Research – research – research.

That is the only way to discover what your customers really want.

Sounds easy, doesn’t it? But how would you go about conducting your research?

If you have the budget for it, you could turn to a market research agency that could come up with all sorts of data for you on customer habits and buying behaviours. But there is one drawback with this method – it can be very expensive and beyond the marketing budget of many companies.

The answer is right under your nose

Often the most obvious source of excellent market research is over looked – your customers.

Who else is better qualified to tell you what your customers want?

Ask them in person, by email or over the phone. Set up a free survey online (e.g. like www.surveymonkey.com) or maybe enter them into a prize draw for completing the survey. By going to them direct you can find out:

• What they like about your product?
• What they don’t like?
• What benefits/features were most important?
• How do they use the product?
• What improvements would they make?
• Would they buy again? If not, why not?
• Do they have any suggestions to improve it?
• Would they recommend it to a friend? If not, why not?

There is a wealth of information just waiting to be tapped.

You can always try the salesman

Another way of gathering important information is by actually asking the people tasked with selling the product.

Your salesman is on the front line every day making him the ideal person to speak to. Through him you’ll be able to discover:

• What closed the sale?
• What features/benefits do clients find the most attractive?
• What are the biggest obstacles to buying?
• What do customers say about the competition?
• When they don’t buy, why don’t they buy?

Sitting in your office with your eyes raised to the ceiling trying to guess what your customers want will never work.

If your copywriting is to be compelling and persuasive you have to know what makes your customers tick – otherwise you’ll be heading for a disaster.

Sally Ormond

Freelance Copywriter

When embarking on a piece of copywriting, identifying your USP is essential.

The unique selling point could be something along the lines of:

• Guaranteed next day delivery
• A promise of a boost to intelligence
• A guarantee that the product will make you look younger

Get the picture? Your USP has to be something that makes your product or service stand out from the crowd and is of value to your customer.

Once you’ve found it, flaunt it

What do you do with your USP once you’ve found it?

Stick it in your headline! This will be your most important selling benefit for your customer. It’s hot news so get it in your headline to hook your reader

What else does your product do?

Once you’ve identified your USP don’t just stop there. Your product will have plenty of other features and benefits you’ll want to use in your copy. But make sure you use the right information in the right places.

The most important stuff goes in the most prominent areas.

How do you do that? How do you make sure you get the important stuff in first?

Here’s a colourful method to help you:

RED IS FOR HOT – information unique to you:

• USPs
• Guarantees
• Freebies

ORANGE IS WARM – benefits that are great but also offered by your competitors:

• Saves money
• Saves time
• Makes you more attractive/younger

GREEN IS TEPID – basic features which are expected but unlikely to stir great interest:

• Colour options
• Texture options
• Size options

Get it wrong and lead with the tepid information – you’ll lose your reader in an instant.

Always start with the red, follow up with the orange and end with the green. But don’t forget to finish off with a huge red call to action.

Sally Ormond, Briar Copywriting

Freelance Copywriter

A strange question?

When do you think it begins?

• When you start writing?
• When you get your assignment?

Would you be surprised to learn that the majority of copywriting is done before a word is written?

Getting the ground work done

If you pick up an assignment, read it through and then start writing – you have missed the point. And not just slightly missed it, you’ve overshot the runway by a mile and ended up in the river.

The real work of copywriting begins by getting to know the product or service you are selling. Think about:

• What is it?
• What does it do? – especially for the customer
• How does it differ from other similar products/services?
• What makes it so desirable?

But that’s not all…

Getting to understand the product or service is the first step – then you have to get to know your customers. After all how can you possibly sell something to someone without knowing what they are looking for?

Think about:

• Who they are?
• What do they want?
• What are they looking for in life?
• What will make them buy?

Real copywriting is about understanding your product and customer – who, what, why, how – by spending time to find out these factors, you will have a wealth of ideas to draw on for your copy.

Be warned…

Going into a copywriting assignment without this knowledge will probably end in disaster – how can you create a compelling sales message to attract customers without it?

Sally Ormond  – freelance copywriter

For many people, the ghost of English lessons past tends to curb their ability to write compelling and powerful copy.

Why?

Because as soon as they get taken over by the wondrous writing that flows from their finger tips a little voice pops into their heads; the voice of their old English teacher.  At times slang, sentence fragments, contractions, colloquialisms etc., are perfectly acceptable.

Here are just a few occasions when you can ignore the voice:

Sentence fragments

The rules state that all proper sentences should have a subject-verb-object construction. But if they communicate complete thoughts, they are a perfectly acceptable part of your writer’s tool chest.

“Get your copy of About the Home today. Full of tips and secrets. Why miss out? Buy yours today.”

Contractions and slang

Why can’t you use contractions? It’s perfectly acceptable in my book. As for slang – why not? If it helps communicate a particular message to your audience, go for it.

And…But

Hands up everyone who was told they couldn’t start a sentence with the conjunctions “and” or “but” – hogwash!!

If you refer to Fowler’s Modern English Usage you’ll be told that this particular prohibition had been ‘cheerfully ignored by standard authors from Anglo Saxon times onwards’ (Fowler’s Modern English Usage, Third Edition, p.52). Even Shakespeare used it in King John.

If it’s good enough for Shakespeare, it’s good enough for me.

Talking of Shakespeare, he also paved the way for another overruling of the grammarians – use of the split infinitive:

Root pity in thy heart, that when it grows

Thu pity may deserve to pitied be

(Sonnet 142)

And of course, another famous example will be known by all the Trekkies out there:

To boldly go where no man has gone before

Ending a sentence with a preposition

Those that believe this don’t have a leg to stand on. If they did I would’ve had to write “Those that believe this don’t have a leg on which to stand” – I don’t think so, I prefer my version!

It is perfectly alright to end on a preposition provided it’s not redundant – so you can ask “Where are you going?” but not “Where are you going to?”

Basically, if you want to write great copy that gets your readers attention and sells products – write as you would speak. By adopting a conversational style you will immediately build rapport with your audience gaining their trust and, with a bit of luck, their cash.

Just one other thing, ditch the Thesaurus – if you use that too often you’ll be in danger of writing with gratuitously overblown hyperbole instead of plain language.

Simple is the copywriter’s friend.

Sally Ormond, Briar Copywriting – Freelance Copywriter

The headline, body copy and call to action are all vital elements within the freelance copywriters marketing arsenal – but they are not the be all and end all of copywriting.

To help you get your message across strongly you’ll need to utilise various tools such as:

• Subheadings
• Captions
• Call outs

Sub headings

There is nothing worse than being faced with a solid wall of text. I don’t know about you, but when I was a kid and had to choose a new reading book, what I found inside the cover was a big factor in making a choice. If I was immediately presented with page after page of small solid print, I’d put it back on the shelf and find something easier.

Well the same thing happens in your readers head. If they visit your website or open your brochure and hit a wall of text – they ain’t gonna read it!

Your sub headings should act like a sign post. At a glance your reader should be able to see what your web page or brochure page is about. They can then use the sub heads to read the sections most relevant to them.

They help break up the text and add that all important white space into your pages.

Captions

I’m sure you know what a caption is without me pointing it out to you – but I will anyway. The caption is the brief line of text that accompanies a photo, graph, drawing etc.

You caption should serve 2 purposes:

• Identify what the illustration is
• Link the illustration to your copy

By the second point I mean if it is a photo of someone using your product, describe to your reader what it is showing. If it’s a chart, again explain what it means i.e. 85% of people asked expressed a preference to Miracle Clean compared to the leading brand.

Callouts

At times you’ll have information you want to stand out. The use of callouts comes into play when you don’t want to interrupt the flow of your text or the information is so damned important you’ll want to draw special attention to it.

This can be done using:

• Bursts
• Callouts
• sidebars

What’s the difference?

A burst is generally a colourful graphic that attracts your readers’ attention to a particular point. It can be for a special offer or to emphasize a special feature:

A callout is usually a section of text, in a different font or colour, often designed to come across as a ‘stage whisper’. They are not quite so in your face as the burst and can be used to give customer quotes, important information, or important reminders:

A sidebar is a column or box of copy set to the side of the main text area. They can be used to house longer sections of copy which may be a list of features, a case study or other information that couldn’t be shown in the main text area (such as shipping details):

A copywriter has a number of tools they can use to create interest and hype around a product. By utilising these 3 features you can compliment your text to produce something that is powerful and compelling without being overly wordy.