Key Questions to Ask Yourself When Writing Marketing Content

Most business owners recognize the crucial importance of written content in their marketing efforts. If you own a company or manage a brand, you've got to create website, blog, email, and sales letter content that makes a powerful impact and compels the proper action. If you've written your share of content that looked fine at first glance but failed to achieve the results you sought, don't despair -- you might have missed the mark due to some common, correctable missteps. Before you publish or send out your next piece of written marketing content, ask yourself the following key questions.

"Who Will Read This Content?"

If you've had any success in your business, you probably know who falls into your target market and how to reach those individuals most effectively. But in addition to understanding where to find your audience, you must also understand what segment of the population that audience represents. What do your typical buyers worry about or struggle with? What level of education do they have? What values do they uphold? What priorities influence their shopping choices? If you can't answer these questions with confidence, work with a marketing strategist to create an imaginary construct called a buyer persona. You now have an imaginary ideal customer to write for -- which means you write much more targeted content.

"What Benefit Does This Content Provide?"

Once you know the frustrations, concerns, and other pain points that make life more difficult for your ideal buyer. Have you addressed these pain points in your marketing content? Few approaches grab someone's attention more firmly and easily than sympathy for that person's situation. When you show that you know your audience's problems, you can position yourself as the solution to those problems. For instance, if you sell mattresses, you want to talk about the misery of restless nights, chronic back pain, and other issues that cause people to shop for an alternative to the torture device they currently endure night after night -- and then offer that alternative.

"Does the Content Inspire Responses?"

If you think of marketing content as a kind of one-way address system, think again. While your buyers can't intercept your message or reply to it in real time, you can (and should) evoke the illusion of a conversation. One of the more effective copywriting tricks in this regard involves asking question after question: "Do you hate scrubbing gunk off your dishes after every meal? Do you sigh when you see white spots on your glasses after you pull them out of the washing machine?" Et cetera. You can practically hear the aggravated audience member yelling "Yes! One hundred percent!" in reply. Notice that "Yes," by the way. When you keep throwing out questions with obvious "Yes" answers, you're achieving two important goals. First, you're using positive language instead of negative language, even when describing negative scenarios. (You don't want to establish yourself as a Debby Downer.) Second, you're getting your audience member to agree with you again and again, establishing that you're both on the same wavelength. Next stop, sale!

"Have I Trimmed All the Fat?"

Sometimes a perfectly acceptable-looking draft can reveal small but telling weaknesses on careful review. Check your marketing content thoroughly for any little extra verbiage that might dilute your message or bog down the flow. For example, do you see an "in order to" where a simple "to" would do the job? Look for any ways you could make your message more compact. Replacing passive phrase constructions with active ones should help you trim this fat while also adding power to your message. While you're at it, replace any needlessly fancy vocabulary with clear, plain words. The changes might prove as simple as "use" instead of "utilize," but the end results should include clearer, more readable text and a more direct impact.

Would you rather feel assured that your marketing content will always hit the mark without having to serve as your own editor and proofreader? Let a professional copywriter craft your content for you! Contact me today to learn more and get started on the easy path to greater marketing success.

4 Ways to Repurpose Your Marketing Content

Week after week, the struggle continues. Fresh drops of blood sprout from your forehead as you stare at a blank monitor, desperately trying to conjure up new and unique material for your marketing efforts. Of course, there's no getting around the fact that you do need to keep injecting relevant, compelling content into your blog, website, and various social media channels. But what if I told you that you already had a great deal of this content lying around, just waiting for you to put it to use in a recycled, upgraded form?

You can make your marketing work so much easier -- and get so much more mileage out of all the hard work you've already performed -- simply by repurposing pre-existing content, it's not even funny. Take a look at four smart ways you can reduce your time and effort curve while still producing a steady stream of marketing content that sells what you do, builds your brand, and keeps you front and center in the public eye.

1. Update Old Blog Articles

You might naturally assume that a blog article has a limited shelf life, with the possible exception of that evergreen anchor post that remains timelessly valid year after year. However, even if the details go rancid after a while, the underlying topic may not. Why not reopen that file and update the information to account for changes in your business, your target audience, or the world in general? Remember, your current blog audience might have missed the original post when it first came out, which should give you reason enough to revisit the subject. You can even opt to rewrite the whole thing from top to bottom, using all the core information that still applies instead of reinventing the wheel. Before you know it, what's old is new again.

2. Post Non-Blog Content to Your Blog

Don't fall into the trap of regarding your blog as some isolated chamber that can only accept content you devised specifically for it. Any point worth devoting time and effort to elsewhere in your marketing efforts can also prove its merits as a blog post. Think about that case study, white paper, press release, or other writeup you recently slaved over. Couldn't that content work equally well in blog form with a nip here and a tuck there? Blogs can offer considerable flexibility in their formats and subject matter, so you'd just be adding more diversity to your target readers' experience.

3. Create Ebooks Out of Pre-Written Content

If you've been writing various kinds of marketing content for months or years, you may have already created the guts of an ebook without even realizing it. Ebooks hold special appeal for prospective clients who want comprehensive, long-form answers to their questions and challenges. That's why they do such a good job as a conversion tool, enticing site visitors to provide their contact information in exchange for a copy of this valuable help. go back and look at your previous blog articles and other written marketing content. Chances are that many of those pieces will fit together (or can be made to fit together) into a larger, cohesive volume. It's certainly a lot easier than composing an ebook from scratch!

4. Transcribe Your Videos Into Articles (and Vice Versa)

If your social media content creation strategy includes YouTube and other video channels, you may have amassed a whole online library of videos relating to your products, services, brand, and industry. But some people naturally gravitate toward text instead of pictures and sound, which means that they may miss your mountain of videos entirely. That's why you should think about transcribing the narrative text of those videos and reworking it into blog articles. By the same token, consider recording your blog articles as voice-over narration for fresh videos. You'll get two pieces of marketing content for the price of one, even as you reach a wider audience and increase your search engine visibility.

Of course, even repurposing your marketing content requires some skill, time, and energy. If you're not sure how to proceed or would just rather leave it the pros, put a professional freelance marketing copywriter to work on the job. While you're at it, request all the fresh content you need as well!

Staring at a Blank Screen? Remember These Content Creation Tips

Few sights can strike terror into the hearts of marketing content creators more quickly and brutally than a blank screen. You've probably been there; I certainly have. You sit there, mentally sweating bullets, wondering how you're supposed to turn all that nothing into something that sells. I've written about ideation before, and I doubtless will again, because it presents an ongoing challenge even for experienced writers. Then once you have the idea -- where do you allow that idea to take your content? When you're struggling to get your creative gears turning, keep the following helpful tips in mind.

Your Potential Buyer Has a Real-World Problem to Solve

Sometimes the sheer number of a business's available products and services can muddy the waters when it comes to marketing content creation. Where do you start? Well, you take a lot of the confusion out of the ideation stage by focusing on specific, individual challenges of pain points that you know your prospective buyers have. Let's say you're a roofer, for example. What worries keep your target audience members awake at night? Do they know that their roof is nearing the end of its projected lifespan? Do they see spots that might indicate damaging leaks? Do they have loose shingles littering the lawn after a storm?Do they need to spruce up their home's asking price by refurbishing the roof? These pain points give you a handle on which to hang your creative hat.

The Buyer's Problem Prompts Your Solution

Once you've described your prospective customer's needs in vivid detail, you've got that person saying, "Yes, you understand exactly what I'm dealing with! So, how can you help me?" This is your cue to segue directly into the solutions you offer. Describe in clear, simple, powerful terms exactly how you can relieve that person's pain through your products and services. Don't drown the reader in details; you can always provide details on individual web pages or (better yet) in a conversation that closes the sale. For now, focus on conveying a sense of emotional reassurance and excitement about the solution to a nagging problem.

The Bottom-Line Benefit Sells the Product or Service

When in doubt, rally your creative message around the bottom-line benefit of your product or service. Remember, your customers don't care how they get to the goal line -- they just want to make that big score. What bottom-line benefit do you provide? Well, at the end of the road, you make your customers happy. Maybe you achieve that goal by making them more physically comfortable or emotionally secure. Maybe you help them enjoy greater business efficiency or productivity, with an even deeper bottom line of helping them earn more money, which raises their quality of life and (guess what?) increases their happiness.

As you might imagine, hurdling these creative obstacles takes a certain amount of time, effort, and patience no matter how many mental triggers you employ. The more urgently you need to come up with that marketing content, and the more time your many other business activities demand, the more stress and pressure you may feel when you sit down to confront that blank screen (which, of course, doesn't exactly help you set your imagination free). If that's the problem you face, here's another helpful tip -- ask a professional marketing content writer to do the creative work for you!

Writing and Organizing Your Website Content: What Goes Where?

You see some funny things when you're enlisted to write or rewrite content for various companies' websites. I've encountered Home pages that launched right into a lengthy account of the company's services or a bio of the company owner, without so much as an introduction to the company itself. I've also seen About pages that weren't about the company or its team players, Services pages that would more properly serve as Contact pages, and the list goes on and on. 

It's important to remember that even the most highly-polished and compelling website content may make zero impact if it doesn't belong on the site, or if it sits on the wrong page. So whether you need to put a new website together from scratch or redo an old, ineffective website, you may create the right kind of content for each of your most critical web pages. Let's take a look at some standard examples.

Home - Many organizations don't seem to know exactly what to do with this page. Some of them simply use it to welcome the visitor, others drop the wrong content into it in an effort to fill it out, and still others don't put any written content in it at all (which gives Google's bots a lot less content to evaluate when ranking your site among its competitors). Ideally, this page starts with a really compelling question, pain point, or other marketing hook. It then shifts smoothly into a brief introduction of your company as the answer to the visitor's needs, directing the visitor to other pages to send them through the conversion journey.

Solutions - Okay, so you've stated that you can solve your visitor's particular problem. But what solutions do you offer that can make that happen? Many sites skip this page altogether, but you may feel it important to describe the processes and strategies that go into your solutions to customer's concerns and challenges. This isn't usually the place to break down your services or products; instead, you'll want to give those services or products their due on a separate page.

Services or Products - Your services or products are the actual tools that solve your visitors' problems and restore happiness to their home or business lives. If you provide professional services, write a clear, simple blurb for each service. If you can group multiple services into categories, give it a whirl and see whether it improves the reading experience for site visitors. If you sell products, make sure that each product gets its own tightly-written blurb. Preface your Services or Products page with an exciting, keyword-rich introduction that whets the visitor's appetite for the goodies to come.

About - An effective About page will always include a bio of the organization itself, from its origins to its present status after X number of years serving its clientele. Think of your organization as an individual in its own right, worthy of the same "ink" you'd devote to your senior team members. You should also include a paragraph about each of your senior players, from the owner and CEO to your various department heads. That's "paragraph," not "book." If you solicit biographies from your various employees, cut them down to a more-or-less equal length so that they'll look good together on the page. (It's also your opportunity to chop out a lot of deadwood that might matter to the employee, but not to your target audience.)

FAQ - A Frequently Asked Questions page often makes good sense as a means of tackling potential objections, possibly even before they pop into the visitor's head. Just remember the proper format for this page: a series of questions, each addressed with a short, clear answer. I've seen FAQ pages that just sort of rambled in an effort to shove multiple rebuttals into a single answer (or too few answers). Keep each point short and sweet. If you don't have an easy answer to a question, explain why and invite visitors to contact you for clarification.

If you're still uncertain about what web content goes where on your site, or if you just don't feel like wading through all this mess yourself, it's time to contact a professional marketing copywriter. We love making bad content good and good content better!

Are You a Problem Solver? Then Market Yourself That Way

Does your business fill a need? Does it help people? Does it solve a problem? 

Of course it does. And that makes you a professional problem solver. We all need professional problem solvers -- people who know way more than we do about how to resolve a given issue causing us some kind of pain, and can do so relatively quickly and effectively. Some of these professionals even share their knowledge and insights with us just because they can. These folks are the ones we really trust, the ones we go to time after time. They are our experts.

You may already have established that relationship with your clients. Now, how would you like to build the same relationship with thousands of people you've never even met?

Take Bob Vila, for example. Everyone recognizes and acknowledges him as a master craftsman, an expert in the field of home building and remodeling, and I can assure that 99% of the people who hold that opinion have never met him, hired him or worked with him. So why does everyone agree on his expertise? Because he shares it with us through his website, books and TV appearances. He's always doling out useful information, in return for which we say, "There goes a guy who knows what he's talking about. I could do worse than take his advice."

You can make yourself known as a trusted advisor too, by establishing your expertise in your field to a wide audience. Write articles, blog posts, and direct-mail or email pieces that solve common problems or answer common questions pertaining to your field (or hire a copywriter to translate your diamonds in the rough into polished gems). Hand out information. Help people. Add value. When it's time for your prospective customer to pay for deeper assistance, who will they logically choose as the provider of that assistance?

Who will we trust first -- a salesman who sends us generic monthly offers, or one who provides us with valuable insights and helpful tips on a regular basis? Which one is more likely to become our go-to guy when the time is right to do business?

You are a problem solver. Something about what you do brings people relief and makes their lives better. So share your gifts with the world -- and receive a world of gifts.

3 Rebranding Steps You Need to Consider

Are you thinking about reinventing your brand? Maybe your current brand has some negative stigma attached to it. Maybe it seems outdated in an ever-changing marketplace. Maybe it no longer reflects your values, focus, and offerings. Rebranding can make a great deal of sense for recharging and repurposing your business -- but simply slapping a new name or logo onto your current marketing efforts isn't going to get you where you need to go. Here are four important steps in any rebranding process that you need to think about.

1. Creating a New Identity (Without Torching the Old One)

While it might be wise to totally invent yourself if your brand has gone totally toxic, in most cases it makes sense to build on whatever name recognition you've achieved in the past. That's why you so often see announcements like "X company is now Y company!" You probably want to make a graceful transition to your new brand that leverages whatever positive power your old brand still possesses. At the same time, you want don't want to convey a sense that nothing meaningful has changed. Your marketing content should emphasize the new advantages, capabilities, and benefits included in this brand change so your target market will get excited about it and want to know more.

Just don't fall into the trap of bad-mouthing your previous brand; "We got this and that wrong, but we're better now." Honesty is good, but you don't want your audience thinking, "Yeah, guys, but you used to be all enthused about the old version, so why should I trust this new pitch?"

2. Rewriting Your Website

If you were rebranding a "brick-and-mortar" business's identity from top to bottom, you would no doubt remodel your stores so shoppers would experience that new identity as they browse. Well, the same goes for your virtual storefront. Your website will be entrusted with the task of presenting your new products or services, telling the story behind your new brand, and guiding visitors through the sales funnel until they're in a position to be converted into buyers.

Resist the temptation to do a patch job on your website content. By the time you've finished massaging individual bits of text to fit the new brand message, you'll be grumbling obscenities and wishing you'd just started over with a fresh new approach. You might even spend less time, money and effort by beginning with a clean slate.

3. Broadcasting the "New You" Through Social Media

Now that you've built your new brand, along with a new website to back it up, how do you let the world know that you're better than ever? In this day and age, of course you'll need to take to social media -- but don't reinvent the wheel. Remodel and rename your existing social media channels, instead of simply opening new ones, so you can carry all your existing followers with you in this transition. Fill up those channels with as many "Coming Soon" announcements, special offers, and interactive conversations as you can to get the buzz focused on your re-branding.

Don't hinge your social media success on little Tweets and Facebook one-liners. Blog your head off (with multi-channel links to and from the articles) to elaborate on all your exciting changes and keep building that wealth of relevant content Google seems to love.

These rebranding steps may sound intimidating, but you don't have to take them alone. In addition to hiring a professional copywriter for your new brand content, make use of graphic designers, digital marketing agencies, and marketing strategists to help you brand yourself for the better!

The Most Important Question in Copywriting: "What's in It for Me?"

I don't have the world's longest attention span. When I receive a direct-mail piece or an email blast, however, I tend to skim over the veneer of cleverness and the endless lists of what a product does or how many years the company has served Satisfied Customers Just Like Me. I cut to the chase -- and as far as I'm concerned, the chase ends with the answer to one simple question: "What's in it for me?"

I've rewritten countless websites and print marketing campaigns for clients who simply took too long to get to that crucial question, or in some cases never got to it at all amidst the personal trumpet blowing and back patting. It's wonderful to take pride in your work, your track record in your industry or dominance of that industry. And yes, you do have to explain the features of your products or services sooner or later. But that's not what we, the prospective buyers, are looking for. We're interested in how you will improve your lives by solving a specific problem, and the longer you take to get around to that little detail, the less chance you have of avoiding a one-way trip to the circular file. 

You've heard it a million times: Push the benefits, not the features. While I wouldn't suggest dumping the features, I would recommend allowing the benefits to leap-frog over them to grab your audience's attention from the git-go. One simple way to do this is by playing the "What If" game right from the beginning -- an arresting opening statement that dares us to dream. "What if you could guarantee your family's financial security for life, starting today?" "Imagine getting the best night's sleep you ever had -- every night!" Determine what your ideal clients' ideal outcome would be, get them excited by making them envision that ideal outcome, and then offer it to them. Closed sale.

If you feel the need to paint even more of a picture for your prospects, or to remind them of the problem that needs solving, you can lead off with a pain statement. If you offer a more efficient lawn mower, for instance, make your reader picture another hot, horrible summer battling that broken-down behemoth in the garage, laying out money for frequent repairs, et cetera. THEN flip the emotional state with a "What If" that describes the fast, effortless mowing experience possible with your super-reliable new MegaCut 3000. Our hero!

Whatever approach you use, make those benefits leap off the page so your readers don't have to search for them. If you need a reminder, put a drawing or photo of a typical customer up on your wall with a caption underneath it reading, "WHAT'S IN IT FOR ME?" If your answer to that question is compelling enough, we will keep reading -- and we will buy.

Selling Is Educating (and Vice Versa)

Are you a teacher? If you're in sales (and who isn't, really, when you think about it), then the answer is yes.

Think of it this way: Would you buy something -- anything -- when you didn't know what it was, what it was for, or how it could benefit you? If so, then you've probably purchased enough swamp land over the years to start your own mosquito ranch. Most of us would just stare blankly at the item in question, and then redirect our attention to something more recognizably useful. Your business has to educate its prospective customers on its products and services, and that's where skillful, focused, specific content marketing comes in.

Writers know that "doing" verbs (runs, creates, proves, energizes) make more of an impact than "being" verbs (am, are, is, has). Well, that goes for marketing content as well. Joe Client cares less about what a thing is than what that thing does. Specifically, he wants to know what it does for him. This is just another way of thinking about the tired old rule, "Push the benefits, not the features," but it works. When you shift your marketing focus from "What It Is" to "What It Does," the product's attractiveness suddenly leaps out at the average person who couldn't care less about its technical specifications. 

One of my favorite examples of this is the blogging I did for a company that specialized in metric screws, bolts and other fasteners. Fascinating stuff, right? But as I learned more about the various fasteners, I began to see that they each had different (and interesting) real-world applications:

• Building a boat? You'll want zinc-tipped or silicon bronze screws for corrosion resistance. 
• Preparing a commercial construction project? You need a ready source for sturdy bolts and rivets in a wide range of sizes. 
• Assembling electronic components? Let's talk about non-conductive fasteners. 

Et cetera. So I created a series of blog articles along those lines, conjuring up images of construction crews enjoying greater productivity, manufacturing floors purring away productively, boat enthusiasts enjoying summer on the lake and so on. Now we had something exciting to talk about -- the bottom-line benefits of purchasing those metric fasteners.

As you can see, educating your customer involves more than just throwing a bunch of numbers at them. Unless that person understands how those numbers translate into benefits, you're wasting your time. Instead, focus on explaining how your product or service solves a specific need. That's educating to sell -- so make your curriculum compelling (with the aid of a professional copywriter), and aim for a graduating class of A-plus clients!

4 Things Your Marketing Content Should Stop Doing

You probably know the old joke about the patient who complains, "Doctor, it hurts when I do this." To which the doctor replies, "Then don't do that." Stopping bad habits can benefit your physical health just as powerfully as taking up new, better habits. The same holds true for the health of your business -- and your marketing content is the pump that keeps the things flowing in your business pipeline. In my years as a freelance copywriter in Central Texas, I've seen (and corrected) plenty of missteps in various enterprises' written marketing content. Here are four common yet harmful goofs that you should stop making from this day forward.

1. Over-Explaining

I can't tell you how many times I've been asked to rewrite web pages and other marketing pieces that read like user guides or industry manuals. I ended up hacking away paragraph after paragraph of detail that held more potential to confuse or intimidate than to build excitement or sell. If you had to study a wiring diagram to turn your lights on, you'd probably elect to spend a lot of time in the dark. Don't give us that diagram; show us the switch, describe the wonderful light we'll enjoy, and let the perceived benefit do the rest.

2. Under-Explaining

Even though brevity is a must in copywriting (especially for online consumption), saying too little can be just as self-sabotaging as saying too much. Are you assuming industry or product knowledge that your target audience isn't likely to have? If so, you may skip from one point to the next while your reader is still stuck on "I wonder what they meant by that?" Your prospective customers can't get excited over what they don't understand. Make sure the basic bottom-line benefit statements are all in place, and invite your audience to contact you with any questions. (More on that in a moment.)

3. Writing to Impress

Trying too hard in your marketing content can backfire on you. One of the most common mistakes I've encountered is lathering the text with impressive-sounding buzzwords and industry-speak. Many of these terms either reek of cliche due to overuse or simply don't mean much to Joe Q. Public. Showing off your vocabulary with lots of five-dollar words is another surefire way to turn off your audience; even if they know what you're talking about, they'll dismiss you as pretentious. Last but not least, avoid phony enthusiasm. Dozens of exclamation marks don't make your content more exciting -- they just paint you as excitable.

4. Neglecting the Final Action Items

You might be surprised at how many marketing content pieces lay out their pain statement, features and benefits, then simply come to a stop. If they do include a call to action, the call to action is too vague to really compel. ("Discover our product's benefits for yourself!") Give your audience concrete, specific action items such as "Call us at this phone number today," or "Fill out the online appointment maker on this page." You've brought your readers this far, so why not take them the rest of the way?

It's easy to fall into old habits in your marketing content creation, even once you know better. Contact me for professional copywriting services if you want to make sure your content is doing all the right things -- and none of the wrong ones.

Meaningful Content for Email Campaigns

Do you get occasional (or frequent) emails from some company representative you met recently? Never mind why you're on that person's email list -- your contact information was probably taken from your business card. But that's okay, because you can always opt out, right? And so you do. Or you banish the sender to your spam filter. Or you simply trash each email as it coms in.

Is the sender getting anything for the time, effort and expense he puts into sending you this steady stream of unwanted email? Obviously not. Are you getting anything out of the email? Again, obviously not; that's why you're throwing them away. But what if those emails contained information you actually wanted or needed? What if they offered nuggets of insight that made a difference in your work or personal life? You might still throw them away -- but only after you've read them thoroughly and thought about what they communicated. Over time, you might even come to rely on the sender as a trusted resource. Heck, you might even buy what he's selling.

That's the power of relevant content in an email campaign.

From time to time I've been asked to pitch in and give a client's multi-touch email campaigns a creative boost. I performed this service for a business broker who was noting a drop-off in interest from his prospects following their initial inquiries. He wanted to send a series of emails that would maintain or rekindle that initial spark of excitement they'd felt over buying or selling a business. So I wrote a bunch of little articles pertaining to the subject -- explanations of the transaction process, tips on due diligence, a "checklist" of the qualities a successful business owner needs, even a description of the beautiful part of the country they'd be inhabiting. They were all written with a positive spin and, of course, a "contact us," "learn more," or "let's get started" call to action. His prospects were now receiving mouth-watering material that not only provided valuable education but also reminded them of why they inquired in the first place. 

Quality of content matters just as much to an email campaign as it does to your regular blog or newsletter. Don't just sell; give, by providing useful and captivating information and compels action. Leave the spam box to your competition!

Technically Speaking: Marketing Content for Technical Products and Services

I've mentioned before how I once walked into a manufacturing company where the owner greeted me with, "Ah, you're here to rescue us!" This company boasted some truly remarkable new processes and systems, but their target audience received those technical explanations as if they were being gifted with a dead fish. Why? Because the manufacturing people were writing technical content instead of marketing content, and then aiming that content at the non-technical people who actually needed their services. Not a recipe for successful promotion, is it?

But you're facing a dilemma if you sell highly-technical products and services. The very aspects of your offerings that make you stand out may also be the ones least understandable to your target market. So how do you craft marketing content that makes your point with your intended audience?

My first suggestion? Ditch the five-dollar words, starting with your industry's standard buzzwords. If it's a word or phrase you don't hear outside of your industry or workplace, use it with care and/or be ready to explain it in simple terms. This not only prevents confusion among the rank-and-file businesspeople or consumers who view your marketing content; it also streamlines and energizes that content. Sleek, simple, and direct is the way to go when you want to grab human emotions and imaginations -- especially on the Internet, where a few extra seconds of head-scratching can kill whatever impact you'd hoped to make.

Talking to the right person matters just as much as using the right language. Who will actually make the decision to order your product or service? What position does that person hold? What daily tasks and challenges does that person confront, and what background or training is that person likely to have? You're probably not aiming your message at a fellow technician or inventor. The rank-and-file manager or purchasing officer who needs your super-sophisticated device may have no clue, or interest, in how that device actually works -- they only want to know that it does work.

Which leads us to the next major point, which is selling the end result instead of the process. Call me a barbarian, but I don't really care how electrons move through specific circuits, wires, sockets, bulbs and filaments. All I care about is having light at the flick of a switch. So don't sell me an electrical diagram or a list of voltage and current statistics; sell me a bright, cheerful environment that enhances my quality of life. If your technology does things that make me happier or more productive or healthier or wealthier or whatever, place that rosy end result front and center in your marketing message. You can can always create more detailed supporting material to back up your promises --but it's the promises that excite me into action.

These strategies aren't about "dumbing down" your content. There's nothing dumb about communicating simply, clearly, and directly, with a focus on what you do instead of how you do it. So play it smart, get whatever professional copywriting help you may need, and start selling instead of explaining!

3 Powerful Ways to Make Your Marketing Content "Pop"

Many years ago, I helped the owner of a local shipping service create a print marketing onesheet to boost his business. He had a fascinating personal story and a compelling value proposition, with plenty of written detail to back them up. Even so, he was frustrated that prospective customers didn't seem to respond to his marketing message. I explained to him that I could take this body of material and employ my copywriting skills to make his marketing content "pop." The next time I saw him after submitting the draft, he smiled ear to ear and yelled across the room, "I SAW THE POP!"

Does your own marketing content fly off the page and demand the attention of your target audience? Does it pop, or does just sort of lie there silently like soda gone flat? If you're not happy with the results you get from your website or print marketing, here are three things you can do to put some extra "wow factor" into your words.

1. Ask Questions

One of the easiest yet most powerful methods for grabbing readers' attention involves asking them questions. "Are you tired of floor cleaners that don't clean?" "Are you ready for a totally new taste sensation?" "If you could have twice the Internet speeds for half the price, would you go for it?" Questions simulate a conversation by forcing the reader to concoct answers, if only in their own minds. This degree of engagement can make all the difference between keeping and losing your audience within the first few seconds.

By the way, make sure the answer to each of your questions is "Yes." Eliciting this magic word from your audience doesn't just keep the emotional tone of the conversation more positive -- it also gets them agreeing with you, which makes life a lot easier when you finally ask them if they're ready to buy.

2. Use Your Reader's Imagination

Products and services usually aren't that exciting in and of themselves; it's what they can do for people that creates excitement. If you sell personal financial solutions, you could easily bore readers to tears by focusing on stuff like interest rates, stock diversification strategies, or retirement account contribution limits. These issues may be important, but they don't captivate the imagination.

But what about the outcomes of successful personal financial strategies? That dream vacation for your family, the summer home you've always wanted but never dreamed you could afford, a stress-free early retirement -- these and other images will get your audience listening to what you have to say. Dream building is a powerful content marketing tool, and it's as simple as painting the picture your ideal customer has always wanted (but perhaps never dared) to visualize.

Your reader's imagination can conjure negative images as well as positive ones -- and this is a good thing. Make them see in their mind's eye that dreary, painful, or frustrating scenario they currently live through on a daily basis, that problem that keeps them from being happy. Make it as sharp and vivid as possible. Then dispel those clouds by offering the path to a sunnier future.

3. Keep It Simple

"The more I say, and the fancier I get with it, the more convincing I'll be." This all-too-common strategy usually backfires when you're creating marketing content. First of all, most people can't be bothered to read a solid wall of text about anything, no matter what the end reward might be. Second, you can't assume that everyone in your target audience shares the same reading level. Last but not least, short, simple words pack more punch -- and they'll give your content more pop, especially when you include plenty of empty space around them. Less is more.

Taking your audience on a journey is another important technique for keeping your message simple, straightforward, and effective. Give your pitch a shape, starting with your leading questions, pain statement, or dream building imagery and then moving on to your proposed solutions. Once you've given the reader both the problem and the answer, hand them the key to happiness by ending with a strong call to action. Tell them what they need to do right now to make the dream come true.

Don't settle for marketing content that barely fizzes. Get your marketing team or freelance copywriter to put these techniques to good use. With any luck you, too, will "see the pop!"

4 Reasons You Should Let a Pro Write Your Profile

Have you ever been stuck with the job of writing your own bio profile for a social media page, professional directory listing, or your website's About Us section? Fun, isn't it? Although entering that text can be as simple as typing into a box, you may feel utterly boxed in when it comes to making that profile leap off the page as it should. Even so, many professionals think they have to go it alone and write up their own profiles, for better or for worse. Here are four good reasons to let a professional copywriter create that content for you instead.

1. The Wrong Impression Will Be the Last Impression

For the countless people who pull up LinkedIn Facebook, or professional directory bio pages in their search for a particular kind of professional, your profile may be their first impression of you -- and possibly the last, if you blow it. Clunky language, misspellings, grammatical errors, and other wrong notes can reduce a visitor's idea of you in a hurry, despite your impressive list of skills, clients, and  achievements. Not screwing up your profile is the first hurdle toward credibility, so don't disqualify yourself right out of the gate.

2. Your Profile Counts as Marketing Content

Some professionals are perfectly willing to invest time, money and effort into several types of marketing content -- from web pages and blog articles to print marketing copy -- without recognizing profile text as another important piece in the marketing puzzle. All your marketing content should integrate seamlessly to produce a single, congruent, compelling presentation of your brand. That can't happen if you just cobble together bits and pieces of your resume and throw them up on your social media profile page or directory listing.

3. Your Uniqueness Needs to Shine

If someone is searching for the products and services you provide, they're probably looking at more profiles than just yours. If you're in a crowded market or a super-competitive industry, it's especially easy to get lost in the shuffle -- unless your profile stops viewers in their tracks. To achieve this goal, you have to state, in no uncertain terms, exactly what sets you apart from the competition. Do you have more experience? Do you bring special skills or training to the table? Are your products or services better than the other guy's? If you're having trouble isolating or expressing that unique value proposition, a professional writer can offer some helpful outside perspective as well as the necessary eloquence.

4. You've Got Better Things to Do

Even if you have the golden combination of basic writing skills, marketing expertise, and the ability to put your unique spin on your profile -- why would you spend hours laboring away at this task when  you've got business to conduct? Some of my best clients are brilliant, articulate individuals who recognize the value of handing this work over to a trusted professional while they focus on more profitable and/or enjoyable activities. Ask yourself what your time is worth -- and then contact me. I can help you put the "pro" in your profile!

Why I Have No Idea What You're Saying

Have you ever chatted with a professional in a different line of work from yours and walked away wishing you'd brought a translator with you? You're pretty sure it was English -- at least, the little words sounded familiar. But 90 percent of it somehow managed to whoosh right over your head. Are you stupid? Do you have a hearing problem? Or have you simply been buzzed by wall-to-wall buzzwords?

We all fall into jargon from time to time. Car buffs talk about torque and fuel ratios, composers pepper their language with Italian musical phrases, electricians casually drop terms such as "resistance" and "capacitor," and physicists no doubt talk like time-traveling refugees from Star Trek: The Next Generation. It's only natural for people in the same profession to talk shop. The problem comes when the engineer or the musician or the Chief Operating Officer suddenly has to speak to a general audience. We're listening, but we just don't understand. And after a few minutes of not understanding, we're no longer listening.

The problem isn't limited to industry-specific terminology, either. I'm often asked to rewrite or edit content written by people work in a more general business field, and I still have to spend half of my project time just trying to figure out what the heck these folks are trying to say. A lot of it tends toward the nebulous, stuff about "aligning verticals and utilizing granular compartmentalization to achieve a more impactful synergy," yadda yadda yadda. Business-speak is a way for people to talk a lot without saying much. But if you're trying to sell yourself or your product/service to a mainstream audience, don't be shocked if you're rewarded by the sound of crickets chirping. 

As a first step in clearing up your verbiage, try to avoid jargon-like words that ordinary language can handle perfectly well, such as "agreeance" (agreement) and "incentivize" (spur, motivate). And watch out for whiz-bang phrases that describe something that isn't really that amazing, such as "results-oriented." (You'd never guess how many business professionals think it a huge feather in their caps to describe themselves or their company as "result-oriented." As opposed to what, "sitting-around-doing-nothing-oriented?" You actually aim to deliver results? Does that mean your competition doesn't?) "Full-service" is another phrase that doesn't really communicate anything. (Ever hear a company describe itself as "partial service?") 

Finally, don't overuse the relatively simple, easy-to-understand buzzwords just because they aren't as likely to whoosh us -- for instance, not everything has to be a "driver" for something else. (I see that one a lot too.) Get a thesaurus and give another word or two a chance. There are plenty to choose from.

If you're not sure you can veer away from industry lingo, or you can't tell how accessible your stuff is to your intended audience, get a professional copywriter or copyeditor to go over it for you. You may get a revised version that makes you exclaim, "Oh, so that's what I was saying!"

Creating a Need: The Key to Effective Copywriting

Here in Central Texas, the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Harvey may be most noticeable in the lines of cars waiting patiently (or not-so-patiently) to fill up at the limited number of gas stations currently carrying fuel. It's not actually a lack of gasoline as such; the fuel is out there, but distributors are having trouble getting it to the public, and the small amounts that are making it to the pumps get gobbled up fast. The situation would probably be resolved sooner if people weren't also buying 2.5 times as much gas as they normally purchase. No, they didn't purchase 1.5 more cars when nobody was looking. They're just responding to what they perceive as a strong, immediate need.

Now, you may not sell gas for a living -- but wouldn't it be amazing to see people lined up along the block, either literally or figuratively, to buy what you do sell? It's certainly possible to achieve that result if you convey a strong sense of need to your target market. Let's look at some types of need you can instill in your copywriting.

Practical Urgency

Before the widespread adoption of the automobile in American life, gasoline was nothing more than just another fuel. People lived their entire lives in one town, while kids trudged several miles to school in the snow (or so your great-grandparents claimed) without complaint. But once Henry Ford placed affordable, sturdy, gas-burning Model Ts in everybody's driveway, gasoline quickly turned into a must-have item. Gasoline allows people to work far from home, take kids to and from school, deliver commercial products to warehouses -- in short, it generally keeps everybody moving. As we became dependent on cars, we became equally dependent on gas for those bottom-line benefits. Which bottom-line benefits do your customers not just want but genuinely need? Or if they don't genuinely need it, what can you say to convince them that they do?

Emotional Need

Cars don't just represent utility; they also represent freedom, independence and flexibility. It's emotionally reassuring to know that your car can take you where you need to go at any given moment -- but by the same token, if you've grown accustomed to this feeling, the sudden prospect of not having transportation can be unsettling in the extreme. That's what turns "Oh, the gas supply will be tight for a while" into "OH NO, THERE'S NO MORE GAS IN THE WORLD EVER!" Rationally, we may know better, but emotionally, we're itching to grab our place at the pump. So ask yourself what your target market is used to. What products and services have they grown to love, and how would they feel without those products and services? What negative emotions can you evoke in your content to create a feeling of need -- emotions which are then eased by your solution?

Unique Solutions

To some extent, gas is gas -- a commodity, with one tankful no better or worse than another. The leading brands try to make their products stand out by trumpeting this cleaning agent or that performance additive, but most of us would be willing to take whatever's out there when gas is short. Even so, there are some high-performance vehicles that call for a particular octane, and the owners of these prized possessions will shell out the additional money for that octane. Does your business offer a better solution that the others? Are your services unique or especially well suited for a particular situation? If so, write to that need and you might well corner the market on a niche audience.

Remember, it's all about the perception and feeling of need -- from "I desperately need gas to get to work" to "I desperately need a jelly donut right now" -- and your unique ability to fulfill that need. And if you have a need of your own for some skilled copywriting assistance to help you achieve that effect, let me know!

This Is Your (Target Audience's) Brain on Copywriting

Do you recall the old TV ad that showed a frying egg with a voiceover proclaiming, "This is your brain on drugs?" As dumb as the analogy may seem, that ad was remembered, quoted and even parodied for years. Why? Because it used certain psychological hooks for engraving itself on the minds of viewers. Let's face it, marketing is largely the art of psychological manipulation. So let's look at how your marketing content can employ specific techniques to place your target audience "under the influence."

The Bizarreness Effect

The Bizarreness Effect holds that creating bizarre images out of otherwise-mundane ones can help lodge those images in the memory. Let's go back to our opening example -- an image of an egg in a frying pan, paired to the idea of a brain on drugs. These two incompatible, less-than-memorable notions form an unforgettable metaphor when you put them together.

Appealing to Both Sides of the Brain

You probably know that the left side of the brain is considered the more rational of the two hemispheres. It's one that responds to facts, reasons and logic -- but it's not the one that makes your target customer buy. That impulse comes from the right side of the brain, which is commonly associated with creativity, emotion and intuitive thought. Ideally, your marketing content appeals to both hemispheres. Your feature statements pile on fact after fact in support of your products or services, while your benefit statements hit readers where they live emotionally by helping them envision how their lives will be improved by those products or services.

Repetition, Rhythm and Rhyme

Just as the major search engines take notice of repeated, relevant keywords in your marketing content, the brains of your target audience will respond to repetition. The more you repeat a statement, the more convincing it becomes--simply because it's being constantly reinforced in the brain. Rhythm and rhyme can then make that statement more memorable, just as they tend to make song lyrics stick in your head. Think about all the great catchphrases you've heard over the years. Still thinking about them? Exactly.

Reticular Activation

If familiarity breeds recognition, then specificity breeds familiarity. If you try to appeal to everybody in the world, in every possible scenario, your message is probably so generic that it has no strong psychological effect on any individual. But if you paint a specific "How many times has this happened to you?" kind of picture, your ideal customer may think, "Wow, I'm having that exact problem right now. These people are talking to me!" That reaction is coming from a bundle of neural fibers called the reticular network, which acts as a kind of high-level "lookout" that waits for stimuli it recognizes as something we need to pay attention to right now, as opposed to the mass of more generic information the brain doesn't have time to bother with. Target your message as precisely as possible, and you'll be targeting that reticular network.

Persuasive copywriting is as much about psychology as it is about sheer writing skill. An experienced marketing copywriter can help you apply both for maximum effect. Contact me today and let's talk about how we can influence your target market!

Generally Speaking: The Copywriting Generalist

Sometimes prospective clients will ask me if I specialize in their particular industry: "Do you have experience writing for the automated-widget industry?" Many times I can truthfully answer, "Yes." Other times I can just as truthfully say, "No, and here's why it doesn't matter."

So here's why it doesn't matter.

Most of us copywriters consider ourselves generalists -- professionals adept at the art of absorbing and understanding whatever information we need to write on the widest possible range of subject matter.

Specializing in a particular industry or subject has its points, of course, both for clients and for writers. Specialists usually require less intake on the subject from the client, eliminating much of the learning curve on the front end of the project. From the writer's perspective, a more specialized niche is easier to market to because that target market makes up a more cohesive group -- people who tend to belong to the same organizations and speak the same lingo.

As a generalist myself, I think general-subject writers have the edge in some notable ways. For one thing, the sheer cross-pollination of concepts, information and resources that we generalists sift through on a daily basis, year after year, enables us to see the broad view of how your particular industry relates to others. If you work in the "green" industry, for instance, your product or service may impact the manufacturing, real estate, health and wellness, energy, electronics and other industries. Well, guess what? I've written for all of those industries and many others, so I can see the connections between them -- which means that I can help your audience see them as well.

At the same time, the outsider's perspective counts for much. People who live and think in one field 24/7 start to assume that the rest of us know as much about it as they do, and they start speaking in buzzwords and technobabble without even realizing it. A writer who can step in as Joe Q. Public and say, "What's the bottom line on this stuff?" can see your products or services from a mainstream audience's point of view.

Of course, everyone specializes in some way or other. Even though I write on every topic under the sun, for instance, I focus on marketing pieces, or as I like to call it, "writing for short attention spans." The work I do has a specific mission -- to grab and hold someone who's ready to flit off to some other distraction, and then nail a point home quickly and engagingly enough that the reader makes a purchase or requests more information. But as a general-subject writer, I can do that for any industry, product or service. Generally speaking.

The FAQ Page: Content Marketing's Neglected Gem

Many times when a client and I are discussing content creation for a new website, the client will list many of the "must haves" such as the home page, the "About Us" page and various product or service pages. At some point or other I'll ask them, "What about an FAQ page?" And they'll mumble something along the lines of "Well, maybe later, I don't know, possibly, if it turns out we need one, sometime down the road...." blah blah. The notion seems to be that the only reason to build and populate an FAQ page on a website is to straighten out hopelessly confused buyers and prospective buyers. Okay, that's a good reason -- but it's hardly the only one.

Your FAQ page isn't just an online troubleshooting guide or information kiosk; it can also serve a powerful piece of marketing content in its own right. Here are some specific actions your FAQ page can perform to help you sell.

De-Cluttering Other Pages

Countless organizations pack their websites hip-deep in details, turning critical top-level pages like the home page into dense, unreadable, uninteresting messes. That's not to say that the details don't matter -- in fact, the right detail presented at the right time can help clinch a sale. The home page just isn't the place for it, but the FAQ page frequently is. By breaking these important specific into paragraph-sized chunks preceded by fairly open-ended questions ("What other chronic ailments can this therapy treat successfully?" etc.), you can lay out these details in manner that makes them easy to spot and absorb while freeing up other pages to do their work more effectively.

Spinning Your Side of the Story

At some point or other you may need to defend your products, your services, your company or even your entire industry against negative press or rumors. Even when all is generally well, there will be instances where you need to relieve prospective buyer's concerns over particular aspects of your offerings or processes. Hence the need for FAQs such as "Why does your product cost more than competing brands?" or "Is it true that some people have had allergic reactions to this item?" Your FAQ page can double as both a natural place to address any lingering concerns and as a positive-spin zone for shooting down false accusations and getting the best possible face on genuine shortcomings.

Guiding the Reader From Pain Point to Final Pitch

An FAQ page can act just like a landing page if you arrange the questions in the right sequence. Start with general introductory questions that include pain points (a literal example would be "What is sciatica?" "What symptoms does it cause?" "How debilitating can this problem become?"). Then go into questions and answers directly related to resolving that pain ("How fast does this therapy yield results?" or "Can this technique eliminate the need for surgery?"). Finally, wrap up the FAQ with a section that compels a call to action ("Why do you recommend that I schedule my first treatment as soon as possible?" and so on).

An FAQ page can do a lot for your online content marketing, no matter how knowledgeable your target market might seem to be. Ask the questions you want to provide the answers to -- and aim those answers right at your audience's sales triggers.

Any questions?

Features and Benefits: Your Marketing Content's One-Two Punch

You may have heard the following phrase, or some variation on it, over and over again: "Sell the sizzle, not the steak." In other words, emphasize the benefits of your products and services in your marketing copy instead of simply trotting out a laundry list of features and expecting those features to get your target audience excited enough to buy from you. I've made similar statements myself from time to time, and the basic principle is a sound one. But there's more it to than that, because features and benefits actually make a great tag team when they're used in the service of each other.

Common marketing wisdom holds that no matter how much compelling data people receive, their decision to buy is ultimately an emotional one. As impressed as they might be by a lengthy set of features, their purchase is fueled by a desire to experience some great end result that replaces their current distress or frustration and with a feeling of satisfaction and happiness. If you're just going on and on about all the things your product or service can do instead of describing the benefits of those actions, you're likely to slam up against what I call the So-What Factor. Readers are scanning your marketing content with the overriding thought, "What's in it for me -- how will this make my life better?" Answer that question with the right benefit statements, and you've got genuine sales content (and hopefully sales) instead of just information.

So are features unimportant? Hardly! Obviously you wouldn't have a business without features, since they represent the specific things you provide and the specific tasks those things perform. If you claim to provide a bunch of benefits without illustrating how you can make those benefits happen, you've got no credibility. So features are definitely important for lending legitimacy to your marketing content -- but they're not what you're really selling. What you're really selling is the promise those features provide, from a fresher-smelling home to a more productive workplace. The features are a means to an end for the buyer; the benefits are that end.

How do you make these two great tastes taste great together? Wherever possible in your marketing content, a feature should be tied to a benefit. For example: "Our new mop has [feature] nano-tubular microfiber static-cling head strands for [benefit] quicker, easier cleaning." Whenever you spout out a feature, be quick to follow up with an explanation of what that feature really means in terms of making your target audience's life better. By addressing the So-What Factor right away, you're keeping your readers' eyes on the prize and helping them envision the final result of owning that product or using that service in everyday life. This approach is especially critical if you offer jargon-heavy features such as legal services, high-tech equipment or medical procedures that require clarification foe the average Joe.

Can you introduce the benefits first and then tie them to features? Of course you can -- and in fact, that's probably the most effective order in which to proceed. Start with the emotional hook of "How much better would your life be if...." or "Imagine solving X problem more easily than ever before" or "Wouldn't you love to have...." This whets the reader's appetite to find out just how such a Shangri-La is possible, at which point you back up your promises with the features that turn them into a reality.

Anyway, don't think in terms of features vs. benefits. Think features and benefits -- because with the aid of this dynamic duo, your marketing content will pack a powerful one-two-punch!