Make Search Engine Optimization Fun Using InboundWriter
Summary: Using web-based services InboundWriter and Scribe, you can refine your copy and get real-time results on the effect it will have on search engine optimization of your website content—making the process more fun!
Bloggers who are seriously about getting search engine traffic always make sure they include the right “phrases that pay” when they write. They understand the underlying principles behind content/search engine optimization or SEO: Create relevant, quality content that is indexed properly by Google and Bing, and as importantly (perhaps more so) get backlinks from other well ranked websites as “social proof” that your content is rank-worthy in the first place.
Optimizing your website content for search engine optimization purposes strikes many people as a huge (and often mind-numbingly boring) challenge. But it doesn’t have to be.
Fortunately, there are some very good, affordable tools to speed up the search engine optimization process and give you more peace of mind vs. guesswork.
InboundWriter: A Fun Way To Achieve Search Engine Optimization

A web-based SEO service that I really like is Inbound Writer (affiliate link). They recently launched a WordPress plugin, and I’m using the free version now for content optimization on this post.
With InboundWriter, you either go to their site and optimize your documents there (similar to Scribe), or install the WordPress plugin. Here’s a YouTube video that shows how the InboundWriter WordPress plugin works:
Using InboundWriter, the content optimization process starts with identifying a select number of “focus terms” (relevant keywords) you want to rank for. Once you pick these, InboundWrite will whir and hum, then offer a laundry list of terms to include in your copy for ideal search engine optimization. As you refine the text, you see real-time results on the effect it will have on search engine indexing. You get a Document Score gauge that updates in real time as you write, which really makes writing seem like a game!
Two Ways InboundWriter Optimizes Search Engine Content: By Search/Social Or Reader Targeting
InboundWriter has two built-in ways to help you optimize your content. Their Search & Social is called a “balanced” strategy or you can choose selective demographic/reader targeting. Depending on which strategy you select, it will affect your real-time results. I haven’t played around with these enough to know how much of an impact either has, though I’m more inclined to go for the “balanced” approach unless my content was super-specific to a niche.

The free, web-based version of InboundWriter limits you to optimizing eight documents per month. Their single paid level, the Professional Plan, is $19.95/month and includes content optimization for unlimited documents.
Click here to try out InboundWriter.
Using Scribe SEO For Web Content Optimization
Another solution, Scribe (affiliate link), is very good at analyzing your content and suggesting keywords and phrases you may have overlooked. Using a web-based version (for use on any website regardless of the content management system), or plugins for WordPress, Joomla and Drupal, you use Scribe to create search-optimized content. Before you start to write, you can do keyword research to determine the best phrases to target for a particular article. Next, as you write the system prompts you to fill in proper information such as title tags, meta description on other “on page” factors relevant to search engines.
Scribe also has a neat feature that helps you build backlinks to your site, which are crucial to getting better search engine rankings. It will look for search engine optimization opportunities for you to cross link with other posts on your own site, external sites and even influential Twitter users you may want to share with.
Scribe’s “platform-agnostic” version is especially good if you are a writer providing content to multiple sites. You can use it to optimize your content before posting it elsewhere.
The system also lets you quickly create Content Optimization Reports to send to your clients. This is a fantastic way to demonstrate your value beyond simply writing “good” content.
Scribe has four packages ranging from $17 to $97 per month (with a 30-day, money back guarantee). Their pricing is based on how many “evaluations” and keyword searches you get in a month. In Scribe, each time you analyze your content using their algorithm, you use one evaluation. They claim it takes about 3-5 evaluations per page, so you can quickly burn through these.
Click here to try out Scribe.
My Initial Takeaways
Based on my preferences, I like the non-WordPress version of InboundWriter better than the WordPress plugin, which doesn’t offer all the bells and whistles. Plus, I hate writing directly in the WordPress editor.
I will say the process adds to the time I would normally spend in terms of worrying about search engine optimization. It also feels unnatural to me to keep repeating keywords just for the sake of moving the SEO needle. After several minutes piddling around with this post, for example, I settled for a 67 out of 100 score from InboundWriter—and I went with a crappier title and more repetition overall than I’d like. Sorry, Google, but I’m not gonna write like a machine just to appease your robots. My valued readers will likely abandon ship.
There’s also the issue of what you’re targeting in terms of keywords. Some phrases are just ridiculously competitive in terms of search engine indexing. I don’t care how many times I say search engine optimization here…the chances of this article ranking on page one of Google is very slim. However, if I’m going after a less competitive phrase, my chances are greatly increased by focusing on my word choices and placement in the title, URL, headers and body content.
I wouldn’t necessarily use either Scribe or InboundWriter every single time to massage my content. But certainly for “pillar” type content that I really, really want to rank for, I’d spend the time working with one of these tools. Both InboundWriter and Scribe make it more of a game and less drudgery to try to figure out how to appease Google and get your content better indexed.
For More Information
Click the links to learn more about InboundWriter and Scribe. Please note, I will make a small affiliate commission on these if you decide to buy through my links. If so, I thank you—and my wife and kids thank you!



