"Speak to Me -- The Art of Communicating with Your Customers"

by Heather Lloyd-Martin

There are simple ways to personalize your copy to speak to your audience!

Is your Web site copy telling your customers what they want to hear?

Here's an example:

Say you walk into a retail store, and the sales clerk exclaims, "Welcome to our store! Our company mission statement is to provide you the best possible service for the lowest possible consumer cost."

Hunh?

Chances are, if you were hit with a pitch like that, you'd immediately walk out the door. The salesperson didn't address your needs (you were there to shop) nor did they even make it easy to shop there. Instead, you were bombarded with useless information that didn't help you one iota. And, that one non-interaction may have been enough to cause you to never shop there again.

Sadly, Web sites galore speak to their customers in the third person, nary a benefit statement in sight. Instead of making it easy for customers to make an informed purchase, corporate gobbledygook alienates their audience, forcing their prospects to wade through information they don't care about. It's not personalized to their needs. Nor does the writing have a tone and feel their prospects relate to. It's just dirt-dull copy that screams, "Look at us. We're so cool. And that's why you should buy from us."

Not.

Writing Web site copy isn't about mission statements - it's about talking to an actual living and breathing Web surfer. If you want to communicate with your customers, there are some simple ways to personalize your copy:

  1. Find all evidence of "corporate speak" on your Web site and immediately destroy it. Corporate speak, usually written in the third person and completely ignoring the word "you," focuses exclusively on the seller's mission statement, strategic positioning and corporate advantages - without mentioning what's in it for their customers. Sure, you may have the largest facility on the West Coast, but if it doesn't benefit your customer, why mention it?
  2. Find your voice. Your writing should reflect how your target market would actually talk in real life. If you're selling to kids, make sure you know the lingo and can sling it accurately - if your site sounds too "adult," you'll lose credibility with your audience. Conversely, if your site focuses on CEOs of major corporations, your writing should be slang-free, concise and immediately informative. A good test for tone is to read your copy out loud. If your writing sounds stilted, hokey and forced, it's time to rewrite.
  3. Know what's important to your customers - and tell them how you can help. Don't assume your prospects automatically know the benefits of working with you. Tell them specifically how you can help. Once your customers clearly understand how your product or service will make their life easier, more exciting or more profitable, they'll drill deeper for more information - and contact you for the sale.

How can we help you with your search engine marketing copywriting? Contact us today for your customized quotation.

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