Website copywriting is the art of writing text for web pages that persuades visitors to take action: buy something, make an enquiry, sign up, or call. Good copy does this while sounding like a real person wrote it for a real audience, not like a template was filled in with industry keywords.
Most businesses get website copy wrong in one of two directions. They write for search engines and produce robotic text stuffed with keywords that no human wants to read. Or they write for humans and ignore SEO entirely, producing beautiful prose that nobody ever finds. The best website copy does both: it ranks for the terms your audience searches for and convinces them to act once they arrive.
Why Most Website Copy Underperforms
Before getting into how to write well, it’s worth understanding why most website copy is mediocre. The patterns are consistent enough to be diagnostic.
The template problem. Most business websites sound identical to their competitors because they’re built from the same templates and filled with the same generic phrases. “We’re passionate about delivering exceptional results.” “Our team of dedicated professionals.” “We pride ourselves on customer service.” These phrases say nothing because they could apply to literally any business in any industry.
The inside-out problem. Businesses write about themselves when they should write about their customers. “We have 20 years of experience” is about you. “You get the benefit of 20 years’ worth of mistakes we’ve already made and learned from” is about the reader. The difference is subtle but significant. Visitors don’t care about your company’s story; they care about how your company solves their problem.
The SEO-first problem. Copy written primarily for search engines reads like it was written for search engines. Forced keyword insertions, unnatural phrasing, and paragraphs that exist only to include a keyword variation. Google is sophisticated enough that this approach doesn’t even help rankings anymore, and it actively hurts conversion rates.
The AI-generated problem. Since 2023, there’s been a flood of website copy generated by AI tools and published with minimal editing. It’s grammatically correct, structurally competent, and completely devoid of the specific details, genuine personality, and earned opinions that make copy persuasive. Readers can feel the difference even when they can’t articulate it.
Writing Your Homepage
The homepage is your most visited page and the hardest to write because it needs to do several things simultaneously: establish what you do, who you do it for, why you’re different, and what the visitor should do next.
The First Screen
Everything above the fold (what’s visible without scrolling) needs to answer one question: “Am I in the right place?” You have roughly 3-5 seconds before a visitor decides whether to scroll or leave.
What works: - A headline that states what you do and who you do it for: “SEO for UK businesses that want organic traffic to actually drive revenue” - A subheadline that adds the “why you” dimension: “15 years of search experience. No jargon. No fluff. Just results you can measure.” - A clear primary call to action: “Get a free audit” or “See how we work”
What doesn’t work: - Vague headlines: “Welcome to [Company Name]” or “Innovative Solutions for Modern Businesses” - Multiple competing calls to action above the fold - Sliders or carousels that rotate through different messages (they dilute rather than focus attention)
Supporting Sections
Below the fold, the homepage should answer the questions visitors have in roughly the order they have them:
- What do you do? A brief expansion on your services or products. Not everything, just the categories.
- Can I trust you? Social proof: testimonials, client logos, case study highlights, awards, certifications.
- How does it work? A simplified process (3-4 steps maximum) that makes working with you feel straightforward.
- What should I do next? A repeated call to action, usually stronger than the first because the visitor now has more context.
Homepage Copy Length
There’s no universal rule. A B2B consultancy selling high-value services might need 800-1,200 words to establish credibility. An e-commerce store might need 200 words because the products speak for themselves. The right length is whatever it takes to answer the visitor’s questions without padding.
Writing Service and Product Pages
Service pages are where most businesses lose the most money through poor copy, because these are the pages where visitors are closest to making a decision.
Lead With the Problem
Most service pages start with a description of the service. Better ones start with the problem the service solves. The reader isn’t looking for “website copywriting services.” They’re looking for a solution to “my website doesn’t convert” or “my copy sounds generic” or “I don’t know what to write on my service pages.”
Generic opening: “We offer professional website copywriting services for businesses of all sizes.” Problem-led opening: “Your website looks good but nobody’s filling in the contact form. The design isn’t the problem. The words are.”
The second version speaks to the reader’s situation. It earns the right to then explain the service because it’s demonstrated understanding of the problem.
Specificity Beats Generalisation
The single most impactful improvement you can make to any service page is replacing vague claims with specific details.
- “We’ve worked with many clients” becomes “We’ve written copy for 40+ businesses across legal, financial, and healthcare sectors”
- “Quick turnaround” becomes “First draft within 5 working days, final copy within 10”
- “Affordable pricing” becomes “Service page copy from £350 per page, with quantity discounts for full site projects”
Specific details build trust because they demonstrate that you’ve actually done the work. Vague claims signal that you’re either new, uncertain, or hiding something.
The SEO Dimension
Service pages need to rank for commercial keywords if you want organic traffic to drive leads. This means the copy needs to include the terms your audience searches for, but naturally, not forcefully.
For any service page, identify the primary keyword (the main term people search when looking for this service) and 3-5 related terms. Work them into the page’s H1, subheadings, and body copy where they fit naturally. If a keyword feels forced in a sentence, rewrite the sentence until it doesn’t, or find a different place for it.
The title tag and meta description are the first pieces of copy a searcher sees. They need to work as both keyword signals for Google and persuasive hooks for the reader. I’ve covered this in detail in the title tags article.
Writing Your About Page
The about page is one of the most visited pages on most business websites, and it’s routinely the worst written. The mistake is in the name: “about us” makes businesses write their autobiography. Nobody cares about your founding story unless it directly explains why you’re good at what you do.
What an About Page Should Actually Do
It should answer: “Why should I trust these people with my money or my problem?”
Include: - Who you are and what you specialise in (not your entire biography; the relevant parts) - What makes your approach different from competitors (specific, not “we go the extra mile”) - Evidence of credibility: qualifications, experience metrics, notable clients, industry recognition - A photo. Businesses with real photos of real people convert better than those hiding behind stock images or no images at all. - A call to action. The about page is a trust-building exercise. Once trust is built, give the visitor somewhere to go.
Skip: - Your founding story (unless it’s genuinely relevant and interesting) - Your company values (unless you can demonstrate them with examples rather than list them as abstract nouns) - Mission statements (nobody has ever hired a business because of its mission statement)
Copy That Ranks: SEO Copywriting Basics
Writing for search engines and writing for humans are not opposing goals. They’re the same goal, expressed differently. Google wants to rank pages that satisfy the searcher’s intent. The searcher wants to find pages that answer their question or solve their problem. If your copy does that well, it should rank.
Keyword Integration
Keywords belong in: - The page title (H1) - At least one subheading (H2 or H3) - The first 100 words of body copy - The meta description - Naturally throughout the body copy
Keywords should never: - Be forced into sentences where they don’t fit grammatically - Be repeated at an unnatural frequency - Replace better, clearer words just for SEO purposes
A page targeting “website copywriting services” should use that phrase where it fits naturally and use variations (“web copywriting,” “writing website copy,” “copy for your website”) everywhere else. Search engines understand synonyms and related terms. You don’t need to use the exact phrase repeatedly.
Structure for Readability and SEO
How copy is structured affects both rankings and reader engagement:
- Short paragraphs. 2-4 sentences maximum for web copy. Long paragraphs lose readers on screens.
- Descriptive subheadings. Not just formatting markers; subheadings should tell the reader (and Google) what each section covers. “Our Approach” says nothing. “How We Write Copy That Ranks and Converts” says everything.
- Bullet points for scannable information. Lists of features, steps, or options work better as bullets than as prose. But don’t default to bullets when a persuasive paragraph would be more convincing.
- Internal links. Connect your pages together. A service page should link to relevant case studies, blog posts, and related services. This helps both navigation and SEO.
Editing: Where Good Copy Becomes Great
First drafts are never the final product. The editing process is where generic copy becomes specific and bloated copy becomes sharp.
The Deletion Test
Read every sentence and ask: if I deleted this, would the page lose anything? If the answer is no, delete it. Most first drafts are 30-40% longer than they need to be because they include:
- Sentences that restate what the previous sentence said
- Qualifiers that add nothing (“really,” “very,” “truly,” “actually”)
- Throat-clearing phrases (“It’s worth noting that,” “It goes without saying”)
- Filler paragraphs that exist because the section “felt short”
Read It Out Loud
Copy that sounds awkward when read aloud will feel awkward when read on screen. If you stumble over a sentence, the reader will too. Simplify it.
The Competitor Test
Read your copy alongside your top three competitors’ websites. If your pages could be swapped with theirs and nobody would notice, your copy isn’t differentiated enough. Find the specific details, opinions, and language that make your business different and make sure they’re present in the copy.
When to Hire a Copywriter
Writing your own website copy is entirely viable if you understand your audience, you can write clearly, and you have the time. Many business owners write their best copy themselves because nobody understands their business better than they do.
Hire a professional copywriter when:
- You don’t have time to do it properly (rushed copy is bad copy)
- Writing isn’t your strength and you know it
- You need the copy to perform for SEO as well as conversion (this requires a specific skillset)
- You’ve tried writing it yourself and can’t get past “we offer solutions”
- You need an objective outside perspective on how your business sounds to strangers
If the copy also needs to rank in search, look for a copywriter with SEO experience, or pair a copywriter with an SEO specialist. Copy that reads beautifully but ignores search intent is an expensive missed opportunity. If you need website copy that’s built for both search and conversion, that’s a specific brief worth getting right.