Liking
When it comes to copywriting or content marketing, it turns out you didn’t leave popularity contests behind in the playground. Your likeability is relevant long after high school: your likeability influences people’s willingness to work with you and their willingness to buy a product or service from you. That’s true whether you’re being likeable in person or on a landing page.
Think about all the times you said yes to a marketer or salesperson who knew all the right things to say. Maybe you didn’t even need to buy the product or service, but you bought it because the person selling the service or the product won you over because they were likeable. When it comes to persuading clients and generating new business, this being likeable can be applied to good copywriting in several ways.
Your copy can mirror good design. Good website design, for example, makes sure that any images of people look like the business’s target clients. That’s because we’re more likely to like people who look like us; it’s basic human nature. You can follow the same line in your copy by writing the way your target clients sound or the way they expect you to sound. Copywriters selling children’s toys would probably adopt a fun, cheerful tone of voice. But a copywriter aiming at high-level executives might sound more professional in order to appeal to their audience.
If you’re playing the long game through content marketing, finding the right tone can help you to demonstrate likeability over time, making eventual sales more likely.
What about likeability and SEO?
Naturally, if you can get more people to your website then you’ve got a chance of getting more business. If you can improve your search ranking, you’ll have a chance to do get more people to your website. This makes likeability an important aspect to incorporate into your SEO and conversion optimisation tactics. How? Being likeable makes it more likely that people will share your content. Sharing your content creates backlinks — links to your website from other sites (including sites like Facebook). More backlinks mean more direct traffic (potential customers clicking on those links). However, backlinks are also the rocket fuel of SEO because search engines take every link as a vote of confidence in your web content.
3 ways to make your landing page more “likeable”
1. Look up your industry and what it does on Wikipedia
Fastidious editors pluck Wikipedia clean of jargon to keep its entries clear to anyone.
Here’s Wikipedia on copywriting, for instance:
“Copywriting is the act of writing text for the purpose of advertising or other forms of marketing… to increase brand awareness and ultimately persuade a person or group to take a particular action.”
And here it is on content marketing:
“A type of marketing that involves the creation and sharing of online material… that does not explicitly promote a brand but is intended to stimulate interest in its products or services.”
Copywriting and content writing are frequently confused, but not by anyone who has read those two definitions. Copywriting on a website, for instance, drives action; content writing on a website (writing blog posts, for instance) stimulates interest without seeking an action.
How close is Wikipedia’s language about your industry and services to the way you talk about those things?
2. Read your reviews
What words and phrases do clients use when they write about you or your services?
You’d be well advised to use those terms. (The purist in you might resist because the terms aren’t strictly correct, but do you want to be right or do you want more business?)
Australian builders have got this down. No Australian says they’re building a house; they’re building a “home”, even though the word “home” is broader than “house”. That’s why you won’t find websites for any “house builders” in Australia, only “home builders”.
Your industry has developed phrases to capture concepts succinctly. Inside the business, they make discussion easier. Outside the business, you can endear yourself to clients by swapping to the phrases they use.
3. How do studets write when they recommend your course?
Similar to reading your reviews, ask your students what they say to someone when they’re recommending your course.
If you don’t want to ask your students directly, look for relevant forums where people ask for help. What do the people answering queries say when giving recommendations?