Digital Marketing

Copywriting VS Content Writing : What’s The Difference?

By Just Digital Team
Copywriting VS content writing cover image

Copywriting VS Content writing: Is it the same thing? Is there a difference? Which one should I use?

These are the usual questions we hear whenever a client approaches us regarding their web copy, and we’re here to answer all of these questions for you.

To start, let me tell you a story. There was once a time when a copywriter was the go-to guy for any and all marketing copy. But this was in the prehistoric days of the internet when the blog wasn’t even invented yet. These days, if you have a blog, you must ask yourself if you are writing the right form of copy or content for your target audience.

Today, blogging has become a behemoth marketing strategy for marketers with 53% of marketing professionals naming it as their top digital marketing content priority. Websites with blogs, in particular, have a 434% higher probability of ranking top spots on search engines.

Copywriters on the other hand don’t necessarily manage blogs or write content for blog sites. They’re working on a separate thing entirely.

The truth is, the distinction matters since these two styles of writing will deliver companies very different outcomes. It’s time to put this question to rest and uncover the difference.

Marketing is all about storytelling!

Man sits on top of huge typewriter

Have you noticed how in recent years the most successful brands are storytellers? These brands succeed in appealing to the market by leveraging human emotions. They use storytelling and empathy to win our trust, encourage us to take action, and convince us to believe in their mission.

But, storytelling is a two-way street that is part of a long term relationship with your clients. You’ll need to build trust before you actually begin selling something.

Customers deserve to know that your priority isn’t to sell to them. You should prove you actually care about them and want to help them.

It’s a juggling act; one where diverse tasks are played by copywriters and content writers. However, both are crucial in forging meaningful relations with consumers.

It’s important to know the distinctions between a copywriter and a marketing writer, whether you’re developing your team in-house or partnering with an agency. This will assist you in recruiting the best person to share your brand’s story.

Copywriting – What is it?

Man with big megaphone holding it up against a big blog post

Source Image

The primary focus of copywriting is generating revenue by converting traffic into leads and sales. It’s basically a direct, short-term goal with big returns. Ads, sales letters, PPC landing pages, and more are all forms of copywriting.

A copywriter can produce persuasive headlines and call-to-actions (CTAs) to entice clients to buy a product, subscribe to a subscription, plan a trip, or submit essential information for follow-up, such as an email address. Creative copywriters have been responsible for some of the world’s most popular ad strategies.

Copywriting is more straight to the point compared to content writing, and it incorporates compelling, emotional words to entice consumers to act quickly. It can sound unlikely, but copywriting may make or break a business.

Content Writing – What is it?

Content writing Man with big pencil writes on laptop screen projecting a zoomed in article/blog post

Source Image

The primary focus of content writing is to generate organic traffic via search engines.

Content writing is producing blog posts, social media posts, white papers, e-books, and other insightful materials that teach, entertain, and update the audience about a given subject. It focuses on developing positive interaction with your customers so that they can value your brand over time and become involved in your product or service.

The best content writers are so skilled at storytelling that they can write hundreds of posts for your blog without even referencing your brand and yet continue to draw and convert prospects. The strength of this kind of prose is that it has the power to gradually turn leads into opportunities, clients into prospects, and return buyers from consumers.

Studies show B2B marketers find blogging to be more time- and cost-effective than conventional methods of lead generation. Content writing also has the power to position your brand as an authority and a credible leader in your industry.

The great thing about this type of content is that it’s entertaining. Since it is free for your readers, your content writer must be well-versed in SEO to ensure that your content is found and read.

Copywriting VS Content Writing – Key Differences

copywriting vs content writingCopywriting VS content writing key differences infographic

(click on the image to zoom in)

If you look at the infographic above, you’ll have a better grasp of the difference between copywriting and content writing.

Copywriting VS Content Writing – Benefits


woman sitting on big megaphone typing on laptop

Let’s start with copywriting benefits!

Copywriting benefits

Helps build your brand

When people visit your website, the first thing they see is your web copy. This means you only have one chance to impress your potential customers.

Remember, your copy aids prospective customers in deciding whether or not you are trustworthy, competent, and potentially deserving of their trust. This means your web copy must be perfect from the outset, whether it’s in terms of tone, syntax, or user experience!

The content of your copy reflects the quality of your goods or services. Any slight blunder will reflect negatively on your business. Great copywriting considers all of these considerations and finds the most successful way to portray the business.

It increases the audience’s opinion of you, helping you to get off to a strong start with them.

Great copywriting doesn’t only shed light on your brand in a positive way, it also helps your customers experience what your brand is like and what it really stands for.

Tells your brand story to connect with your customers

As you may already know, more and more people are buying into brands more than a single product or service, which means your target audience is always trying to figure out if you’re the best match for them.

This is where the brand’s story enters the picture!

Brand stories that are well-crafted resonate with your customers, reassuring them that you are the best option for them.

Good brand stories let the listener feel heard by touching on their worries, aspirations, and wishes.

Prospective customers can only trust and buy from you if they feel a connection with you. Great copywriting assists in the creation of the required bond.

By telling your brand’s story, you will be able to build a long lasting relationship with your customers.

Sets your business apart from your competitors

Nowadays, customers have a multitude of options.

If they want to buy something, a short Google search yields pages of results!

They would no longer buy from you just because you approached them first.

Instead, they’ll compare you to your rivals to find out which choice is better for them.

So it’s crucial for you to stand out in order to win the deal.

You must relate the advantages of your products/services to their needs and serve them better than anybody else.

Great copywriting accomplishes this by presenting them with a fresh viewpoint on how you vary from your rivals in an objective fashion.

You can be so engrossed in the day-to-day activities that you use detailed, jargon-laden terminology to differentiate yourself from your audience.

With their thorough knowledge of psychology and business experience, qualified copywriters can help you avoid everything we’ve mentioned above.

They are qualified to rapidly dissect markets for gaps your business can fill.

Higher rankings on Google

Having a website is useless if no one sees it. Think about it, your website should act as a valuable “internet salesperson” for prospective customers.

However, much as salespeople in a supermarket, they can only produce sales if buyers come in, or in this case visit.

But how can you draw thousands of targeted, organic visits to your website so that your “virtual salesperson” can do its job?

The answer? Rank on Google of course!

Although the aim of copywriting is to turn guests into paying clients, better copy also makes the website rank higher in Google.

This is achieved by creatively inserting keywords into the copy of your website that your guests are looking for.

Persuades prospective clients/customers to take action

Another string of dull sentences is the last thing the reader needs to hear – spare them the anguish!

Great copywriting entices readers by delivering knowledge in an entertaining manner.

Suddenly, they’re the main character of the plot, and the advantages and features you’re pitching to them stand out.

Awesome copywriting is mindful of their client persona and how to relate to them on both a rational and emotional basis.

The last thing you want is for your copy to fail, resulting in a waste of all your previous efforts.

People are normally cautious when it comes to money. They are fearful that after investing their hard-earned money, they would not get what they were promised.

Great copywriting solves this apprehension by evoking the best rational and emotional responses. They do that by using…

  • Attractive headlines that catch the reader’s attention
  • Copy that stresses the benefits in order to evoke desire
  • A lucrative bid that prospects won’t be able to reject
  • Social evidence that is both impressive and well-targeted (like testimonials)
  • Properly reacting to potential objections
  • A compelling Call-To-Action

To make prospects feel comfortable enough to take action and trust your services/products.

Now onto content writing benefits!

Content writing benefits

Get organic traffic and improve rankings on Google

Pay-per-click (PPC) ads help you access a vast amount of people instantly, but it’s costly and does not make the website expand organically. Professional content writing, on the other hand, enables authors to use a range of search engine optimization (SEO) methods to bring sites closer to the top of search engine results pages.

According to Neil Patel, an SEO, and marketing specialist, 75% of people never look beyond the first page of Google results. It takes some time for content writing to get you to the top of search engine rankings, but it does. You will increase your rating and draw more users as you add more optimized content to your site.

Helps customers move through the sales funnel

In an ideal world, you can create content that reaches customers at specific stages of the sales funnel. Any of your blog posts will include general knowledge that will pique the attention of your followers. Other material will contain specific statistics, product comparisons, and other facts that will encourage them to buy.

Increase conversion rates

Professional content is supposed to increase conversion rates as it pushes readers along the sales funnel. Readers learn more about the goods and services as they progress down the funnel. They come to recognize your business as a brand they can rely on to provide them with reliable details.

BigCommerce lists useful content as a crucial optimization phase to boost revenue in 2020 because it has such a significant effect on transaction rates.

You won’t be creating bonds that make people continue to buy your brand if you don’t have excellent content created for your target audience.

Establishes your brand as an authority

You want to cultivate partnerships between your business and your customers/clients. However, you still want to publish content that makes other businesses in your industry identify you as a credible expert.

Building relationships with customers is not the same as establishing your name as a market leader. You must build thought leading content that openly provides insights into the industry’s patterns and roadblocks.

Sharing knowledge that can help competitors succeed can seem to be a bad idea. Most of the time, you begin to create bridges between your business and other businesses. When they recognize you as an expert, they may refer clients to you if they don’t have the time or expertise to complete a project.

You want to stay competitive, but cooperation and collaboration have their benefits too.

Educates your readers and helps sales

Sales reps already work in high-pressure, high-demand environments. Companies pay them well because they know how to close important revenue-generating deals.

Unfortunately, many salespeople are overworked because they must educate potential customers before closing deals. Every minute a salesperson spends providing basic information to potential customers is a minute that could have been spent closing a deal.

Customers and clients need information and instructions before they become serious about spending money, and content writing provide this. When you produce content, you’ll be able to provide much of the information customers need to make decisions when they contact your sales reps.

The salespeople can then concentrate on what they do best: ironing out the details, signing contracts, and cultivating relationships.

Copywriting VS Content Writing – Types

We’ve established that a copywriter creates marketing material, while a content writer produces content—but what kind of marketing material and what kind of content? This is the last significant difference between the two.

In the past, copywriting was only used for advertising. But, beyond witty slogans, the internet has expanded the scope of what copywriters can write for. Today’s list includes, but not limited to the following items:

  • Ad copy, both online and offline
  • Tag lines and slogans
  • Content for websites
  • Email marketing campaigns
  • Scripts for advertisements on tv or radio
  • Scripts for video
  • Publications and press releases
  • White papers
  • Catalogues
  • Billboards
  • Brochures
  • Postcards
  • Sales letters
  • Sales letters
  • Lyrics for jingles
  • Social media ads or promotions

Today’s copywriters work closely with content writers and technical writers but bear in mind that the aim is to sell you a marketing strategy concept.

Similarly, content writing helps you to write a number of different styles of content, including but not limited to:

  • Blog posts
  • Newspaper articles
  • Features on magazines
  • Email newsletters
  • Ebooks
  • Print magazines
  • Posts on social media
  • Podcasts
  • Radio, Film, or Television

What you just need to remember is that brands require both copywriting and content writing to remain current, so there are lots of chances for writers to dabble in both. It’s just a matter of finding out which one you’re good at and sticking with it.

Copywriting VS Content Writing – Which one is right for you?

Copywriting VS Content writing woman sitting on desk with big screen showing article behind her

Source Image

It all really depends on your goals. We see companies farm out their writing to “a friend” or “someone abroad” all too much. You could get good copy this way every now and then. Under the vast majority of situations, you can not. Words are more than just that.

Marketers noticed a few years ago that if a website has a lot of content, Google rated it higher in the search engines. So they charged pennies on the dollar for a huge volume of copies, and they couldn’t care less what it said. It was successful. This approach delivered a lot of traffic to a lot of websites. The concern was that if a reader arrived, the copy was at best awful.

This is your business. When somebody takes the time to visit your website, don’t you want to “talk” to website visitors in a polite way, and mention things that matter to the both of you?

Don’t you want your words to leave a strong impression on them?

If your company spends a lot of time educating prospects and clients, particularly before the sale, then content-rich websites and blogs are the way to go. It’s in your best interests to recruit a content writer who can do this effectively.

Copywriting VS Content Writing – What we suggest

We suggest you aim to blend the best of both worlds: useful, insightful, and authoritative content with a strong call to action. It’s important to note that copywriting is content, but content isn’t always copywriting. Copywriting is straightforward and based on a sales-generating end-game, while content writing is insightful and imaginative and intended to be shared.

We hope we answered your copywriting vs content writing questions and more! Want more content like this? Head on over to our blog and get all the tips and tricks you need to help your business grow!


With Just Digital,
Success is Easy-Peasy Lemon-Squeezy.

When life gives us lemons, we generate results. Contact us today and we can start making lemonade.

Get Started