Call me naive, but I just discovered that there are copywriters who use templates for creating their copy.

These templates seem to be popular for long sales letter copy typically used by the information marketing crowd, but you may stumble across other kinds.

They work like this: you have document with generalized copywriting and then “plug” your product with specific benefits into it. The end result may have a few persuasive copy elements, but overall it is devoid of any real character.

If you want your site to get slapped by Google, this is a perfect way to do it.

Such templates are used hundreds of times by the “black hat” copywriter. His intent is to take a shortcut toward creating copy. But he really doesn’t care about the results. All he wants is to create the fastest copy possible and charge what may seem a reasonable fee at the moment. (Around $250 or so.)

Don’t do it. Google is constantly looking for such tactics and then penalizing the sites who use it. Bottom line: your site may disappear from the search engine.

When you hire a copywriter, make sure you’re not getting a template. How can you tell? Try typing in the title in a search engine. If the very same title (or a similar one) pops up, check out the site. If by chance you see almost the same copy, then you know your copywriter has given you a template.

Avoid “black hat” copywriting. Get the real thing… copywriting that is customized to your business’ needs.