A very old, hard working copywriter...

From time to time I publish articles that I think are of real value to readers; this seems a great article I hope you agree

Author: Sunita Biddu

None of us are perfect. As the old saying goes, even monkeys fall out of trees sometimes. And even an expert copywriter may make a mistake from time to time. Here are some mistakes every copywriter has made at one time or another.

1. Forgetting your audience. When you are copywriting, you are writing it for someone. That person may be your client, but ultimately the audience is the person you want to act based on what they have read. It does no good to write to make a particular client happy if the audience will not respond to what you have written. Hopefully you have found yourself a client who knows the audience he is trying to reach.

2. Not knowing your product. When you are trying to write about something that you do not know, it shows. Nothing is worse than reading about a product when it is clear that the author did not know what they were talking about! Not every writing job can be in your most knowledgeable subject field, but you must take the time to know something about the product you are writing about.

3. Too much detail, or not enough. It is sometimes hard to know just how much detail to write about. You have to give the audience enough information to grab their attention, but not so much information that they feel overwhelmed.

4. You write too much. People today do not have a lot of time to read, so if you can not capture their attention with your message quickly, you will lose out on your chance. You need to make sure your first words are attention grabbing and then the reader will stay to see what you have to say to them.

5. You do not make it easy for people to do what you want them to do. If you want someone to buy something from you, you have to make it easy for them to find the price of your product, and buy it. If you want someone to subscribe to your newsletter, you have to offer them an easy way to subscribe, hopefully more than one way. If you really want someone to do something, make it easy for them to do it.

About the Author:

Sunita Biddu is an expert author and CEO of copywriting company Content Axis, Inc. that offers premium quality copywriting services and article submission services. While providing top rate SEO services, she also writes on excellent SEO strategies. To know more about the services, please visit Content Axis Inc.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com – Common Copywriting Mistakes That Even Expert Copywriters Make

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Loch Fyne is an established chain of 49 Seafood restaurants dotted about the UK; the website at www.lochfyne.com makes the following claim

Join us at Loch Fyne Restaurants for a healthy and delicious start to 2009. Our extensive a la carte menu features dishes to suit all tastes and our specials board changes daily so come in and try something new in ‘09.

Five of us went to dinner on Saturday 7th Feb, Charlotte, me, Charlotte’s mother, Anne and Charles. None of us drink so we checked with the restaurant first whether we could substitute the free glass of wine, that came with the set menu, and were told ‘no problem you can have any soft drink on the menu’. We duly arrived and ordered dinner from the set menu, Sea Bass and Mackerel and ordered some drinks, sparkling water and ‘freshly squeezed Orange juice’. This is when the disappointment started, the ‘freshly squeezed orange juice was from a carton of reconstituted juice, powder in other words, and the sparkling water was flat, the Sea Bass was dry and over-cooked and my Mackerel had been on the grill so long it was about a third it’s original size with flesh that looked and tasted like a fish corpse, corpse being the operative word. The waiter asked how the food was, we told him, nothing happened. Then the bill came and the glasses of ‘freshly squeezed orange juice’ had been charged at £2.50 each, we queried it citing our earlier reassurance regarding replacement drinks we were told we could only have sparkling water, flat, or Coca Cola, disgusting sugary muck from a tap and really cheap. We were obviously lying when we claimed we had checked before booking.

So Loch Fyne, even when we double check our expectations are going to be met at one of your fine restaurants, you fail. Even when we write a polite letter of complaint, Charlotte wrote it so it was polite, we get no response. Are you so successful that you don’t have to bother with customers?

we await your response…

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In a spellbinding show of fantasy become reality, the British Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, walked down the aisle with Hilary Clinton, US Secretary of State, yesterday. With a look of a 12 year old who’d just snogged Naomi Campbell, Miliband looked stupifyingly smug in his too short trousers, and in a Fagin’ish frenzy of hand rubbing, young David could barely speak for the jaw cracking grin that split his face from ear to ear. This would seem to be the beginning of a star-struck engagement. The lovers strolled to the press conference, whispering sweet nothings to each other, and appeared at the lectern singing each others praises in pretty sharp about turn from Obama’s recent comments and feedback from the Pentagon that British troops aren’t all they’re cracked up to be. We wouldn’t like to think that either of them were using the media like Big Brother celebrities, but the truth is that Miliband and Hilary go way back to ‘Bill time’ when New Labour were trying to get the magic from wherever they could. Perhaps they’re still chasing the magic now Gordon’s proved what a distraction he is.

I find it hard to visualise young David, with his rabbit in the headlight look saying to the media ‘I did not have sex with that woman’. Hey Dave, if it works, go for it…

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Any way I found this cool (sic) software that might be the answer to all my problems (do people really use this kind of stuff? maybe people with Sat Nav do, they’re pretty useless as well) – please read on

Author: Paul Kessler

One of the hardest things in writing English is the use of punctuation. Are you one of those who sometimes are doubtful on what punctuation marks you are going to use? If so, then this article is for you. The Grammar Punctuation Software is the best solution to your problem.

Grammar Punctuation Software is the solution to any problem on basic editing and proofreading. The software enhances these functionalities (proofreading & Editing) of conventional word processors. You should always remember that English writing is a skill that can be improve through practice. If you will always use the software, it is as if you have a virtual teacher in the comforts of your home. If you desire to improve your writing skill level, read further.

According to the developers of grammar punctuation software, this technology is designed to ensure that your English writing matches the basic grammar and punctuation rules. The software automatically identifies and corrects your writing errors and will enable you to further edit your text or document. It is true that language analyzing technology is complex, but in recent years it made a significant progress as databases got bigger and algorithms got smarter. This state-of-the-art writing technology offers the following benefits: grammar check, punctuation and spelling check.

Natural Language Processing technology (NLP) can surely transform English writing easier.

Advantages in using this kind of technology:

* Analyzes sentence structure for correct punctuation and making your writing more comprehensible.

* Automatically corrects sentence construction problems that is miss looked during manual proofreading.

* It will refine your writing style.

* It will amplify your vocabulary.

* Improve your status quo once people will notice that you are a well educated person.

This amazing technology constantly progress through time, and through this (progress of time), newer version and features will be added, thus making it more useful to you and everyone that uses this software. By doing extra research on this solution, it would bring up additional benefits that are not covered in this article.

If you want to be like the experts, having a clear, clean, and professional English writing, use grammar punctuation software. The fact that English writing is very important nowadays, expect further development with this technology.

What can you benefit from using a punctuation checker? It can help you in many ways. It checks for errors in spelling, punctuation, grammar and it also suggests alternative words to make your writing better. Definitely there is no need for you to look for alternative words such as synonyms every once in a while in your dictionary. Doing online grammar check saves a lot more of your time too, it saves you from the extra time of manual proofreading and editing. Overall, it simplifies your writing tasks and gives you more time to do other things you need to do.

If you desire to improve your English writing skills, then do not take chances, avail of this new technology and take advantage of the things you will get out of it.

About the Author:
Watch how an innovative English Punctuation Checker instantly can improve your writings on a daily basis and learn how advanced NLP technology can help you to write better English than your English teacher. Visit: http://wwww.englishsoftware.org

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/writing-articles/punctuation-software-write-error-free-instantly-746531.html

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In the beginning was the word. The keyword, that is. And when it was placed into the keyword META tag of any web page, that page received high rankings. Then the Internet boom raged throughout Cybertown. It soon became a greater challenge to rank in the coveted top 10. Enter search engine copywriting.

As algorithms changed, a need arose to use keywords (and soon, keyphrases) throughout a page’s copy in addition to its tag set. Here’s where typical Internet behavior set in. The online marketing mindset that is so common took hold: If one is good – 1,000 is better. Well-meaning copywriters began to shove keyphrases into existing text willy-nilly. It didn’t take long before site owners and their customers began to baulk at the way SEO copywriting sounded.

But, with theories about keyword density and fears of keyword stuffing floating through Cyberspace, copywriters did their best to find balance. 

Coming Full Circle

Due to unceasing demand by site owners for copy that sounded natural while still being optimized, SEO copywriters began to flush out ways to write content that didn’t sound “like that.” And so, we came full circle – from virgin copy that was written exclusively for the site visitor to copy that was butchered horribly in the name of higher rankings to natural-sounding SEO copy that pleased everyone. 

Seems as though all is well and SEO copywriting has settled into an acceptable balance, right? Yes. But other changes were taking place behind the scenes that should influence the future of SEO copy.

Search Engines Get New Skills

Along the way, Google and other engines have been picking up new skills for indexing and evaluating copy. Many years ago, Yahoo! and other engines gained the ability to read PDF files. As time went on, SEO taboos – including frames and the dreaded Flash – became less fearsome as engines adapted, acquiring the technology to read these formats as well. 

Prediction #1: about SEO copywriting is this: Search engines will begin to index the copy that is superimposed on the screen of videos, in video voiceovers and in audio clips. The technology actually already exists for the most part. Closed captioning for the hearing impaired could easily be adapted for this purpose. Search engine copywriters take note: You’ll soon be asked to write optimized voiceover and audio scripts.

Rather than simply optimizing the web page that hosts these files, the scripts themselves will require a search engine touch. This will make it all the more imperative that copy be written naturally. It is annoying enough to read something like this:

Texas Web Design Firm in Dallas, Texas

Welcome to our Texas web design site. Our Texas web design staff is highly skilled in creating beautiful and functional sites. When you need a Texas web design firm to help build your Internet presence, one of our Texas web design specialists will be glad to speak with you.

Ugh! Can you just imagine having those words spoken as part of a voiceover? The old tip of reading your copy out loud to see how natural it sounds will absolutely become standard practice once scripts are indexed. 

Prediction #2: Latent semantic indexing will continue to evolve, making the use of synonyms in SEO copy vital. Early in 2008, Google announced it was indexing synonyms (although not heavily from what I’ve seen). I think this practice will be put into full force in the next year or two. For example, we’ll begin to see results from a search for “handbags” that contain that term as well as “purse,” “pocketbook” and “bag.” 

I also believe that Google and other search engines will consider the overall context of a page more, in addition to the keywords and phrases that are used. Hopefully this will alleviate much of the elementary SEO copywriting that goes on now. (See Texas example above.) 

As with everything online, change is inevitable. While certain core practices and techniques will remain foundational to SEO copywriting, advancements in search technology and site visitor preferences will continue to alter the face of this copywriting niche. Adjust, adapt, advance!

By: Karon Thackston

Article Directory: http://www.articledashboard.com

See Karon Thackston live in Boston April 2-3, 2009. Get info at www.highrankings.com/seo-workshops. Or buy Karon’s SEO copywriting course and learn at your own pace.www.copywritingcourse.com. © 2009, All Rights Reserved

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I’ve noticed a worrying trend recently – the use of cliche as a method of engagement by copywriters, as if cliche had become a cultural vocabulary and it’s how people have come to speak? like everyone is acting in East Enders and calling each other matey cos’ they’re not bovvered. These thoughts, and post, are generated by my receipt of a letter from Virgin Media, who I’d telephoned to complain that I was being charged too much (always speak to disconnections). I got the required result and a couple of weeks later I received a letter that read as follows:

at the top in big bold type, above Dear Mr Garnett -

Glad you’re sticking around

Cliche number 1 then Dear Mr Garnett

We’re ‘chuffed to bit’s’

Cliche number 2 and I haven’t heard the expression ‘chuffed to bit’s since I was running up and down the Apple & Pears and still in short Callard & Bowser’s.

I just have one thing to say, don’t do it, it’s got no purpose, who are you trying to talk to using language like that? you’ll just alienate all the cockneys and make them feel even more like an ethnic minority. Desist, stop, now!