Writing for the Web

The fastest way to master the craft of writing for the web is to create and write your own website.

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My money making website about coffeeIt’s hard to track all the different ways in which I have built up my knowledge and expertise in writing for the web.

I guess it started when I wrote and published my first website back in 1996.

When I began writing for the web full time in 1998, I was soaking up new knowledge from all kinds of different sources. I would read articles, buy books and listen carefully to fellow presenters at industry conferences.

And, of course, I learned a great deal from every new client project I took on.

But nothing compares, or even comes close to the knowledge I have gained from writing and publishing my own hobby website, CoffeeDetective.com.

Yes, it’s a hobby. I work on the site just in the evening and at weekends. Sometimes.

And before I get into the part about learning, let me just mention that the site has also become a significant source of income for me and my family. Since I began writing it in 2007, this hobby-site has earned me over $200,000 in passive income.

Now let’s look at how my coffee site has helped me learn so much about writing for the web.

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The 3rd element that’s missing from your online sales page.

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Online copy structureAn increase of just one or two percent in the conversation rate on a product sales page can translate into a lot of extra cash in a company’s bank account.

So how can you set about adding those extra percentage points?

First, you have to catch your client’s attention – or your boss’s attention if you work in-house – and persuade him or her that it’s worth investing the time in a rewrite or edit.

Next, you have to pay attention to the 3 elements that will contribute the most to a page that converts better. The third of these is, I think, the hardest and the least understood. But the first two are essential too. So let’s go through them one by one.

The 1st Element: Get the structure right

Any successful sales process has a structure. This is true whether you are selling face-to-face or writing a sales letter or an online sales page. Some people might argue about this, and say that you should just hang loose and sell as if you weren’t selling at all. But they are wrong. They are mistaking lack of apparent structure for the lack of an underlying structure.

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It turns out I have been a Growth Hacker since 1979.

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growth hacking

First, what is “growth hacking”?

Growth hacking is a term and practice beloved of Silicon Valley startups. It’s anti-traditional marketing. Some of its advocates go so far as to suggest that marketing ideas should come from the engineers, and not from anyone trained in marketing.

There are numerous definitions out there, but for the sake of brevity, here is how John Elman describes growth hacking, “This concept of “growth hacking” is a recognition that when you focus on understanding your users and how they discover and adopt your products, you can build features that help you acquire and retain more users, rather than just spending marketing dollars.”

Wanting to learn more, I have just finished reading an excellent book by Ryan Holiday, Growth Hacker Marketing: A Primer on the Future of PR, Marketing, and Advertising.

It’s a reasonably short book, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. In large part because I am a fan of any smart thinker who beats up on the old school of marketers. Those are the marketers who believe they can succeed by throwing bucket loads of money at campaigns designed to persuade people to buy stuff they probably don’t want anyway.

You should read it. It’s a smart book.

However…

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Don’t send your readers to sleep with pigeonhole copywriting.

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piI’m going to begin by giving you an illustration of what this post is all about.

Here are two ways in which a company might communicate the availability of its customer service agents.

Example #1: We are available to take your call between 8:00AM and 6:00PM.

Example #2: We’ll leap at the chance to take your call between 8:00AM and 6:00PM.

If I were to give you a brain scan while you read those two lines – and if I knew the first thing about brain scans, which I don’t – I might see zero brain activity while you read the first example, and a sudden spark of activity while you read the second.

How come? Because the language in the first example is so familiar, so expected and so simple, you really don’t need to think at all. Your mind recognizes the vocabulary, and sees that it’s all put together in a way you have seen and comprehended a hundred times before. No cognitive activity is required.

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Give your online copy the face-to-face test.

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Read your online copy face to faceWhat do I mean by the face-to-face test? It’s simple.

When you have finished writing a draft of your copy, ask yourself if you would feel comfortable reading it out loud to one of your readers, face to face.

In fact, imagine someone from the audience you are writing to is sitting at your kitchen table, and you are reading your copy to him or her.

I suggest you get as close to this being real as you can. If you can get a family member or friend to sit across the table from you, so much the better. Look them in the eye and then start reading. Or hook up with someone through video on Skype. If there is nobody around to take on the role of your audience, find yourself a mirror and read your copy to yourself.

Completing this face-to-face test can improve your copy in three important ways.

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One simple question that can increase all your online writing fees.

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freelance client questionsAs freelancers we often take on a project from a client and then write that web page in isolation.

But that’s not a very smart thing to do.

Whether you are writing a product category page or a blog post – or anything else – your work is part of a broader strategy.

If you write a product category page, that page will be linked to from other places, and it will have outbound links to other pages too. It will take its place at a particular point within a sales funnel.

If you write a blog post, that post will be part of a content publication plan that is aligned with your client’s marketing plan and calendar.

In other words, whatever you write for a client, it fits into a broader picture.

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