The Importance of First-rate Marketing Copy

Biggest Marketing Mistake Made by Small Businesses

When solo practitioners and small business owners decide to step up their marketing efforts or to market their business for the first time, they often hire a graphic artist to design their marketing material. If you don’t possess high-level graphic design skills, you probably won’t hesitate to hire a qualified designer. They are the ones who put together brochures and web sites, right?

You understand the necessity of paying for a high-quality visual impression and when presented with design options, you know almost instantly:

• if you like the design
• if it is at the level of quality you had expected
• and if it accurately represents your company’s brand

If the design meets these criteria you are satisfied. Who can argue with that? It’s certainly wise to have a “look” or brand that is visually striking and portrays your company accurately.

The mistake that many business people make, however, is that their use of outside professional help ends there. The written marketing message is composed in-house and incorporated into the expertly created design. Since your business probably does not have a “Marketing Department,” you compose the web site, brochure or ad copy yourself. Why not? Who knows your business better then you do? Logically, it makes sense.

But nine times out of ten the owner of a small business is not a marketing expert. While you may have excellent writing skills, and know your company inside and out, unless you are a trained marketer, it’s unlikely you possess the skill to create compelling copy that effectively sells your product or service.

So, you’ve written the content for your brochure or web site. It sounds good to you. Your friends and colleagues give you high praise for your new site or your updated brochure. They love the look and the logo and the way you’ve featured your products or the images you’ve used. But only you know if this highly praised marketing material is doing its job of increasing your sales volume. If it’s not doing its job, then either you have an undesirable product or your material lacks the essential elements of successful marketing.

Just as you wouldn’t ask your colleagues for advice about the effectiveness of a medication (unless they are a doctor), they aren’t the appropriate source for feedback about your marketing material either.

While the visual design has the important role of offering an appealing presentation, creating your desired first impression, helping the eye to navigate the page, and creating a sense of trust…it’s the written content and how it is presented that actually sells your product.

Additionally, it is important to understand that while your copy may be well crafted grammatically and even have an appealing flair…that does not guarantee its effectiveness.

Great writing and great marketing copy are not one in the same!

Unfortunately, many small business owners do not understand the necessity of professionally crafted copy and are therefore unwilling to hire a skilled copywriter.

This is the biggest blind spot of small business owners!

Perhaps this has happened to you already.

Have you spent significant time and money creating a new image for your company? Launched a new or re-designed website and logo? With a gorgeous color scheme, an edgy design, a splashy image…but no increase in sales?

Are you baffled because your re-branding and stunning new design has not resulted in new clients, more students, higher sales, new subscribers, increased membership…or just plain inquires?

I have seen this phenomenon time and time again – A web site or brochure with top-notch graphics and lackluster content – or content that is “good” but not organized effectively or presented with a compelling angle that engages the interest of prospects. You may have a fantastic visual foundation that is not supported by copy that persuades your potential customer to take the action you had hoped for.

Sometimes the issue is lack of copy. I can’t tell you how many business cards I’ve seen with a striking design, but that don’t tell me a thing about what the company offers. How will I know if I want to buy your product or service if I don’t know what you do? You might tell me when you hand me your card, but a week later when I find it on my desk, I guarantee that I won’t remember why I should contact you. And no matter how eye-catching the design, I’m not going to take the time to go to your website to find out.

Some web sites have the same problem. You arrive on the home page, perhaps by accident through another site, and if you bother to stay, it takes you 20 minutes to figure out what the company does. And even then, the copy can be so esoteric that anyone unfamiliar with Intergalactic Widgets would not have any idea how they might be used or why they should buy them.

In summary, the biggest mistake that small businesses make is not hiring a professional copywriter or marketing expert as part of their marketing team. This results in missing knowledge about how to present the proper angle with the nuances of compelling copy – the subtle elements that specifically draw and engage a prospective customer to read further, scroll down, browse longer, click through, download, send an email, pick up the phone, or place an order.

A lovely in-depth description of your business will not necessarily get your prospect to take any of these actions.

Find out what will –
Contact me for your Free Marketing Consultation

A copywriting makeover can engage your prospects and convince them to take the next step toward doing business with you.

Bonus:
A special word here about Web Sites, since they are now used by almost all businesses. In addition to great copy, a successful web site requires a complexity of marketing elements and techniques that fully utilize its expansive and interactive format.

Does your web site have both sales-inducing content, and a structure that captivates and guides your prospects through the sales process?

If not, don’t fret.
Just download my FREE crash course in web site marketing:

Seven Things Your Website Must Accomplish