Web Copywriting – What to Be Very Careful About

Web copywriting is the most important thing that a business owner or CEO can do for his website.

There are a number of critical factors to take under consideration when you create a homepage. Communication reduces the buying cycle at an accelerated pace, therefore it is vitally important for a company to establish trust.

Web CopywritingA visitor to your website has no desire to work and figure out what you’re all about. If you do not quickly establish your identity as who you are, what you’re offering and your reputation,  your prospects will abandoned your site to find your competitor.

Just like in land, you can describe your website in terms of real estate. There are areas in your site that are more important than others. Good web copywriting will emphasis those areas. One of them is your Homepage. It has to effectively communicate your unique story through copy and images. This sets your Unique Selling Proposition.

The easiest way is not necessarily the best path

The larger majority of people begin their websites with a web designer who plans the site and creates it. At that point it doesn’t have anything in it. Then, the owner of the site seeks a copywriter to fill up the blanks in the site by putting words.

Many of these web designers are in love with certain aspects of technology. For instance, some like flash in the header, lots of pictures, big pictures. Somewhere along the line, the copywriter is expected to put content in this empty container.

This is going the wrong way. There is a reason why in Internet Marketing, content is king. This is not a cutesy statement. Instead it describes a reality. Your visitor will not be driven by web design or by pictures. Words will drive your prospects to the desired action.

From an architectural perspective, the web copywriting should be the first involved into the process of ideation.  You will need to develop the message and copy before starting any web design.

This is the opposite direction that most people take. One ofhomepage the misleading strategies is to buy a pre-built website. This is a very attractive idea. One can get a whole site for a couple of hundred dollars. That option seems to solve the problem of web site creation. The challenge with this, is that the themes forces you to write to an audience that exists in the mind of someone else.

Your homepage is like your business card, it reflects who you are

When you get a pre-built theme, both the homepage and all the other pages are really boxes joined together. They limit the amount of words that you can write. Meaning, it does not allow you to have useful, long copy which is very important for the reader to get value and for Google’s semantic search.

You will be better off getting the service of a custom designed website. Yes, far more expensive than a pre-built site but more effective. Your strategy, your message and your marketing objective will drive the design of your website.

In fact, I would begin by doing a lot of research, which is the most important part of writing a copy. You need to know what is the intention of the site. Is it to give information, to sell a service or product? What kind of information or products are being sold? Who is the audience. Are you selling locally, nationwide, or internationally?

Creating a homepage is the most important part of your website. Good copywriting should allow you to give care and attention to your visitors who will love you, trust you, and buy from you.

 

A Lead Magnet is a Special Report That Intrigues Your Prospects

There is no doubt that you have seen in many website an offer for a free ebook in exchange for the name and email of the visitor. This free ebook is called a “Special Report.” The idea behind it, is that businesses want prospects to know, like, and trust them.

Special Report/Free ReportIt is important for you lead magnet to have value. You have to provide worthwhile information to your prospects. This special report is used in your website to make an offer, to advertise or even used in networking situation. You can see why such document must offer value. It must be of high interest to your prospects.

Finding clients is the life blood of any business. You can find them by paying advertisements, through the search engine, or being referred to by someone. Nonetheless, you want to create a list of clients, leads, and prospects that you can stay in touch with.

A special report is by far the best tool you can have in your marketing arsenal to accomplish this. You have your website. It’s a great accomplishment. Just for that, you should congratulate yourself. In fact, a site is an asset. It has financial, marketing, and branding value. It is something you can sell as a real-estate. In fact, even the URL has financial value, based on good will.

Once you have your website, you want to include a squeeze page in it. Its purpose is to collect the name and email address of your visitors, so that you keep in touch with them. This kind of information has tremendous value for your business. Therefore, people need a reason why they’ll give you their very valuable name and email addresses. That is why you need a special report.

Start by giving away a special report to your visitors

The special report is a free downloadable E-book that would have value to your visitor. You’ll give it to him in exchange for his or her information. You cannot give to your prospect just any kind of electronic book. It has to be within the niche you’re serving. For instance, if you are into the oil energy industry, don’t give to your visitor a special report about dog obedience.special report

For instance, if you offer a special report on the oil energy industry. Something like, “World Economic Forecast of brent crude pricing for the next five years”. That is what would be of interest to those in the industry you’re catering. Think about the kind of information your clients would find most valuable. Based on their dialogues in conventions, symposiums, trade organizations, what kind of questions do they ask the most?

The special report should answer some of those burning questions. Unless you are addressing yourself to a very small, extremely specialized group of readers, keep in mind that the special report is not a research paper. It is not an academic thesis written after exhaustive research. There is a balance that needs to be achieved. It’s an e-book that must have value to your reader, but yet light enough not to be too brainy.

Most often, a special report is about 5 to 12 pages. It should be designed in such a way that it can be read in basically one sitting. This marketing strategy has the tremendous power to position you as an authority in your field. And in this case, your prospects will not only purchase your products or services, but will also be looking to hear from you in your emails.

3 Ways E-newsletters can help you attract more customers

E-newsletters are valuable, but unfortunately, it’s a neglected tool in web marketing. All industries can use this tool. Whether you are a professional service provider, a manufacturer, or a wholesale business, E-newsletters are indispensable to your marketing strategy.

They are incredible marketing goldmines for the service industry. Whether you are an accountant or dentist or an insurance agency, they are extremely effective.

E-newsletters give professionals the opportunity to tell their clients and readers what services they offer. In addition, they contain articles about tips for their customers.

The question you will need to answer in your business is, how do you find leads? And once you’ve found them what do you do with them? Once upon a time email lists were frequently used to find clients. But times have changed, and many of these list providers have gone out of business and those who survived have dubious databases.

Sending regularly E-newsletters

1. This is the great secret of the marketing gurus. Most of them will not reveal it unless you belong to their little club and you hang around them. They have a voluminous list, often comprising of hundreds of thousands of E-newsletternames. The engine behind their list is eNewsletters or E-newsletters.

This is the best marketing tool around because your readers will be able to forward them to their friends. Even if you are an accountant or an attorney, E-newsletters are the best way to find your clients and nurture the relationship with those who have not yet committed to your service. Of course, you will require a website. But once you have one, the most pressing need is for you to offer an e-newsletter.

2. Electronic newsletters can generate leads for your business. After building a website, you will need a squeeze page which is also called an opt-in. This page will enable you to get the name and email address of your visitors. But they won’t give you this information for free. It is extremely valuable for both you and them.

The name and email of your prospects are important to them because they are related to their privacy and they do not want to have an avalanche of spam mail. But this information is valuable to you, because that makes them your potential customers. So you will need to give them something back, and a series of e-newsletters will have value for them.

3. Whether you are in the environmental or energy industry, or whatever else, providing to your list a monthly or even bi-monthly e-newsletter is an excellent way to increase your sales. Selling is not about pushing a product. We’ve left the time of the fast-talking salesmen who use this technique to push their products down our throats. Now, we are at the stage of relationship.

E-newsletters can help you attract more customersProviding your list with eNewsletters is a way to open a two-way dialogue. This is a way to stay in front of your clients. Every time they receive your e-newsletter, you will have the opportunity to remind them of your existence. At the same time, they will be looking forward to hearing from you, because they know you’re offering them value.

E-newsletters are valuable Email documents that give important content to the reader. They are informational and even sometimes entertaining. They can be delivered weekly, bi-weekly or monthly.

This marketing tool helps you to build relationship with your clients.

E-newsletters have dual purposes, to get more business and to inform the customers.

Kick-Start your site with an effective squeeze page

A squeeze page is a very important web page in your internet marketing strategy. It is known under different names, such as an opt-in page. It is specially created for obtaining the email address of your visitors.

For many years, we have heard the saying that the money is in the list. An email list allows you to stay in touch with your visitors. Without it, once they leave your site, you’ll never see them again.

In order to build a list, you’ll need two ingredients. The first one is the squeeze page which will capture the name and email address of your visitor. The second element, is a free offer, which is sort of a reward to your visitor for their information.Effective Squeeze Page

This free offer is usually an ebook, a special report, or some other downloadable piece of information that has value to your prospect.

When you design a squeeze page, you will need to make it simple, yet informative. A clean and simple design is very effective. Don’t use fancy, elaborate graphics and cluttered text.

When there are a lot of things going on in your page, it makes it difficult for your visitor to understand what’s going on. Your opt-in page has three parts. One, is text. Two, a picture of your free offering. And three, a call to action.

First, build your virtual presence

Obviously, you will need a website in the first place. This statement seems asinine, but it is surprising how many people want to have an internet business, but don’t have a website to begin with.

Once done, having a squeeze page but no one coming to your website would be depressing. You need traffic coming to your site. But wait! Not just any kind of traffic. You need targeted traffic; people who will be interested in what you are offering.

You can get your traffic from either organic, that is from Google search or pay-per-click advertisement, or direct mail. As you build your squeeze page, you have to offer value to your visitor, which is your special report.

For example, if your site is about animals and you target pet owners, you can have an e-book giveaway on, say, “Five ways to keep your dog warm during winter”.

Is there a difference between a squeeze page and a landing page?

Absolutely! Browsing through the web, I see many people who are confused about those two marketing tools. Don’t be one of them. Both are tools that accomplish different purposes.

Mail list peopleThe squeeze page, or otherwise called the opt-in, is a form that asks your visitor to sign up, but it offers no distractions. Meaning, it is a page by itself that has no sidebars, no navigation and no links, except only the call to action.

The landing page on the other hand, is similar to the squeeze page, but it sells something. It is usually a long-form sales letter. But the time your reader finishes reading it, he or she will be a qualified prospect and might get your free trial or buy your product.

There is a misunderstanding that the squeeze page is all about design. It is not. There is a world of difference in? opt-in design. What is important is your headline. Your headline must be compelling, not cut or smart. It needs to attract attention by offering some sort of benefit.

In your squeeze page, what your are offering is your free report, that’s all. So focus on it. Your headline should be about the benefit that it will bring to the reader. Then you should have a short description of it. Write it around the theme of “What’s in it for me?” which some people call WIIFM. And your call to action.

The squeeze page is a great tool for lead generation and lead nurturing. By getting the email of your visitors, you can stay in touch with them.

Copywriter Tips For Making Your Product Irresistible

Copywriter Tips For Making Your Product IrresistibleThere are so many copywriter tips you can use in the promotion of your business, that you can feel overwhelmed. The reality is that you have to sell your products or services. In fact nothing happens until a sale is made. This means that all your concerns are geared towards selling, and this is the right strategy. However, do not confuse strategy with the tactical process.

The issue is, how do you get to your goal?  To do that, you will need to rethink your marketing approach. Stop thinking about your products or services. Instead start thinking of what goes through the mind of your prospects.

Your perspective needs to be a guide, a counselor. You are dealing with a human being who has needs and desires. In business-to-business, these come in two categories, business and personal wants. Your prospects are not interested in your products or services, they just want their satisfactions fulfilled. So the question for them is:  “What’s in it for me?” Or WIIFM. They have a problem and they are looking for a solution. Can you solve their issues?

The two sides of the marketing coin

Whatever the products or services you provide, there are two sides to deal with. These are the product features and benefits. Both go hand in hand. The one you will stress the most, will depend on your market target. These are critical copywriter tips.

As a general rule of thumb, if you’re selling to consumers, you will stress much more on the benefits than the features. For example, a car commercial may show the leather interior, or the electronic-computerized dashboard. These would be the features. Then, it will show the gentleman in tuxedo, with the gorgeous woman. That’s the benefit. The message, this car shows prestige.

If you’re selling to a business, they might be much more interested in features. For example, the greater capacity of the freezer, in case of a restaurant, the low energy consumption. These might be critical information for your prospect to make a decision. But the features imply benefits. In the example above, the volume of the freezer means more food can be preserved. Yes, but so what? Less spoilage. There is a process that’s taking place here. Your starting point is the feature, but there is a benefit attached to it. Consider these important aspects as you use those copywriter tips.

There are no features without benefits. This is where you begin to answer your prospect’s most important question, “What’s in it for me?” You show him the answer.

However, it’s not only one advantage that you’re giving him, but a multitude of them. In order to do that, you’ll need to dig deep into the benefit hole. Here, you transform critical features into core desires. This way, you become a guide to your client who will appreciate your concern for him and will reward you with the purchase of your products or services.

 

What is Content Marketing?

We hear the expression content marketing everywhere on the Internet. But it’s like a store of goodies. There is a world of divisions in there.  It encompasses social media, blog posts, newsletters, informational emails, articles, case study, etc. In fact, if you want to reach customers, you need content marketing.

The world is changing at an accelerated rate. What was true just a couple oWhat is Content Marketingf years ago, is no longer valid. According to the Content Marketing Institute, “Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience – and ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.”

For some people, writing is fun. They sit in front of a computer and pound at the keyboard. They had written a fantastic article by the time they finished.

For others, writing is a drag, ideas come slowly, laboriously, and by the time they finished, they stare at the word count. They are observing that what they really wrote was so little.  They’ve been told that a blog post should be 800 to 1,000 words.

Clean writing solves this issue

Professional copywriters face this issue all the time in their writing. The question is, how long should their sales letter be? Usually, sales letters are long, very long. However, observe the great masterpiece of writing made by David Ogilvy about the Rolls-Royce. The copy was written on only half a page. Very few words, yet extremely powerful sales.

The fact is that your sales letter, like your blog post, should be long enough to say the essentials, but short enough to be interesting. This answer doesn’t seem profound on the surface, yet it encapsulates a world of wisdom. It all has to do with the intent of your piece.

One piece of writing would be need-to-know products, which would include information about the niche of your blog, such as food, auto parts, coffee, clothing, alternative medicine, etc.

Your prospects don’t need a long copy in this case because they need the products. To sell this kind of product, you’ll have to establish the product’s Unique Selling Proposition and make an irresistible offer.

How long should a blog post be?

Therefore the length of your blog has to do with what it is you want to accomplish. This was pointed out so eloquently in the Copyblogger, when the author says that “Good writers know how to craft long and short content, and they’ve mastered the art of knowing which one to use in every writing circumstance.”

There is no amount of words that should be assigned to a good blog post. The length of your article has to do with your reader and the intention behind your communication. The audience is crucial. David Ogilvy in his sales letter was trying to communicate with people who did not want economical cars. A Rolls-Royce is a car for those who are wealthy and have other cars, as well.

When dealing with readers interested in “how to” information, you may have to stir up a desire for the product. So your copy might need to be a little longer. This is where the intention behind your communication comes in.

If you’re writing a highly technical blog post, then it could be more than 1000 words. As Copyblogger rightly pointed out  “many long posts do very well online.”

Great content increase traffic

You can observe that companies who substantially invest in great content – like videos, blog posts, or case studies – experience 8 times more site traffic than companies who don’t. According to Forbes, the trends for success is up for content marketing in 2018.

It is not surprising to know that 4,500 B2B and B2C companies shared with HubSpot that the growth of their content was the number 1 priority. According to a study done by Forrester Research by 2019 digital marketing will spend a $103 Billion.

The well known and respected Content Marketing Institute points out that prominent organizations in the world like P&G, Microsoft, Cisco Systems and John Deere use content marketing. There is no better way to attract the attention of prospects and generate leads, as well as expand the customer base.

 

Business Coaching

Business coaching has increasingly become a necessity in the life of an enterprise. Any business, no matter whether it is a local one or nationwide or international, is faced with the reality of global economy. That implies a tough and rough competitive atmosphere. That, by itself is a challenging task. We live in a world economy where we see rising expectations of customers and indeed aggressive strategies of competitors.

Success in an organization becomes more and more difficult to achieve which is why business coaching is essential to the progress of a firm. With the right approach to coaching, a business can move from the most humble level to soar to the zenith of success. Business coaching can help an organization when it goes through changes in management or in business process re-engineering.

Business coaching will improve productivity

Business coaching can help in productivity and work quality development. Improved relationships allows the organization to smoothly progress. Obviously there is a connection between personal and business goals.  When thinking about business ideas it would be easy to assume that these ‘great ideas’ must come from a business guru, however that is not necessarily true. Often the obvious for one is not so for others.

When you consider business coaching keep in mind to never underestimate what you can learn for someone else. It is important not to be too judgmental toward the contribution of someone just because he or she does not fit a specific category. Each and every one of  us have different experience in life. We have traveled in different roads. So our experiences are always relevant.

Business coaching is inter-connected with the practice of networking and surrounding oneself with positive, like minded people. We have to grab opportunities to brainstorm different ideas. The idea is to find the good thoughts (the positive, encouraging and constructive) and emphasize those, while ignoring the negative chatter. These are the non-tangible aspects of a business organization assets.

Affiliate Email Marketing – Marketing Tactics

In affiliate email marketing, you carefully teach your market and gain their trust instead of just offering a product or a solution. If you are offering content, make sure it’s not promoting your product and you’re not pushing it to your internet market.

You need to provide value. As a marketer you’ll be put in the position  to educate your customers and prospects in order to help them make the right decision on the product or services that would be best for them..

Current affiliate email marketing trend is to educate your prospect whether they purchase a product or service or not.

Gaining your prospect’s trust will ensure they’ll return and will be ensuing their loyalty.  Just like there is brand loyalty with correct affiliate email marketing, you will gain your customers loyalty.

They’ll prefer buying from you then going to your competitor.

In order to gain new customers, marketers use SEO, PPC, email, newsletters. There is a comprehensive affiliate email marketing tactics that can be employed by many different people for increasing response effectiveness.

Various tools, technology based solutions can be found to insure the effectiveness of one campaign. 

Businesses need to generate inbound leads, a tactic used is cross selling.

Goals for your affiliate email marketing

In your affiliate email marketing campaign you should target your existing customers who might only have a limited knowledge of your product base and service. However, keep in mind that you also need new prospective customers as well.

You can develop a fresh list of customers by educating them about the unique features or components of your product or service. You can suggest to them different ways or things they can do with what you have to offer.

Letting your customers find out the potential of your product or service could really increase your clients ROI or help them run a better business

Helping both you existing customer base and new ones will maximize their profitability.

You should keep in touch with your customers, prospects a few times a week or at least on a monthly basis.

Follow-up emails are very important as well as good turnaround response to any inquires or questions.

When one has a comprehensive affiliate email marketing program encompassing multi avenues and media it will help increase your ROI.

Attention-getter personalized micro-email designed for recipient with a personalize message is a great tactic.

Modern technological advancement has paved the way for communicating with your list.

Multimedia strategies include partnering with others in the industry to bring an all around approach solution.

For example, you could acquire some freelance writers and graphic artist to create thought provoking promotion and successful affiliate email marketing campaigns

Since digital communications are on the rise consumers’ in-boxes become increasingly crowded, many marketers are looking at other means, in order to create an emotional response.

Copywriting Services – Various benefits

One of the most important aspects of having a successful online business is to have traffic. This would be generated through high quality content that you can get from copywriting services. A lot of content in your site means a strong web presence. As a business owner you may have a lot of good ideas about your products or services. Help for putting all this content in a consistence fashion on your site is available.

A Google search will quickly reveal that there are literally thousands of copywriting services available to use for your online business. However, you need to keep in mind that a good copywriter service will try to get to know your audience. It’s not all about writing and putting a lot of things in your site. It is about adding worthwhile, relevant content that offers value to your audience.

Copywriting services that businesses need

The important thing about copywriting services is to see if their interest is focused on what they can do for you or what benefits they can offer you.

You may not know how to present yourself to your target market in a manner that appeals to their intellect and emotions. Which is why your writer has to be able to fill the gap for you. First and foremost, copywriting is about selling.

Therefore, when you consider copywriting services, watch if the writer tries to go inside the heads of your target customers. The writing is not all about words in the web site, rather, it’s about persuading your prospect to own the product or service that you are offering. Crafting the copy has to speak to the demographics of your market.

When you look for copywriting services, try to see if they will also do SEO. Remember, a copywriter does not necessarily have to write according to the search engine optimization (SEO). That’s another kind of service, and it will cost you extra.

SEO Copywriter: What does an SEO Copywriter do exactly?

An SEO copywriter is someone who writers content in a web page that search engine optimized. You basically start by doing a keyword research which can be done on Google or other search tools. In this case the seo copywriter begins with a basic word and see if it is used often by people. If so, he’ll use it in a content on his web page.  SEO Copywriters have the talent to influence people with words in a way, which makes them seamless to search engines and communicate with web readers.

There are people who specializes as SEO copywriter. Put simply, he wins web traffic with carefully crafted words. The words he uses are keywords that fits into the content he’s writing. There are agencies who hire seo copywriters to work for their clients. They  specialize in the optimization part, producing keyword-rich content that has the primary purpose of pushing your page up the Google rankings. Ranking is about your position in the search engine.

SEO Copywriter helps the position of your page

The SEO copywriter creates web content embedded with search engine optimization strategy that brings your copy to a high SERP position. One has to be careful not to stuff keywords into the content. Once upon a time people used to do that. They used to put a keyword multiple number of times in a sentence to the point that it was not legible. Google became aware of it, and then discounted the value of this technique.

When an SEO copywriter writes content, it may be in a sales copy, or even in an article or a piece of information.  Often SEO marketing firms have in-house writing positions. In order to be successful, the SEO copywriter must first know where, how, and to whom he is addressing himself to. Who is he training to communicate to.