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Why Great Copywriting For Small Business Is A Game Changer

by | Dec 28, 2019 | Messaging/Copywriting, Most Current

Copywriting for small business

How Great Copywriting For Your Small Business Will Change The Game in 2020

 

Good copywriting is invisible. Why? Because if a message is delivered clearly, the only thing that’s noticed is the message, the value, or the action, not the writing itself. 

Innocent is a great example of this. The copy on their website clearly states their value–why potential customers will be interested in buying their products.

H1: How Great Copywriting For Your Small Business Will Change The Game in 2020 Good copywriting is invisible. Why? Because if a message is delivered clearly, the only thing that’s noticed is the message, the value, or the action, not the writing itself. Innocent is a great example of this. The copy on their website clearly states their value--why potential customers will be interested in buying their products. Do regular consumers sit back and say, “Wow, that’s great copywriting!”? No, they do not. But what they do think is that these smoothies are a healthy choice for feeding their family. On the other hand, bad copy stops consumers in their tracks in a very bad way. Instead of not noticing the copy at all, when one reads some bad writing, they recognize the words and their awkwardness or unclear message. Take this message from iMedia Connection, for example. Wow, you lost us. Copywriting is one of the most crucial parts of a successful brand, and without it, you can lose the attention of an audience very quickly. That being said, great copywriting is a must. Let’s take a look at the role copywriting plays for small business success. H2: The Role of Copywriting It’s not all about the vibrant colors, the thoughtfully designed logo, or the on-brand photography. While all of these pieces are irreplaceable, we can’t forget about the very important words that go along with each of them--great copywriting. Emails, pages on a website, print marketing, onboarding materials, billboards--copywriting is at the center of it all, and is therefore a critical component of any brand. While it can certainly be easy to dismiss copywriting because it’s not always flashy and exciting like design can be, it’s not something that you’ll ever want to overlook as a small business owner. Accompanied by beautifully crafted visuals are words that no marketing strategy can live without. Copywriting is the skill of persuading the people of your audience to buy what you have to offer. It helps provide information, reason, and value to your products and services, enticing your audience to understand your brand and respond, or convert, after coming across it. As a critical role in marketing, great copywriting for small businesses is a must for attracting customers, business growth, and, ultimately, for success. H3: What Makes Great Copywriting Copywriting isn’t all about writing CTAs like “buy now” and “sign up here”, it’s more along the lines of persuading your audience to think, feel, and respond the way your brand wants them to. While a blog post might have 2,000 words to get a point across, great copywriting will oftentimes have much fewer words to do the same convincing. As a small business copywriter, it’s important to know and incorporate the following seven components into the copywriting for your small business. H4: 1. Knowing Your Audience(s) Picture the typical person who is part of your target audience. What do you know about them? Think about their age, location, marital status, and income. Consider what’s important to them, their buying habits, and their spending power. When an email goes out from your brand, these are the people who are going to be reading it, so write it just for them. If your brand’s target audience is made up of single men in their 20s and your website copy refers to raising kids and marriage, chances are you’re going to miss the mark with the people you’re looking attract. The more you know your audience and what they want, the better you’re able to tailor your copy to their needs and interests. H4: 2. A Clear Understanding of Value Proposition and USP What’s in it for customers if they decide to buy from your brand? What are the key differentiators that will make them purchase from you and not your competitors? As a small business copywriter, you have to know and emphasize your brand’s value proposition and unique selling proposition. A value proposition is a promised value that a brand offers to its customers--how a brand will help solve a customer’s problem. A unique selling proposition (USP) is how your products or services stand out from what your competitors have to offer. By clearly defining your value proposition and USP with great copywriting, you can paint a picture as to why your customers should be your customers, making them believe just that. H4: 3. Know the Objective of the Piece Great copywriting cannot be accomplished without an objective. So ask yourself, why are you writing? What do you want your readers to do? Let’s say you need to write copy for a print piece. This particular print piece is to promote an upcoming event that you’ll be hosting to support homeless youth. As the main sponsor of the event, the goal is to get as many attendees to purchase tickets as possible in order to raise money. With the copy for this print piece, you need to get across two things: Why people should care: to raise money for homeless youth The how: purchase tickets to raise money By knowing those objectives, you can then write copy that gets that value across and a call to action that clearly states what you’d like people to do. H4: Organize The Copy: AIDA With any copy that you write as a business owner, the ultimate goal is to attract attention and persuade action. There are four steps you must take in order to grab your audience’s attention and take them through the process of diving deeper into your brand (making a purchase, visiting your website, etc.): attention, interest, desire, and action. Attention: Be quick to grab attention with action-seeking words that are clear and simple, yet powerful. Interest: Once you have their attention, you must then get them interested in your brand. Do so by writing copy that focuses on their needs. Desire: As you’re building a reader’s interest, you will want to connect that interest (their needs) to a real-life way that your brand can help solve a problem for them. Action: Now that your reader knows they can and want to make use of what you have to offer, let them know the action you want them to take. Maybe you want them to read more, shop now, or give you a call for more information. Whatever it is you want them to do, let your audience know. H4: Active Voice and Present Tense Writing copy in passive voice will ultimately weaken your message. Make sure to write your messages with an active voice in the present tense. This helps your audience understand what your brand can do for them right now, and show them that your brand and your message is powerful. Here is an example to help with active voice and present tense: NO: Many products were sold to many loyal customers last month. YES: We’ve solved problems for so many of our most loyal customers, and you could be next! How can we help you? H4: Leverage Your Customers’ Voices Any brand can tout about how great they are, but what’s more convincing is hearing from other customers themselves. If you have some great testimonials or customer quotes, incorporate them into your copy. Add a testimonial to bottom of your brochure or display a customer photo, name, and quote in your promotional email. The more real you can make a customer and their experience, the better people will understand that your brand has great value that they might also be interested in. H4: Clean, Simple, Clear, and Concise Consumers are bombarded with copy left and right. This brand wants them to buy a skateboard while the other is urging users to subscribe to their monthly magazine. If a message is too long or unclear, it’ll quickly lose attention. If it’s too wordy, it’s confusing. If it’s full of jargon, you’ll be misunderstood. Be mindful of choosing clever over clarity. It’s great to add a dash of humor to your message, but not at the expense of getting the point across. When it comes to copywriting, the simpler the better. H3: How Copywriting Can Transform Your Brand Marketing and Communication All great brand relationships and customer communication starts with effect copywriting. While copy can certainly sell your products, the value of wonderfully written words bleeds farther into components like overall brand marketing and communication. Here are some of the many benefits of copywriting for small businesses. H4: Nurture Customer Relationships Initially connecting with potential customers isn’t enough, you have to continue to nurture them over time. Copywriting is a great way to do this. Great copy will grab the attention of strangers and then continue feeding them the value your brand has to offer. By staying in their mind and touching on how you can you solve their problem, brands are able to nurture their customer relationships, develop trust between brand and customer, and drive them closer to action every time they see great copy. H4: Speak Your Audience’s Language When you know your audience and what they need, it’s easy to speak their language and write in a way that resonates with them. When this is the case, the copy you write is tailored to their specific desires and gives your audience a straight view and understanding into your brand. H4: Guide Customers To Take Action Obviously one of the main benefits of copywriting for small business is that your words will sell your products or get your audience to do whatever it is you want them to do. Will great copy that emphasizes your value, is clear and engaging, and is interesting, you’re able to grab the attention of consumers and encourage them to dive deeper into your brand and what you have to offer. H4: Increase Brand Awareness Every word your brand writes or sentence it speaks reflects your company’s image as a whole. The right words will build your brand’s image and develop its awareness to new customers. And it’s that image that customers will form to think of and describe your brand to others. Well-written copy will help you stand out, differentiate you from the competition, and establish credibility among your industry. That’s why all of your small business copywriting should convey the quality and value you have to offer. H3: A Copywriter For Your Small Business Great copywriting can be a big task for any small business, and it’s something that never really stops. As your brand develops, changes, and puts out more marketing materials to advertise your brand, new or updated copy is needed. If you can’t find the time to continuously write great copy, maybe you’ve considered finding a freelance copywriter for your small business or hiring an agency to write actionable copy for you. Bareknuckle has a writing team full of copywriting experts that craft great copy for small businesses in all kinds of industries. We know a thing or 30 about the kind of copywriting that builds quality brands, loyal customers, and profitable businesses. Think we might be a match? Let’s see!

Do regular consumers sit back and say, “Wow, that’s great copywriting!”? No, they do not. But what they do think is that these smoothies are a healthy choice for feeding their family.

On the other hand, bad copy stops consumers in their tracks in a very bad way. Instead of not noticing the copy at all, when one reads some bad writing, they recognize the words and their awkwardness or unclear message.

Take this message from iMedia Connection, for example.

Copywriting for small business

Wow, you lost us.

Copywriting is one of the most crucial parts of a successful brand, and without it, you can lose the attention of an audience very quickly. That being said, great copywriting is a must.

Let’s take a look at the role copywriting plays for small business success.

 

The Role of Copywriting

It’s not all about the vibrant colors, the thoughtfully designed logo, or on-brand photography. While all of these pieces are irreplaceable, we can’t forget about the very important words that go along with each of them–great copywriting. Emails, pages on a website, print marketing, onboarding materials, billboards–copywriting is at the center of it all, and is, therefore, a critical component of any brand. 

While it can certainly be easy to dismiss copywriting because it’s not always flashy and exciting like design can be, it’s not something that you’ll ever want to overlook as a small business owner. Accompanied by beautifully crafted visuals are words that no marketing strategy can live without. 

Copywriting is the skill of persuading the people of your audience to buy what you have to offer. It helps provide information, reason, and value to your products and services, enticing your audience to understand your brand and respond, or convert, after coming across it.

As a critical role in marketing, great copywriting for small businesses is a must for attracting customers, business growth, and, ultimately, for success. 

 

What Makes Great Copywriting

Copywriting isn’t all about writing CTAs like “buy now” and “sign up here”, it’s more along the lines of persuading your audience to think, feel, and respond the way your brand wants them to. 

While a blog post might have 2,000 words to get a point across, great copywriting will oftentimes have much fewer words to do the same convincing.

As a small business copywriter, it’s important to know and incorporate the following seven components into the copywriting for your small business.

 

1. Knowing Your Audience(s)

Picture the typical person who is part of your target audience. What do you know about them? Think about their age, location, marital status, and income. Consider what’s important to them, their buying habits, and their spending power. When an email goes out from your brand, these are the people who are going to be reading it, so write it just for them. 

If your brand’s target audience is made up of single men in their 20s and your website copy refers to raising kids and marriage, chances are you’re going to miss the mark with the people you’re looking attract. The more you know your audience and what they want, the better you’re able to tailor your copy to their needs and interests.

 

2. A Clear Understanding of Value Proposition and USP

What’s in it for customers if they decide to buy from your brand? What are the key differentiators that will make them purchase from you and not your competitors? As a small business copywriter, you have to know and emphasize your brand’s value proposition and unique selling proposition.

Value proposition is a promised value that a brand offers to its customers–how a brand will help solve a customer’s problem. A unique selling proposition (USP) is how your products or services stand out from what your competitors have to offer. By clearly defining your value proposition and USP with great copywriting, you can paint a picture as to why your customers should be your customers, making them believe just that.

 

3. Know the Objective of the Piece

Great copywriting cannot be accomplished without an objective. So ask yourself, why are you writing? What do you want your readers to do?

Let’s say you need to write copy for a print piece. This particular print piece is to promote an upcoming event that you’ll be hosting to support homeless youth. As the main sponsor of the event, the goal is to get as many attendees to purchase tickets as possible in order to raise money. 

With the copy for this print piece, you need to get across two things:

  1. Why people should care: to raise money for homeless youth
  2. The how: purchase tickets to raise money

By knowing those objectives, you can then write copy that gets that value across and a call to action that clearly states what you’d like people to do.

 

4. Organize The Copy: AIDA

With any copy that you write as a business owner, the ultimate goal is to attract attention and persuade action. There are four steps you must take in order to grab your audience’s attention and take them through the process of diving deeper into your brand (making a purchase, visiting your website, etc.): attention, interest, desire, and action.

    1. Attention: Be quick to grab attention with action-seeking words that are clear and simple, yet powerful.
    2. Interest: Once you have their attention, you must then get them interested in your brand. Do so by writing copy that focuses on their needs.
    3. Desire: As you’re building a reader’s interest, you will want to connect that interest (their needs) to a real-life way that your brand can help solve a problem for them.
    4. Action: Now that your reader knows they can and want to make use of what you have to offer, let them know the action you want them to take. Maybe you want them to read more, shop now, or give you a call for more information. Whatever it is you want them to do, let your audience know

 

5. Active Voice and Present Tense

Writing copy in passive voice will ultimately weaken your message. Make sure to write your messages with an active voice in the present tense. This helps your audience understand what your brand can do for them right now, and show them that your brand and your message is powerful.

Here is an example to help with active voice and present tense:

NO: Many products were sold to many loyal customers last month.

YES: We’ve solved problems for so many of our most loyal customers, and you could be next! How can we help you?

 

6. Leverage Your Customers’ Voices

Any brand can tout about how great they are, but what’s more convincing is hearing from other customers themselves. If you have some great testimonials or customer quotes, incorporate them into your copy. 

Add a testimonial to bottom of your brochure or display a customer photo, name, and quote in your promotional email. The more real you can make a customer and their experience, the better people will understand that your brand has great value that they might also be interested in. 

 

7. Clean, Simple, Clear, and Concise

Consumers are bombarded with copy left and right. This brand wants them to buy a skateboard while the other is urging users to subscribe to their monthly magazine. When a message is too long or unclear, it’ll quickly lose attention.

If it’s too wordy, it’s confusing. If it’s full of jargon, you’ll be misunderstood. Be mindful of choosing clever over clarity. It’s great to add a dash of humor to your message, but not at the expense of getting the point across. When it comes to copywriting, the simpler the better. 

How Copywriting Can Transform Your Brand Marketing and Communication 

All great brand relationships and customer communication starts with effect copywriting. While copy can certainly sell your products, the value of wonderfully written words bleeds farther into components like overall brand marketing and communication.

Here are some of the many benefits of copywriting for small businesses.

 

Nurture Customer Relationships 

Initially connecting with potential customers isn’t enough, you have to continue to nurture them over time. Copywriting is a great way to do this.

Great copy will grab the attention of strangers and then continue feeding them the value your brand has to offer. By staying in their mind and touching on how you can you solve their problem, brands are able to nurture their customer relationships, develop trust between brand and customer, and drive them closer to action every time they see great copy.

 

Speak Your Audience’s Language

When you know your audience and what they need, it’s easy to speak their language and write in a way that resonates with them. When this is the case, the copy you write is tailored to their specific desires and gives your audience a straight view and understanding into your brand.

 

Guide Customers To Take Action

Obviously one of the main benefits of copywriting for small businesses is that your words will sell your products or get your audience to do whatever it is you want them to do. 

Will great copy that emphasizes your value, is clear and engaging and is interesting, you’re able to grab the attention of consumers and encourage them to dive deeper into your brand and what you have to offer.

 

Increase Brand Awareness 

Every word your brand writes or sentence it speaks reflects your company’s image as a whole. The right words will build your brand’s image and develop its awareness to new customers. And it’s that image that customers will form to think of and describe your brand to others. 

Well-written copy will help you stand out, differentiate you from the competition, and establish credibility among your industry. That’s why all of your small business copywriting should convey the quality and value you have to offer.

 

A Copywriter For Your Small Business

Great copywriting can be a big task for any small business, and it’s something that never really stops. As your brand develops, changes, and puts out more marketing materials to advertise your brand, new or updated copy is needed.

If you can’t find the time to continuously write great copy, maybe you’ve considered finding a freelance copywriter for your small business or hiring an agency to write actionable copy for you.

Bareknuckle has a writing team full of copywriting experts that craft great copy for small businesses in all kinds of industries. We know a thing or 30 about the kind of copywriting that builds quality brands, loyal customers, and profitable businesses. Think we might be a match? Let’s see!