Words are words – right?
Not quite.
Understanding the difference between copywriting and content writing is crucial if you want to maximize your company’s sucess.
To stand out amongst thousands of competitors in the digital world, businesses require words that are:
- Concise
- Interesting
- Valuable
- Visionary
- Persuasive
- Memorable
- Relatable
Effective content writing and copywriting can accomplish this.
Although copywriting and content writing sound similar, they serve distinct roles for companies.
If your business uses online marketing, it’s important to understand the differences between copywriting and content writing to ensure you are taking advantage of them both.
In this blog, I’ll explain why these writing services often get confused and how to use content creation to help your business succeed.
What Is Copywriting?
Copywriters create copy.
Ok. But what does this mean exactly?
Copy is the text used to market services, sell products, and convince an audience to take action. You probably see copy every day in the form of clever Facebook ads or magazine ads. It’s often brief, convincing, and catchy.
Marketing copywriting is focused on driving sales and encouraging customers to take action.
There are even different types of copywriters (website copywriting, medical copywriting, technical copywriting, creative copywriting, marketing copywriting, etc.), but I’m going to focus on the general industry.
A few copywriting examples include:
- Product descriptions
- PPC landing pages and ads
- Paid social media ads or online ads
- CPM ads
- Slogans
- Taglines
- Website sales copy
- Sales emails
- Short Message Service (SMS) ads
- Commercial scripts
- Brochures
- Postcards
- Catalogs
- Billboards
- Magazine ads
Notice the common phrases? ‘Sales’ and ‘ads’ show up often in copywriting services.
What Is Content Writing?
Content writing is focused on providing information.
At its core, it can also include marketing aspects. However, content writing focuses more on solving problems, providing value to an audience, and establishing brand recognition.
Meaningful content can help build credibility, encourage customer engagement, and increase organic search traffic to your site.
Content marketing aims to provide relevant information about your products and services, entertain readers, and subtly draw your audience closer to action.
Content writing examples include:
- Social media posts (paid social media ads fall under copywriting)
- Blog posts
- E-books
- White papers
- Tutorials / How-to Guides
- Newsletters
- News articles
- Case studies
- Web content creation
Similarities Between Copywriting and Content Writing
There is a good deal of overlap between content writing and copywriting.
Some copywriters write copy and content, including blogs, sales page copy, product descriptions, paid ad copy, email copy, web copy — whatever the client needs.
Ultimately, both content writing and copywriting can involve marketing purposes and seek to generate leads and sales.
The best copywriters and content writers possess similar skills:
- Time management
- Creativity
- Knowledge of best SEO practices
- Ability to create memorable, positive impressions of your brand
- Empathy
- Ability to convey your company’s values to your audience
- Willingness to learn your brand voice and understand your target audience
- Research
- Excellent communication
How Content Writing and Copywriting Work Together
Copywriting and content writing complement each other beautifully and play a key role in overall marketing.
For instance, people don’t go around to strangers saying, “Wanna marry me?”.
Well, not usually at least.
Instead, they typically become friends first. Hang out. Get to know each other. Build trust.
Using straight-up copywriting without valuable content writing would be similar to proposing to a stranger.
Content writing builds trust and connection and helps your audience get to know you and your brand.
When done correctly, content writing combined with quality copywriting makes it easier for prospective clients to *Want* to click to learn more about your services or feel good about buying a product from you.
Essentially, content writing engages readers, provides value to customers, and informs them about your products.
Then, copywriting brings home the sales.
How to Know When to Use Copywriting vs. Content Writing for Digital Marketing
A good marketing approach uses a mix of both content and copywriting.
Copywriting is used to:
- Sell a product or service
- Convert leads
- Drive sales
- Promote a sense of urgency
- Invoke emotion (i.e. fear of missing out)
- Encourage users to engage in a specific task (i.e. contacting you, signing up for a course, registering for a webinar, buying a product, clicking an ad, etc.)
Content writing is used for:
- Educating your readers on a topic or product you offer
- Answering a question that will be helpful to your target audience
- Passing information along to your audience
- Building brand awareness and trust
- Generating web traffic
- Attracting new customers
- Connecting with your readers and encouraging loyalty
- Establishing yourself as an authority in your industry
- Facilitating engagement with your audience
In Need of Custom Writing Services for Your Business?
To recap:
- Copywriting aims to sell, market, persuade, grab a reader’s attention, compel, convert, invoke emotion, captivate
- Content writing aims to inform, engage, provide value, educate, entertain, connect, generate interest, build trust
Copywriting and content writing differ in their intent, but both services play a key role in a successful marketing strategy.
If you understand how important the right content is for your website but can’t find the time to create it, let’s chat.
My goal? To save you time and help your business make more money.
I offer a range of custom writing services, including:
- Website copywriting services (taglines, web copy, product descriptions, service pages, etc.)
- Content writing services
- Blog writing services
- Ghostwriting services (there’s a good chance you’ve read a blog I created, a YouTube video description I wrote, or a tagline I came up with…. But you’d never know it!)
- Content overhaul (rewriting old blogs to help them rank better and provide more value to your readers)
When I collaborate with a business, the outcome matters to me. Your success is my success.
Knowing that I’ve helped a business grow and succeed makes writing more than a job to me.
Coming up with a punchy tagline for a business that was drawing a blank or creating a blog for a growing company that just doesn’t have the time is why I do what I do.
I’d love to hear about your business, your dreams for your company, and the type of content you need. You bring the vision. I’ll bring the words.