The majority of my clients of the last four years realise the importance of a quality business blog. Most understand the increasing need for quality content. As the search engines (especially Google) further refine their algorithms, that is only going to get more important. Why? Because with social media, how much and how often your customers interact with your blog suggests its quality. 

Content is king, but sharing is the strong queen who ensures the king isn’t making stupid political gaffs that annoy the allies and enrage the enemies further.

Where Businesses Go Wrong

Quality content is now more important than it ever was. So why some businesses still feel the need to cut corners by producing their web content in-house is anybody’s guess. Time and time again, clients have come to me with poor quality content that doesn’t do the job it is supposed to do. Often, the content is written in-house by a marketer or sales rep. No doubt these people are good at their job, but that doesn’t make them good writers. The failing is often one or more of the following.

• Too much focus on SEO keywords and too little on content quality
• Poor spelling, grammar or syntax by employees who don’t know any better
• Reproducing the same stuff everybody else is writing
• Content that waffles and flies off on tangents instead of sticking to the point

Then there are the more technical failings of a piece of content:

• It fails the Flesch Test (the test for simple readability)
• It fails a basic SEO test in other ways (lack of headers, lack of images, lack of tags in images, lack of keyword in headers)
• Too much self-congratulation and not enough customer focus
• Too much industry jargon that means nothing to your customer

I could go on. What usually happens is they then approach a web content writer to sort it out, losing valuable time and costing them money. This is one area where you shouldn’t cut corners. Web outreach is a vital part of modern business and hiring a content writer is never a frivolous waste of money (I would say that anyway but it is true). No doubt you have many reasons why you won’t hire a content writer.

It Looks Unprofessional

When the flow, grammar and spelling are of poor quality it does not reflect well on your business. A typo here and there is fine (I still make them even running my content through Grammarly) and forgivable. Persistent poor quality language skills will never say “I’m a professional who pays attention to detail!”, quite the opposite in fact. Your customer will see you as sloppy and that is never good.

You’ll Lose Their Custom

If a piece of web content doesn’t read well then your audience is less likely to make it to the end. You need to grab and keep their attention. If you can’t do that then it will be a waste of time, effort and money.fr All you’ll have is content that nobody is reading taking up space on your website that not enough people are visiting. I’ve lost count of the number of blog posts and landing pages I’ve clicked away from because the web content hurt my eyes or it didn’t make sense. In each case, that’s a lost customer.

If You Don’t Give Them What They Want,
They’ll Leave

Web surfers are a fickle bunch. They’re looking for information and then they will leave. You might see that sentence and think “what’s the point then? Isn’t it just a waste of money?” Well, no. There is a need in the world of web content writing for your brand to be seen as a reliable source of information, even for people who are not your customers. If they can’t get what they want from you, they will go elsewhere. That means to a potential competitor. Repeated visits to your website increase the chances they will see you as a potential supplier of goods or services.

Need a Freelance Content Writer?

If you wish to hire MG Mason Creative Services for your web freelance content writing needs, please contact me via the About Page here. You will also see my terms and conditions, and charges.