The Puppet Master's Guide to Marketing Copy

This is your moment for action. By choosing the right words, tone, structure, and story, you influence your customer to take action. It’s time to own your message.

The audience needs a clear message. Have you ever received an email that you need to read more than once to understand what it’s about? I know I have and it’s incredibly frustrating. Do you think a customer will spend extra time deciphering your message? No! If they’re confused or it's unclear, they’ll simply move on.

You don’t have to be a writer or copywriter to craft clear marketing messages. However, clear copywriting isn’t limited to an advertisement on social media or legacy media (print, if that’s where your audience is). You need to consider every aspect of your marketing campaign from the social media ads to the email marketing mobile preview text to your website’s landing page. You need cohesive, powerful copy triggering the most effective emotions to initiate action (discovered during the research phase) by crafting a great story they relate to with no copywriting errors.

This is where your storytelling skills are crucial. You don’t have time to tell an in-depth story which means every word counts. Your goal is to be as clear and brief as possible to influence your customer’s actions.

The best marketing in the world does this. Nike’s “Just Do It” or McDonald’s “I’m lovin’ it” are great examples of direct, clear marketing that everyone understands and connects with. I want you to remember, marketing gold doesn’t happen with the first iteration (usually). If you have a once-in-a-lifetime moment of inspiration, that’s awesome! But, the reality is you will work through iterations until you have something effective.

This guide isn’t about one-offs either. You’re developing skills that help build a process that’s effective and repeatable. My goal is to provide you with the strategies and techniques for you to craft wonderful copy that resonates with your customers.

Dissecting the discovered psychological triggers

During your research and interviews, you discovered plenty of emotions. Humans are ruled by emotions whether it’s what we like to hear or not. Before there were schools of logic, we relied on our emotions to survive. While that’s not our life now, this instinct is in our DNA.

As Calne said, emotion is the driver for action and reason leads to a conclusion. You’re not in the conclusion business. I’ve come to many conclusions in my life that never required me to take action. It’s the difference between a need and a “nice to have.” Your marketing copy must spark emotion, trigger the need, and force action.

Have you ever looked at a picture and realized how nice the frame is? I know I have. The same thought applies to framing the customer’s emotions in regard to decision making. Cheryl Strauss Einhorn, CEO of Decisive and bestselling author, calls them emotional bookends. They provide the guardrails for your marketing journey. As Einhorn writes,

"The process is as simple as taking the time to identify 1) the emotions you feel as you face your decision, and 2) the emotions you want to feel as you’re looking at your decision in the rearview mirror. What do you see? How is your life better for a satisfying decision outcome?"

Using the information you gathered, emotional bookends guide the emotional transformation you want your customers to achieve. As much as this can be applied to your own decision making, you need to really visualize how your customer’s life will be better and how your marketing will achieve that. By applying these guardrails, all your messaging should stay within them.

Once you establish the emotional bookends, you need to consider exactly how emotion can influence their actions. Psychology and business researchers Jennifer S. Lerner, Ye Li, Piercarlo Valdesolo, and Karim S. Kassam wrote a paper about emotions and decision making identifying eight different themes to emotion and decision making. “Emotions shaping decisions via Goal Activation” is the best strategy to apply to the marketing Hero’s journey. During their research, they said, “...emotions serve an adaptive coordination role, triggering a set of responses (physiological, behavioral, experiential, and communication) that enable individuals to address encountered problems or opportunities quickly.”

This is the result you want by triggering their emotional response. You want the customer to act quickly because the longer they debate, the less likely they become to act. The second emotional bookend is the goal so your marketing should provide the customer with urgency to alleviate their negative emotions and embrace the positives of victory.

To accomplish the customer’s transformation, create an emotional journey map. Emotional journey mapping involves understanding customer behaviors, preferences, and pain points, and identifying their actions, touchpoints, thoughts, and emotions for each stage of the journey.

Consider an emotional journey map the outline for your copywriting. Across the marketing hero’s journey, there will be different emotions at different points. By creating an emotional map based on your research phase and your personal experience, you can create connection pathways to the most powerful emotion in that moment.

These five steps will provide an emotional journey map:

Define the activity. Choose what activity you want to map, such as a customer's experience searching for a solution via web search, social media, etc.
Create customer mindset personas. Identify your customer’s mindset, such as goals and objections, at each stage of their journey in order to tailor your copywriting for maximum impact. Also, there might be more than one mindset for your “ideal” customer which might require crafting multiple personas.
Define objectives. Set clear goals for this stage of the journey. What do you want them to do next? Is it getting them to your landing page? Scroll down the page? Take action? By defining your objectives for them, you are able to write copy with a clear purpose.
Analyze the objectives. Based on your customer research, analyze your customer’s known objectives. Take your data and identify the stages where they could experience highs or lows so you can nail your role as the Advisor. Like any great advisor or coach, you should be prepared to guide them towards the sun or help pull them back from the edge of an abyss, before they even know they need it.
Describe actions and emotions. For each stage, describe the customer’s feelings and their most likely actions. You can utilize your customer research to form these assumptions. You need to craft targeted messaging to either reinforce their actions by confirming their emotion or influence them to take the action you know is best using an opposing emotion.

Taking the time to create an emotional journey map for each stage will save you effort and time once you start crafting marketing messages. Each section will have different requirements, but understanding the transitions along the journey, and planning for them, will significantly increase your marketing campaign’s cohesiveness.

It’s time to start working on your marketing messaging from first contact with the unlikely hero to their victory (transforming from audience member to customer).

Craft resonant marketing messages

Everything operates at a frequency. The universe is full of them. Some resonate with you, some don’t, but you’re drafting marketing that needs to resonate with your audience. The best writing, marketing or not, has the ability to evoke images, memories, and emotions. This is the heart of resonant marketing messaging.

There are three essential components to crafting resonant marketing messages. These components are guardrails. They aren’t the execution, which comes later, but the building blocks that guide all your marketing copy. The components are integrating emotional triggers, the constant presence of the hero, and bold statements.

If you don’t utilize these components, your marketing concepts lose their emotional resonance and take you back to square one. The constant presence of emotional triggers and the hero boosts the resonance of your messaging.

Let’s take a look at Beyond the States, an online service that provides all the necessary details about attending college, in English, in Europe. College is a daunting task, and I’m only talking about admissions. However, it’s a milestone many people, and their families, go through. In America, there are over 11.5 million full time college students. They all had to apply to universities (usually multiple), write entrance essays, take the ACT/SAT, plan for tuition costs, new living arrangements… the list goes on.

This is an emotional process for students and family, but let’s focus on the parents. There’s excitement, anxiety, frustration, and, hopefully, elation at the end. Beyond the States ensures their copy highlights one (or more) of the emotions associated with this process. Perhaps, one of the strongest parental emotions is the fear their kid won’t come back. Their kid is taking a big step towards independence and that’s very complex for a parent because they want what’s best while naturally worrying too.

These are great emotional triggers for the company to focus on because it’s consistent and supersedes all demographics, especially economical standing. Using these triggers, the next component is the constant presence of the hero. The parents are undertaking their own hero’s journey. While they might feel like an advisor for their kid, they are a hero too. They’re not taking on the physical journey, but their emotional journey is robust and challenging.

Beyond the States’ copy on their website provides solutions to their questions and eases their concerns as they scroll down the page. They never take their focus off the reader or stray away from hero-focused content, whether it’s copy or images.

The constant presence of the hero needs to be paired with bold and relevant marketing copy. As we work through the guide, you’ll learn more about crafting it. For Beyond the States, their landing page, has bold, relevant, emotional triggering copy immediately with the line, “Let’s find your dream school together.” The student’s dream influences the parent’s dream: wanting what’s best for their kid.

This is the broad satellite view. From this point, you will slowly refine your marketing copy through storytelling principles, copywriting skills and structure, emotion in copywriting, and your landing page layout.

Storytelling Principles

You don’t have hundreds of pages to tell a story. You have however long your marketing can hold their attention and inspire them to victory. To put it bluntly, not long at all. This makes your ability to tell a story critical.

We’ve discussed the hero’s journey, but now is the time to articulate that journey. There are crucial elements to good storytelling. The difference between an ad campaign and a story is the ability to personally connect with your audience.

The Moth storytelling competitions are the gold standard for storytelling. Storytellers show up and have seven minutes to tell a story. Matthew Dicks, New York Times bestselling author, 36-time Moth StorySLAM champion and 5-time GrandSLAM champion, said, “The simplest stories about the smallest moments in our lives are often the most compelling.”

There is the foundation for your storytelling. The most grand stories with unreal circumstances are great tales for a bar or barbecue, but they’re not relatable. When you determine the story for your marketing, make it the most personal and relatable theme because that will resonate with your customers.

In addition to a personal touch, there are qualities to great storytelling, such as structure, the opening, and establishing emotional connections. When telling a story there is a lot to consider and, in some cases, you might not be able to put a check next to all the criteria. That’s okay. While I’m providing you with the tools, only you can determine which tools are right for your marketing story.

As Winston Churchill famously said, “Perfection is the enemy of progress.” Don’t get wrapped up in perfection. Just like The Moth storytellers, this is a process and if you wait for “perfect” you’ll never move forward. Don’t fall into this trap. Marketing is constantly evolving and won't ever be “done.” The more you work at it, the more you will build strong and impactful storytelling.

The tools are categorized according to audience, emotion, and storytelling fundamentals. As you write your marketing copy, these are the principles you need to incorporate.

Audience

Your audience is everything. In marketing, you build profiles of your ideal customers to tailor your marketing to the audience you want to reach. In storytelling, there are vital audience principles to remember that minimize fatal errors.

Respect your audience. Your audience is smart. If you don’t think so, that says more about you than them. Your storytelling should anticipate their intelligence. Remember, the audience has a problem and are hunting for a solution. While we know emotion drives action, there’s still logic and reason involved in the process. Do not try to be overly clever with your copywriting because your audience is intelligent. Your storytelling should be a smart, punchy, obvious solution to their problem. If you’re struggling between clarity and cleverness, always choose clarity.

Embolden their dreams. Make the seemingly impossible, be possible. Reassure them they’re capable of solving their problem and achieving their dream. No matter your industry or product, you are the one that can solve their problem which will feel like victory. Your story needs to provide this level of inspiration.

Alleviate their fears. What’s your audience’s biggest fear? Everyone has fears. During the research phase, you will uncover fears that paralyzed them from taking action. Remember, humans want to know they’re not alone so by addressing their fears, you’re providing evidence that fear is normal, can be conquered, and you understand them.

Account for failures. This might not be the customer’s first time attempting to solve their problem. Perhaps they’ve tried other solutions and none of them worked. Your story needs to recognize failures as part of the process and, in some cases, necessary. This is where experience comes from. Your story can reframe their setbacks as part of the journey and important for their growth..

Be their ally. You're always on their side. You see them. You understand them. You will see this through with them. No matter what’s happened before, they can count on you to vanquish any villains while cheering them on to victory.

Emotion

Authenticity. As far as importance, emotional authenticity is top of the list. If your audience feels any inauthenticity in your story, it’s over. They’re great at knowing when something doesn’t pass the sniff test. If you try to manufacture emotional authenticity, your story will feel contrived and, ultimately, will fail. Don’t go looking for emotions that aren’t there, even if you think they’ll fit your narrative better. Only operate from the known emotions you’ve encountered and discovered during your research.

Connection. Star crossed lovers being emotionally connected across time and space is a successful storytelling trope because it focuses on connection. Your story needs this same level of connection with your audience. This connection is the heartbeat of your story. The emotional connection draws in your audience and they become emotionally invested. They care about what happens because they feel a kinship with them. A great marketing story evokes the audience to care and connect because they see themselves in the hero.

Universal and personal experiences. Universal human experiences are personal experiences too. There are certain experiences everyone relates to, such as falling in love, finding success, enduring loss, withstanding pain, money, and aesthetics. You need to identify the universal personal experience that resonates best with your audience. Powerful storytelling requires your personal experience in relation to a universal experience.

Relatable. The hero of your marketing campaign needs to be relatable. The audience won’t relate if they can’t see some part of themself in the main character. Don’t shy away from flaws, fears, or failures. These are details that speak to the unlikely heroes in your audience that dream of change and victory.

Storytelling Fundamentals

An obvious and relatable goal. Don’t leave your audience guessing about the goal. This is true in storytelling, but extremely important in marketing. Your marketing should make the goal obvious and relatable. If the audience doesn’t know what the goal is, they’ll quickly move on. There is no amount of flash or word play that can cover for an unclear or unrelatable goal.

It’s an adventure. Have you ever been bored with an adventure? No! Stories are about the journey, but the journey shouldn’t be droll or predictable, even with an obvious goal. However, the story should elicit excitement, no matter what the other emotions are. Every unlikely hero wants an adventure and you need to provide it.

An impressionable opening. “You never get a second chance to make a first impression.” Famous words that could be attributed to Oscar Wilde, Will Rogers or Andrew Grant, but regardless of which person said it, it’s an immutable law in storytelling, like gravity in the physical world. First impressions ultimately decide whether the audience will become your next customer. Your story is an adventure and it needs to grab their attention. You can’t convert if you can’t get them interested. The opening is your best, and perhaps only, chance to grab their attention.

Momentum. Narrative momentum keeps the audience rolling forward toward your intended call to action. This shouldn’t feel choppy or disjointed. Internal conflict is a driver of momentum because it’s relatable and the story strikes on a deep seeded emotional level.

Details. You can never overlook the details. The more vivid the details, the more real the marketing story will feel. We don’t know it, but when little details are added, like a coffee cup on an otherwise empty counter, those details make things more relatable. It’s not about the details of the product, but the details of the story.

A Final Principle

Know when to break the rules. Yes, all the principles before this are great. They can help make your story stronger or more refined, but in the end, you’re the storyteller. If there’s a story you want to tell and it doesn’t match all the criteria (or even most of it), tell it.

As the hero of your own story, there are times when you need to break the rules. Great art doesn’t always follow the rules. Some of the most memorable marketing campaigns didn’t adhere to the old ways. There is evolution. While I highly recommend using the emotion and storytelling principles, I also believe in trying new things too.

Copywriting Skills and Structure

Copywriting is a skill. If you don’t practice, you won’t improve. The most successful people with clear talent have worked for their success. We rarely see the hours toiling away honing their craft. As H. Brown Jackson Jr. eloquently said,

To fully realize your potential as a copywriter, you need to study the discipline. Yes, I know you’re an entrepreneur and problem solver, but this skill can only be developed through focused effort on building your skills.

Luckily, copywriting isn’t the same as writing. You don’t have to go in depth into all the nuances of language and structure that writing a novel, magazine article, or newspaper editorial requires. Those require different skills, more words, and an invested audience.

As a copywriter, you need to develop skills that help you achieve the four C’s of copywriting: clear, concise, compelling, and credible. Let’s focus on the skills needed to write effective and impactful copy!

Easily skimmable copy. According to a Harris Interactive poll, 67% of people skim online news and 81% don’t read it. Your formatting matters! All of your marketing copy needs to be easy to scan because science shows people will scan an article, website, or review looking for keywords that matter to them.

Keeping the copy skimmable means avoiding long paragraphs of text, especially on your website. Even if you have the most engaging copy, if it’s tough to find the information or pick out the vital calls to action, you’ll find it difficult to convert customers.

Use a direct voice. Nothing adds words or confusion like the passive voice. The passive voice doesn’t sound as confident as the direct voice. Being passive can easily be interpreted by the audience as a lack of confidence which immediately affects your credibility. Here’s a simple example:

Passive: It’s better if you try your best to never use the passive voice.
Direct: Never use the passive voice!

Feel the difference?

Kill the comma. You’re not writing long complex sentences. Honestly, any list you use on your website or blog, should be bulleted for quick scanning. Commas are for writers who think being more complicated is clever. Your goal is clarity. Regular comma use is the antithesis of copywriting. By killing the comma, you eliminate opportunities for the passive voice.

Minimize adjectives. You’ll need descriptors, but you don’t need fantastical, fancy, flowery ones. Do you see what I mean? While you need potent descriptors that punch up your copy, you’re not Fydor Dostevsky and require three for every instance. Choose the adjective best poised to strike the emotion you’re targeting. This is a process of elimination, but you will feel when you’ve found the right adjective.

Edit. Edit. Edit. You’re always improving on what you wrote. The first draft is simply that, the beginning. Like sandpaper smooths rough edges, your eraser (or delete key) can transform a rough idea into a copywriting masterpiece. Don’t get attached to an idea or word combination. Every extra word you erase, the easier it is for your audience to know your value.

The snowball effect. Like a snowball that runs downhill that grows in size and strength, your copy does the same. Every line you write keeps the audience’s attention and momentum towards your call to action. While creativity is great, your ultimate goal is selling your solution for the hero to achieve victory. You care about truly helping each customer, but the truth is you are a salesperson. Your ultimate goal is selling.

Don’t embellish. There are obvious advantages to your solution so stick with the facts. There’s no need to embellish and make overly bold claims. The truth is compelling and feels different from an exaggeration when you read it. You don’t want your customer to see you as a snake oil salesman, promising the world and delivering none of it.

For example, don’t use the hyped words you often encounter on website landing pages. You know the words. Businesses use them and they don’t feel remotely authentic. Words like supercharge, unleash, unlock, enhance, etc. Just reading that list, it doesn’t feel like words anyone authentically uses. They feel like an embellished sales tactic.

These are the technical aspects of copywriting. This is part of the equation. The other part is your ability to properly convey emotion ensuring connection with the audience.

Emotion in Copywriting

Let your personality shine. Authenticity is the most important currency in today’s world. If you’re inauthentic, people know and won’t trust you. Don’t hide yourself. Remember, your brand is you. Let the little quirks come through, especially in your storytelling.

Your personal stories are more important than any list of your solution’s features or benefits. We remember great stories, but not when they lack personality. When you hear a heartfelt story from a charismatic person, you’ll always be able to recall more details because of your connection to that memory. The opposite side of the coin is a dull, emotionless, fact driven story which you instantaneously forget once the moment is over.

Your personality needs to shine in your story telling so even if the moment isn’t right for the customer to buy, they’ll always remember you which means they are more likely to answer your call to action in the future.

Write like you talk. This is counterintuitive to most writing. The way we talk can be problematic when transferred to the page. However, by writing the way you talk, there’s an authenticity that your audience will connect with. Your brand will feel real with thoughtful, empathetic people at the helm. Make your copy casual and conversational.

Conviction. This attracts the right people. Your conviction eliminates the “fence sitters.” You’re not interested in people that identify with “maybe” in most of their life. Your conviction will speak to people that can’t imagine not changing. If your conviction makes them nervous, they’re not your audience. You want unlikely heroes that see your message as a beacon to follow.

Sir Ernest Shackleton did this when he put out an advertisement for men to join his expedition to Antarctica. His survival and his men’s survival required a shared conviction which comes through loud and clear in his advertisement:

“Men wanted for hazardous journey. Low wages, bitter cold, long hours of complete darkness. Safe return doubtful. In event of success, honour and recognition.”

Your conviction either inspires action or doubt. Be unwavering in your conviction and the unlikely heroes’ ready for action will follow.

Your customer cares about themself. This isn’t a bad thing. They should care most about themself and their needs, wants, goals, and dreams. Honestly, I’d be concerned if they didn't. It’s extremely important to highlight what you can do for them! It’s not about what you can do in general, but specifically what you’re going to do to improve their life. If they can’t discern that from your copy, you have no chance to convert them.

The best example is the original iPod. This was one of the world’s first portable digital media players. However, even if Apple claimed to be first, why should the customer care? What does that do for them? Apple drove demand because every person could see how awesome it was to have “1,000 songs in your pocket.” There were a lot of digital media players in the beginning and I can’t remember another brand or device. There’s no better lesson than that.

Copywriting = speed dating. Copywriting is speed dating on overdrive. At least in speed dating, the other person has to sit with you for a dedicated amount of time. In marketing, you’re not guaranteed any amount of time which makes your first line crucial! Your first line needs to connect instantaneously. You’re not guaranteed more than a few seconds on social media and, on average, people might spend 30 seconds looking at your website.

Make your product interesting in six words (or less) or lead with the benefit that has the greatest impact on their life. If they don’t connect with your first line, they’re not going to read anything after that.

Challenge them. Using direct voice and conviction, challenge commonly held assumptions. Create some conflict.

If there’s a hint of conflict, two things can happen. First, they agree with you which means you’re one of them. Win!
Or, they disagree, think you don’t know what you’re talking about, and want to poke holes in your claims. Win again!

In either circumstance, they’re likely to push beyond the first line which means your snowball has a chance to be an avalanche.

Last copywriting strategy

There is no universal approach. You just learned (and reviewed) a lot of copywriting strategy, but there is no one size fits all approach. Every customer is different. What might resonate with one person, won’t resonate with another.

Your strategy is to connect with people like yourself and the customers you engaged with during the research phase. This takes time and patience. There will be many iterations. Honestly, there’s clever marketing out there that doesn’t convert customers while, simultaneously, marketing that converts a lot of people and doesn’t seem to be all that special.

This sounds discouraging, but I tell you this so you’re not afraid of trying different campaigns. Use these tools to ensure that your copy and marketing stay true to your intentions. In the end, I know you’ll be successful and connect with the right audience!

Landing Pages: Modern Storytelling

The website landing page is modern storytelling. This is where all copywriting storytelling, skills, structure, and principles are on display.

Your landing page is the center of your marketing and copy. Your other ads are focused on getting them here. A properly written and structured landing page is where the full Hero’s journey can be traveled, ending with their conversion from audience to customer.

Have you ever gone to a landing page and felt claustrophobic, like you were being closed in on all sides with text, images, and graphics? How about a webpage that made you feel like you needed a compass and codex to determine what the point was or how to buy? Or my least favorite landing page, where only certain parts work and they repeat the same lines over and over again? It’s a painful virtual ground hog’s day!

You are going to avoid all those mistakes. In this section, you will learn the structure and vital components for a successful landing page.

Structure: Hero’s Journey

Your landing page shouldn’t feel like a splattering of facts and aggressive “buy now” buttons. You aren’t using the full potential of your landing page if you do not provide the audience with an adventurous journey.

According to Forbes, there are 1.09 billion websites on the internet and 252,000 new websites created every day. The customer has a lot of options, but, based on my experience, the majority of sites, especially small and new businesses, don’t tell a story.

The moment your landing page opens on a customer’s device, your goal is to get them to scroll down. They need to feel compelled to see what’s just over the horizon (bottom of the page). This requires the proper implementation of the hero’s journey.

The Hero’s journey breaks the landing page into sections, like chapters in a book. This is the sequence for the landing page:

Identifying the Unlikely Hero
The Hero’s dilemma/problem
Establish yourself as The Adviser
Provide them with your Roadmap
Call to action
Help them avoid obstacles and failures
Victory!

To accomplish your goal, there are elements you must use throughout your page and are critical to your success. Before we build the landing page story, let’s hone these vital elements.

Crucial Landing Page Elements

Headlines

Headlines are the only copy that will absolutely be read by everyone. We live in a world of scanners, not readers. Most site visitors will briefly interact with your page. As headlines are usually bigger and bolder text, they could be the limit of your audience’s interaction.

The importance of employing different headlines in the right sections is strategically imperative to success. You can’t use the same headline for each section of your landing page. Think about each section headline as an arrow that indicates where the hero goes next on the path to victory.

There are three ways to write headlines: explaining what you do, hooks, and owning your niche.

Explain what you do

This is an excellent headline type when your product is unique. The challenge is doing so in the simplest way while adhering to the copywriting principles in this guide, like direct voice, being concise, etc.

When writing these headlines, consider you have five seconds (or less) to tell the customer everything that’s unique and valuable about your product. If you can’t say the line in five seconds, it can’t be read in 5 seconds, which means it’s too long and not concise enough.

The Nielsen Norman Group has four important criteria for writing a headline that converts. The four criteria are:

Make sure the headline works out of context.
Tell the readers something useful
Don’t succumb to cute or faddish vocabulary.
Omit nonessential words.

It’s important the headline doesn’t require a lot of context or backstory to understand. They might not read the description that follows the headline. Have you ever noticed how quickly people scroll on their smartphone? There’s the likelihood that your audience will simply skip down your page from headline to headline. Does the story make sense this way? Do they really understand the benefits?

Language is always evolving. The Global Language Monitor estimates that in the modern world a new word is created every 98 minutes and an estimated 800 to 1,000 new words are added to English language dictionaries every year (in the 20th century alone, more than 90,000 words have been added). Not all those words will be in common usage. The English language comprises 170,000 words. There are thousands that weren’t common already. Using the newest or faddish vocabulary can also isolate potential customers. Stick to tried and true words that are the foundation of language.

Nonessential words in a headline is the equivalent to dying by a thousand tiny cuts. You’ll think your headline is good, and it might be, but your conversion rate from visitors to customers will be abysmal. If you’re having a conversion problem, don’t doubt yourself or your product, but look at whether your headline is too long or ambiguous.

Here are three “Explain what you do” headline examples:

Quantum - Coffee-Infused Energy Bars
Muzzle -Silence embarrassing notifications while screen-sharing
Fast - One click. No passwords. The world's fastest checkout.

Hooks

Okay, the truth is most products aren’t unique. In fairness, most problems aren’t either. In competitive markets, there are a plethora of competing solutions which is why your copywriting is the difference maker.

Hook headlines are the solution when this is your reality. This grabs your audience’s attention because it speaks to a customer’s objection and highlights your value.

It’s a simple formula: Hook = Objection + Value

The key to the hook is simplicity. For the biggest impact, start with your product’s biggest values. The objection is what they identify with, but your value is what keeps them scrolling down the page. Here are some examples:

Customer Objection:

I suck at SEO.
It’s hard to do well on the SAT.
I don’t want people to know I have erectile dysfunction (ED).

Business Value:

Rank higher on Google.
Ace the SAT.
ED pills online.

Hook:

You don’t have to be a SEO pro to rank higher on Google.
Ace the SAT with just 10 minutes a day.
No pharmacy visits, ED pills delivered to your home.

Own your Niche

Can you summarize what you stand for in one line? If someone stopped you on the street, could you succinctly describe your business, its benefits, and why they should be interested in seconds?

This is owning your niche. One line that tells everyone what you do and why they need you. This is a bold identity statement. There is no room for ambiguity, passive voice, or doubt (especially the last one).

I consider this headline the cure to imposter syndrome. It’s normal to have a little bit of imposter syndrome when you’re launching something new, even if you really believe in it. When you’re in this space, it’s challenging to get others to strongly believe too. When you truly, and confidently, own your niche, this headline style is your bold shout for the audience to follow you!

This headline style requires lots of editing. Don’t worry about getting it right the first time. There are going to be a lot of drafts. The first draft should have everything you want to say in it. After that, it’s editing and finding if there’s one word that can replace two. Once refined, verify it’s relatable and understandable without amplifying context. Here are a few examples:

Privy - How Small Brands Sell More Online
Basecamp - The All-In-One Toolkit For Working Remotely
Descript - It's How You Make a Podcast
SparkLoop - The Referral Tool for Newsletters

Descriptions

The amplifying, critical information that immediately follows the headline. The most immediate and impactful information must be here.

Have you read a headline and then struggled to find useful information on the page? It’s a real bummer! Even if your product is the solution, this misstep could encourage the customer to look elsewhere.

The description must be a value statement. Read that again, aloud. Your value needs to be irrefutable in the description. Let’s look at some examples:

Brand: PRIVY
Headline: How small brands sell more online
Description: Privy's conversion, email marketing, and text messaging tools help you get more customers from your traffic.

Privy’s headline tells the customer what they do. When you read that headline, the immediate response is “How?” Their description anticipates the question and immediately shows their value. Privy’s tools will help you convert more traffic into customers. Perfect!

Brand: DORMIO
Headline: Your most restful sleep is just a sip away
Description: Calming teas that help you relax, unwind, and drift into a deep, restorative sleep.

They hook their customers based on their need (restful sleep) and offer the simplest solution: a sip. The immediate follow-up question, “A sip of what?” Their description is infused with words around their tea (the solution) that equate to restful sleep. Win!

Brand: E-Learning SAP
Headline: Ace the SAT with just 10-minutes of studying a day
Description: 10-min micro-lessons designed to boost confidence and make SAT strategies easy to remember.

If I read that headline without their description, I’d call BS. However, with the included description, the headline feels achievable. By providing the method, micro-lessons and easy to remember test taking strategies, the headline is a bold, believable statement. Nailed it!

Without a well-executed description, the headline might not make sense or feel attainable. Yes, the headline is meant to grab the customer’s attention, but well written descriptions boost the chance of conversion from reader to customer.

Social Proof

Abraham Lincoln probably never imagined the connectivity of the modern world, but he knew people. The simple truth is, you're a business trying to sell a product. As personable as you can be, customers will always have a degree of skepticism. While your marketing might speak to them or your product seems like the exact solution they need, there is usually an underlying feeling that it’s “too good to be true” or “ there’s a catch.”

Social proof is the credibility boost you need. When the audience can see that you’ve received reviews by real people or experts, they’re more open to the solution. If there’s no social proof, how does a customer know you are genuine? How can they trust you?

Social proof is verification in an unverified world. There is no website or marketing police that fact checks every claim on every website. The more social proof a company has, the greater their credibility. As Honest Abe Lincoln said, “With it, nothing can fail. Without it, nothing can succeed.”

Here are a few examples:

Brand: Privy
Headline: How Small Brands Sell More Online
Social proof: 18,000+ Reviews. The most reviewed platform on Shopify

Privy’s headline makes a bold claim. Even with their description in the previous section, how do you know those tools work? Enter social proof, which Privy has a Himalayan mountain of. Over 18,000 customers were so impressed they reviewed the platform. There’s no way to read all 18,000 reviews, but you can easily extrapolate that the reviews aren’t negative because if they were, the brand wouldn’t still exist!

Brand: Email Software
Headline: Email's new heyday
Social Proof:

GEAR PATROL - Best New Tech Products of 2020
POPULAR SCIENCE - 100 Greatest Innovations of 2020

This is professional grade social proof. Two well-known, well-established publications provided their reviews and they were amazing! When you can make lists that speak to “best” or “greatest,” you have social proof kevlar! Publications would never risk their credibility in the eyes of their audience which means there is zero doubt in the value of your solution.

Product: Podcast launching software
Headline: A proven framework for launching your health podcast
Social Proof: In 2020, we've helped 258 podcasts rack up 17,679,124 downloads

Hard data that can be verified. Social proof that can be fact checked. There’s a specific reassurance that comes from numbers. Without those numbers as proof, the headline doesn’t have any credibility and feels like a generic claim. With the numbers, the platform seems like a no brainer!

Social proof, in all its forms, is the verified check mark in a skeptical world. The more social proof your landing page can include, the stronger of an investment you are to the audience and the more likely you convert them to customers.

Call to Action (CTA) Button

All your marketing and copywriting is ultimately about the customer taking action, the hero achieving victory. When should that happen? Where on the landing page should you prompt them?

The Call to Action button should be in several places on your landing page. There is no way to determine when the hero will decide to take action, which means providing them ample opportunities along the journey.

There are four criteria to writing a CTA:

Keep it simple.
Use action verbs.
Create a sense of urgency.
Be creative.

Simple criteria. You want to urge action and force the customer to not overthink the process. Every CTA you write, does it meet this criteria? The last criteria “Be creative” speaks more to injecting your personality, voice or humor into the CTA, not trying to be creative in your wording or placement (again, choose clarity over cleverness).

I know you’re familiar with CTAs on websites because, like me, you’re a consumer too. However, not all CTAs are the same. While you continue to prompt the reader to take action, there are different emotional “buttons” you can push to drive action. These are the four CTA button types:

Match the feeling
Handle the objection
Actionable next step with value
Make it specific

1. Match the feeling

A simple call to act on their feelings. Of the four types, this requires the most creativity while demonstrating an intimate understanding of your customer’s needs. I think this is the most emotionally driven CTA button, making it a powerful driver action!

Make a list of feelings associated with the problem you solve, the happy feelings associated with the solution, add in the four CTA writing criteria, and make something unique. There is no wrong answer. Your landing page will have multiple CTA buttons so feel free to express yourself and experiment with this style. These examples trigger very different feelings, but are equally powerful:

“I want to drink wine on the balcony”
“I tried, I'm stuck, I need help”

2. Handle the objection

The CTA is a sales pitch and, with any pitch, there will be objections. Emotionally they might be ready for action, but their logic creates resistance. Instead of fueling the resistance, take it head on!

The most common customer objections usually center on money and time, resources that are finite and often triggering. Don’t leave the customer hanging to determine if this is going to cost them a lot of both. Address their objections directly in the CTA. Here are some examples:

Original CTA: Start Free!
Customer Objection: I bet it asks for my credit card.
Improved CTA: Start Free! No CC Required.

Original CTA: Try Prisma
Customer Objection: I don't have time.
Improved CTA: Try Prisma in 5 minutes

Original CTA: Get started
Customer Objection: I bet this is expensive.
Improved CTA: Get started for $1

Each example clearly addresses the customer’s objections. The improved CTA still has the sense of urgency and action while providing reassurance. This is a simple change that will immediately make action feel safer and more accessible.

3. Actionable Next Step with Value

What’s more important, the action or the value? Why not emphasize both?!

CTA buttons that highlight value over action usually perform better because the customer isn’t focused on the action as much as the value they’re getting. This isn’t to trick them either. They have to take action to access the value, it’s really that simple. When writing this CTA, focus on fulfilling the promises in your headlines, descriptions, and other copy, more than the action.

The following are CTA examples that reinforce the product’s value and invites action.

Headline: Record podcasts in studio quality!
CTA: Start recording

Headline: Learn why users leave your site
CTA: See my heatmap

The focus is the value. The action, in regards to selling, isn’t highlighted which squarely keeps the focus on the customer’s journey. It’s a subtle difference from other CTAs, but when placed appropriately alongside headlines and descriptions, it’s incredibly potent.

4. Make it specific

This is the no BS CTA. Everything the customer needs to know is right there in the button. Other CTAs can still feel ambiguous (slightly) which creates customer hesitation. This is the call to action you can’t misinterpret. This CTA is the New Yorker on the street that’s in your face and without hesitation telling you everything you need to know (or whatever they think you do).

There are places on your landing page where you need a very direct CTA. At the end of the day, the customer needs something and you want to sell them something. While we don’t always come across that directly, it’s the underlying truth of all business. And you know what?

Both sides know it!

Instead of making them wonder about clicking a button, tell them exactly what clicking that button will do for them. It’s as easy as:

“Start a 7-day trial for $7”
“Take a Two-Minute Tour”

After all this copy, there’s one last vital component to your landing page. Frankly, you need to get this right because a page full of wonderful copy is unlikely to keep anyone’s attention, unless they’re a logophile, without breathtaking images to partner with.

Recommended Creative

Ever wonder why kids story books have lots of pictures and adult fiction books don’t? It’s crazy how at some point in our lives we transition from pictures and text to predominantly text. Well, your landing page needs pictures, graphics, infographics, product photos, and other media to accompany your copy.

While words are powerful drivers of action, a picture is still worth a thousand words. Well, if it’s the right picture. This isn’t the bulletin board at your local yoga studio where a bunch of flyers, business cards, and pictures get slapped up in a haphazard, indiscernible way.

Your creative needs to compliment your copy. The creative should make your product’s value obvious, especially when matched with an associated headline and description. You can’t assume that every person that visits your landing page will read every word (remember, we live in a world of skimmers). When you include strong creative elements with your copy, you’re significantly increasing your chances for conversion.

Start by showing off your product in all its glory! Beyond just the product, photos of customers using the product are excellent inclusions too! Any creative that showcases the product and its benefits. These should be dispersed along your landing page in the appropriate sections to provide visual reinforcement. Too much standalone text can cause a visitor to skip that section, miss important information, or lose interest altogether.

If your messaging needs it, don’t shy away from infographics, simple charts, or a product photo with featured highlights. These can all play an important role in the marketing hero’s journey on your landing page. These shouldn’t be complicated, but simple graphics that highlight the most important points to the customer. This is a great place to create a visualization based on gathered social proof.

I recommend utilizing a professional photographer or AI generative platform for creative work. In both cases, you need to consider elements, such as pose, setting, style, angle, color scheme, etc. This can seem overwhelming, but the more details you can provide to a professional photographer or AI platform, the better they will be able to execute your vision.

There are costs associated with this work, but luckily there is an army of freelance digital creators across the internet at your disposal. (Note: I recommend conducting a search to see which are the best platforms for freelancers. Any information I include could be outdated by time of publication and I don’t want to waste your time.)

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