Stop Making These 5 Website Copy Mistakes
You’ve seen them — a bunch of bold headings with the latest trending “healthy” buzzwords (organic, grass-fed, all-natural artisanal, self-care, bulletproof, biohacking & anti-aging) in an eye-catching ad on socials.
Or perhaps it’s followed by a pile of text on a dedicated sales page with the latest trending marketing words, like innovative, cutting edge, state-of-the-art, revolutionary, exclusive, results & success.
Just to name a few… yet, you literally have NO idea what it’s trying to advertise or sell!
When it comes to your web copy, a visitor should be able to answer THESE questions fairly quickly:
- WHO are you? (no need to give your full bio on the homepage though!)
- WHO are your offerings for? (your target audience or ideal client; do they feel like you’re speaking to them?)
- WHAT do you offer? (what are your solutions to your audience’s problems, struggles & pain points?)
- WHAT will the reader/visitor get out of it? (how will they feel when they work with you and/or buy your stuff? i.e. what’s in it for them?)
*Notice all the ‘feeling’ stuff… this will be of the utmost importance later. Keep skimmin’!
If your reader or website visitor can’t easily IDENTIFY THOSE 4 THINGS (and you’re noticing readers are quickly leaving or “bouncing” from your site), you need to re-evaluate how you’re communicating to them through your written words.
Copywriting is the process of writing copy or text used for marketing purposes. To be more specific, it’s the words you use to win over your people AND promote/sell your services, programs & products through advertising and marketing.
But, effective copywriting is kind of like learning your tween’s new lingo that they seem to connect with other tweens on another level because of it.
It’s basically what separates the effective marketing campaigns from the not-so-effective ones… like the ones I described at the beginning. *Le sigh*
If you’re keen to DIY your web copy – DON’T DO the following 5 things!
Since I’m so connected to the online wellness business space, I can readily identify the 5 (er, 6) MOST COMMON WEBSITE COPY MISTAKES that I watch so many health pros make when they “DIY” their own web copy.
(Which I fully encourage and support you in doing by the way… I even wrote a whole guide for you HERE.)
And you can rest assured that I’ve made them all too. Hey, human over here!
1 | Make it all about YOU.
Want to know what your readers and your target audience, who are also a pool of your ideal clients, care about the most?
Themselves… and what you can do for THEM.
They do care about you, of course, but more in the context of how you can address their pain points, help them accomplish their goals, and provide the solution to their problems.
(They are the “hero” of their own story after all.)
Keeping this in mind…
Everything you write should be framed with the underlying messaging that clearly demonstrates that you know how to meet the needs of your ideal client effectively.
The caveat to writing about yourself (because there’s also your About Me page) is doing so in such a way that it’s in the context of providing value to your potential clients while invoking emotion – basically, you want your clients to FEEL a certain way.
That should really be the whole point of your copy – and your business for that matter!
Your web copy is a direct conversation you’re having with the “consumer” of it, and this starts with knowing your target audience in great detail.
Some quick tips on how to get to know your Ideal Client better:
- First, know who YOU are – have you ever written your “elevator pitch” or your “audio logo” before? (I talk about it HERE in a guest post for Wellpreneur)
- Know your competitors – who is doing similar work in a similar field to you? i.e. who probably has a copycat audience to yours?
- Map out precisely WHO your ideal client is, i.e. if it came down to describing just ONE PERSON in great detail – who are they?
- Then find out where this ONE PERSON hangs out online, what questions do they ask, what “language” do they speak, what struggles, challenges, frustrations do they deal with (pain points), and what are their goals & priorities (what solutions do they need)?
The above process I’ve just described shouldn’t be done lightly – take some time to really map it all out. Your business will grow just in the process!
Speaking of all-about-you…
THE WELL membership IS all about you — and has ALL the sweet resources you could ever want or need to take action and finally make some progress in your health & wellness business 😉
2 | Use a loosey-goosey Call To Action (CTA)… that’s anything but actionable!
The CTA on any given page (or blog post) should always be…
- Brief and to-the-point
- Eye-catching
- Action-provoking
- Relevant to the rest of the copy
Avoid having multiple CTA’s on the same page, especially all in close proximity to one another – more is not better!
Also…
A call-to-action (CTA) that is not well-defined will cause readers to quickly leave your website because they’re confused by your vague messaging.
For example, “Get monthly tips sent to your inbox” or worse… “Sign up for my newsletter” isn’t an effective CTA as it doesn’t offer the 3 keys your ideal client must FEEL before they’re most likely to take action:
- VALUE – what are the “tips”?
- RELEVANCE – how is a tip or a newsletter going to solve my problem?
- URGENCY – what’s the rush, I can sign up any old time for a tip!
On the other hand,
“Are you sick and tired of feeling sick and tired? Grab the Ultimate Guide to Healing Your Gut – and get back to feeling more like yourself again sooner. You’ll love all of the easy but actionable tips that you can begin doing right away.”
… offers clear value, relevance to a specific need, and that it must happen now because urgent action is required!
3 | Ignore SEO.
It should go without saying that your website copy should be written FOR your people, and should speak their language. But, that doesn’t mean you should forget about showing the search engines some keyword word love.
Basically, there are 2 ways you can incorporate your keywords into your copy:
- Keep a list of your keywords handy while you write to help you find more natural places to put them OR
- Go back after you’ve written your content to find logical places to put them in
Either way, keywords should be placed where they sound like they belong, but don’t force it!
Also, consider frequency: if you cram in too many, not only does your writing go downhill, but the search engines will penalize you. However, if you don’t use enough of them, you simply won’t get found by your ideal clients.
Generally speaking, do a little research, and come up with a few key phrases and just incorporate them as best you can.
Using a plugin like Yoast for your website can make a big difference and makes implementing a simple SEO strategy, as part of your writing, a lot easier!
As my fellow writer friend, Ana Reisdorf says, “Learn about using good SEO principles — no point in writing, if no one is reading!”
So, basically, if you’re not using an SEO strategy when you write a blog, for example, then what’s the point as no one is going to find it, or you!
Keep this in mind though – you’re probably not an SEO expert (you’re a health expert dammit!), and if learning the nuances of it simply is not in your wheelhouse, don’t bother going beyond the basic keyword strategy.
I’ve found these tools to be helpful in discovering what search terms people are actually searching for! (not just what you think they are! C’mon, we’ve all done it… ass-umed.)
However, if you do really want to uplevel your SEO game, hire an expert to optimize your website, blog posts, videos, and other content:
Here’s a great episode of The Unconventional RD Podcast:
How to Skyrocket Your Website Traffic with SEO.Here are more cool writing tips from industry experts:
Business Writing Tips from 10 Nutrition Pros
4 | Not test what’s working.
It’s largely impossible to predict how your target audience or ideal client is going to react to what you’ve written – there are just so many factors involved.
That’s why testing out the measurable parts of your writing is the key to honing in on your soon-to-be mad copywriting skills!
FYI – “measurables” are things that you’re able to get feedback on through your analytics, whether that’s a plugin on your website, Google Analytics, or from your email marketing platform.
For example, A/B split testing of email subject lines — I do this with every single email I send out to my community!
5 | Do NOT hit ‘publish’ before proofreading
This has got to be one of my biggest pet peeves of all — finding a glaring error in an otherwise great piece of content!
Never, ever, ever hit that ‘publish’ button without thoroughly proofreading and fixing your errors.
Even if you won the spelling bee in Grade Four and the teacher always asked for your help with writing on the blackboard.
*waves hand triumphantly*
Trust me, there are likely still going to be a few errors!
Proficient editing = better copy and better content overall.
That being the case… while you should definitely proofread and edit your work, don’t agonize over it! Also, don’t do it right away either. Write the piece, then come back to it at another time with fresh eyes — it’s easier to be objective that way.
Using the spell check function in your word processor or in Google docs, plus the Grammarly app – are a good start! I also read my work out loud before hitting publish or submitting it. Just a thought.
And here’s another thought… if you need some fresh eyes on your work, be sure to seek out an external editor. *waves hand triumphantly*
BONUS TIP | Use too much “expert” jargon, adverbs, CAPITALIZATION, and exclamation marks!!!!!!!!
Trust me that people can see right through big-word-stuffing, and industry jargon overuse.
Also, I am SO guilty on ALL of these points!!! I mean, no one really likes to be spoken to LIKE THIS!!! RIGHT?!?!! (it feels loud, over-bearing, and abrasive)
Very, actually, really, truly, just, entirely, extremely, completely and other adverbs, are almost always totally and very unnecessary. They only actually function in sl-o-o-o-w-ing your reader down extremely.
Adverbs: Only use them if necessary and you can’t convey the same meaning or feeling without them.
Ok? So, just cut it out.
So, my wellness entrepreneurial friend, which of these copywriting mistakes have YOU made? All of them? (Me too… still do sometimes!)
Well, now you know about the 5 (no, 6) deadly “sins” of website copy and you can move forward in developing your kickass copywriting skills 🙂
Speaking of, have you picked up the DIY Your Own Copywriting Guide yet?
You can find it (along with a whole whack of other amazing health business resources) in THE WELL membership — freshly launched!