With marketing budgets tight, the responsibility for copywriting and creating content for your website, social media and email campaigns has moved back in-house.
But what are today’s browsers, readers, and visitors looking for when they read your content? How can you boost your campaigns and increase engagement? What improves conversions, and what turn’s them off?
Tiffany Lewis from SmartBlogger has some great suggestions based on the latest trends:
Website copywriting
Research shows that most visitors to your site will skim read your content and spend just 37 seconds on average on an article.
Copy should be:
- Scannable
- Listicles – one list for every 500 words
- How-to articles
- Bulleted guides
- Personalized
- Add the word “because” with a reason to your Call To Action (CTA)
- Provide what you promised in the headline
- Headlines should have 10-13 words
- Believable
- Exhibit social proof with testimonials
Social media copywriting
When planning your social media content, remember that 99 per cent of your audience are accessing it via their mobile phone. In addition, users spend a staggering two hours and 22 minutes on social media platforms every day.
Successful social media content tends to follow these rules:
- 11-word headlines receive the most shares on Facebook and Twitter
- Facebook posts with under 50 characters receive the highest engagement
- Hashtags increase Twitter engagement by nearly 50 per cent for brands
- Speak your fans and follower’s language
- Develop a unique voice
- Be positive in your content
- Keep it short and simple
- Use supporting images and video
- Use emojis to illustrate a point
Remember, social media content isn’t just about text and an image or a link back to your website. Consider:
- Videos and video stories
- Live video
- Infographics
- Testimonials and reviews
- Announcements
- Contests
Email copywriting
In previous articles, we have discussed how to get through the various email filters. And we’ve discussed the issues emailers face with Apple’s plans for email delivery.
However, there are 4.1 billion email users worldwide, and over 319 billion emails are sent and received each day. In addition, around 40 per cent are opened on a mobile device. So how can you improve your email success?
- Newsletters remain one of the most popular B2C formats.
- Personalized subject lines book open rates by 10-14 per cent
- Nearly 50 per cent of people will view an email as spam based on the subject line
- People will unsubscribe if they receive too many emails
- Fridays are the best days to email for high conversions
What to remember when writing copy for your email campaigns:
- Tailor the content to your audience – write for who is reading your email
- Use clear language to get your point across
- Use trigger words to grab attention (subject + verb + clause)
- Align your subject line with your body content
- Write in the second person
- Understand the purpose of your email
- Be brief
Video scriptwriting
All marketers understand the power of video. Research shows that:
- 53 per cent of people watch two or more instructional videos weekly
- 52 per cent prefer content that is between three and six minutes long
- Of highly rated videos, 92 per cent are under 20 minutes long
- The title and description are the most cited reasons for watching
- 85 per cent of people hope to see more video content from brands this year
So how can you improve your scripts?
- A two-minute script will have about 260-300 words
- Explain why they should watch your video in one sentence
- Plan out your visual and audio elements
- Speak directly to your audience
- Write the way you would say it
- Read your script out loud
- If you’re still unsure, use a template
For more advice on video script development and video creation, contact our Supplier Network Partners, A-V-A, who will assist you further.
Back to basics
If copywriting and content production has been added to your remit, don’t panic. There are some key things to remember:
- Proofread your copy to check it makes sense
- Read through it yourself
- Then ask a colleague to read it
- Reading aloud can help
- Check your spelling and grammar
- Poor spelling and grammar can negatively impact your brand’s credibility
- Reduces the time spent on landing pages and increases the bounce rate
- Sign up for a Grammarly account (free or pro)
- Consider your page layout, so you give the best first impression
- 93 per cent of visitors have left a site if it displays poorly on their mobile
- 90 per cent of visitors leave a site due to poor design
- While Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is best left to a professional in this field, make sure you are aware of some SEO tactics.
- Make some simple changes to increase the click-through rate (CTR):
- Change “Start your free trial” to “Start my free trial.”
- Change “Request a quote” to “Request pricing.”
- If you’re unsure, then test your copy, as this will highlight variables that could make a significant improvement.
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