2 Ways to Really Connect With Your Customer in Your Copywriting

Written by Bruce Carlson


Copyright © 2005 by Bruce Carlson

One ofrepparttar least talked-about areas in copywriting education is voice. This is probably because it’s tough to set general rules for something that’s so personal to each of us. After all,repparttar 138740 same things go into building your copywriting voice that go into making you who you are!

Personality, upbringing, environment, education, audience, purpose…all these and more go into forming your voice, no matter what kind of writing you’re doing.

In this article, I’d like to try to tacklerepparttar 138741 subject of voice in copywriting. I’ve identified a couple of areas that I believe arerepparttar 138742 most important when it comes to making your voice more credible when writing copy -- style and tone. By improving these two areas, you'll connect with your customer in a much more genuine way.

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In my conversations with successful copywriters and marketers, I find that practically every one of them has an uncanny ability to communicate on a gut level with their customer or prospect. And that is one ofrepparttar 138743 main keys to their success.

How do they do this?

By removing internal editors, and writing as if they were speaking to a friend.

When you sit down to write, you need to make a psychological leap and forget everything you ever learned about writing in school.

Yes, I know that you’ve got those “ghosts of English teachers past” sitting on your shoulder and whispering in your ear about how you should write. But those internal editors need to be tossed out.

Instead, you need to write like you talk. This is much easier said than done, and requires some practice and work. If you have a hard time doing this, one possibility is to record yourself speaking your sales message first, and then to transcribe it afterwards. That way you’ll getrepparttar 138744 spoken spirit ofrepparttar 138745 language.

You’ll still need to edit it though, to get rid of “hesitation markers” like ummmm, uhhhhh, etc. You don’t want those sounds in your copy…

But more than anything, writing like you talk means being informal. One thing I see with novice copywriters is that, even though they might start to getrepparttar 138746 idea of writing like they talk, they’ll still “speak” formally, as if they were giving a (dull) public speech.

It’s true that ad copy from 50 years ago, especially direct mail sales letters, may have been a bit stiff and formal. And there may still be times when a certain level of formality is needed, depending upon your target market. But with Web sales copy, and especially with email copy, informal isrepparttar 138747 right way to go.

Informal style means breaking a ton of grammar rules. Which is what you do when you talk, anyway, at least in conversational speech. Use contractions (like can’t and won’t and I’ll…). And fragment sentences. And you can start sentences with “and”. Or with “or”.

And you can tail off sentences with ellipsis markers (those three dots)… Which is also a good way to show hesitation when writing, byrepparttar 138748 way, since you can’t userepparttar 138749 hesitation sounds you normally use in speech.

And you can have sentences that have only one or two words. Like this!

And you can use really short paragraphs to express a quick thought. Or a bit longer paragraphs to express a longer thought.

Copywriting: Aida is more than an opera

Written by Dave Bromley


Aida is more than an opera by Verdi Ask most people what Aida is and they will tell you it is an opera set in Egypt. Ask a marketing person and they will tell you that it isrepparttar sales formula that all advertising must incorporate if it is to be successful.

A = Attention

I = Interest

D = Desire

A = Action

It does not matter how well your description is written, how good your product is or what terrific value it represents if no-one knows about it. So how do you grab people's attention and get them to read your listing?

We know thatrepparttar 138631 majority of potential bidders will start by going to eBay's search engine. Sorepparttar 138632 important thing is to get as many key words or phrases that they might use into your title. If I am looking for a Rolex Oyster wristwatch I might type in Rolex, Oyster or wristwatch intorepparttar 138633 search engine. If you have a Rolex Oyster Wrist Watch for sale at $50 I will not even find it if your listing title is something like "Amazing Value Top ofrepparttar 138634 Range Quality Watch"

The secret is to think like a buyer. EBay offer you some tools to help you gain attention. If you cannot get everything in your title that you want you could pay an extra 50p and add a sub title or go for one ofrepparttar 138635 other enhancements that eBay offer. Only testing will tell you whether these are worth it for your products.

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