5 Top Tips for Compelling Advertising

Looking to create compelling advertising content to draw people to your website, but struggling to generate a steady flow of traffic? Many new business owners are in the same boat. Advertising, on the surface, seems like it'd be the easiest form of creative writing. That's just because adverts are typically so short.

However, when writing their own compelling copy, people tend to fall into the same traps over and over again.

·         Business owners assume that their customers want the same thing they do.

·         They boast about new features, services and functions of a product but forget to say why those things are helpful.

·         They don't give a clear message to their target audience about the next steps.

·         They talk about the product as though the audience already understands it.

So, how do you avoid these common mistakes and become a successful copywriter?

Collaboration is key in copywriting

Landing a Copywriting Job with Excellent CTA

Call To Action (CTA) copy is the most important part of your advertisement and it's important to formulate your writing skills around this. Don't get too hung up on showing amazing imagery with sparkly filters and writing copy that lists all of the great things about your product without telling your customers what they need to do next.

Digital copywriting means that your whole advertisement needs to work towards getting your target market to take action. And this isn't always making the purchase. To keep customers involved with your future product, you might want to advertise a ‘softer' CTA that keeps people interested. Perhaps asking them to sign up for a newsletter or follow you on Twitter?

You could even create a chain of CTA copy throughout your writing, that shows your potential clients where to head next. Do you want them to visit your social media or your online portfolio first, then click to sign up or make a purchase?

If that's the case, make sure that you make the next steps really clear on each of the pages or product descriptions, so that you're directing the customer through the process.

Confusion isn't attractive – if people don't understand what they're supposed to do, then they won't do it.

As a copywriter, your bread-and-butter phrases might be:

‘VISIT OUR WEBSITE' > Taking them to the page where they sign up for the newsletter.

‘SIGN UP' > By selecting this they're taken to a page where you can collect their details.

‘BUY NOW' > From the newsletter page they are taken to a specific product page to make a purchase.

See, it's actually easier than you thought. Remember to TELL your customers what to do and they'll do it.

The best copywriting tips for posters and press releases

 The F-Structure on Blogs & Press Releases

When you see that junk mail that comes through your letterbox, what do you do? I imagine you throw the majority of it in the bin just like everyone else. But before you throw it away you might notice a few of the words on the paper. To become a good copywriter, these are the things that you should pay particular attention to.

The copy you'll notice is in the ‘F-Structure'. It's just as simple as it seems. If you place the letter ‘F' over the paper, it covers the copy that customers will see at a glance; and it's that glance that separates your advert from being left on the table or being immediately thrown away. It works the same for websites too. You need those ‘F' words to pull in your potential customers to stop them clicking onto another blog.

To gain experience, it's best to put in some practice. Focus on your Headline, the first part of your subheading and the wording down the left-hand side of the advert. (See, just like an F). Your most important wording needs to be placed in front of the eyes of the customer as they glance at the page. If your choices are:

·         ‘HOLIDAYS TO THE MALDIVES, HALF PRICE'

·         Or, ‘50% OFF MALDIVES HOLIDAYS'

Always use the latter. You can elaborate on the actual offer later on, but the most important thing to the potential customer is the sale, so put it first!

Numbering vs Lettering in Digital Marketing

As you gain more writing experience, you'll start to notice that actually, sometimes the numbers are more important than the letters.

Now, using the example above, you might have noticed that your eye immediately jumped to the ‘50% off' offer, rather than the writing that said ‘half price.' This is what happens every time your customers read your adverts.

Our eyes are naturally drawn to numbers rather than lettering. This is because they're easier for our brains to digest and understand. The numbers also look more physically attractive in comparison to a jumble of words because even the most enthusiastic of readers want to read shorter pieces of creative copy if they can take in the same amount of information.

If you have a choice between writing ‘TWENTY PERCENT OFF' or ‘20% OFF' – always use the numerical format.

Working as a team

Over Punctuating in Creative Writing

The same goes for punctuation. I'm a stickler for correct grammar and punctuation and it sometimes pains me to see it used incorrectly. As you move forward in your copywriting career, you may even find yourself reading the work of another copywriter and correcting their grammar in your head. It happens to the best of us. However, marketing is the one place where those rules don't exactly apply.

Much like the lettering versus numbering argument, people don't read advertisements for their correct use of commas. The more punctuation you use, the less people actually want to read it, believe it or not. There are some instances, where you need to scrap your formal education in favour of your copywriting work.

·         If you've got something that should appear as speech, try using a speech bubble to indicate this, rather than using speech marks.

·         Use short sentences wherever possible to reduce the need for commas, semicolons or colons.

·         Bullet points are encouraged, rather than a long list separated by commas.

·         Use CAPITAL LETTERS mid-sentence if you need to, to emphasise a word.

Still struggling? Compare:

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Or…

50% OFF MALDIVES HOLIDAYS

Take the holiday of a lifetime with FANTASTIC ACTIVITIES for all the family!

·         Scuba Diving

·         Whale Watching

·         Boat Trips

Sit back and RELAX with a SPA DAY and champagne on the beach.

Digital billboards help to catch the eye of your audience

 Removing Strays to Improve Your Writing Skills

And finally… learn to remove your strays. What are strays I hear you say? Well, a stray is a word or phrase that many copywriters forget about. They're the bits of copy left on their own at the start of a line because you didn't arrange it to fit exactly on the line above. It looks just like this...

^^^ Just like this one.

It's fine when you're writing other content, but when you're trying to advertise something, it looks really unattractive and honestly, like you haven't thought it out properly.

A good copywriter always tries to fit their copy exactly onto a single line so that nothing sits on its own. This 1) makes your copy look shorter – which we've learned that customers find more attractive, 2) it makes your marketing feel more professional and 3) most importantly – it gives you more space to showcase your product!

Learning to Become a Copywriter Takes Time & Patience

Sure, it looks easy, but getting all those elements just right whilst still trying to get your message across might take a few attempts. It's likely that you'll need to try 4 or 5 different versions of your potential copy before you're happy. Practice makes perfect!

The Comprehensive Copywriting Academy

To push your copywriting skills to the next level, taking a copywriting course to learn more tips and essential tricks is a great idea. One of the best courses out there that I would personally recommend is the Comprehensive Copywriting Academy.

The course provides amazing advice to gain hands-on experience and even provides you with the skills to approach clients and land your first job. you'll also be able to get advice from the amazing network of freelance copywriters who are in the exact same position as you - at the beginning.