7 Sins of Website Copywriting That Send Prospects Fleeing

Credit: Jeancliclac on Photodune

Let’s look at seven major blunders that appear on the freelancer’s sites on a regular basis.

Remember: your website is your virtual salesperson. The design is the way that salesperson is dressed. It makes the first impression. But the copy are the words coming out of that salesperson’s mouth: that’s what will make or break the sale.

When a prospect is looking at your site, they have a question in their mind: “Do I want to hire this person?” Your copy’s job is to make sure the answer is “Yes!” as often as possible.

1. Making it All About You

Repeat after me: “My prospects don’t care about me. They care about the results I can deliver for them.”

One of the biggest mistakes you can make on your website is to put the focus on yourself and not the prospect. Even when you’re in a business to business role, all the normal copywriting rules built around self-centered psychology still apply.

In other words, your prospect cares about herself, and she wants to see that reflected in your copy. Read through your website copy for a moment – do you find it mentions “we” and “I” a lot? Think about how you could restructure it to include more of the words “you” and “your” – referring to the prospective client. That’s what she wants to see – she wants to know what you can do for her.

2. Typos

Watch out, copywriting mistakes can loose you potential clients and effect your reputation.

As a website copywriter, I quite often notice mistakes (like the ones linked to above) in the websites of other freelancers. The good news is these simple mistakes are often darn easy to fix.

Not much needs to be said on this point. Typos are the fastest way to kill your credibility and lose what might have otherwise been an easy sale. Spell check, scan your work, then read it out loud. That three-step process should ensure no typos slip through.

3. Jargon

I’m going to let you in on a little trade secret here.

The people reading your copy are individual human beings. They aren’t robots. You’re not selling to the Terminator.

No matter what station in life they’ve achieved and level of education they’ve obtained, they will respond to compelling, simple and direct copywriting. That is universal.

Using a ton of jargon in your copy only achieves two things. In some cases, it alienates those who don’t know what you’re talking about. In other cases, it makes you look like you’re trying too hard to impress.

Write in a tone and style appropriate for your target audience – yes. But don’t write your selling copy as if it’s an industry tech manual. You’ll scare prospects away.

4. Features Over Benefits

The benefits versus features equation is one of the basic cornerstones of copywriting. You might have come across it before, but if not, here it is in a nut shell:

Prospects care more about benefits (the end result of using your product or service) than they care about any given feature of the product or service itself.

Your copy should be focused on results. The fact that you have 12 years of experience as a logo designer is a feature. The fact that your extensive experience working on a wide range of projects over 12 years ensures you can produce world class logos that customers will remember and trust is a benefit. In this case, your client wants a logo that will make people “remember and trust” her business. So tell her you can deliver that. Never assume she’ll extrapolate the benefits on her own if you just tell her the features or what you sell.

5. Vagueness

Being vague is another big killer of credibility. I see a lot of copy like this:

“I’m the Best Copywriter in the World”

That’s great – but so are the next ten wannabes. The simple fact is: if you’re not being specific, you’re not giving the prospect a reason to believe you, and you’re not differentiating yourself from the competition in any way. Now compare this:

“Ready to Boost Your Conversion Rate By 56%?”

The number is specific – it gives the reader something to latch onto. I would then go on to tell how I achieved such a conversion rate for a client in the body copy. Of course, it’s important that the specifics you use in your copy are actually true and backed up by proof – otherwise this will backfire as a credibility builder. But start employing statistics and facts in your copy – ones that are relevant to what your prospect cares about most: results.

6. Addressing the Wrong Audience

Your copy is read by one person at a time.

Think about that for a second. You’re not addressing “you guys.” You’re addressing “you,” the lone reader.

On top of that, only a slim subset of the people who read your copy are going to fit into the demographic of your ideal buyer.

Write to that person, and ignore everyone else. Don’t ever try to write a sales letter that is supposed to appeal to three different markets. A tight focus is a key to successful copy. Make up your mind about who your ideal customer is, and then write to that person as if you were writing a personal letter to a friend.

7. Emotional Distance from the Reader

Many freelancers have a slightly warped concept of what it means to sell themselves. For that reason, their copy remains stand-offish from the client. There’s no indication that the freelancer really understands what the prospect is looking for. The ironic thing is that the freelancer usually does know exactly what the client is looking for, but their ‘sales fear’ prevents them from expressing that in a natural way.

Stop trying to sell and just connect. If you’ve been doing what you do for any length of time, you know exactly what your clients need. If you’re still relatively new, talk to your clients until you can get into their heads. The best copy expresses the wants and needs of the ideal customer in their own terms, and then provides the solution: your business.

Photo credit: Some rights reserved by Jeancliclac.