Accounting Websites: Creating Superior Copy
Your CPA website is never finished. After you get a site posted and running it's time to compose some unique content for it. Very few accountants and CPA's write their own content. Instead they prefer to get website "templates", ready-made CPA websites with copy already already included.
This is not a perfect method. Don't misunderstand me. If you're planning to get a website published this is without question the best approach. Getting your website up quickly is important and using a template will get your site up in a matter of days. This brings in new customers faster and the sooner the search engines index your site the better you'll do in the long run.
The downside to this strategy is that you are presenting what the search engines call "duplicate content". It's unlikely that you're the only CPA using that content provider, and all these other websites for accountants have essentially the same content on their websites as you have on yours. These pages will not usually be indexed well in the search engines. Duplicate content pages get indexed, but the page that indexes first gets the lion's share of the credit. This means all the other sites using the same page will need to change the page to get full credit for it. All these pages count... they'll get crawled and your website will get credit for them, but they won't appear on the search engine's results pages.Fortunately there's a easy fix for this problem.
If you customize your important pages once the site has been posted you can get around this problem.
Start with your "index" page. The "index" page, also known as the the "welcome" page, is the most important page on your site. As a rule it has the most inherent authority, and it almost always gets indexed first. By rewriting it you are creating "unique content", and that's what the search engines are looking for.
Once that's done selectively rewrite other pages. As a rule the more pages you re-write, the better. You'll get more pages with better rankings, and your overall site will accumulate authority faster. Assign an order of importance to the pages with the pages you consider most important at the top of the list, then rewrite the pages on your site one at a time in that order.
There are some important rules of thumb to keep in mind that will maximize your appeal both to search engines and prospects.
Using Meta Tags
Before you begin writing create a keyword rich page title for your page. Make your page title 5-7 words, and make sure you include the city and state you're marketing to. For example:
Los Angeles, CA Accounting and Business Planning
Put this in the "Page Title" Meta Tag for the page (if you don't know what a Meta tag is or how to change it your web host may need to help you with this).
Now create a keyword rich, headline-style introduction to the page for the search engines to display when your page comes up. For example:
Your Los Angeles, CA Accounting and Business Planning Solution. Free initial consultation for Business Owners.
Put this in the "Page Description" Meta Tag for the page (again, your web host may need to help you with this).Some accounting and CPA website design providers will not help you modify the Meta Tags on individual pages. They'll try to sell you on using a "global setting". This means all the Meta Tags on every page are one and the same. This is fine at the start, and a global setting is handy to have, but in the long run it's disastrous to rely on it. As you customize your site content you MUST change the tags on each page. If your website provider doesn't allow you to change the Meta data on individual pages it's time to get a new website.
Now... rewrite your page copy.
Most people find it easiest to just use the existing copy as a guideline. This is fine. Just make sure you "spin" it enough that the search engines don't catch on. There are no exact guidelines to offer, but the industry standard among SEO's says you should have variation in at least 30% of the sentences. Some people claim that figure should be closer to 70%.
Make Your Copy Search Engine Friendly
The search engines want a "concise summary" of the information: Too long and the search engines will penalize you because they'll think you're either babbling on or getting too technical; Too short and they'll assume you're summary isn't detailed enough. Make your page 400-600 words.
Use your keywords in your text. Try to use your page title keywords (in the example above that would be"Hoboken ", "NJ", "Accounting", and the keyphrase "Business Planning"). Optimally you want a 1% "keyword density". If your page is 450 words use each keyword 4 or 5 times. Don't overuse your keywords. This is considered a type of spam and could result in your page being de-indexed.
Make Your Copy People Friendly
Don't write too smart. Accountants tend to prefer copy that's slick. They like to make their copy look super-intellegent and professional. This is a mistake, unless you're looking to get other accountant's to hire you. The average business owner is an open collar guy, and as a rule that's what he's looking for. Write your copy to appeal to your prospects; not to yourself. Making youre visitors feel stupid will just frustrate them or make them angry. Don't waste their time with the details. Prospects don't care about the details. All they care about is what the benefit is to them. Concentrate on this. Show the customer how your service will benefit them personally. Write conversationally. Good copy reads casually. People friendly copy is just that... friendly.
Most custom website designers don't want you to know this, but you can actually get a full featured website up quickly and inexpensively and still reap the benefits of custom content and meta data.