Got some helpful feedback on my Oct. 18 web post, WWW.What the Heck?, which attempts to talk about what makes good copy for your website. One person asked: How about some examples of good and bad web copy, Fran?  OK—can do! It just so happens that a couple of years ago, I made a presentation to another group on the same topic. Here are the two websites I used as my examples, with the URLs and other identifiers of the guilty held back (in case they are your first cousins). I’ll just share the first two paragraphs from their respective home pages. Take a look at them and compare each to my points about being brief, using informal language, and getting to the heart of what your client cares about. Both websites are for companies doing home inspections. This one I don’t like—it uses we/you point of view, but it’s mostly about the company, not the customer. On the site itself, you can’t even find this text until you’ve “paged down” twice past too many uninformative stock … [Read more...]

Have you looked at your business website lately?  Maybe you’d better. As a matter of fact, pull it up right now and look at it as you read this. How well does your web copy communicate what you want it to say? As Dr. Phil would say, “How’s it working for ya?” What I do often is write web copy for my clients. Web copy is different from the copy you’ll see in other types of marketing vehicles. We web surfers, well, we just don’t have the time to read a full sentence.  So, you have only a few seconds to grab people’s attention and make your case, before they go on to the next site. Readers will ditch your site right away if they are: bored by your presentation confused by what you are trying to say overwhelmed by all the stuff you throw at them can't easily find what they are looking for   So, make sure your site is written for your customers, not for your own entertainment.  Here are some quick tips, supported by my gurus in web content like Robert W. … [Read more...]