“Copywriting is not a creative endeavor.”
Joanna Wiebe, Copyhackers.
For a few years, I spent a little more than half hour of my time watching Tutorial Tuesdays live.
This was provided by Copyhackers.
I learned a ton.
One thing I learned is that conversion copywriting is a totally different skill.
Copywriting is NOT an art.
Sorry, let me rephrase: Effective copywriting is not an art.
Joanna Wiebe, Copyhackers
You will often hear copywriters say they are wordsmiths, and further, clients will use these words in their testimonials.
But Joanna Wiebe taught me to point to conversion rates. This isn’t easy to accept because numbers determine your success once you begin doing that.
I often find that clients just want “some words” for their websites. They don’t seem to be interested in if it makes money for them.
There is a reason that conversion copywriting rates are much higher. For one, there is a greater sense of risk. You are writing words and pointing to conversions to show its effectiveness.
During those Tutorial Tuesdays, I learned about things I had never heard about before. One such thing is what Joanna would call “crossheads.”
What the heck, you say? Read more.
Voice of Customer Research is your friend
Another thing I learned about was Voice of Customer (VoC) Research.
Frankly, VoC blew my mind.
VoC is your secret weapon to higher conversion copywriting.
The formal definition from Peep Laja is:
“Voice-of-customer (VOC) research is the process of discovering the wants and needs of customers through qualitative and quantitative research.”
CXL
My friend Anna writes this really thorough article about VoC and there she says,
“We do this work (VoC research) because copywriting that converts is relevant, compelling and persuasive to the very specific humans you need to persuade.”
Anna Bolton
Now, why am I going to the trouble to talk about this VoC stuff?
First, I admit, there is one thing I left out of the Website Copy Framework (WCF). That is VoC research.
I did this on purpose. I have a few reasons why, but mostly I am not an expert. The other reason is that most clients are using the WCF to write their website for the first (or second) time.
Most of the time, they (and you) are trying to get a website launched.
However, I wanted to do one thing when I started doing training for the Website Copy Framework, bring in experts to supplement what is provided.
Last month we had Beth Livingston who gave us some fantastic tips for project management.
This month, I have managed to sweet talk Hannah Shamji into giving us some tips about customer research.
This will not be a complete training, but she will give us some great tips that we can implement quickly to learn more about our customers.
I first saw Hannah on one of those Tutorial Tuesdays, where she gave a presentation on customer interviews.
She has a degree in counseling and spent time as the Lead Researcher at Copyhackers.
I hope you will join us Friday, October 23, at 10 am CDT (Chicago) as she presents information on customer insight research.
Wrapping it up
If you want to better learn how to interview your customers and gain insight into your marketing message, you should join us for Office Hours.
Hannah is an expert.
She will give us some tips we can use quickly.
