If you’ve ever worked in sales or marketing, you probably know that most people buy on emotion and justify their decision with logic. We buy from people we like even if, rationally, it doesn’t make the most sense.
Your website challenge is to replicate what customers experience when they meet you.
So how do you do it? How do you turn your website into an environment that’s as unique as you?
Here’s a few tips....
1. Write your content the way you’d say it in person. In other words use plain English. And don’t be afraid to use a bit of colloquial language or slang – it adds colour to your style. This will make you sound like a real person.
2. Put your name and a picture of yourself on your site. It helps to build trust and reassures people that there’s a real human being behind the site. Think about it, would you trust someone who never told you their name? That’s why customer service people either wear nametags or introduce themselves by name. Customers want to know who they're dealing with, so tell them.
3. You can use colours to stimulate different emotions. For instance blues and greens are relaxing..... red and orange generate excitement. You can experiment with colours to make
people feel differently, depending on what your objective is. But don’t use too many or you’ll put people off – two or three is probably the most you should need.
4. You can use type to add variety to your ‘tone of voice’. Techniques such as bolding, highlighting, underlining and capitals are ways of drawing attention to key points and adding rhythm to your style. They’re the written equivalent of raising your voice or highlighting something important. Have a look at my site at www.comedy-monologues.com to get an idea of the possibilities.
5. Use exclamation points sparingly. Too many people use them to emphasise what they think is humour. And too much excitement looks like you are trying too hard to sell!!!!! Remember the salesman’s adage "everyone likes to buy but no one likes to be sold".
6. The more information you offer, the more likely people are to trust you. Remember the net is a place where people go for information. They’re empowering themselves to make decisions...... you can help them by providing enough information about your product or service to make them feel like they’re getting the full picture.
7. If you want to make a real difference, you can record an audio or video of yourself or your customers talking about a new product or something relevant to your target audience. There’s even a low cost way of creating animated graphics of yourself – like a cartoon.
So, you get the idea..... The point is that it DOES make a difference. These techniques are used by the best in the business and I guarantee it's not by chance.
Now try it yourself. What’s your site saying before people read the words? I’ll bet that it's not doing everything it could.
I use the Editor Software programme to help me keep my style in plain English. For more details have a look here http://www.incisecomms.com/default.asp?page=copywriting_for_results.htm
Why your site needs personality and how to get it at low cost - To learn more about this author, visit Paul Lock's Website.
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Paul Lock
(Visit Paul's Website)
Brought up in London and been in marketing
since the days of Johnny Rotten - yes,
that long. Corporations may be slow moving
and full of political windbags but
they're a great way to get your training.
After 20 years 'training' I went into
the agency world and set up my own company
three years ago. We help small businesses
make the most of their web marketing
investment, from design and planning to
search engine optimisations and analytics.
If you can't measure it, don't waste
your money - are you a business person or
a gambler? Over the years I've made more
mistakes than you could shake a stick at
and, on the basis that an investment in
knowledge pays the best returns, I offer a
few morsels which might help you make
fewer mistakes than me. I hope my articles
help and feel free to visit my web site.
Best of luck,
Paul
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