Are You Talking to Me?
Everything changed once I learned this key lesson in copywriting:
Write as if you’re speaking to one specific person.
The common mistake most people make when they’re new to writing marketing copy is they write as if they’re standing on stage speaking to a large audience. Yes, your site will be seen by many people, many of which might be on your site at the same time. No wonder it feels as if you’re speaking to a crowd of people. Technically, you are!
But here’s the thing: The people in your audience don’t see it the same way. To them, they are not one person sitting among a crowd of people, listening to you give a presentation to everyone. In their eyes, it’s just you and them. They feel as if you’re engaged in a one-on-one conversation, speaking directly to them.
This is their natural perception. So if you’re not speaking directly to them, then they feel as though they are a spectator, listening in on your “speech” given to other people. But if you embrace their perception that it’s just you and them, then you can speak (write) directly to them, making your message renonate on a much more personal level.
Here’s a quick example:
Speaking to “everyone” (bad):
It’s a to-do list app for project managers.
Speaking to one person (better):
It’s a tool to help you manage your project to-do lists.
Notice how the first example feels like it speaks to a room full of developers, making you feel like you’re an outsider looking on. But the second version speaks to You, and comes across with much more impact (if you’re a project manager).
Now let’s take this a step further. You know you need to speak directly to one person. But how do you know who that person is? This is where creating a customer persona becomes critically important.
A customer persona is a detailed description of your target customer. It should describe everything about them: Their age, gender, occupation, what they value, what they do for fun, etc. Try and paint a complete picture of who this person is, even going so far as to give them a name and choose a photo to represent them. It might even be easier to think of an actual person you know in real life, who fits the profile of your target customer.
You want to choose your primary target customer. Your product might be a good fit for a variety of people representing different personas or variations on one persona. That’s ok. By choosing one primary customer to build a persona around — the person who experiences the pain point that your product solves more-so than anyone else — and speaking directly to that person, your copy will be that much more resonate. It will have a greater impact for everyone, than if you water it down so that it covers all the variations.
Writing to one person isn’t just effective when writing the copy for your website. It’s also a great rule of thumb when writing emails that you send to your list.
I’m much more likely to open, read, and engage with an email that speaks directly to me, as if it’s a one-on-one conversation between the sender and me. Sure, I understand it’s an email blast sent to many people. And yes I know that when the email starts with “Hi Brian”, it’s actually a computer that inserted my name there. The sender didn’t hand-write every person’s email. But the tone and message of the email, intended to speak to me (not everyone) is what resonates and keeps me engaged.
Next time you’re writing the copy for your product’s marketing site, or you’re preparing your next email newsletter, remember: Pick one person and speak directly to them.
Interested in going deep into stuff like this — Ya know, ideas to help you craft a better marketing site for your product — Then you’ll want to sign up to receive a free chapter of my upcoming book, Design For Conversions.