Andriana BoyrikovaWhen you meet someone in person, you unconsciously begin to judge how trustworthy they are: you pay attention to the information they share and to their body language. It is exactly the same when your prospects land on your website: they judge the information you give them and how you deliver it to them. The copy on your website will determine if they will feel they can trust you and want to do business with you or instead leave your website.
Whether your company consists of one person or 100 people, you need web copy that is valuable and relevant to your target audience and triggers them to take the action you want. I am sharing with you a few hands-on tips how to achieve that and ensure you aren’t driving your ideal customers away.
Know your product/service
First and foremost, you need to know what you are selling. Perhaps this will strike you as nonsensical: “Of course I know the product/service I am selling, I have built it myself!” However, before you dismiss this point, I suggest you take a minute and try to answer the following questions (and write down the answers on a piece of paper):
- Why did your develop this product/service? (Making a profit isn’t the answer.) What is your Why, your purpose, the spark that ignited your decision to start a business?
- How does your product/service compare to everything else on the market? What does it do differently from the rest? How does it do it differently?
- What problems does your product/service solve for customers?
- What are the strengths and limitations of your product/service (be honest with the latter, every single product/service has its shortcomings)?
- What do prospective customers find in your competitors? Why do they choose your competitors? What do you do better, cheaper or faster than your competitors?
Only when you have crystal clear answers to these questions and are able to articulate them to yourself, can you start drafting copy for your website. You might want to use customer feedback and your team members’ feedback to help you in the process.
Understand your audience
Trust comes through understanding, so if you want the prospects who land on your website to get to trust and like you, you first need to make an effort to understand them. Before you write a single line of copy, refer to your buyer persona template(s): who is your ideal customer, what matters to them, and how can you address that in their own words?
Making your audience care is your next step: don’t forget potential customers don’t care about your product or service, they care how it will solve their problem or meet their need. Always keep in mind: what is in it for them?
Also, make sure your web copy sounds like it is part of a conversation, as if you talk with them face to face. You can do that by using headings in the form of questions (questions your prospects are having); the personal address you (“You will use a custom solution while you can be sure all your data is encrypted and secure”); and active voice (“Conversions will be increased by 70%“; “You will increase conversions by 70%”).
Before you publish your copy, make a final check:
- Is this the type of content your buyer persona wants to see?
- Can this content help your buyer persona understand your products/services better?
- Can this content trigger your buyer persona’s emotions and make them realize they need you?
Focus on benefits
When you visit a website, do you:
a) want to hear 20 different reasons why the company or product you are reading about is so amazing
or
b) want to know how the product/service can actually help you?
I can imagine you will choose b). In your web copy, you shouldn’t give lengthy descriptions of features or how great your product/service is; instead you should focus on WHY it will make your prospect’s life better or easier. Here is an example how you can turn me-centric copy to prospect-centric:
“We are the largest shoe retailer in the Northern Netherlands.”
Okay, so what? You are telling your prospects about yourself instead of explaining what you can do for them. You might have a better chance of getting their attention if you start with:
“Keep your feet warm this winter with the largest selection of shoes in the Northern Netherlands.”
Your copy should always focus on WHY a specific feature is important to your prospective customer. An easy way to do that is by using the “So what?” principle.
“We offer the best-in-class CRM software.”
So what?
“It will help you manage all your customer data and deliver actionable insights.”
So what?
“It will help you manage and analyze all your interactions with prospects and customers in one place.”
So what?
“You will convert more leads to customers and keep your current customers while having more time for your other tasks.”
Write for the web
Web visitors spend 3 to 5 seconds on average before leaving a website which means you have 3 to 5 seconds to convince them you are worth their time.
Easy to scan text
- Web visitors read in the F-pattern: they scan a text from the top-left corner, scan horizontally, then drop down to the next line. Place your most important information at the top of the page and make your text left-aligned.
- Apply the inverted pyramid principle: web visitors are easily distracted and impatient, so always place the most important information in the first two paragraphs of each web page.
- Chunk the text into small paragraphs of just a few sentences, use bullet points (instead of a sentence with ten commas), headings and subheadings, and visually prominent quotes.
Easy to navigate website
- Make sure your logo, name, and tagline are in your header on every single page, so your visitors don’t get confused or forget where they are.
- It shouldn’t take your web visitors more than ten seconds to find the following information: Products and Services, Contact, About, Testimonials, Pricing, Blog, Social media.
- It is worth asking laypeople who aren’t familiar with your business to check your website and provide feedback: is it clear at ONE glance what you do and how that will help them?
Call to action
- Each web page is your opportunity to get your visitors to act, so it should have a prominent call to action: Stay connected; Contact us; Sign up for our newsletter; Request a demo; Request a free trial; Add to cart.
- A call to action needs to grab your visitors’ attention, so use a bright button color that contrasts with the color of the page. Keep the button text between two to five words long.
- Make sure you highlight a clear benefit that your visitors will get after they click the button; your call to action needs to reflect a benefit, an action that they want to complete.
Keyword optimization
Even though I believe we will never really know how the Google’s Search Algorithm and Ranking System work, there are a few keyword optimization practices that you need to be aware of:
- Target only one keyword per page and use semantically related keywords within the text on the page.
- Use the keyword in the URL, meta title, meta description, beginning of the text and naturally in the text, image title, and image alt text (that is the text that describes the image textually so that search engines and visually impaired people can understand what it is.)
- Don’t resort to keyword stuffing, repeating the same keyword(s) so often that it sounds unnatural. Instead, create content that is relevant and helpful to your prospects and makes them want to stay longer on your website.
Human side
- Your business comprises of people and offers a service/product to other people, so you need to show the human side of your business. Add photos of you and your team, links to your social media channels, and videos.
- Add testimonials (memorable quotes based on actual customer experience); customer stories (stories how your product or service has resolved a customer’s problem); and relevant certifications or awards.
- Don’t make a separate page with testimonials: place your testimonials and success stories either on your homepage or spread them in context on your other pages.
Conclusion
The copy on your website can trigger a prospect to subscribe to your newsletter, contact you for more information, and eventually purchase your product/service. However, it can also make them leave your website and never come back.
That’s why it is crucial before you publish a single line of copy on your website you ponder:
- if you really know the product/service you sell
- if you know your audience
- if you focus on the benefits, not on the features
- if you know how to write for the web
- if you show the human side of your company.
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I hope you have found these tips helpful. Which principles do you follow when you write copy for your website? Let me know in a comment.
Featured image: Agence Olloweb, Unsplash.
Do you need help with your website copy? Email me and I would love to write copy for your website that will attract your ideal customers.
