Strategic copywriting: what’s it all about? Andrew Field
Creative communications consultant Compelling copywriter
This white paper explores how strategic copywriting benefits businesses as they look to take full advantage of their online presence, which includes www, social media, SEO and keywords, content creation and content management.
“Search is now social. In addition to keywords, search engines like Google consider Tweets, Facebook “likes” and Google “+1’s” in their algorithms. So the more that your content is shared, the higher it will rank.” Jamie Turner (co-author of How to Make Money with Social Media and chief content officer for BKV’s 60 Second Marketer online magazine) has defines the three-stage Social Media ROI Cycle below. Stage 1: Launch Jamie says generally the approach during this launch stage is very executional with very little long term planning. The primary objective is simply to get started. Most companies just jump into www and social media with very little forethought, even though best practices would be to do some advanced planning. He says you won’t really see much traction unless you move onto Stage 2. Stage 2: Management Jamie says objective at this stage is to engage prospects and customers in some way that gets them to connect with the brand. Ideally, this would mean buying something, but it can also mean downloading a white paper, liking a Facebook page, responding to a survey or any other tangible evidence that they’re connecting with your brand. Stage 3: Optimisation
Andrew Field
James says creating content should never be done in isolation. You should be focusing on improving conversion and optimization of campaigns by tracking inbound leads and seeing of they convert to customers. He says it also means testing, such as assessing two different landing pages and seeing which one is the winner. And it also means understanding the Customer Lifetime Value (the total revenue the average customer generates for your business during the lifetime of their engagement with you.
What is strategic copywriting? In the good old bad days (not so long ago) copywriters could play with alliterations, metaphors and similes under the creativity banner, revel in guilty pleasures unique to the unofficial union of wordsmiths. Marketing collateral was crafted free from very smart but literal search engines.
For my perspective, strategic copywriting adds a new and exciting dimension to the power of our communications and our ability to be more effective content providers
Remember when we could lap up the ingenuity of the Cream of Manchester slogan, even though comparing a diary product to frothy hoppy beer would be the antithesis of today’s fascinating keyworddriven SEO world? Today, our challenge is to widen our perspectives as writers and have a greater communications influence. That means that the traditional copywriter’s craft not only includes content creation (the actual research and writing) but also embraces context consideration (publishing means) and integration (how words complement keyword/SEO strategies and ultimately deliver buying customers) and needs a much greater strategic focus. Core copywriting disciplines, skills and experience remain but also accommodate the online digital revolution. Our triggers point are:• • • •
thinking of words/copy in relation to search engines and keywords creating unique content for each media platform ensuring words/copy perform seamlessly across different media maintaining tone of voice, brand perception and the effectiveness of the key message.
What are the benefits of strategic copywriting?
Communications strategies for a brand, product or service can be developed far more effectively and with greater accuracy by adopting a strategic copywriting approach. Zooming in on appropriate keywords to articulate an offering greatly enhances strategic business and marketing planning. A systematic starting point allows you to:• brainstorm or select keywords at the earliest opportunity to pinpoint the selling points and competitive advantages of your proposition. • explore all possible names, roots, products, competitors terms, graphics, descriptions and common usage to position your offering. • test your keywords (using instantaneous and free SEO analysis) to endorse or negate your findings • deliver a brand template to create the content that drives your communication strategies A strategic approach also focuses copywriters on producing more accessible and easily assimilated copy. The content has to be well written, accurate, relevant and entertaining AND look good on the page/screen with:• • • •
shorter paragraphs more bulleted or numbered lists (like this) focused relevant headers and sub headers conversion focused links within the content areas of the page (this applies to all hard and soft collateral).
The phenomenal growth of the www and online social media has changed the way we communicate personally and professionally. The sheer numbers (you can probably add several thousand more to each brand by the time you’ve finished reading this White Paper and your coffee) for social media’s Big Four are staggering:• • • •
Facebook tops the popularity stakes with a staggering 800m Twitter is next with 200m LinkedIn is third with 115m Google+ pops up with a cool 50m.
How does strategic copywriting apply online?
It is clear from the numbers alone why search engine optimisation is increasingly seen as a viable alternative to advertising in Yellow Pages, trade directories and magazines. However, the real beauty of online SEO isn’t the headline figures - rather it’s the ability to specifically target the people who you want to reach - both potential and existing customers. SEO helps you reach the parts other media cannot reach by clever filtering by:• attracting traffic and people who want to buy from you • excluding people have no intention of buying from you and will waste your time This is where a strategic copywriter can help define and give you the penetration you’re after, allowing you to reach your people with clever, targetted content.
According to Shar VanBoskirk (Interactive Marketing Professionals) by 2016, the USA will spend $77 billion on interactive marketing – as much as they do on television today. Search marketing, display advertising, mobile marketing, email marketing, and social media will grow to 26% of all advertising spend within the next five years.
How do keywords apply to strategic copywriting?
The obvious temptation is to pick your keywords and then flood your communications with them. The problems with that approach are obvious:• search engines are very sophisticated and don’t like be fooled • customers want regular added value updates - they don’t want to read the same keywords over and over again The following criteria will help you select the right keywords, which must:• have sufficient volumes (number of people using them to look for products in your business sector) • be relevant to your business • give you a) competitive advantage b) profitability of the services/products linked in with the keywords. As a word of caution, remember big money/trophy keyword phrases are the hardest to gain ranking spots as they are the most competitive. So be creative. All search terms have variations - related modifiers should make your text feel natural while subtly covering a variety of keyword options. Common variations include:• • • •
singular versus plural alternative word order synonyms and acronyms keyword modifiers.
Although keyword phrases are the initial building blocks, it is a site’s ‘authority/relevance’ that creates a highly visible online presence and drives the traffic you want to you. Generally, on-page optimisation creates relevance while in-bound links generates authority while external (in-bound) links from other sites are the single most powerful ranking tool amongst search engines today. There are three key factors influence the latter:• the number of links to a site, where generally more is better... • the number of links to a specific page which will be ranked in terms of a question asked • anchor texts (the clickable text of a link) connects to specific questions Link building tactics divide into three areas:• ‘manual’ (achieved technical activity such as comments, social networking) • ‘editorial’ (building relationships and third party endorsement with the goal of achieving unprompted high value links) • ‘combo’ of the two.
The greater your relevance and authority, the more you will gain from your investment in strategic copywriting.
How does strategic copywriting promote online visibility?
How does strategic copywriting produce trafficattracting content?
Research from HubSpot shows that companies with blogs get 55% more website traffic, and that number goes up exponentially in line with the number of times you post as long as the content is credible and relevant. From our own personal experiences of the web, watching TV and films and reading newspapers and books we want content to be timely, accurate, relevant, considered, informative and fun. What it cannot ever be is boring, predictable or rehashed. It has to be original, innovative and created fresh for each media platform. Traffic-attracting content can be driven by:• • • • • • • • • • • •
news stories blogging e-cards podcasts videos on-line demonstrations webinars tips and advice existing content evaluations content sharing share professional advice showing thought leadership
Whatever the format, your call-to-action is essential to collect information, start a dialogue and take the first steps to generating transactions.
1. Decide what you want to achieve by stating objectives 2. Brainstorm keywords to define your brand proposition 3. Combine keywords with the rest of your brand ID 4. Map out your communications journey treating each platform independently 5. Optimise your on-page presence 6. Establish online relevance and authority 7. Develop inbound links and editorial credibility 8. Constantly add fresh content to the your online presence 9. Always test, test and test again to refine and improve what you’re doing.....
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essential strategic copywriting steps
I am an experienced, versatile copywriter and communications professional. I have run my own PR consultancy (1987-97) and worked as an independent writer and consultant with clients and agencies (1997 onwards). M: 07850 933350 T: 0161 798 8810 E: afcuk@btinternet.com skype: afcuk61 www.afc-uk.org
Andrew Field
Of course, there is no end.... strategic copywriting is an on-going commitment... if you want to discuss your copywriting and communication needs get in touch today.