Remember - Copy Before Graphics!
When setting up a website, it will be more profitable for you on the whole if you prioritize getting good copy down before you segue into graphics.
Advertisement experts recognize the value of quality copywriting. It is best to get your message out to people in a clear way they can understand. In the ad world, ads are constructed around a central concept. This concept must be translatable into language your customers can understand before you even begin to elaborate on it. Unfortunately, many people spend too much time on fancy designs and features when they move into online marketing tactics. This is reflected when customers visit websites seeking more information about a good or service of interest and find the sites useless.
Since this is such a basic principle of advertising, it is difficult to know why companies have not integrated the formula of great copy/good design onto their websites immediately after creating them. The best designed website in the world will fall flat if its content is nonexistent or poorly written. Especially when pitted against an ad with simply “good” copywriting.
So, why invest more time and effort into your copywriting before you have constructed your entire website? People are sophisticated. By throwing up a smokescreen of flashy design and empty content you are ultimately discrediting yourself and your product, as your customers will be able to see through the show to the lack of content within. When people are making decisions about items important to their lives, they like to feel as though websites have informed rather than entertained them.
Also, writing is a solid foundation for anything online. Your main mode of interaction with your website-browsing customer is the content he or she is reading online. Think about it: would you rather buy from a website with beautiful graphics that offers no real information? Or would you rather buy from a website with rather plain design but clear and thorough information about its wares? In this situation, it almost seems as though the ill-designed website practices modesty while the well-designed website compensates for something. Whether this is true or not, a customer’s perception that he or she is on firm footing when making a decision is paramount.
If you are not comfortable writing your own copy, it can be easily accomplished anyway. Writers are there for the hiring, whether you want to add one permanently to your staff or hire freelancers from project to project. It is usually best to hire a writer to work with your art people, or to use the same freelancers on a consistent basis. You must find a writer who understands the voice you want to have in your copy and who is able to put ideas in a way that explains them exactly how you would like. This is not always quick or easy to find. It is worth the expense and search, however, to have someone who is aware of your organization’s current and future goals and who is familiar with your staff.
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One Response to “Remember - Copy Before Graphics!”
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May 16th, 2008 at 7:39 pm
You’ve hit on a subject of “discussion” that we frequently have with our business technology clients. That is – good content is the cornerstone of a successful website.
There are two often-overlooked challenges in creating good content. One is that to generate good content, you must understand the point of view of your visitor. Most business websites (most websites in general) are very self focused. They offer up info on the product or service from the supplier’s standpoint. Prospects don’t really care about your product or your service. They just want to know what’s in it for them. They want to know how they’re going to benefit by doing business with you.
The second challenge is that good copywriting is underappreciated. Everyone thinks it’s easy, and it often gets assigned to someone with no persuasive writing skills whatsoever.
As you mentioned in your post, it’s not difficult to find a good copywriter. What seems difficult is realizing that you need one. It seems that internet marketing copywriters are doing a pretty good job of selling the need for the service. Somehow this need hasn’t been made very visible in the business technology world. My life would be much easier if business copywriters themselves did a better job of selling themselves!