Entries Tagged 'freelance copywriting' ↓

Recently I was asked to do a video for BT Tradespace. I have been using this service for quite some time now, in fact probably from the very start of my freelance copywriting days. It has been a great tool for me to attract business as it provides an extra web presence.

By the way, that’s not my living room!

Follow this link for more details about how your business can benefit from BT Tradespace.

More often than not, puff or hype and copywriting go about as well together as oil and water.

But hype can atually be good. You see there are 2 types of hype:

• hype that will always convert
• hype that will NEVER convert

The piles of junk mail waiting to be recycled are full of the latter type. They are stuffed with words such as biggest, fastest, easiest, greatest, amazing, unique, etc., and unblievable claims such as “Your skin will be transformed overnight”.

These examples stand out as hype because they are recognized as less than believable and are quickly discounted and ignored by most consumers.

But there is nothing wrong with using these words if they are accurate descriptions.

Turn bad hype good

If you are writing an ad and used this either in the headline or body copy:

All your wrinkles will miraculously disappear overnight!

The chances are it won’t believed and it won’t convert.

It won’t matter if the rest of your add can actually prove the claim – by kicking off with it ruins any chance of getting a sale.

If you are going to use a claim such as the one above, you need to place it wisely within your ad.

Avoid the ad-killing claim

How? Simply by making it an unavoidable conclusion.

Before making any claim to unparalleled excellence—prove it first.

Assemble and present your evidence; this proof will lay the groundwork for what is to come by creating a strong and overwhelming direction and momentum.

In other words…

Turn hype into an undisputed conclusion

So when you finally do present your hype it will be seen as a descriptive and accurate statement of the obvious and the proven (hype of the good kind). If executed skillfully, your hype will also have the added benefit of becoming sustainable and actionable.

I was recently asked by the Twitter Guru, Mark Shaw (@markshaw) to do a Twitter Business Interview.

Follow the link below to see how I use Twitter

Twitter Business Interview – Sally Ormond | Twitter For Business.

Guess what – one style of copywriting doesn’t fit every requirement.

Not ground-breaking stuff you may think, and I would have to agree with you. But you would be amazed at the number of people who firmly believe that one style suits everything and everyone.

I touched on this in an earlier post Become an Effective Copywriter: Lesson 2 – Short Copy vs Long Copy. It really doesn’t matter whether you are writing for B2B or B2C, not every reader will want to be faced with exactly the same style of copy. There are a huge number of factors that are going to affect your writing style, for example what the product or service is, how familiar the product or service is to the market, the target customer’s preferred communication style etc.

There is really only one way a copywriter can get their styling right for their chosen market – by using their own judgement. Think carefully and decide on whether what is being suggested really makes sense for everybody.

News flash – not everyone across the entire globe respond in the same way.

Look around you. We are all different, we all think differently, we all make decisions differently, we all have different tastes – above all we make decisions based on different criteria; criteria that are important to us.

Writing copy takes time, research and little understanding of your market. There are no magic forumlas that will win over every reader.

I never said it would be easy.

When you think of copywriting services, what springs to mind?

Web copy – newsletters – direct mail – brochures – press releases – articles – blogs – white papers…

Some businesses spend a lot of money hiring freelance copywriters, but they don’t consider doing the same for their email copywriting needs.

Why?

The customers won’t want those emails unless they’re well written. And if they don’t want them, they’ll just unsubscribe and then they’ll be gone – forever.

Having good email copywriting will help your business in the long run, so here are a few tips.

Tell them what to do next

This is vital no matter what form your copywriting takes, but rather than a strong request for a direct action, you require something a bit more gentle. The more information you reveal in your email, the less response you’re going to get. You want your readers to get just a taste of what you’re offering, so they’ll click on your link instead of the delete key. But it still has to be specific enough so the recipient will take action.

Avoid the Spam

You may not be writing Pulitzer Prize novels but you must still pay attention to spelling and punctuation because nothing turns off a reader more than silly typos. You also need to avoid spam filters so watch out for phrases like “risk free” and “order now.”

Don’t go it alone

These very simple steps will help you have more success with your email marketing, but don’t consider getting your freelance copywriter to do the work for you. Your business is well worth the investment, particularly when it comes to excellent email copywriting. Besides, using the services of the same copywriter for your marketing materials will also generate a consistant voice which will help generate a feeling of trust and credibility in the eyes of your customers.