Web copy basics: It’s not (all) about you
The words on your website shouldn’t be all about you.
But it’s my brand. I have to tell them about my business. What do you mean?
If that’s your reaction, you are absolutely correct. You are telling your audience about your business on your website.
But you’re also trying to persuade them to take action, whether that be signing up for an email list, subscribing to your newsletter, starting a free trial, or buying whatever you’re selling.
This means that, while you are informing your audience about your brand, you want to do it in a way that speaks to your audience’s needs, thoughts, and wants. It’s not enough to tell site visitors your brand story and generally tell them what you do. Instead, you want to quickly and effectively inform your audience about what your brand does, how it benefits them, and why they should buy in.
And you need to do this quickly, concisely, and effectively, because it’s unlikely your site visitors will read paragraphs of explanation.
Tell the people how they benefit
Unless there’s some kind of personal connection, most people don’t care too much about businesses themselves. For example, I’m not concerned with every piece of obscure technology inside my smartphone, or how my favorite big-box grocery store came to be (unless these are aspects that bring some kind of value to me, the customer).
Instead, people care about what value they are getting from a brand.
As excited as Mr. Businessowner might be about the inner workings and systems of his products, those details usually aren’t important to a buyer. I, as the website visitor, don’t care about the special nuclear metal fusion and 17 rounds of blueprints that went into making my new refrigerator (Is nuclear metal fusion a real thing? I have no idea.). Instead, a buyer wants to know how they benefit from whatever product or service is being sold. They’d want to know about the new refrigerator’s energy savings, stainless surfaces, and internal self-cleaning mechanisms.
The value proposition
I like to think of the value proposition as the big-picture message that captures the value you bring to consumers. In a few words, you’re communicating to potential buyers how your brand will improve their lives or solve their problems, and telling them why they should bite. This value proposition is the backbone of your communications with target audiences.
The value proposition can sometimes appear front and center of your home page, and plays a big role in conversion. Other times (and oftentimes), brands will craft memorable taglines and slogans out of their value proposition, and use those on their web copy or marketing campaigns.
In order to craft an effective value proposition, you need to think of your target audience’s needs, wants, and behaviors, and communicate the value of your brand/product to your audience in a concise way. From there, taglines, slogans, and clever messaging can be built.
I bring up the value proposition because it’s a great way to think about the consumer and what they want, and you can craft your website copy around it. Hubspot offers an awesome, detailed article all about value propositions (examples included), and the book Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip and Dan Heath has great insights on crafting memorable messages that work.
That’s not all
There’s a lot—and I mean, like, a ton—more involved when it comes to writing effective website copy.
For example, you want to communicate in a way that resonates with a target audience and uses fitting language. Research is vital to strong web copy, and there are various copywriting strategies that will help improve engagement and the like.
I’ll be getting to some of these topics in future articles, but remembering that your web copy should be written with your target audience in mind is a great place to start. It’s not about you, the brand or owner; it’s about what value you bring to consumers.
TL;DR
Your web copy should communicate the value of your brand for consumers (ex. how they benefit, why they should buy in, what you offer that care about and want).
The value proposition is the backbone of audience-centric messaging and copy.
Thanks for reading,
Megan
