How to Adapt Print Copy to the Web
An online environment has different demands than a print publication-and it’s never a good strategy to just copy the text from your company brochure online. Here are a few tips on how to change the writing on your print collateral to make it work online.
Make it current. Online, all your information has to be up-to-the-minute current. With a print brochure, you can get away with last month’s info-it takes time and a monetary investment to reprint your company’s print collateral every time there’s a new offer or change. But online, it only takes minutes to update your site, and readers expect everything to be up to date. The good thing is that you can advertise new offers and products there long before you get your print collateral in order.
Make it helpful. People surfing your website online are looking for information as much as they’re looking to buy-and if you don’t tell them what they need to know, they may look elsewhere. Sure, you still have to sell on your website. But in most cases, you shouldn’t adopt a hard-sell tone. Keep your tone conversational, with the underlying message that you want your readers to get the info they need. If you can incorporate informational articles into your site as well as product and company info, you can build trust and increase your search engine rankings.
Add links. Particularly on your home page, add a few links into the copy that lead to pages deeper into your site. Choose anchor text-that’s the words you use for the link-that reflects your relevant keywords. For example, you may write a sentence like “Check out our new selection of ergonomic desk chairs“ with underlined text as your anchor text, as opposed to “to see our new selection of ergonomic desk chairs, click here.”
Break it up. If you’re adapting a longer informational article for an online environment, you have to deal with the online reader’s limited attention span. Instead of sitting down with a magazine, they’re sitting at their computer with their email and the rest of the Internet competing for their attention. You need to make sure they get the information they came for quickly and efficiently. To do it, break long chunks of text into brief paragraphs. Make good use of bolded subheadings and bullet point lists. This makes your article easy to scan.
Print and online environments have different demands—and readers have different competitions for their time. Adapt your print copy for the web, and you’ll have better results than you will if you simply copy your print brochure on your website.