Understand how your customers search for you
Good website content begins with understanding how your customers search for your products or services. One of the most common mistakes businesses make is describing what they do rather than the words their customers actually use, or focusing on what they can do rather than how they can help. Before writing a page, ask yourself, “What would someone type into Google if they were looking for my business”. Your content should naturally answer that question.
Choosing high-value keywords
High-value keywords are more likely to attract high-intentional visitors and a higher chance of resulting in meaningful business value like a sale, enquiry, booking or qualified lead. A person searching "web design", is less likely to result in a conversion compared with a person searching "web design South Devon small business".
Think about the specific words and phrases your customers are likely to search for. If you serve multiple locations, create dedicated pages that provide useful information about each area rather than simply repeating place names throughout your website. Search engines reward content that is relevant, informative, and genuinely useful to local audiences.
Research the keywords your customers use
Google’s autocomplete suggestions (see screenshot below),
the “People also ask” section (see screenshot below),
and the related searches at the bottom of search results (see screenshot below)
are excellent free sources of information because they reflect real searches made by users.
Write for people first
Your content should:
- Answer the questions your customers are asking
- Explain your product and services clearly differentiating your brand
- Include call-to-action guides that support visitors in taking the next step in their user journey. Ultimately, the user journey should answer a question, build truth and credibility, and end in a conversion.
Support claims such as “high-quality service” or “industry-leading solutions”, search engines increasingly recognise content that demonstrates genuine expertise, experience, and usefulness.
Purpose-led content
Search engine optimisation is about communicating the purpose of each page using descriptive page title, clear heading structure, and content that matches the intent behind a user’s search. The better your website answers your customers’ questions, the easier it becomes for both search engines and AI systems to understand your content and recommend it to the right audience.
Review your Copy
When writing copy for a page check:
- Does this page answer a specific customer question?
- Does the page title describe exactly what the page is about?
- Would your customers use these words when searching?
- Have you included your location naturally where appropriate?
- Does the page explain what makes your business different?
- Is there a clear call to action?
- Would this page still be useful if Google didn’t exist?
That last question is particularly important. Modern search engines and AI systems increasingly reward content that demonstrates genuine expertise and usefulness rather than content written primarily to manipulate rankings.
If you'd like to me to evaluate your SEO performance consider an SEO audit