How many times have you heard the phrase KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE? It’s one of the holiest of holy commandments in marketing.
To write compelling copy, you need to know your audience so you can speak their language. For example, you wouldn’t speak at a Star Wars convention and close with live long and prosper.
Discovering your target audience and learning what drives their decisions is part of the copywriting process. However, before you understand your audience, there are a few things you need to know.
There are unspoken truths about your clients – truths that many small business owners and entrepreneurs simply don’t understand. But these three unspoken truths about your audience have to be understood before you write a single word of copy.
Truth 1: Your Audience Doesn’t Care About You
They only care about what you can do for them.
I know, I know. I was a little hurt when I found this out, too. Whenever I call it quits and retire to the lake for an idyllic life of fishing and grilling meat, my clients will find a new copywriter to take my place.
The same applies to your small business. Unless you invent a cutting-edge product that’s never been seen or provide a service that’s never been offered, you’re just one small company in a very saturated market.
That’s why creating benefit-driven content is so important. Your audience needs to know what you can do for them because, at the end of the day, you don’t sell products or services. You improve lives by solving problems.
Consider the following two statements you might find on a retailer’s website:
- We have more than 100 styles of graphic t-shirts in stock.
- Keep up with the latest pop culture trends with over 100 styles of graphic t-shirts to choose from.
The first statement provides a basic fact. The second provides a benefit to the customer. By creating customer-centric copywriting, you take the focus away from you and put it back on your audience.
Truth 2: Your Audience is Very Busy or Very Lazy
The point is that they’re not going to go out of their way to follow your lead or do what you ask them to do. Take point-of-sale (POS) surveys as an example.
How often have you gone through your favorite drive-thru or local DIY home repair supercenter and been told you’ve been selected to participate in a customer service survey?
These POS surveys, sometimes called sales receipt surveys, ask you to use your phone or computer to complete a relatively short survey about your experience. They often offer incentives like free food or a chance to win a cash prize or gift card to encourage your participation. And who doesn’t like free food and money?
Apparently, a lot of people.
The response rate on POS surveys is only 1%. The problem is that many people discard the receipts or choose not to participate, regardless of the incentive.
To get your audience to follow your lead, make it easy for them to complete the action you set before them. Use clear and concise calls-to-action (CTAs) to increase your odds of directing your audience to take the desired action.
Truth 3: Your Audience is Smarter Than You Think
Master showman P.T. Barnum has been attributed with the phrase, “There’s a sucker born every minute.”
While there’s some debate on whether or not he actually delivered the famous quip, it enforces a common misconception that most audiences aren’t very intelligent or are easily swayed by blatant exaggerations paired with a bit of razzle-dazzle (like a slick website).
Advertising icon David Ogilvy once said, “The customer is not a moron. She’s your wife.”
He believed in showing the audience reliable, trustworthy data and letting them make their own decisions. This led to a new way of advertising that recognized the customer’s intelligence and downplayed the hype surrounding most advertising campaigns of the day.
By giving your audience access to factual proof and backing it up with solid social proof, you let them see the true benefits of your offer without patronizing or insulting them. You acknowledge their intellect and ask them to come to their own conclusions on whether your product or service is right for them.
The Wrap-Up
Once you understand the three unspoken truths about your audience, you can start digging deeper into who they are, the challenges they face and how you can help them. Only then will you be able to produce effective copywriting that turns visitors into leads, leads into prospects, and prospects into customers.
Until next time… may the Force be with you.
David
The CopyGeek
P.S. Want more copywriting tips on how to improve your small business marketing content? Click here and read through the archives. I promise you’ll find something new and useful in every blog.
