Conversion or making sales is one of the biggest challenges for small or medium sized businesses or startups.
Business rely on some form of marketing such as content marketing, email marketing, ads, social media marketing, etc. for their sales. All of them involve content in it, however, on average, visitors to a page will only read 20% of its content. This means you need to structure your page so that the most important points stand out.
And, you can do that using copywriting.
“Here’s the only thing you’re selling, no matter what business you’re in and what you ship: you’re selling your prospects a better version of themselves.” – Joanna Wiebe
Today at NxtDecade, we have Matej Bartko, a freelance copywriter. He’ll tell us how copywriting can help our business and how it improves the conversion power of your website.
About Matej Bartko
Matej comes from a technical background. He was a FE web developer helping companies build their web presence for over two years. By leveraging his technical skills and passion for fitness, he started a fitness blog. “I enjoyed writing, but when I heard about copywriting, I fell in love with it.,” he says. Persuasive writing that brings high profits to his clients became his service. Now, he helps businesses scale up and achieve their dream goals.
Interview
Q1. Why is copywriting called “copywriting”? How does it differ from content writing?
It’s called copywriting because the copywriter creates a text (called “copy”) which is reproduced (copied) and printed in newspapers or ads. In the old newspaper jargon, they referred to all articles as “copy”. Thus copywriting. Hence copywriters don’t copy someone’s work.
Copywriting is advertising via the written word. Its goal is to make readers do actions like subscribing to your email list or buying your product. Primary goal of copywriting is to persuade the reader to take action.
The goal of content writing is to inform. Usually through long-form copy like blogs, articles, e-books, etc. Content writing focuses more on building the relationship than selling. Content writers also put more emphasis on using SEO strategies to raise the brand’s awareness.
Q2. Copywriting is hard and requires skills & talent to do. How much reality is in it?
Learning copywriting isn’t hard. You can become proficient in a few months if you practice enough. You don’t need talent, but you need to write daily and spend long hours behind the screen.
Becoming a great copywriter requires years of practicing and constant learning every day.
Q3. Can you describe one copy myth people have? Do businesses underrate copywriting?
One misunderstanding people have is that copywriting doesn’t take long. Well, it’s not just about the writing. First, you need to do proper research – who precisely is your customer, what he wants, what his struggles/desires are, what keeps him up at night, etc. What are all the features and benefits for the customer from your product/service?
You need to understand what the expectations of the customers are. And much, much more. You also need to do proper research on your competition, what they do, how they do it, why it works/doesn’t work for them.
After the research and writing copy (which takes a lot of time if done correctly), you need to edit the copy and make sure it sounds great! If not, back to the writing!
Yes, a lot of businesses don’t know about copywriting. Some ignore it, because they don’t know the actual power behind it. Copywriting changed business from the scratch and likely it’ll change yours, too.
Q4. How does content with/without copywriting look?
Let’s take a device that we use daily as an example – a smartphone.
Copy without copywriting looks like this:
Our brand is manufacturing the fastest, most affordable phones in the industry. We just released our new model AG x5. It has a massive storage capacity of 64 GB. We put 4GB of RAM into the AG x5 model. We included a 16MP camera. In our company, we are trying to go with the trends. We want to be first. That’s why we introduced an innovative design. We also chose a big 5.5 inches display with a screen resolution of 1080×1920 pixels. We are among the first companies that did this. We are a company that is doing our best to ensure our customers are happy.
Copy with copywriting looks like this:
Are you the type of person who wants to be as productive as possible without breaking a bank? We just released our new model AG x5 to bring you the best experience possible.
With AG x5, you won’t ever need to think about deleting your data again because you’ll get a massive 64 GB storage.
Thanks to 4GB of RAM, you can work on multiple apps with no shuttering.
Do you want to take a group picture of your family or friends? No problem! A 16 MP camera can capture your precious moments in the highest quality.
Doing work on the 5.5 inches display will be easier, so you’ll be more productive.
In AG, we’re doing our best to ensure you’ll get the most powerful devices for an affordable price.
What’s the difference?
- The first example is all about the brand, not the customer.
- In copywriting, we use the WIIFM (What’s In It For Me) rule. That means we want to show the customer benefits of buying our product/service.
- The first example shows the features of the product, but not the benefits. It’s missing one important detail. What will the product bring to the customer? The second example lets the users imagine all the benefits they’ll get after buying the product/service. Benefits ensure a unique view of our product/service.
- The first example is hard to read and boring. The second one, however, is piquing the interest of the customer and it’s easy to read.
- We know that our ideal customer is John, a 32 years-old man with two children. John wants a device that will make him more productive. And thus, we tailored the copy specifically for him in the second example.
There’s so much more to copywriting, but I cannot show all the benefits of it in one brief article.
Q5. How does a copywriter help with sales and conversions? What aspects of the website can copywriters improve?
The copywriter can:
- Tailor the copy specifically for your ideal customer, as I did in the second example. By doing this, your prospects will see themselves enjoying the benefits the product offers, and thus you’ll make more sales.
- Leverage the copywriting templates like AIDA (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action), which is a popular method for leading the customers from the start (e.g., viewing your website) up to the actual action (buying in most cases).
- Identify the customer’s deepest desires or pain points and can offer a solution. When the prospect knows that you can solve his problems or desires, he’ll buy. Offering a solution for a problem or desire increases conversions significantly.
- Create a strong CTA (Call To Action), and more people will do the desired action (click on the link, buy a product, type their email address, etc.). A strong CTA leads to more leads and sales.
- Improve copies on your website like landing page, about page, sales page, lead magnet (an offer that gives you valuable information for your email), product descriptions, blogs, and more. And other forms of direct-response copywriting such as email lists, ads, fliers.
Q6. If I want to learn copywriting, what can I do? Any course, or resource that you can suggest to me?
The AWAI Method course is all you need. I took that course, and a few days afterwards I landed my first client. Many of my friends, who are copywriters, did the same, and everyone said it was worth every penny.
Honestly, I bought the course based on the recommendation from my friend. Some of them took The Accelerated Program for Six-Figure Copywriting and said it was great, too.
Wrapping Up
We thanks Matej for answering our questions and telling us about copywriting and its benefits.
I hope our readers got to know much enough about how proper use of copywritng can help to boost the converting power of their website or other marketing content.
