Is your website getting lots of visitors, but struggling to turn them into paying customers?
Your copy might be working against you, putting people off — or, worse, making them feel indifferent — instead of encouraging them to give you a try.
Here's a look at some common copywriting mistakes that make prospective customers run for the virtual hills, and a look at how you can fix them.
Mistake #1: Trying to appeal to everyone
Was your copy written with an ideal customer in mind? Or are you trying to appeal to anyone with a bank account and two legs?
Deliberately limiting who you try to sell to might sound like a bad business strategy. But unless you're Amazon — or another ginormous brand with mass market appeal — the latter approach will most probably backfire.
Imagine you're playing darts.
There's no way you'll hit the bullseye every time, even if you're a seasoned pro. But that's not an issue. Since you're focused on a single target, the odds are that, even if you miss, your dart will still land somewhere on the board.
Now, imagine there are several dartboards next to each other and you have to hit them all with the same dart at the same time.
Can't be done, right?
The most likely outcome is that your dart will end up stuck in the wall. Which means you'll get zero points (and grief from the pub landlord for ruining the wallpaper).
To put that analogy in copywriting terms, if you try to appeal to everybody, you'll end up appealing to nobody. So it's crucial to narrow things down.
CopyHackers' Joana Wiebe says:
"I recommend treating as much as 80% of your, say, home page’s traffic as throwaway. They came, they saw, they left and you’re cool with that. The 20 to 35% of your traffic that you should write for is your actual target market or market segment. These are the people that will make your business grow..."
Mistake #2: Appealing to the wrong customer
Narrowing down who your target customers are is a surefire way of increasing your copy's impact and effectiveness. But — and it's a very big but — this only works if you've chosen the right customer to appeal to.
As someone who lives and breathes your business every day, you might think it's obvious who your customer is. But you'd be surprised at how easy it is to get it wrong.
Case in point, car ads tend to target men. But research shows that, 82% of the time, it's women who make the final buying decision, at least where family cars are concerned.
Similarly, while your customer relationship management software will ultimately be used by sales and marketing teams, don't forget about the procurement department. The latter holds the purse strings and usually has the final say.
So how do you make sure you've picked the right customer to appeal to?
Start by looking at past sales
Who have been your best clients over the past year? If you're B2B, what kind of industries are they in? And what's the person you dealt with like?
It's helpful to list information like age, education level, job role, and even whether they were the decision-maker or had to consult someone else. This is all information you can use to make your copy more relevant, relatable, and compelling
Speak to your customers
Once you've made a list of your best clients, it's time to speak to them directly and ask them what made them choose you. What problems were they trying to solve? How has your product or service helped? And what did they like most about it?
Asking these kinds of questions shines a light on what your customers were thinking. It may also reveal unique selling points or benefits you might not have considered
Build an ideal customer profile
This is a summary of what the typical person likely to buy from you looks like and is looking for. If you imagine you're having a conversation with them as you're writing, your copy will be that much more effective
Mistake #3: Answering the wrong questions
This can happen in three main ways:
You focus on the wrong pain points. For example, you copy leads with "Do you want to be more organised?" when what your customers really need help with is reducing their workload
You highlight the wrong benefits. For instance, you emphasise your software's time-saving benefits, when what your customers are really interested in is accuracy
Your benefits aren't actually benefits. In other words, they look valuable at first glance, but don't stand up to scrutiny. Let's say you sell data analysis software. "Make your data work harder" sounds like a pretty great benefit. But is it, really? Can you imagine a customer telling themselves "I really need to make my data work harder!"? Or would they be aspiring to something else?
As in mistake #2, if you're addressing the wrong pain points or highlighting the wrong benefits, it pays to speak to your customers directly.
What problems were they looking to solve when they looked into your product or service? And how has it made their lives better? The answers to these questions will give you a better understanding of the pain points and benefits your copy should focus on.
As for the third issue, the easiest way to weed out fake benefits is to try the "So what?" test:
Make your data work harder
So what?
You'll have better information to hand
So what?
You'll feel more confident about making important business decisions
Mistake #4: Telling, not showing
Anyone can talk the talk. But if you want prospective customers to trust you and reach for their wallets, you can't make bold, unsubstantiated claims and hope for the best. You need to back up what you're saying with cold, hard proof.
Here are four ways you can beef up your copy and make it more credible:
Quote studies, respected experts, and statistics from research reports
Ask your clients for testimonials and place them in prominent places on your website
Place trust seals — such as badges from professional organisations you're a member of — in prominent places on your website
Show off any awards, accolades, or press coverage in high profile publications
Mistake #5: We-ing all over your copy
Is your copy packed with words like "we", "our", "I", and "[company name]"?
You're probably boring prospective customers right out your digital doors.
Nobody likes listening to someone drone on and on about themselves at the best of times. But this holds even more true when they're preoccupied with solving a pressing problem.
Now, you might be saying, isn't the whole point of a website to talk about your business?
Yes. But there's a subtle but important difference between banging on about how passionate you are about what you do and explaining to people who are considering buying from you exactly how you can help them.
With this in mind, find all instances of "we", "our", "I", and "[company name]" in your copy and replace as many of them as you can with "you". This will reframe what you're saying so the focus is on the customer.
Copywriting is like a bridge
And prospective customers have a sixth sense for sniffing out those with shaky foundations, because they could send them tumbling into the river below.
By weeding out and fixing these common copy mistakes, you'll make sure your bridge looks and feels solid. Which means more of the people you want to do business with will be more likely to cross to your side.
Need help sprucing up your copy so it gets you more leads and sales?
