll end up with a better copy.
How feedback helps with text optimization
Ideally, it would help if you got support to optimize your texts. Another person automatically has enough distance to the written text and can give you valuable feedback:
- Are the headline and teaser written crisply?
- Are there parts of the body text that don’t read quite right?
- Is there a recognizable thread?
- Is the text understandable (no technical jargon)?
- Does the text’s structure help the reader get through the text intuitively?
- Does a central message stick?
- Does the reader know what to do after reading (call-to-action)?
Please note the suggestions and decide what you want to implement and what should remain as it is. It’s even better if your test reader has no prior knowledge and is coming into contact with the topic for the first time. This way, you can put the comprehensibility of your content through its paces.
Ask your test reader which keyword you probably used. If the answer is “I don’t know,” you’ve done everything right. The ad text reads naturally, and the keyword doesn’t stand out. A text that looks like spasmodic SEO from 50 meters away desperately needs a correction loop.
Optimize Texts Better: 7 Tips From Practice
#1 Storytelling
Sure, you can explain information in a completely matter-of-fact way. But you won’t necessarily win over your readers. Storytelling is a clever way to breathe life into your copy. By telling a compelling story, you entertainingly convey vital messages – and stir emotions. Bet your readers are curious to know what happens next.
#2 Avoid Tapeworm Sentences
Is your text bursting with complicated convolutions? Keep it as simple as possible. Any tapeworm sentence can be broken down into understandable everyday language. You will only seem competent if you use your writing voice. And your reader will have a much easier time following along.
#3 Add Variety
Optimize your texts by varying the text length and spicing up your content with a pinch of rhythm. A long one follows a short sentence. Then a question, a temporary insertion, and a more prolonged correction. Boredom is the last thing you want to trigger in your target audience.
#4 Live Verbs
Refrain from overloading your content. Many nouns in the text come across as impersonal and bureaucratic, almost like a letter from a lawyer. If you use verbs instead, your ad copy will read more vividly and dynamically.
#5. Use Technical Jargon Sparingly
Before optimizing a text, you need to understand your target audience clearly. How much expertise do you assume the reader has? Is he new to the topic or already half an expert? This determines whether you explain technical terms or avoid them altogether.
#6 Reduce Filler Words
Many writing software programs display filler words like “actually” or “so” in the text. But not all of them. If you find yourself bloating your content with contentless blah blah, you should delete some of them. Otherwise, your texts will look like they were written by a machine and not a human conversation at eye level.
#7 Active Sentences
Active instead of passive is the motto when you are about to optimize your texts. Who is doing something? Do you know the actor of an action? Then name him! It would help if you answered this fundamental question of your readers first.
Example: “We will process your request promptly.” instead of “Your request will be processed promptly.”
Let It Go: Don’t Over-Optimize
All of us know it: The nagging voice of the inner critic. Doubts about your formulations quickly arise, and the feeling that you could express it even better. Should you rewrite your texts again and again in pursuit of perfection? No. Perfect is not a text.
Every writing project needs a clear end. As an author, you are responsible for the finished text. So consciously decide when the content meets your quality standards – and release it. Keep your content manageable, or you’ll end up in an infinite loop, struggling for every word.
Is writing not your thing? Let the professionals do it! We’re happy to help you optimize your texts and find a language that picks up your readers.
