Copywriting for Beginners: 6 Best Practice Tips for Small Business Owners
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The world of marketing is a constant and never-ending struggle to gain the attention of your audience.
Each day, consumers are exposed to upwards of 10,000 advertisements.
Yes, you read that right—10,000 advertisements per day.
It’s no wonder that many small businesses struggle to stand out and find new customers.
While there are many tactics of breaking through this noise, copywriting is one tried and true method bound to help.
The power of persuasive writing
For decades influential copywriting has been one of the key differentiators between making or losing a sale but with consumer attention spans beginning to mirror that of a goldfish amidst the competitive landscape, being effective with your copywriting is becoming increasingly important.
To help you stand out from your competition, here are 6 copywriting tips for beginners that are bound to help you sell more and worry less.
1- Knowledge is power
Before you start writing any copy, be as literal as you need to be to understand exactly who your customer is and why they are coming to you to solve their problems.
Don’t assume you already know the answer to these questions by using random buzzwords you’ve plucked from your brain.
Understanding their search intent and subsequent keyword usage will help you craft copy that will connect with your consumer.
Treat your competition the same way. Spend time understanding how they have found success to date by reviewing their website, social accounts, past advertisements, etc.
Ask yourself what makes their brand voice unique and how have they found a way to position themselves to win over the hearts and wallets of their customers?
A robust brand strategy will be your saving grace, so if you haven’t done so, be sure to start there.
What you will quickly learn is that knowing your audience and competition (among others) is core to almost everything you do, especially when writing copy.
After all, if you don’t know where you’re going, how are you going to get there?
2. Keep it simple, silly
Don’t think for a second that a potential customer is going to spend countless hours reading your self-serving monologue.
You’ll be lucky to snag a few seconds at best!
When you write copy, you should focus on keeping it as simple as possible. This doesn’t mean that you have to write ‘dumbed-down’ versions of your content.
Instead, it means that you should remove any of the fluff that you’ve included that isn’t necessary to communicate your message.
As you write copy, read it, re-read it, and re-read it again asking yourself each time, “how can I simplify this and still get my point across?”
Ask yourself if your copy is as simple as it should be to leave a lasting impression.
3- Keep things conversational
This past year certainly wasn’t kind but if it taught us anything, it’s that we love social interaction. It’s the human in us.
So why does your copy come across as corporate and disconnected?
We’re not gamblers, but if we were we’d bet that some of your best sales conversations were the unintended outcome of you being, well, you.
Picture this: You’re at your relative’s house talking about the latest piece of technology you purchased or a credit card you can’t live without. Ten minutes go by and you’ve got your cousin on the respective website filling in his personal information and ready to hit the order button. Affiliate link, anyone?
Hindsight being 20/20, much of your sales success came from the fact that you kept your conversation simple and relatable.
You were being you.
4- Talk about them
Yes, people do need to know who you are. This is why your 'About Us' page exists.
When we sort things by importance, it goes something like this:
Customer
Everything Else
By nature, we are all are selfish and want to hear our own names, not others.
Quit telling your customers why you are so special. You aren’t.
What makes you special is how your product or service makes your customer even more special.
Try this on for size;
You Focused: Running Shoes- Try our innovative lightweight sneakers engineered by our Harvard graduate design team.
Them Focused: Running Shoes- Oh you like records, do you? It’s time you update your PR book.
Learn to replace ‘we’ with ‘you’.
5. Always talk benefits
Customers care about what’s in it for them and nothing more.
Translation?
Features tell, benefits sell.
Run through what we call the ‘so-what test’, where you ask ‘so-what’ after every statement.
In case you are having trouble nailing down your benefit here’s a sample:
“Here at Tammy’s Tutoring we offer our courses in person, and you’ll always have access to the pre-recorded video, audio, and text options.”
So What?
“So you can choose your preferred method and learn accordingly.”
So What?
“So no matter what challenge you run into you can reference our resources to help you deliver a better service.”
SO WHAT?!
“So you always have critical resources available to you to overcome any obstacle at any time in any environment, allowing you to deliver a top-notch service that keeps customers coming back at all times.”
#BenefitsOverFeatures
6. Be bite-sized
Shorter sentences are a great way to keep your audience engaged.
Too many people think that creating more content and talking about certain topics for a longer period of time makes them look more professional and knowledgeable. We’re here to tell you that while this might have worked 400 years ago, this is arguably the worst way to write today.
To prove my point, the previous sentence was about 41 words longer than it should have been.
In fact, reading it must have felt like talking to that one Uber driver who spills his life story.
Did he even take a breath yet?
Let’s try that again:
People value time; Save theirs by using shorter sentences.
Writing copy that sells
Writing copy that sells is no small task but with practice comes perfection. Following the above steps will give you a leg up on your competition, help you capture short attention spans and win over the hearts and wallets of potential customers.
Not sure where to start? Drop us your thoughts in the comments below or better yet, some copy you want feedback on.
Ready to turn your business into a brand? We’ve got your back.
