FREE website content - Is it worth the money you pay for it?

 One of the major stumbling blocks I regularly experience when talking to potential clients is that of money...  filthy lucre,  dough, dosh... even folding greens – Call it what you will, the love of it may be the root of all evil but it often blinds people to a very important point:

Often you get what you pay for

 Of course, this is a flexible statement (otherwise no-one would bother spending 3 nights in a sleeping bag outside Debenhams waiting for the January sales to start!!) but by-and-large it holds true for so many things.

 To use a recent example I was contacted by an online business who wanted to know what, as a professional writer & copywriter, I would charge to write 3 x 500 word articles for their website? I gave it some thought and duly replied with a reasonable cost for their consideration.

 Shortly afterward I received an email telling me that they were currently obtaining 500 word articles for half of my charge and therefore felt that they could not use my services...

 Curious as to how they were getting professionally written material for their website at such a cheap rate I had a quick look at just the first two articles... Yes, you’ve guessed it: both of them contained quite a few examples of simple mistakes in spelling, grammar and language which even a simple word-processing package would have spotted.

 Needless to say I wrote back to the company and gently highlighted how, despite the cut-price cost of their web copy, it might well be costing them in terms of lost business... 

 The truth is that Joe Public is NOT stupid – not by a long chalk – and despite the increasing encroachment of ‘txt speak’ into the written language, business is one area where the vast majority of people still expect good writing. This becomes increasingly true the higher your customer demographic but that’s not to say ‘budget’ services can get away with sloppy English...

 So there are two fundamental truths that I have discovered which I try to put across to people. Let’s call them Woolley’s Cardinal Rules:

Cardinal Rule No.1 – Nothing sends customer confidence in your business plummeting faster than poor spelling or bad grammar. It doesn’t matter if it’s in a printed brochure, a flyer or a webpage: If your writing is bad then it will undermine customer confidence in your services/products &/or professionalism

Cardinal Rule No. 2 - FREE website content is only worth the money you pay for it. In the same way as you wouldn’t try to repair your own gas boiler (unless of course you were a CORGI certified boiler repair person!) if you want good, professional looking website content – then get a professional copywriter in to do it for you.  Admittedly, failing to do this won’t result in a gigantic explosion but it might just save you from learning an expensive lesson...

 For more information on a range of affordable copywriting services visit my website at: http://www.nigelwoollsey.co.uk/

Website content writing, SEO tips & Larkrise to Candleford

Whoever said running your own small business was easy?! My whole Sunday evening was taken up by rewriting a 'few' pages on my website to improve its search Engine Optimisation (SEO).
 One of the most important things I've learnt is that SEO isn't just about optimising your pages and then sitting back to reap the rewards - Nope, to truly work well you've got to keep refining and rehashing those all important keywords and links.
 However, one of the truly brilliant rules of SEO is given by equally brilliant Peter Kent: Make your site useful...
 Sounds deceptively simple doesn't it - the trick is to ensure that you have fresh content that 1) keeps people coming back again and again and 2) encourages them to share your site elsewhere.
 The downside is that you might just miss the opening 10 mins of Larkrise to Candleford as you're so absorbed in updating your website... Just goes to show what a Rock 'n' roll lifestyle us copywriters lead... *ahem*

http://www.nigelwoollsey.co.uk/

Nigel Woollsey - Freelance Writer & Copywriter: Top tips for writing web site content and web copy

Nigel Woollsey - Freelance Writer & Copywriter: Top tips for writing web site content and web copy

Top tips for writing web site content and web copy

One of the classic mistakes that people make when writing content for their own website is to treat it like an ordinary, written document.
Often a copywriter or editor will be presented with a body of text which is way too long and bloated out with rambling content.
If you're writing for the internet - be it for your own website, a blog or an online article the most important rule is: Keep it short.

Text intended to be published online is not like writing material for printed use. You've got be clear, concise and get your point across with a minimum of preamble. My personal limit when writing content for business websites is a maximum of just 350 words - ideally, around 200 is much better for snappy, focused material.

To find out the other ways of improving your webcopy or online content visit my website and take a peek at my top tips for internet writing: http://www.nigelwoollsey.co.uk/?p=website.content.writing.in.norfolk

LOCAL WRITER IN SOBER DANCING SHOCKER!

Broadland District Council last night pledged to launch a full criminal enquiry after Norwich Copywriter, Nigel Woollsey (89), was seen dancing at the Rivergardens last night.
Startled staff and guests were forced to endure his manic gyrations for several minutes before he was restrained. To add insult to injury it later emerged that Mr. Woollsey had only had a single pint of shandy before he embarked on his shameful display.
PC Norbert Lymph-Gland of Norfolk constabulary told reporters "Overweight yet incredibly talented men dancing will not be tolerated in any civilised society".
Riot police later broke up the event after an ugly brawl started over who ate the last piece of Quiche at the buffet. www.nigelwoollsey.co.uk

In Support of Broadland District Council's Business Training & Support

Hiya Folks.

Just a quick update today - below is a copy of an email I was inspired to send to HM Treasury in support of the wonderful services provided by Broadland District Council for start-up and established small businesses.
Following the advice of Kate Elliott of Active Marketing & Design I've also sent a copy to the local newspaper (The Eastern Daily Press).
Considering I knocked this up in about 20 minutes it doesn't look too shabby!

Dear Sirs,

I understand that you were recently contacted by a small business colleague of mine, Sally Porter, who wrote in support of the Broadland District Council business support team.

I whole heartedly endorse the very positive comments made by Sally regarding the excellent service and superb training courses supplied by BCTS. During the recent economic recession I was made redundant after 20 years employment with a large multinational company based in Norwich - with my prospects of finding alternative employment being poor I decided to set up my own small business but like so many people had no real idea of who to go to for help & advice.

Consequently, I enrolled on the Free 3 day 'Basics for business' course led by the superb Kate Wilde. This was a fantastic and informative workshop which more than provided me with the necessary basic information and encouragement to make a success of my new business.
Such was the positive impression that this course left on me that I have subsequently attended 3 more business courses at Broadland District Council: 'Marketing for small businesses' (with the brilliant Kate Elliott), 'Finance for small businesses' and 'Writing a dynamic press release' (with the equally brilliant Maria Veronese).
All have proven a remarkable benefit in helping to get my new business off the ground in what can only be described as the current challenging economic conditions.

If the continued recovery of the UK economy is so dependent on private enterprise, and small businesses in particular, then it is my honest belief that teams and services like this one at Broadland District Council must not be subject to cuts.
In fact I would strongly urge you to vigorously support and expand this vital service to small businesses and enterprise within Norfolk.

My heartfelt thanks to all at Broadland District Council Business Support team who are doing an excellent job.

Yours sincerely
Nigel Woollsey - Freelance Copywriter

Time - there's just never enough of it

The road to Hell, they say, is paved with good intentions.

I start every working day by mentally organising what I need to be doing with my time - including ascribing a 'priority level' to each task. Impressively this is usually all done in the shower (steady ladies!) while I absently listen to the radio. Over the sound of the water I can often also hear the shouting, screaming, laughter, chuckling and singing that normally accompanies my two children being herded into their clothes by my wife.

Very often I'll transfer this mental 'To Do' list onto paper before I start work - it makes me feel good. It makes me feel 'organised' and 'efficient' - which is good.

By 10.00am my orderly, planned and regimented day has gone straight to Hell in a handcart.

My day, it seems, is very much an example of the second law of thermodynamics: Entropy increases. Entropy in this case being the tendency of all ordered things to revert to a state of chaos.

In a similar vein it's just astounding how long it takes to get a small business off the ground. You start off thinking that you'll be up and running within a couple of days. You just need to get a few things, make a phone call or two and boom, you'll be in business.

Not so - no siree.

There's branding, there's business stationary, there's finance, buying equipment, regulations to meet, legal requirements, advertising, marketing strategies, profit & loss forecasts, networking, meetings, blogs, business planning, premises, insurance... The list goes on and on and on.

It can be a little disheartening. At worst it can make you wonder why on Earth you started this whole thing in the first place when you could have easily got another job doing precisely the thing that you hated before you decided to start your own business.

But in the end you know it's going to worth it - so you keep going. Past the limits you thought you could never exceed; doing things that once would have seemed impossible.

So this whole thing boils down to two pieces of advice to bear in mind when you start your own business. Just two. Keep them in mind and it might save you a lot of headaches &/or heartaches:

1) It ALWAYS takes much longer than you think
2) It ALWAYS takes a lot more money than you thought.

But, I also learnt 2 things from the lovely bunch of guys I met last night, each one struggling to set up a successful enterprise just after the deepest recession in over 70 years:

1) You are not alone.
2) Sometimes other people have a lot more faith in you than you do in yourself.

But I do wish I had more time :-)