I couldn’t tell the difference between these two types of sheep’s milk yoghurt.
One was green. One was blue. But they both had the same list of ingredients and I couldn’t for the life of me work out why they were two different products.
So I bought neither.
As you can see, I have a brand new website. (Well, you can’t see it if you’re reading this via an RSS reader, so do you mind clicking through just this once?)
Rather than posting something long, I’ll give you a chance to have a look around. But I do have some people to thank, most importantly Rikki Bochow and Stuart Steel at Acorn Web who built the site for me.
I think Rikki’s done a fantastic job of designing an attractive site that’s almost all text. And Stu isn’t just generous with his employees’ time; he’s also a fount of great ideas.
One of his best ideas, in fact, was the “interactive demo” which you can get to from every non-blog page on the site. Have a look at it, it’s pretty nifty. While we’re at it, I’ve got an offer for you, loyal readers (or some of you at least). If you’ve made it all the way through the demo, you’ll see that one of the things I try to illustrate is the importance of links.
The only thing is, the bits of linked text in the demo don’t point to anything yet. Would you like one of them to point to something you’ve written? I’d be happy to do so, if you’ve written something that clearly and succinctly illustrates one of the following points:
So if you have anything that might be suitable, drop me a line. (If you have more than one, feel free to send me all of them, but I won’t publish more than one link per person.) No strings!
Oh, and before anyone suggests this, I’m already planning to offer a bookmark/Stumble friendly version of the demo.
Anyway, enjoy the website, and I’d love to hear your feedback. (This to Glenn at Divine Write for the very useful feedback he’s already given.)
The other day I idly typed “copywriter melbourne” into Google (as you do). Here’s what turned up:
Yep, that’s me, the third link on the page. Pretty good, huh? Here’s what’s even better: this took almost no effort on my part. I only have a stub of a website at the moment, this blog aside. (My real website is launching very soon, by the way, and just between you and me, it’s looking good.) I haven’t gone beyond the most rudimentary forms of search engine optimisation. And I’ve been in business for a shorter time than most of my competitors.
In fact, I feel a bit sheepish about placing higher on the page than experienced copywriters who’ve obviously put a great deal of effort into SEO. How did I do it?
To cut a long story short, I did two things:
This listing, you see, isn’t a “normal” search result. In regular “organic” searches - the kind the SEO industry is built around - I’m pretty much where you expect me to be (nowhere, more or less).
But when searchers type in something that Google recognises as a location, Google thinks “aha, this person is looking for something in their local area”, and so the first thing it displays is a map showing businesses that have registered themselves as being located there. Those organic results that everyone works so hard for get relegated to second place.
It probably wasn’t Google’s intention, but this is particularly good for business like mine that are located close to a CBD. Even though people searching for “copywriter melbourne” are probably looking for copywriters in the greater Melbourne area, Google starts at the CBD and works outwards. Which is rotten luck for all the copywriters in Frankston.
If you have a business with any kind of address, even your house, you probably can’t do much to change your physical location (not at short notice, anyway!), but you can take care of getting listed right now. Go to Google Local, and list yourself. It’s easy, and free. Go on, do it now. I’ll still be here when you get back.
Done? Good. Because what I haven’t told you yet is that for some of you, it’s just become even more important to have an up-to-date Google Local listing. You see, Google has just started serving up these local results some of the time even when searchers don’t type in a location! (They do this by making a guess about where you are based on your IP address. Hope that doesn’t feel too creepy.)
Now, this change will mainly affect businesses that are genuinely local - florists, dentists, pizza shops, and so on. [Edit: for businesses that aren't clearly local, like copywriters, the situation is less clear - see the comment from Glenn Murray below.] If you’re one of those local businesses, having a Google Local listing is now more important that being listed in any other directory, online or off. It’s the easiest, cheapest SEO boost you can possibly imagine. Hopefully you don’t need any more encouragement, because you took my advice two paragraphs ago, but I’m just saying.
What’s going to be interesting over the next few months is seeing businesses start gaming the system. I can see businesses registering under fake addresses in popular locations. I can see “public-spirited” competitors reporting those fake addresses to Google. I can see new businesses springing up to provide “legitimate” virtual addresses. Isn’t it funny how, in our virtualised world, a simple change on Google’s part suddenly makes actual locations important again?
If you’ve never heard the motto “Work on your business, not in it”, then you probably haven’t spent much time hanging around business coaches, or fans of the various iterations of Michael Gerber’s E Myth.
I haven’t read Gerber myself, but from what I can gather, “Work on your business, not in it” means roughly this:
If you own a business, you shouldn’t be spending your time doing the day-to-day things that keep the business ticking over (”working in your business”). Instead, you should hire, outsource or automate these tasks, and concentrate instead on the “big picture” strategic tasks that will make your business bigger, more scalable, more efficient, more saleable down the track, and so on (”working on your business”).
Now, obviously there’s something to this idea, otherwise half the business people I know wouldn’t devote their lives to realising it. The problem is, these same people are often so enamoured of the phrase itself that they want to use it in their marketing copy. I think this is a mistake, for two reasons:
The first of these is a problem with the underlying idea of the phrase, the second a problem with the wording. But both of them lead to what I’d describe as “huh?” reactions. Something that seems totally self-evident to the person saying it seems either wrong or confusing to the person hearing it. And that’s never good marketing. read more >
Emotional benefits? Business clients? If that combination sounds strange to you, keep reading.
If you’re nodding your head, on the other hand, you probably already know about using emotional benefits as a way of persuading potential customers they need you.
This idea has become pretty well-accepted in consumer product marketing circles (which doesn’t mean it’s always applied well of course!). But when it comes to business to business (B2B) marketing, there’s still an assumption out there that the only relevant benefit of any product or service is the “bottom line” or return on investment.
That’s a mistake. A big one. When you’re talking to a business, you’re talking to a person within that business. And business people are just as emotion-driven as anyone else.
Yes, business people need to justify their expenses. But the key word there is “justify”. By all means, follow through with some convincing-sounding numbers. Flatter business customers into thinking their buying decision is 100% rational. But start by appealing to their emotions, because emotion is what actually drives their behaviour.
To get you started, here are some emotional benefits you might think about offering potential customers if you’re in a B2B industry:
What do you think? Which ones have I missed?
(I know a popular one is “Work on your business, not in your business”, but I kind of hate that one. Remind me to talk about why some time.)
Photo: Diabolic Preacher
Am I the only person who’s sick of being talked to like a 14-year-old boy gamer?
“10 tips for killer copy!” “Dominate your niche with these killer content ideas!” “Killer strategies for destroying the competition!”
It’s all a bit…macho, don’t you think?
What if we stopped channeling Jean-Claude Van Damme and tried channeling Jane Austen instead, just for a change?
Anyone agree? What other copywriting clichés annoy the bejesus out of you?
Image: simon.wright
My credit union (which, by the way, is a terrific organisation that employs excellent customer service staff) has recently launched a fancy new website that’s mostly very pleasant to use. But there’s one thing I think they’re doing very wrong: using modal windows to advertise their products.
It’s been a much-discussed trend in web interface design lately, littering sites with these windows that require users to take some action before they can get on with what they came to do. They do look pretty nifty and have their uses - they can work really well for quickly displaying full-sized versions of thumbnail images, for instance. In fact, I’m planning to have a (user-initiated) modal on my website, so I’m certainly not against them in principle.
But when they’re used for advertising, they really do suck - it’s the ultimate form of “interruption marketing” because users can’t get on with anything else until they’ve interacted with the ad in some way. On a banking site, which existing customers use on a daily basis to accomplish specific tasks, that’s an even bigger sin.
When my credit union started using modals to advertise credit cards a couple of months ago, I wrote to them with a polite objection. They sent me a prompt reply, which was great, but they didn’t really seem to be taking in what I was saying. They pointed out that there was a cookie preventing anyone seeing the ad more than once (fair enough, but some people disable cookies, and maybe once is one too many). And they went on to tell me again how wonderful the credit card was. So I guess they think it’s OK to interrupt people if the product you’re selling is good.
This week I see the modal ads are back, this time advertising mortgages. What do you think - am I being a drama queen, or do you agree that this is really not on for a financial institution?
Photo credit: House of Sims
This is the final post in my series on dealing with objections in web content. The first two are here and here.
The story so far: We’ve established that, for any objection that might potentially get in the way of a person’s decision to buy your product and service, there are three broad types of objector: explicit objectors (those who have the objection and will voice it), latent objectors (those who have the objection, at least at some level, but won’t voice it), and non-objectors (those who don’t have the objection at all).
We then went further and divided each of these three categories of objector into a further three subcategories. And we finished the last post by saying that the way to deal with all these different types of objector is not to try to write something that will please everybody. So what do you do instead?
I could deal with this topic at very great length (well, OK, I could deal with most topics at very great length) but I’m going to boil it down to five steps:
So let’s take each of these in turn. read more >
As promised, a follow-up to my first post on objections. This is the post where I start to get pointy-headed. I have to warn you that not only will I divide people into three categories, I’ll also divide each of these three categories into three subcategories!
But as long you can deal with that much taxonomy before breakfast, this post should give you a more nuanced way of working out how different groups of customer might relate to a potential objection. And there will be donuts.
I’ll also briefly talk about how to deal with these different kinds of objector. But this will be mostly theory: the applied stuff will come in the final post in the series. (Yes, it’s a trilogy!) read more >
One of the things good web copy does is answer objections - the niggling blockages people have that prevent them from buying what you’re selling. According to marketing guru Sonia Simone, “FAQs” should really be called “FROs” - Frequently Raised Objections.
So when you’re developing web content, you should certainly try to anticipate objections your potential customers might have. But here’s something that might sound a bit odd: you shouldn’t answer every single potential objection! Let me give you a (rather gross) example to show why not.
read more >
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Writing content for the world wide web web content is different from writing for brochures, magazines, or other print media. Good web copywriters know what web users need (the reasons they use the web, what they are looking for, and their habits), and how to help them get it. Here's what they do. There are five main elements of effective web writing.
First, Most web users don't have a lot of time and are doing several things at once - checking their email, updating their Facebook status, browsing newspaper sites, and maybe even working. Your target audience needs to know you're exactly what they're looking for...right away.
So the best thing to do is to write web content in short, punchy sentences. Write directly to the customer, as if you're talking to one person. And cut out anything that's extraneous, any words or phrases you don't need.
Second, On the web people tend to skim, and they get intimidated by big, uninterrupted blocks of text. Use signposting methods such as
to break up the page and also to make your readers focus on your main points so that they are unmissable.
Third, Although you're mainly writing for people, you have another audience: that audience is search engines. To make search engines such as Google love you, it's necessary to use keywords strategically, in web content but preferably without making your text read awkwardly.
Fourth, well-written Web content should make it easier for people to find their way around a website. Use hyper links liberally, and make sure you always think about what's useful to readers when you decide on a label for them.
Tell readers what you want them to do next. You'll be quite surprised how often they go ahead and do it.
