Transcript
A few months ago I quietly transformed the lives of millions of copywriters by informing the world that they make the best SEOs. You’re welcome. I spoke about how they combine a natural empathy with deep market research to create massive landing pages that cater to a vast array of user intents in an intuitive and digestible manner – precisely what Google wants.
It got me thinking – this phenomenon of people (including copywriters themselves) undervaluing the role of copy within the digital landscape – is far from limited to SEO. With new shiny channels we look fo new shiny skills, but the reality is far simpler – those that create the most compelling messaging are those that make the channels wok. Every time.
So here 3 other channels where the impact of a world-class copywriter is as unappreciated as it is transformative:
- PPC – you’d be had pushed to find an area of digital so left brain dominated as PPC. But why? Yes, it requires a methodical thought process in setting up the campaign, and a confidence with data in analysing its performance, but at its core a PPC campaign is about words. It’s the words that determine when you show up, it’s the words that will determine your click though rate. It’s the words that determine the quality score of you landing page, and it’s the words that determine whether people take action. And because most PPC campaigns are so utterly bereft of creative messaging, you will find a small amount goes an awfully long way.
- Email marketing – email is positioned by many as a highly technical channel and yes the marginal gains achieved by getting the technical stuff right do add up, but 80% of the performance come down to the words. If you want a game changing direct response email campaign, don’t go looking for someone with 5 years experience in email. Find a breathtakingly good copywriter. They will learn all they need to about the mechanics of email in Q1.
- Conversion optimisation – we think of this as something new, but copywriters were using split tests with their print ads a hundred yeas ago. Hire an expert in CRO to review you website and they will tell you where the problems are and where the website is deviating from best practice. But will they be able to insert a new message that triples your conversion rate over night? Absolutely not. For that you need a copywriter.
Of course every campaign is different and having quality technical expertise is always a big plus. but we need to remember that, digital or otherwise, we’re in the business of communication and communication is about words.
Besides, you can bring Boss in for the technical bits. We get to charge more fo that stuff and if it doesn’t work we’ll just blame it on the copywriters.
See you next time,
Dan
