Persuade with passion. Engage with the unexpected.
His face was slightly ashen, and had clearly fallen since he first entered the conference room. I felt a lump in my stomach as he reviewed the revisions to the copy he’d written just a week earlier. I was a bit sick at being part of this, but it was… inevitable.
I marveled that he still held out any hope to begin with. The work before him was little more than a carcass of the original. Of course, he’d been in this position before.
Eager to bring some excitement to a new client’s Web site, he’d spent more time than he should have crafting a story for our business. His work communicated what the visitor needed to know, and did so using the tools of the persuasive writer.
Words that convert.
The heading invited the reader to read the first sentence, as it should. The work started with a story. It generated an emotion, if only a slight one. Details were held back so that the reader’s interest would mount.
Juicy words were chosen in favor of posing adjectives. Simile and metaphor were scattered here and there.
These are the tools that engage those parts of the brain that ask the reader to remember what they’re reading.
I’ve said it before. You can create more engaging images with paragraphs than with Photoshop.
The Tyranny of the Managing Amateur
What I delivered to this beleaguered writer was the internally edited version of his work.
It had been squeezed dry, like a lemon.
Those within the company that edited it down meant well. Sadly, they were not writers, but they had the privilege of position. The “rules” that they had heard in passing were to be the undoing of this prose:
“You only have 8 seconds to engage your reader,” and, “brevity is the soul of wit,” and “No one reads below ‘the fold.’”
Unfortunately, all of this is true. Ironically, it is only true for writing that is bereft of storytelling, diluted of color, and opaque with hyperbole.
Here are the quotes business marketers should be spouting:
“Web visitors will give you as much time as you have the talent to muster.”
“Brevity without wit is soulless.”
“You can entice anyone to scroll by entertaining or educating.”
I was young. I didn’t defend his work. I didn’t stand behind the very thing that was going to make this new website successful. I just didn’t know any better.
Can you recognize and defend writing that will set you apart from your competitors?
Can you identify copy that increases conversion rates? Do you have the knowledge to say “NO” to hack editors, though they may hold the key to your paycheck? Do you need some copywriting tips that deliver results? Or some copywriting hacks you wish you’d known sooner?
Design your website around the strategies that drive leads and sales and avoid the marketing strategies that don’t convert.
I had one of those meetings this week; a meeting with a company that has really come to understand the significance of online conversion in their business. I predict good things for them.
They’d taken advantage of a Conversion Sciences home page review, and had attended my workshops. It’s a good feeling to know that I’m making a difference.
They wanted to be sure spent their Web budget on the things that were going to help their business grow faster.
This is going to sound obvious, but take a good look at your own site before you dismiss this statement: They decided that focusing on strategies that would generate leads would alleviate the need to invest in things that didn’t. They would save money and sell more.
That makes sense, doesn’t it?
So what should you be investing in?
Find out which conversion strategies you should be building your web marketing programs around and avoid marketing strategies that don’t convert.
Design your website around the strategies that drive leads and sales and avoid the marketing strategies that don’t convert.
The Five Core Patterns Of Conversion Marketing
How many basic web patterns are there? If you were to boil every web site down to a set of core species, how many would you list? Would there be 500 basic types? 100? 50? How about five?
Conversion scientists require some categorization and classification to do their job well. This allows us to simplify rather complex concepts, easing communication with each other and with you. It gives us a common vocabulary with which to work.
For example, if you can tell me which of five patterns your web site fits into, I can tell you with some accuracy which three strategies you should implement first to maximize your conversion rates. From one word springs an entire online marketing plan. That is the power of classification.
Over my next five posts for Conversion Sciences, I’m going to help you identify your core web site pattern and tell you what disciplines you can’t get wrong if you want to turn visitors into leads and sales.
The ground rules
Before I define the five web site patterns, let’s lay some ground rules for the ensuing debate.
We are focused on business-oriented web sites designed to increase sales for a business, no matter how indirect the effect.
A web site pattern is distinct from its implementation. A blog is not a web site pattern, since many patterns could be implemented using a blog structure.
A new pattern is defined as a type of web site that requires a set of online strategies substantially different from the existing patterns to be successful.
I welcome your input on new web species that may exist in the wild. Here is the first of the five basic patterns which I look for when advising a client.
The Brochure pattern
Also known as the “sales support” pattern, the brochure web site is modeled after the glossy print publications that have been created by businesses for decades, and ignored by 99.99% of those who have received them.
Often presented in tri-fold fashion, the brochure is the appetizer of marketing. Its sole purpose is to provide enough information to whet the desire of a prospective customer and tell them how to get more information.
Likewise, its online counterpart is designed to provide little truly valuable information, but to make the sponsoring company look like it has its act together. In this sense, the primary quality of a brochure site is safety.
You have, or desire a brochure site if you answer yes to the following statements:
When you decided to create or refresh your web site, you called a web designer first.
You spent a great deal of time huddled over a tree-like map of your future web site. This is called an “information architecture.”
The copy for the site was reviewed and edited by several people, most of whom were not professional writers. This copy inevitably declares you as the “leader” in something or espouses the ethereal “difference” you offer.
Your site contains at least one stock photo of a very happy or very serious person, whom your designer thinks your visitors will admire.
Your site avoids the words “you” or “your,” but talks incessantly about what your company and products do. This feature culminates in the ever-popular “News” section of the home page with more information about you.
You get your sales leads from anyplace but the web and you have no need to change this.
Don’t be fooled by my snootiness. The Brochure pattern is an important pattern for many businesses. Just because everyone uses the web doesn’t mean that every business should be trying to generate leads and sales there.
The Brochure site has only to make the visitor feel comfortable sharing the site with their boss and with others who are a part of the any purchase decision. No controversy should ever enter into a brochure site. It has to look good. It has to present benefits and features. It has to provide contact information. That’s about it.
The primary goal of the brochure site is to make sure the prospect can find you when they are ready to make a decision. A “conversion” is a phone call or an email.
The three “must get right” conversion strategies for a Brochure business are:
The design must be what the visitors want to see. Your design must be professional for people who ware suits to work. It must be fun for creative businesses. It must look unprofessional if you sell hand-crafted products. It must be exciting for adventure-oriented businesses. This is why you call the designer first.
It should feature logical tree-like navigation. Since your visitors aren’t really trying to solve a pressing problem, and since they really don’t care that much about what they’re reading, you should organize the content in as logical a manner as possible, so you don’t look sloppy. Those irritating menus that “fly-out” when your cursor accidentally rolls over them are also fine on a brochure site.
The contact information must be easy to find. The primary role of a brochure site is to support a sale after the salesperson has been contacted. Think of it as a “leave behind.” Put your phone number on each page and have a simple, clear “Contact Us” page.
The Brochure site is the primary pattern found among business web sites. This is unfortunate, because too many businesses put up brochure sites when they really are counting on the web for sales leads. The result is a site that isn’t a good brochure site, and isn’t a good lead-generation site either.
For example, marketers will optimize their brochure site for search, but see little positive effect because a brochure site is a terrible tool for cold visitors. What these marketers want is a site built on the considered purchase pattern, which we will discuss in part four of this series.
Brochure sites are efficient. Marketers only need to update them when their product lines change, when new news is published, or when they get a new VP of Marketing, who will inevitably want to refresh the site to show how quickly they’re making progress.
The four remaining web site patterns
I’ll next venture into the Portal pattern, a site in which the content takes center stage, and then explore the key conversion strategies for the eCommerce Pattern, the Considered Purchase Pattern and the Site as a Service Pattern. Read on in The Portal Pattern: Core Conversion Marketing Strategies.
I’ll be posting to the Conversion Science column every four weeks, so you should subscribe to the Conversion Science email.
Many of you are going to be surprised at which pattern you end up choosing for your business.
Summarizing
The first pattern is “The Brochure.” Most of the business sites on the Web are like an online brochure. But “The Brochure” is not designed to convert. It’s purpose is to support sales, often after the visitor has already spoken with a salesperson.
If you have a brochure site, you may discover that you really need a site based on one of the other four patterns: a Portal, an eCommerce site, a Considered Purchase site, or a Site as a Service.
Over the next four months, I’ll be digging into each, helping you choose the right pattern for your business, and highlighting the conversion strategies that you must get right for each.
The next installment is coming next week. I’ll send you an email when each of these go live if you subscribe to The Conversion Optimization Blog.
You don’t have to be a copywriter to know crappy copy when you see it. Use these 10 ways to find out if your copy converts visitors into customers. Know bad copy when you see it. Read on.
Does your copy convert visitors to customers? If you read this article and then go out and read your landing page or website copy, odds are very good that you will be embarrassed. Don’t be. It is not a helpful response. The proper response is to change the copy on your site. It works. You can completely revamp your website and increase conversions without changing one pixel of the design.
Please, for all of our sakes, change the copy.
Knowing bad copy when you see it will keep you from writing more of the same boring Styrofoam flavored copy. Here are 10 ways to know that your copy is going to convert visitors to buyers and one bonus tip.
Does your Copy Convert Visitors to Customers? Use these 10 ways to find out. Know bad copy when you see it
1. Does your Copy Convert Visitors to Customers? Does it Speak Specifically to Someone?
If you can’t tell who the copy was written for by simply reading it, you are in trouble. Who are your customers? What happened in their lives that made them come to your site at this particular time? Profile your visitors, understand their motivations, and write to their issues. Personas help.
2. Copy that Converts is Written Naturally
Do people talk like your copy is written? Does it convey meaning with the kinds of metaphors, euphemisms and engaging omissions that are used in speech? Or are the words straining to persuade the reader, attempting to touch on every point necessary to make the reader buy?
3. The Copy on the Page Matches the Offers in your Ads
Your visitors didn’t get to your site by magic. They got there from one of your ads, from a search engine or from a referral. Does the copy on your home pages and landing pages pick up where your ads started? Does your “Title” and “Meta Description,” which the search engines display on their results page match the copy on the page itself? If not, you are breaking what the Eisenberg brothers call the “Scent Trail.”
At each step of their journey to and through your site, there should be something familiar, something related to the previous step. Nothing provides scent better than headings and copy that draws on a common thing. Images and color are also affective, but that’s another article.
One of the most expensive mistakes is made in pay-per-click (PPC) or Google Ads advertising on search engines. If you offer a discount in your PPC ad, the page they come to or landing page should have the discount clearly visible. Too often, great offers in ads are defeated when the visitor is taken to your homepage, on which the specific discount cannot be found.
Yes, to do this effectively means that each ad should have its own landing page on your site.
4. It gives the Reader Information They Can Use
Is the copy persuading or being helpful? It’s not about who you are and what you do. How can your visitors solve their problems with your offering? Do you present a good value proposition?
When I visit your site, does your copy answer any of the following questions for me:
How does it work?
How will I use it?
Which features should I care about?
What should I be cautious about?
When does it make sense to try something different?
How do I justify the cost?
How do I sell this internally?
These are just examples, but you need to understand that they are fundamentally different from telling the reader that you will give them “unparalleled visibility, divisional support and alignment.”
5. An Experienced Copywriter Wrote It
Don’t look at copy as filler on your page. In the hands of an experienced professional, your copy will increase the effectiveness of your website and this will translate into more leads and more sales. Unlike design, though, we can all create copy. And unfortunately we do.
As I have said before, treat copywriters like designers. Get two or three “sketches” of the copy. Choose one. Correct the errors. Leave the rest alone.
6. Copy that Converts Visitors to Customers is Efficient
Long copy is OK. Rambling copy is not. Use efficient copy of any length to engage your reader.
Amy Lemen recommends using copy indexing formulas to help you measure the efficiency of your copy.
7. Your Analytics Tell You It’s Working
Google Analytics is free, easy to add, and relatively easy to learn. Use it or use something else. Then ask someone to show you how to check the following. If copy changes don’t make these better, try again. The company that knows grows.
Bounce Rates: How many people leave immediately when they come to my pages? You want this to be low, at or below 30% usually.
Site-wide Conversion Rate: How many people visit the site? How many people take action by completing a form or buying something. When you divide the latter by the former, you get your site-wide conversion rate. You want it to be higher over time.
Exit Percentage: Which pages most often cause people to leave the site? These pages are either solving their problems completely or turning them off. Take a look at them. Try to get the exit percentage down.
Page Conversion Rate: For those pages that really count, the pages where people buy, find out how many people took action and divide that by how many people visited. This is your conversion rate for this page. You want it to be higher over time.
Online sales: How much stuff are you selling online?
8. You had a Person Edit it, not a Committee
Having a whole website go through a committee is a bad idea. Just because your marketing manager developed the product messaging doesn’t mean she should write or edit the copy. The product manager should only look for errors, not rewrite. The CEO needs to know the end result.
9. There Are Links Throughout the Copy
When someone reads your text, they are engaged. In fact, they are probably less likely to see supporting information in the left or right columns of the standard webpage. Use links within paragraphs to get readers into the site. Don’t over-do it, however. Too many links or links that encompass lots of text will make the paragraph difficult to read.
This is great for SEO, too. It provides an internal linking structure that helps search engines understand what the site is about. Your copywriter should be using important keywords for these links.
10. Get Someone from Outside the Company to Participate
Internal writers are often too close to the material. Consider a copywriter from outside the company. This also requires that you go through the process of communicating what your company does.
You’ll be surprised at how difficult this will be, even with a sophisticated copywriter.
This process should help you refine your messaging, and maybe delay updates until you’ve got a coherent story that the average human will understand.
Bonus: Does your Copy Convert Visitors to Customers? Test Your Headlines
Your heading are critical to scanning readers. Try different headings, font sizes and colors. Be patient. Watch your analytics for benefits that last.
Litmus Test
Do you enjoy reviewing the copy for your website? Do you feel pride when you read it? Is it something you’d consider adding to your portfolio should you find yourself looking for work? If not, imagine what your visitors think. “Good enough” just doesn’t convert as well.
If you can’t write like these guys, please let someone else do it.
Executives love their sites to have flash headers. It looks cool. It looks like marketing is doing something. The problem is, a flash header can hurt engagement and conversion more than it helps.
The Triple Threat of Flash Headers
Flash banners are usually no more than cool images with “poser” slogans riding on top of them. They tend to focus on what’s good about the company and very little on solving the visitors’ problems.
Flash does draw the eye, and will be looked at by visitors. But, if the meat of your message is in the body of the page, this actually draws the reader away from the important stuff.
Tall flash banners also push your body content down, obscuring much of it below the fold.
This is the triple threat: irrelevance, distraction and obfuscation.
Proper Use of Flash
Flash is a great tool for communicating your message in seconds. It will appeal to short-attention-span visitors such as your Spontaneous and Competitive visitors. Images can reinforce brands quickly.
If you’re going to use flash on a page, it basically has to do the work of the whole page. This means you need to spend considerable time making sure that it will:
Explain your value to the visitor efficiently and completely
Provide a way to take action
Support the brand image that the rest of the site presents
Flash that Works
I’ve seen few flash headers that do this well. The Tumri home page is an exception. The motion in the flash presentation draws the eye. With just a few moments of watching, you get how their offering works at a high level. To the right of the “action” is a button enticing you to “Learn More.” This is a weak call to action, but at least it’s there. The flash presentation is tasteful and probably highlights products sold by Tumri’s target customers.
Tumri Flash Header.
Yes, their flash header pushes down the content, but there’s not much there of value to visitors below, just brochure copy, self-promoting icons and news about the company. In short, if it wasn’t for the flash header, this page would be an engagement disaster.
It takes time to use Flash as the super-communicating tool it can be. Don’t use it for “effect” or “image building.” When you do, you unleash the triple threat that will make Flash work against you.
If you are building a site as a service website, you have some important advantages when converting visitors to subscribers.
ConversionCast: Spinscape.com Site as a Service
Editor’s Note: While Spinscape is no longer in business, there is something to be learned from my critique of the site.
In this ConversionCast™ we review the conversion strategy for online application Spinscape.com. I am a big fan of mind-mapping software.
The Site as a Service Pattern
This site follows the Site as a Service Web pattern. You can identify your Web pattern by listening to my presentation at Innotech.
The key strategies for a SaaS pattern are:
Trial or Demo and a Home Page that encourages the trial
Effective signup Process
E-mail notifications that encourage use and subscription
Yes, there are more things you could do to increase conversion, but if you don’t get these right, the rest is not going to help much.
If you can delivery what you offer online, you have some marked advantages over other patterns.
You can move a visitor quickly through the conversion funnel, from awareness to action.
You can use a trial or demo to begin a relationship with your visitors
You can find new reasons to email your subscribers using notifications and updates
Enjoy this 15 minute review.
Tell us what your Site as a Service offers in the comments below.
21 Quick and Easy CRO Copywriting Hacks
Keep these proven copywriting hacks in mind to make your copy convert.
You can connect with thousands of visitors to your site by understanding only four modes of persuasion.
Relate to Four Connect with Thousands
Communicating is connecting. If you’re communicating successfully, each of your readers will feel that you are writing directly to them.
I’m going to introduce you to a method of writing that will forge strong connections with your readers.
You will understand your readers when you understand the four “Modes of Persuasion.” Every visitor fits into one of four modes, and, as will see, each mode describes a different way of connecting. If you can master each of these modes, you can effectively draw anyone closer with your words.
Each of your visitors will come in one of four modes: Competitive, Methodical, Humanist, or Spontaneous.
COMPETITIVE visitors are looking for information that will make them better, smarter or more cutting-edge. Use benefit statements and payoffs in your headings to draw them into your content.
METHODICALS like data and details. Include specifics and proof in your writing to connect with them.
HUMANISTS want information that supports their relationships. They will relate to your writing if you share the human element in your topic.
SPONTANEOUS visitors are the least patient. They need to know what’s in it for them and may not read your entire story. Provide short headings for them to scan so that they can get to the points that are important to them.
When you understand that every visitor consumes information differently, you can build empathy with more of your readers. In time, your content will appeal to a wider audience making your Web site more enjoyable and accessible.
You can learn more about these four Modes of Persuasion in the book Waiting for Your Cat to Bark? by Bryan and Jeffrey Eisenberg.
21 Quick and Easy CRO Copywriting Hacks
Keep these proven copywriting hacks in mind to make your copy convert.
We’re starting something new here at Conversion Sciences: The ConversionCast.
A ConversionCast is a detailed analysis of a page based on two primary scales: The four Modes of Persuasion and visitors’ position in the Sales Process.
These two issues are key to making your Web site convert. You should understand that everyone comes to your site in a certain mode, which the Eisenbergs name Methodical, Competitive, Spontaneous or Humanistic. These modes are based on research on Myers-Briggs personality types and Jungian archetypes.
You must also realize that visitors to your site are at different stages of the buying process: Awareness, Consideration or Action.
Watch These Two Five-minute Examples
In ten minutes you should begin to understand how to look at your Web site, and how to improve your conversion results.
NOTE: These turned out a little big, but consider these the HD versions. Please comment with your thoughts and ideas.
We may request cookies to be set on your device. We use cookies to let us know when you visit our websites, how you interact with us, to enrich your user experience, and to customize your relationship with our website.
Click on the different category headings to find out more. You can also change some of your preferences. Note that blocking some types of cookies may impact your experience on our websites and the services we are able to offer.
Essential Website Cookies
These cookies are strictly necessary to provide you with services available through our website and to use some of its features.
Because these cookies are strictly necessary to deliver the website, refusing them will have impact how our site functions. You always can block or delete cookies by changing your browser settings and force blocking all cookies on this website. But this will always prompt you to accept/refuse cookies when revisiting our site.
We fully respect if you want to refuse cookies but to avoid asking you again and again kindly allow us to store a cookie for that. You are free to opt out any time or opt in for other cookies to get a better experience. If you refuse cookies we will remove all set cookies in our domain.
We provide you with a list of stored cookies on your computer in our domain so you can check what we stored. Due to security reasons we are not able to show or modify cookies from other domains. You can check these in your browser security settings.
Other external services
We also use different external services like Google Webfonts, Google Maps, and external Video providers. Since these providers may collect personal data like your IP address we allow you to block them here. Please be aware that this might heavily reduce the functionality and appearance of our site. Changes will take effect once you reload the page.
Google Webfont Settings:
Google Map Settings:
Google reCaptcha Settings:
Vimeo and Youtube video embeds:
Privacy Policy
You can read about our cookies and privacy settings in detail on our Privacy Policy Page.
