A lot of beginning copywriters start out by applying their skills to writing for the Internet. You must keep in mind, however, that there are some key differences between writing for the Internet and how one would work with an offline audience. Keep these ‘golden rules’ in mind while you write and you will achieve great success in your Internet writing.
There are three crucial differences between traditional publishing and writing for the Internet:
Audience
Format
Lifespan
You must take each of these differences into consideration when writing for the Internet.
Audience
Any writer must consider their audience. But audience consideration is even more important when writing for the Internet. The basics won’t change (like identifying who your primary target audience will be, for example), but there are some huge differences in other areas.
First of all, your audience is somewhat guaranteed in a traditional publication. Most people, once they have bought a magazine or newspaper are likely to at least give each page a cursory read before setting the item aside. Not so online. When writing for the Internet you must always keep in mind your reader can leave as easily as a click of the mouse. People don’t have a lot of time to waste so you must remain on target and highly focused at all times. As the writer, if you do not appear to be delivering good content the reader will simply go elsewhere… fast. Please do not take this to mean you must cater to the lowest common denominator; you don’t. Your audience is not stupid. But you do need to know your targeted audience and how to deliver for their wants and desires.
Format
Another important point when writing for the Internet is that many online readers are what I call skimmers. They scan your copy quickly before committing themselves to reading the entire thing. It is important to write clearly and concisely. Use punchy headlines and subheadings, as well as solid introductions and conclusions, as these are key points for skimmers.
An error that new writers might make, is trying to make their articles look like text in a magazine article or a book. However, writing on the Internet has big differences. A reader will actually read the Internet differently from ‘physical pages’, so different techniques are needed. ‘Point of entry’ is one of the most important. A search engine can send a reader to the middle or even the end of your document. If you have written accurate and concise content however, a reader and yes, even the ‘skimmers’ could likely go back to the beginning of your article to read it entirely. There is a way to skip this step though, and that is by splitting up your text into several stand-alone pieces that will fit together as a complete article, or separate documents if looked at the same way. (A good example of this? Did you see how I broke this article into individual stand-alone segments?)
Lifespan
The last major difference between writing for the Internet and more ‘traditional’ publications is what I refer to as lifespan. Because the Internet operates with a very rapid nature, people often make the mistake of thinking the lifespan of online content is limited. Nothing could be further from the truth. The ‘magic’ of the Internet is that content may last for years – potentially forever – which is why many offline publications now archive their material online. But you must be careful. While your writing should always be current, you want to be wary of being too topical. This is a good way to date your material. This is not good. Your readers may be reading your words a long time off in the future and you want it to be as “fresh” as the day you wrote it.
Keep in mind the 3 Golden Keys. By concentrating on audience, format, and lifespan when writing for the Internet, you will achieve great success.
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