What The Future of Web Content Writing Looks Like

Conventional wisdom on web content writing ten years ago was to “stuff as many keywords into your copy” and the reader be damned.

Of course, Google’s PageRank algorithm was refined further - and so has web content writing.

We now arguably live in the age of “clickbait” - though the future of web content may look very different.

In this blog, I’ll break down emerging trends in web content writing and what the future may hold for marketers and web content writers of all stripes.

The Human Factor In Web Content Writing

We all know that AI copywriting is coming. In fact, it’s here.

However, despite our collective best efforts to replace humans with machines, we still encounter the uncanny valley. This is no more obvious in supermarkets; I’ve yet to meet one person who’s felt a connection or affinity with an automated checkout. Does anyone find a soulless voice announcing “unidentified item in the bagging area” cute or endearing?

The same will apply for content writing. There will be an upsurge in AI content - but humans are smarter. We can tell there’s no soul behind the screen - we know something is missing, even in Zoom meetings.

Authentic, thoughtful, and informative web content will always remain king; despite an army of bots invading the kingdom and threatening its throne.

Topic Authority Will Displace Keywords & Backlinking

As an SEO copywriter and web content writer, I know all about keyword relevancy. It’s how your business gets noticed on Google.

However, Google’s AI and crawlers will transition toward topical authority as a ranking tool more so than keyword relevance and backlinking. As marketing AI and machine learning expert Eduard Klein says:

When marketers talk about authority, they talk about building backlinks. This is still the case, but as google gets smarter about semantics, link relevancy will likely decrease over time. Organisations that cover a topic with the most depth will own the future traffic flow for related queries.

The remedy is to focus on long-form, well researched, and potentially peer-reviewed web content that forms the pillars of your web content writing. Having web content that is thesis-like in scope but rich in media and interactivity will be a boon to business. The “mega-skyscraper” web content will be in vogue soon.

Good Web Content Is Good User Experiences

Just having web content on a white blank page that loads slow won’t cut it any more - good web content will be part and parcel of delivering a good overall user experience across all device types - perhaps even AR and VR such as the Oculus or HTC Vive (as an owner of one, I can tell you how awful reading web content is on one of those things.)

Interactivity and other experiences that users will come back to time and again will drive the future of web content writing.

Giving Users Control Over Web Content

This means how they consume, share, and remix content - can they get the same content in video as they do as text? What about as audio, like a book on tape? Giving users the option for multi-faceted media that suits their lifestyle or consumption habits will be valuable to marketers and businesses in the future. If you’re a web content writer that only writes for web copy, be prepared to branch out into writing for podcasts and video, too.

Value-Driven Web Content Will Rise

Free eBooks about how to set up Mailchimp or the five best tips for writing about ducks in exchange for an email list sign-up won’t cut it any more. There are so many tips out there for the taking, a bit of Google-fu can give you the entire sum of knowledge in the area without signing up for anything. If you think what you are offering is an insight and you’re peddling it without cost, it’s probably not.

Gated and cards-to-the-chest web content will become extinct - providing valuable web content as your core offering will be the future that inspires the success of your business or brand. The value proposition should be immediate and obvious.

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What is Digital Marketing In 2022?

Digital marketing - we’ve all likely heard the term being bandied about in boardrooms and offices - but what is it really? Marketing is the process and art of identifying and satisfying customer needs through mass communication. Marketing has been aided by digital means since the 1960s, with mainframes crunching demographic numbers for advertising agencies. However digital marketing refers to marketing purely using media driven by digital means - the World Wide Web, hand-held computing, electronic billboards, and so on. Now that our culture is digital, our marketing is also digital. This gives marketing greater speed, accuracy, and channels to promote products and services than ever before.

Digital Marketing vs. Traditional Marketing

The biggest difference between “traditional” marketing and digital marketing is that digital marketing is often bi-directional - audiences can “talk back” to brands and companies. This can be a blessing and a curse for digital marketers, who can use the data to refine their product or service; but also means managing negative feedback and how that can effect community and sales. So what is digital marketing in 2022?

Digital Marketing Channels

Digital marketing companies will often tout they are “channel agnostic” or “omni-channel” - meaning they employ as many media (that is, carriers of messages) as possible. Digital marketing channels need not be discrete: they often overlap and complement one another. For example, let’s take a look at the web and Search Engine Optimisation first.

Search Engine Optimisation

If you are a business and have a website, the aim is to have it shown to as many people as possible to gain as much traffic and sales as possible. This is achieved by Search Engine Optimisation, as I’ve discussed in detail here. This means organising or curating your content to match what people are searching for on Search Engines so it ranks higher in relevance and above your competitors in search engine results. This organic, or non-paid traffic, means a higher return on investment over time than paying for leads or sales over and over again.

Pay Per Click Advertising

Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising has been around a long time (in computer terms) with the first ever PPC ad bought by a Silicon Valley law firm on the now defunct Global Network Navigator site as far back as September 1993.

As I wrote on my blog Crushtor.net,

“Advertising alongside search engine results pages (SERPs) became the standard in October of 2000, when Google launched its AdWords service. Companies and brands would pay for sponsored links that appear at the top of search results, bidding for the top spot using automated algorithms. When a browser clicked on the ad, the company paid for the privilege – what’s known as a “Pay Per Click” advertisement.”

By most accounts, a business can expect to earn $2 in revenue for each $1 they spend on PPC. This is further refined by using data to pinpoint where ad spend (i.e. higher quality keywords, remarketing, demographic shifts, etc.) should go to receive the maximum return on investment.

Social Media

Social media such as Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram are “no brainer” digital marketing platforms. Billions of people combined use social media every day, and deploying advertising and marketing through these channels is the reason why these channels exist in the first place. However, it also gives brands and companies opportunities to talk directly to consumers and hear their concerns - as well as the added challenge of responding to negative feedback. Social media marketing comprises Pay Per Click advertising, organic community management, and content strategy or curation.

Content Strategy

Content strategy, as I’ve outlined here, is a part of digital marketing in terms of reaching customers or audiences using text, video, moving images, audio, and other multimedia. The more strategic content a brand or company can leverage, the more it flows into SEO, social media, and other aspects of digital marketing.

Email Marketing (eDM)

Email marketing or electronic Direct Mail (eDM) is a powerful tool in a digital marketer’s arsenal, allowing marketing communications to be sent to willing customers (as almost all jurisdictions forbid unsolicited eDMs - aka spam.) These customers opt-in to mailing lists to recieve special offers, tips or tricks, or affiliate offers. Sort of like my fantastic eDM, which you should definitely sign up for!

Native Advertising

Native advertising is a story or piece that’s published to a blog or online news site that’s supposed to look like normal, unbranded content - but in fact is an advertisement for a product or service. This may be disclosed as “in partnership with” or “promotional consideration by.”

Videos and Podcasting

Producing video or podcast content is fast becoming a new avenue for digital marketing, as it too is a space where digital marketers can either buy up time in various (and hopefully popular) video/podcasts for impressions or launch a video or podcast series that directly markets to consumers on their own. This has some overlap with influencer marketing.

Affiliate or Influencer Marketing

One of the more recent developments in digital marketing is using affiliates or influencers - people with a substantial following on social media - to promote products or services. This could appear as native advertising - e.g. sending your new prototype watch to a watch review channel on YouTube (my favourites being The Urban Gentry and Just One More Watch) or paid advertising such as sponsored posts. Affiliates get a commission for each sale they make, usually through partner programs as run by Amazon.

Using Data Driven Marketing

One of the major differences between digital and traditional marketing is the data this type of marketing generates. Clicks, page views, bounce rates, interaction rates, demographic information - is all harvested through various applications such as Google Analytics, Google Search Consoles, or Customer Relationship Management software (CRM.) This helps marketers identify incoming search terms, what people are looking for and tailoring content to fit, and market to specific niche segments, e.g. 18-24 year old men who enjoy watching football and eating chocolate ice-cream (yes, it can get that granular!)

Does my business need Digital Marketing?

In short: yes. If you want to reach customers, create a community, and sell to a wider audience, your business absolutely must employ some measure of digital marketing. “Building it and the audience will come” is relying on hope and prayer to ensure business success. Holistic and sustained digital marketing campaigns help your business not only survive in the online marketplace, but thrive and grow into the long term.

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Do you need help with your digital marketing and copywriting in Melbourne? Contact me today!

How To Write A Content Strategy For 2022

In business, you have to have a plan. Because in business, we all have goals to hit. Writing content for your website should also have plan – and a goal. When it comes to content, you should be strategic about it. Having a long-term plan informed by real intelligence which exists to achieve a chosen objective doesn’t just work for armies and business, it works for your marketing. Though some people feel that marketing and content writing is a creative endeavour, the framework that your content sits on must have some kind of strategic direction.

So how do you write a content strategy, even if you’ve never written one before in 2022?

Start With The Broad View – Why Are We Making Content?

A strategy needs a broad goal: do I want to increase page views? Do I want to expand my social media following? Do I want to sell more products? What is the point of my content, and how – in an ideal sense – will my content get me to where my business going?

What Your Content Needs to Achieve

Your content should be linked to a goal – a SMART goal, or a Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Time-Limited goal. This could be summed up in a sentence or a statement: “To become the premier resource on novelty straws within five years.” Then the objectives sit underneath that – “To gain 100,000 page views for my novelty straw content within three months,” or “Rank on the first page of Google for ‘novelty straws’ by the end of 2023.” If you need help setting marketing goals, Neil Patel has some great quotes about goal setting by some leading marketing experts on his site.

Knowing Your Audience

Your content in part will be informed by your audience. Your audience is almost like a persona or character you’re pitching to – 25–34-year-old women who enjoy socialising – and naming that persona “Social Butterfly Jane.” You can determine where they are hanging out online and what other content they consume through analytics.

Using that data, you can establish a voice or tone that is authentically matched to that persona. To that end, you can read similar websites, looking for affinities with similar products or services, or doing boots-on-the-ground market research: your content has to engage your audience specifically lest you risk turning them off. When making content, just like in fiction when fleshing out character, you need to ask: “Would Jane actually enjoy this?”

Creating a Style Guide

A style guide is a must, especially if many hands are involved in the content writing project. This ensures brand consistency across all your media. This includes style such as whether you spell out numbers from one to ten; but also tone and certain words that your brand will use (or never use) as part of meeting the expectations of your audience.

Choosing Your Content Channels

This is the next part you need to weigh up – which apps is your persona or audience spending most of their attention? If you are a fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) company, a visual medium such as Instagram or Facebook works best. If you are a B2B rope company (my favourite analogy ever) then LinkedIn and EDMs would probably make more sense. Don’t just create content and shoehorn it into media and expect people to love it – tailor it for the personas you are trying to target.

Setting Up Data Collection

At this stage, you need to set up data collection and analytics. This may be Facebook Business Suite, Google Analytics, Google Search Console, and other data gathering tools. This will enable you to do keyword research, find when your most traffic is active, and other drilldowns such as already popular content. This will help you re-evaluate your strategy later on.

Intent and Creative Planning

Strategy is a byword for planning in advance to achieve a goal later. At this stage, you should have an overall plan of “attack” for your content strategy – how often you will post, where, and at what time. You should also have themes for your content – brand awareness, product highlights, community stories, insights & tips, “hard sales,” etc. This is dependent on your personas, message, and brand voice. Splitting your posts up into themes help you determine what kind of posts work best.

Generating Ideas

Staring at a blank piece of paper is far more daunting than having a topic to write about. Creativity happens within limitation – and idea generation should have the same sort of parameters. The strategy you’ve created for yourself so far should inform your ideas. What do people need to know? What will be high impact and high performance? If you’re really stuck, you can use idea generation software such as Blog About by Impact – it spits out ideas which you can run with or modify as you see fit.

Set Up a Workflow

If you’re a small business and tight on time, you need to set up a workflow from start to finish – who will come up with the creative? Who will write the copy? Who’s responsibility is it to program or schedule the posts? Make sure you delineate each task and give clear direction over who does what – it prevents “too many cooks” and also saves a lot of time and angst. Using a workflow tracking tool like Teams, Monday, or Asana can also help smooth out any potential hang-ups.

Re-Evaluate Your Content Strategy

After about three months, you need to reconvene your team and look at the data you’ve collected. What’s working? What isn’t? Are the people looking at the content still in the persona we created, or do we need to pivot? Are they clamouring for longer form content, or are they enjoying videos more? A content strategy should be a living, breathing document and process – and continuous improvement means a better return on investment!

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If you need a killer content strategy created by someone who’s done it all before and can do it all again, contact me!

Why is Copywriting Marketing Important for Your Business?

Copywriting is to the eye what a salesperson is to the ear.

What does that mean?

That if you’re in business, you need to market your product or service in order to make sales and profit.

Copywriting marketing is the art and science of enticing, engaging, and persuading people to choose your product or service over all others. Copywriting, as I’ve mentioned before, is any piece of writing that is written for the sole purpose of encouraging someone to act – buy, inquire, sign up, etc. The catch all phrase describing this is a conversion – converting a passive on-looker to an actor.

Why is copywriting marketing so important for your business? Here’s why:

A Copywriter Establishes Brand and Consistency

Have you ever seen a shop with bright flashing lights and colourful signs only to be greeted by a drab, beige, and uninspiring interior? It’s jarring – because it’s inconsistent. A brand, as the great semanticist S.I. Hayakawa once said, is a symbol of reliability – that each can labelled “Coca Cola” for example will contain refreshing, sweet, bubbly cola. One example of the product is all examples of the product. If your message is inconsistent, wishy-washy, and devoid of intent, visitors will be turned off. People need to connect with your business, and that is your brand identity. Copywriters are integral to establishing that brand and consistency for your business.

Copywritten Content Is Good For SEO

It’s all about the SEO – Search Engine Optimisation. If no one can see your site when it comes up in search engine results pages, customers will pass you by. Producing engaging and informative content that search engines find worthy and persuades customers is difficult for someone who isn’t practiced. Copywriting marketing ensures you get the best shot at ranking higher for your business’ keywords and keyword phrases, so you gain more visitors and ultimately, more conversions.

Copywriting Maximises Your Market

Copywriters are unacknowledged psychologists – like all good authors – they need to understand your target market by stepping into their skin. Just like authors or scriptwriters flesh out ‘real’ characters with solid and identifiable motivations, copywriters speak to those “avatars” or segments of your market. They need to figure out what they need, what they want, what pain points you can solve, and what will drive them to your brand above all others. This might mean an expansion of your market – and finding niche or “blue ocean” or uncontested markets you may not have considered!

Copywriting is Strategic

One blog post in isolation is fine – but a comprehensive content strategy as part of your entire digital marketing helps your business grow. Ongoing storytelling with compelling content through multiple channels such as social media, blogs, video, and other interactive web elements increases rapport and builds community with your customers. Pre-emptive crisis communication can also help smooth out times when your business falls short of the mark. Copywriters are your friend to roll on the good times – but also ride out the bad.

Copywriting Allows You To Get On With Business

Not everyone is a copywriter – and it might take a couple of years before you can call yourself one, as I’ve said here – and that’s okay! I’m no accountant (I couldn’t think of anything worse to do, no offense to my accountant friends) so I get someone to help me with my books and tax because it’s not my core business. Outsourcing your copywriting marketing to an expert is an investment in your business’ sustained growth; so why not make the most of it?

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Top Five Copywriting Trends in 2022

The great fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent once remarked that “fashions fade, but style is eternal.” There are certain trends in copywriting and digital marketing that come and go - in the 2010s, it was stuffing as many keywords into a document, the human reader be damned.

Now with refinements in PageRank, Google’s search engine results page algorithm, that’s frowned upon (and rightly so.)

As technology shifts, demand changes with it.

With that in mind, what are the top five copywriting trends that will emerge in 2022?

What are you doing, hovering? You’re ruining my flow.

Voice Search

According to SERPwatch, there are 4.2 billion digital assistants such as Google Assistant, Siri, and Alexa in use around the world - and copywriters have to learn to write how they talk (which is how it should be, according to Joel Saltzman.) Tailoring content to natural spoken language search instead of simple keyword search will become more common as voice becomes the dominant way of searching for content. That means “best bakery Melbourne” will be spoken as “OK Google, what’s the best rated bakery in Melbourne?”

AI Assisted Copywriting

Yes, the robots are taking over. AI is assisting us with pretty much everything, copywriting included. TechRadar’s roundup of the best AI copywriting assistants doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll go the way of the Dodo - AI is only as good as the algorithms it contains, the data it’s fed, and the “awareness” it has. AI writers have been used to hilarious effect to write the “perfect” Hallmark Christmas film, The Christmas on Christmas.. AI can prove useful in automating certain tasks (we’ve been using AI spell-checking since WordPerfect) but as for replacing the humble scribe? I think we’re a way off.

Podcast Scriptwriting

Podcasts are everywhere. The Joe Rogan Experience podcast is so popular, it dwarfs the viewership of major news networks. Writing scripts for podcasts, especially story driven podcasts, will increase in demand throughout 2022 and beyond. Also in demand will be researchers and editors - so it might pay to learn how to write clearly and succinctly for broadcast - and warm up those vocal cords!

Online Course Copywriting

Online courses will be how we skill up from now on. The corporate e-learning industry will be worth $50 billion USD by 2026, according to Business Wire. Online sites like Coursera, Brilliant, and Skillshare (hey, I have a course on Skillshare! Get one month free by joining here) make it easy to publish your own courses - though using ClickFunnels and software such as Kajabi, an entrepreneur can keep 100% of the profits and potentially reach millions more people. Knowing how to write for education - and in an easy to understand style - will be a boon.

Long Form Content

400 words? 800 words? 1,000 words? What’s the sweet-spot for the best SEO score? With Google implementing Passage Ranking, which assigns PageRank to sections of a page as well as the entire page, long-form content rich in information will find itself in a renaissance once again - known in the biz as the “skyscraper.” Great for readers like me!

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Want to get ahead of the trends? Click here and contact me to discuss your next content marketing move: and keep ahead of your competition!

How to Become a Copywriter

People often ask me how I became a copywriter in the first place. I half-jokingly say that I “printed up a bunch of business cards, put my name on them, then added ‘copywriter’ underneath.”

It’s a bit of an oversimplification, but that’s essentially how I began my business as a freelance copywriter.

There is no standard definition of “copywriter.” A technical copywriter may focus on documentation and processes, while a creative copywriter writes for marketing and advertising purposes. More on that in my blog about technical vs. creative copywriting here.

There exists copywriters who write exclusively for advertising; others that write direct response or sales letters; some are website copywriters, who may also be called “content writers” interchangeably.

If you are thinking about becoming a copywriter as a career, here are some things to consider.

How Do I Become A Copywriter With No Experience?

Unlike other jobs, copywriting is a profession with a low barrier of entry – copywriting is not regulated, nor is it self-regulated or gate-kept by a guild or union. Anyone with an internet connection and a laptop can set up a website or register for a job board such as Upwork or Fiverr and ply their trade.

Training as a copywriter isn’t standardised, nor is it essential. You can read books about copywriting and attempt to emulate the greats such as David Ogilvy or Dan Kennedy. If you have a good – and I mean being in the top ten to five percent of the population - command of English (or your home language) you can “make it” as a copywriter.

Basic Copywriting Skills

The main suite of skills you’ll need to be a copywriter are:

• Written communication

• Creativity or lateral thinking

• Problem solving

• Oral communication

• Time management

• Editing

• Business management - if you are going freelance

Studying some type of business finance or management is essential. I recommend the Finance Academy course Managing Business Finance by Chinmay Ananda to get you up to speed.

The Academic Route

In Australia, if you absolutely love learning in an academic setting (and I did), you could study a Bachelor of Arts concentrating in English or Media and Communication. A Bachelor of Business or a Bachelor of Commerce in Marketing may also include units on copywriting.

However, if you find you need to hone your skills without spending thousands of dollars (and hours) at university, I personally recommend you study a Certificate IV in Professional Writing and Editing. This teaches you the fundamentals of written English communication in a work context.

How Do I Start Out As A Copywriter?

If you have your heart set on copywriting as a career, try to apply for as much work experience as you can at your high school or TAFE. Try to get work experience at as many types of agencies or houses as possible – advertising agencies, marketing firms, content writing houses, communications, or PR agencies – so you get a feel for what type of copywriting and editing you are strong at; and what needs work.

In this work context, you should also be able to work to tight deadlines and confusing, sometimes contradictory briefs. You’ll also learn not to take criticism personally and learn from your mistakes. Letting go of attachment to your work is also a must; in the content writing world especially, you are giving voice to someone else!

The Advertising Advertising Paradox

As mentioned before, the barrier to entry for a copywriter is low. You ideally need a website to show off your portfolio and act as a lead magnet. If you don’t have a portfolio, approach friends and family and offer to refresh their resumes or websites for them.

However, you need to write ads that not only advertise your proficiency as a copywriter, but act as a “free sample” of your work for other businesses. If it can convince them, chances are you can convince their audience their product or service is worth buying too.

DO. NOT. WORK. FOR. FREE.

Because you are just starting out, you will be tempted by offers from start-ups or ne’er-do-wells asking you to work for “exposure.”

Ignore these people. They are choosing beggars at the very least.

Working for free is not only illegal in Australia, but it also makes it worse for everyone else in the industry.

The number of emails I get saying “I’ll get my cousin/friend/best mate’s brother’s wife to do it for free” would make the average person blush. I simply tell them – if they’re so good, why are you bothering me?

A 400-word blog post may take me 20 minutes to write. However, just like the mechanic who knows exactly where to strike his tiny hammer to fix a car in five seconds – you’re not paying for my time, you’re paying for my expertise.

Even if you hit up family and friends for work, set a price. A junior, fresh out of uni/TAFE/beginner should be able to earn $25-30/hr if they can demonstrate a good level of professionalism and proficiency.

As I always say, be “uneditable” - the less work you make for editors, the more you jobs you’re picked for.

With all that in mind, will you make copywriting your career?

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Want to know more? Want a professional to write your copy and content? Get award-winning copywriting from I Sell Words.

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No Is The New Yes

How afraid are you of the word No?

Nein. Non. Iie. Nyet. No. (That last one was Spanish and Italian, that one.)

Is your blood running cold? Are you breaking out into a sweat?

As business owners, we don't like the word No. No signals the end of a conversation.

However, as a writer and a grammarian (is that a thing? It is now) the definition of a word isn't the end of an argument, it's the beginning of one.

No, we ain’t gonna take it, the battle cry of the hair metaller can be applied to subjugated populations. No - we don't deserve this treatment. We want to be free.

In a rhetorical sense, not saying yes is a powerful persuasion tool. We might construe it for wit - "How about grabbing that drink with me?"

"Well, I wouldn't say no."

Hey, hang on a sec...

The Cult of Yes

Almost every time you approach someone in sales, you get a guy or gal trying to get you to agree with everything they say.

Imagine this - buying a car. The salesperson strides up to you and bumps the bonnet with an open palm. "She's a beaut, ain't she?"

Well, we don't want to sound rude. We agree. Enough "yes" responses and the prospect is ripe for closing.

But are they?

Presenting a ring to a woman on bended knee and waiting for her "yes" is light years apart from asking the same woman if they enjoy chocolate ice-cream. They exist on two different logical levels; even if we can't articulate it fully. Human communication is context dependent. One size rarely, if ever, fits all.

In business, the Cult of Yes began in 1981, when Harvard Negotiation Project fellows Roger Fisher and William Ury published Getting To YES: Negotiating an agreement without giving in. I own this book. I studied it. Didn't get as many "yes-es" as I'd hoped.

In fact, it reinforced my death-like fear of the word "No." My father stands at about 6'4' (and a half, gotta remember that half) and if he was in a foul mood, I'd loathe asking him for anything as a kid. He was a negotiator by trade. Sometimes I think he just wanted to tell me "no" after acquiescing to "yes" all day. I'd rather beg for forgiveness than ask for permission at that point. Just so I didn’t hear the “no.”

Enter former FBI Hostage Negotiator Chris Voss and Never Split The Difference, who emphasises getting to "no" as a way of life. The first thing you should hear is "no." Hearing "no" is fine. It's an obstacle, sure. But as the Stoics say, the obstacle is the way.

"No" isn't the end of the negotiation - at least not always. In the same way that "yes" isn't a commitment to anything.

We need to stop being afraid of the word "no."

It's a compliment to everything affirmative in our vocabulary - not the enemy.

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How To Choose The Right Social Media For Your Business - Kalkine Media Expert Talks

With profound thanks to SavvySME, I was featured on online business channel Kalkine Media’s Expert Talk on 3rd of September, 2021, discussing how to choose the right social media for your business. Together with host Holly Shields, we talked about committing to content writing and social media, how to find a good marketing firm, and trends in social media marketing. Watch below.

Tom on Kalkine Media

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All Of Our Brain - Spelling and Grammar Tips for Talkers

If you have sloppy spelling and grammar, you’re losing customers.

It could be as simple as using the wrong “you’re” in a sentence - or grocer’s apostrophes; either way, it turns people off.

You may shrug off grammar and spelling errors off, but as my survey shows…customers aren’t as forgiving.

A lot of us in business are inclined to talking - which is fine. As Joel Saltzman says, “If you can talk, you can write.”

However as instinctive as talking is, the written word and the spoken word use different areas of the brain. Looking at words and gaining meaning out of them actually uses different hemispheres of the brain, according to research by neuroscientist Michael Gazzaniga.

Here are some simple ways to improve your spelling and grammar if you’re more of a talker.

Replacing The Contraction - It’s vs Its

My favourite explanation between it’s vs its - the contraction versus the possessive - is Strong Bad’s take on it.

The easiest way is the “speak it out loud” test - if saying, out loud, “it is” makes no sense in the sentence, then it’s the pronoun. (It is the pronoun.) For example, “the car lost it is appeal” - then it’s the possessive form.

Oh, and it’s never Its’.

Me Want Dinner - I or Me?

Another common bugbear in grammar is the use of possessive pronouns - Me or I? For example, “My grandmother and I used to watch soap operas.” If you get rid of my grandmother from the sentence (how rude), it makes sense.

In another sentence, “Me and my grandmother used to watch soap operas,” then getting rid of “my grandmother” forms “Me used to watch soap operas,” which when spoken out loud…kind sounds like my grandmother speaking it. (She was from Macedonia and English was her fourth language, so I kind of went gentle on her.)

If it sounds funny, don’t write it down!

There or Their or They’re? The W to T Trick

Want to know if you’re using the correct form?

What is the opposite to “there?” Well, here. Remove the T - if the sentence sticks, then you know it’s “there.” If it’s a question - “Where?” then the shortest answer you can give is “There.”

As for the other forms, it’s a little more involved. Another bit of “W” transformation is required for “they’re.” If you can replace “We are” with “They are” in a sentence, you know it’s “they’re.”

Example: “We are going to the movies/They are going to the movies/They’re going to the movies.”

By process of elimination, you’re (you are) left with their. Which is possession. Their ball, their fight, their thesis.

If You Can Count It, It’s Fewer

If you can count something - cupcakes, cars, people - then it’s fewer. There are three fewer cars on the road than yesterday. If you can’t, then it’s less. There’s less milk today than yesterday. Simple!

If This Is Giving You A Headache

Then give me a call instead! I’m a Melbourne copywriter that can give you peace of mind with solid proofreading and editing. Contact me here for copy that gets the little things right so you can land the big customers.

Fake News: why don't we call it a spade?

Image by PDPics from Pixabay

Do you ever find yourself agreeing or respecting a talking head that talks in "Plain English," uses "common sense" and "calls a spade a spade?"

I sure do - then my internal BS detector goes off and I realise they're politicians and they speak exclusively in spin and doublespeak. But I digress.

A lot of us are familiar with the term "fake news." It's a highly abstract term for news reporting, which is meant to be objective, instead is misrepresented by being opinion or outright falsehood.

"Fake news" isn't new. Because lying through one's teeth isn't new.

Fake news, like the words bathroom, PTSD, and sanitation engineer all hopped on a phenomenon called the euphemism treadmill.

This process, as described by scholar and linguist Steven Pinker, is a societal shift from the use of certain words towards more palatable alternatives.

Think of the word "toilet." In most situations toilets - and the actions performed there - is something that high society would rather not mention in good company. So we adapted the word bathroom. This still contained some vestige of bodily contact with porcelain (bath) and we ran the treadmill again and landed upon restroom. A few more miles on the rubber excised the room entirely: lavatory. An ancient case of "if you know, if you know."

The same happened to soldiers in World War I that suffered from "shell shock", which then became "battle fatigue" by World War II, and the present day "combat-induced Post Traumatic Stress Response."

Printing lies was once called yellow journalism, which is now called fake news. It connotes an air of lost respectability; that organisation still peddles news but it's either distorted, slanted, or outright made-up. The generation of today trying to make its mark on what came before. It's novel to us, but not to history.

Why do we do it? It's hard to tell. We as humans seem to want to forget about the unpleasant facts of life sometimes - why do we use the euphemism "passed on" instead of "died?" - and our cognitive shields go up as a result.

As much as we want to call fake news spades and spades toilets; we need to be reminded of the context in which we utter the word and those who will hear it.

As much as you'd like to tell grandma you need to "drop a deuce in the shitter" I think we'd all be better off if you excused yourself to "use the lavatory" instead.

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Yes, Bad Spelling Turns Customers Off

A couple of months ago, I asked my mailing list (sign up here!) all to participate in a short survey. I got a handful of responses (about 20 or so) and the results are clear: yes, bad spelling and grammar turns customers off.

Responding to When you see a business with spelling or grammar errors in their marketing or advertising, what is your perception of that business?, four-fifths said it looks "sloppy."

Most (80%) agreed that "Better spelling and grammar means better attention to detail."

Almost all said if they saw a spelling error in a piece of their communications, they'd rewrite it. (One person said they'd ignore it. I can't wrap my head around that. At all.)

When asked How much do you agree with the following statement: "Writing that is simple and direct is easier to understand" all respondents "strongly agreed" (an 8/10 or more.)

Here's the big takeaway: not ONE response went above neutral when asked "if you see a business with spelling or grammar errors in their marketing or advertising, does it make you more or less likely to buy from them?" It generated an average of 3/10 - meaning "extremely unlikely."

If you think that bad spelling or grammar doesn't effect your business: it's time to think again.

My lame superpower is finding spelling and grammar errors in writing - but as lame as it sounds, it could help your business win more customers with a polished presentation.

Language Is Mental Health In Action

Language is thought in action. What does that mean, Tom? I'm glad you asked.

I don't want to crawl too far down a rabbit hole, but almost all of us subvocalise our thoughts. Subvocalisation is that inner monologue we hear when we read or think - you're likely subvocalising right now, reading this sentence. Yes, it's all very meta.

One of the ways we confuse ourselves is to skip the thought bit and think language is action. It isn't. It's just a thought, an idea. Communism the idea didn't kill 100 million people directly, those acting in its name did. (That said, it's still a bad idea.)

When we humans confuse thought with action, we do silly things like compose text messages in our head and forget to actually send them or have arguments against our colleagues in the shower (which we inevitably win.)

The problem with this is our nervous system often doesn't know the difference between what's perceived and what's real. We can think our way into anxiety and depression, aided by complex and repetitive trauma that's located in our viscera - our gut feelings, as it turns out, play a big role in our moods and emotional wellbeing.

This poses a problem for the "talking cure." According to trauma researcher Bessel van der Kolk, responding to trauma through medication and talking alone doesn't always work in isolation. I've been on mild anti-depressants/anxiety medication since high school. I can definitely attest to Dr. van der Kolk's assessment. In everyday situations, especially when we're feeling low, it can be attributed to the narrative we spin about ourselves.

Your brain will believe what you tell it is true. The root of depression, as put in a meme, is the result of nasty rumours you tell about yourself. So how can you flip the script, or at least try to?

What I Do

The first act is to open up and own what you say. If something doesn't feel right, ask someone you trust and talk it out. No, they might not understand. But at least you will get it off your chest. Join a support group, see a counsellor, do whatever suits you best. Always use the "I" statement. Not "you know" or "you know when..." No, I don't know. Own what you say and often the solution will become clear.

Second, journal. Keep a daily (or near enough) journal. Opening up by writing things down is not only good for tracking your own progress but getting clarity on your thoughts.

Truth isn't a convenience, it's a winner's mindset.

Third, tell the truth. Tell it to yourself, tell it to your loved ones, tell it to everyone around you, as hard as it seems. If you say "Oh, I tell the truth 90% of the time..." Well, how do I know I'm getting the 90% or the 10% that's BS? Truth is the currency of business. Hiding things, being dishonest, pretending everything's alright...reality always kicks down the door of fantasy. Always. Truth isn't a convenience, it's a winner's mindset.

All three elements are explained much better in the following books, which I recommend every businessperson read:

A Rational Guide To Living by Drs. Albert Ellis & Robert Harper, Ph.D
The Situation Is Hopeless, But Not Serious by Dr. Paul Wazlawick, Ph.D.
The Obstacle is The Way by Ryan Holiday
Daring Greatly by Dr. Brene Brown, PhD.

It doesn't always work, but it works much better than the alternative.

Are You Eating Record Sales Pie This Christmas?

Admit it - you gifted yourself a bunch of "presents" during lockdown, because reasons.

As it turns out, so did everyone else. eCommerce growth is showing signs of normalisation. Retail is so 2019. People are buying items and goods sight unseen from online shopping sites.

Australia Post figures that 2020 will be the biggest year on record for online sales. They're expecting the peak to reach over 30% over last year.

Last year we spent about $28.6 billion on online shopping. 30% more than that...well, that's a lot. If I knew how to do maths, I'd tell you. Lucky for all of us, I'm a copywriter, not a mathematician.

So how are you going to get a slice of the record sales pie this Christmas - and eat it too?

We're only 29 days out from Christmas (I know, right?) and if you aren't ramping up your marketing and mailouts, there's not that much time left.

Sending electronic direct mail (eDM) helps your audience recall your brand more often - 74% more according to research - and being impossible to ignore is the aim of the game this Christmas.

If you need help with eDM, content, or a strategy for this Christmas (and New Year) I Sell Words is open until the 21st of December - and I'll be re-opening on the 6th of January, 2021. Drop me a line!

If You Can Interview, You Can Negotiate

Up until earlier this year, I worked as a music journalist and editor. I spent about nine years at Hysteria Mag, the last few of which as an Editor of some kind. One of the most enjoyable aspects of the job was the rock star interview.

I’d done about 300+ interviews in my time for a range of publications. I conducted about 95% of these interviews over the phone. These interviews are given out in “slots.”

Journalists and broadcasters are invited to join a one to two-hour block of interviews, with each interviewer given a 15 to 20-minute allocation to talk to the muso.

This was all an exercise in PR and promotion for a new album or tour. About 90% of interviews were about an upcoming album, tour, or both. It was rare to interview a subject “just because.” It had to be during “promotion season” or not at all.

As a greenhorn, I would ask obvious questions. How was it recording this time around? Are you excited to go on tour? Did the new member contribute well? Are you going to have X and Y on the set list?

Woe betide the scribe who hit their subject with generic questions like this at the end of a two hour block. At best you’d get annoyed, one- or two-word answers as they’d been asked the question about six times already.

Sometimes, musos just didn’t much care for doing media. They were strongarmed into it by their PR or record company. At the end of the day, it was like they were being treated like a sponge, each interviewer wringing more and more out of them, even though their mental bandwidth had long since evaporated.

“With apologies to Joel Saltzman who said “if you can talk you can write,” it would seem “if you can interview, you can negotiate.”

In computing, Garbage In Garbage Out means that if you put in erroneous data you’ll get unreliable results. The same goes for interviewing. Ask boring questions, get boring answers. I wanted to make this my career one day (my advice for kids doing it now: don’t) so I had to up my game.

Through trial and error, I hit upon the magic words that signalled a great interview. The interviewer either had to respond with something like:

“That’s a great question.”

Or

“Yes, you’re right.”

The setup to these questions is usually closed, not open ended. For example, interviewing one of my favourite subjects; multi-instrumentalist, and wide-eyed dreamer Devin Townsend, I asked:

“Would you say that you’re a person that sort of craves varied stimulation? I mean this in a creative sense, where doing that same thing will lead to an inevitable inertia, stagnation.”

He replied with “a hundred percent, a hundred percent.” Devin is not a particularly hard subject to interview. The fact that I connected with him on a level that made him heard, not just a resource, allowed me to probe further and ask more personal questions than if I didn’t have him on side.

Not everyone is an interviewer by trade, but we do communicate with people in the same way. In business, we use the euphemism “job interview” as part of the selection process for an open position. In other terms, a person negotiates their way to getting the job. He or she must convince the boss or hiring manager that they are the right person.

Reading and watching videos on Never Split The Difference: How To Negotiate As If Your Life Depended On It by Chris Voss, a former FBI hostage negotiator, finding an empathetic common ground often leads to a successful negotiation where you concede little, perhaps none, of your position.

He calls this “tactical empathy.” I used to call it “good interview technique.”

With apologies to Joel Saltzman who said “if you can talk you can write,” it would seem “if you can interview, you can negotiate.”

In an interview, the subject has information that a journalist wants to gain. Some interviewees, especially in general news or politics, do not want to give up that information so easily. Gaining the trust of a subject can be a tricky business, especially if they are survivors of a traumatic event.

We all know what it feels like to be heard and empathised with. We all know how it feels to have a conversation where both parties get to know one another. Most things in life are negotiated in a broad sense; a romantic date is a negotiation in some respects, as both parties put their best qualities forward to find love or companionship.

It would seem that “Getting to Yes” (a great book on negotiation) is as important to achieving the empathetic “Getting to ‘You’re Right.’”

Interviewing is a learned skill, like writing is a learned skill. Mathematics is too (still working on that, let me tell you.) It would seem the calculus of a successful negotiation is simply applied listening and empathising.

It might lead to less stress and a greater understanding of our needs. I think it’s definitely something we’re all craving at the moment.

Support For Business During Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Pandemic

It’s tough for business at the moment. We’ve all felt the pinch and will do for months to come.

It’s imperative that we band together and survive this crisis so we can make the most of the recovery that lies ahead.

As such, I'm offering half-rates for consulting, editing, and proofreading during the crisis through to May.

This is helpful if you need a "sanity check" or additional research to ensure your communications are clear, compassionate, and free of errors. The spread of disinformation is something all of us want to avoid.

I'm also offering 25% off copywriting for new website pages and product descriptions, helpful for businesses transitioning from a face-to-face operation to online.

As always, half-rates apply to not-for-profit organisations and/or community organisations for all work.

Last, I have special codes for two months free Skillshare, where you can take my course on better business writing.

Skillshare is a platform where you can learn new skills around almost anything you can think of: writing, photography, web design, crafts - you name it. (If you've seen a YouTube video in the last few months, you've probably heard of it!) Just email me and I'll send you the link.

If you need a hand or are willing to lend a hand, I urge you all to sign up to crisisheroes.com.

Stay strong,

Tom

Working from home? The freelancer’s guide to staying sane and being productive

Today marks my 1542nd day of self-isolation. I’m not sick or anything. Unless you count full-time freelancing as an illness of the mind.

As much as I love freelancing, it isn’t for everyone. I’m a natural born introvert (and some say, misanthrope) and am most energised when I’m writing instead of talking.

Others are the opposite. I get that too.

So here are some ways to stay sane and be productive at the same time – both of which go hand in hand.

“This is my fifteenth cup of coffee and I’m still not done reorganising my folders.”

1.       Be at your desk when you’re meant to

This one is a crucial one. It establishes a routine which you can follow. If you usually start work at 9am, be at your desk at 9am. Even if it is just a shuffle from your bedroom to your new ersatz office setup. Which it should be: don’t work in pyjamas from your bedroom.

If you work from a desk, set up a desk, even if it’s at your kitchen table. Ensure a continuity of your habits at your home. If you sit in a beanbag at work…why?

2.       You’re still on company time – remember that

The urge to watch YouTube and play video games on your computer with 1440p screen and GTX 1070 graphics card can overwhelm you at times; but that’s not why you’re at your desk. A quick round of Battlefield 1 or side quest of Kingdom Come: Deliverance may not hurt anyone, but you’re being paid to sit there. Honour the commitment. Play games during your lunch break, or better yet, after knockoff time.

Don’t disappear from your desk for long stretches without explanation. You wouldn’t do it at work, so don’t do it here.

3.       Lonely? Use talking heads in the background

Hungarian-American author and psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi said that every human being can enter a state of “flow” or effortless connectedness to their work, brought on by setting goals and devoting oneself to a challenge. You’ve felt it before when you felt “in the zone” or “switched on.” This means your brain is allocating mental resources to the task above all others.

However, as our brains want to do, ruminate. Some of us feel anxiety when we are isolated. (I’m not one of them. Then again, I’m weird.)

In order to regulate your mental resources and flow state, it’s helpful to have familiar noise in the background such as human voices. They aren’t substitute for the real thing when you’re concentrated on it but will suffice when you’re in a “flow” state. No, I don’t recommend the news at the moment.

I recommend death metal at ear-splitting volume, but that’s just me.

4.       Stop eating everything

Seriously, stop that. Don’t order in. Make your own stuff. It’s not only better for you, it’s cheaper. My coffee bill is about $15 per month, because I make my own using a drip filter. Most office working people hit that in about two days.

Go for walks in the afternoon, too. Keep up your gym routine – this is just as important for your mental health as much as it is your physical health.

5.      Do your job and do it right

The temptation to do your job half-assed unsupervised is tremendous; but character is what you are in the dark and who you are behind a screen when no-one (you know of) is looking.

Sir Henry Royce said “whatever is rightly done, however humble, is noble.”

I also say that adulthood is the feeling when, as a kid, you clean your room from top to bottom and your parents (who usually bug you about it) don’t even notice. You do what must be done because it must be done. The mature person does not lust after praise.

In these trying times, hard work, honesty, and helping others are the three elements that will ensure we bring out the best in ourselves and each other.

Let’s get to work.

Three Tips To Improve Your Writing

As a copywriter, I have clients and friends ask me, "How do I improve my writing?" I always say that clarity and concision are the key to making communicatio...

Clients and friends come to me asking about how they can improve their writing? I say that clarity and concision is the best way to communicate. To start with, concentrate on these three things:

1. Read examples
2. Edit yourself
3. Swimmers swim, writers write.

Here is a short video discussing these tips. Got tips of your own? Comment below!

Camera by Dave Kenyon

Machines Using Humans To Make Better Machines

While browsing social media, have you ever encountered something that made you just so angry you couldn't stand it? Well, that's a feature, not a bug. As media theorist Douglas Rushkoff states:

“Researchers have found, for example, that the algorithms running social media platforms tend to show pictures of ex-lovers having fun. No, users don’t want to see such images. But, through trial and error, algorithms have discovered showing pictures of our exes having fun increases our engagement. We are drawn to click on those pictures and see what our exes are up to, and we’re more likely to do it if we’re jealous they’ve found a new partner. The algorithms don’t know why it works, and they don’t care. They’re only maximise whatever metric we’ve instructed them to pursue.”

- Douglas Rushkoff, Team Human

It struck me how far we've come from the 1950s, when Norbert Weiner's theory of cybernetics - humans using machines to improve humans - has turned itself on its head. We're now using machines to exploit humans to refine the machines. We can either program (the insidious "learn to code" meme) or be programmed.

The machines are trying their best to remove us from the human equation. We have metrics, dashboards, bounce rates, pageviews, conversions; some of us talk in this machine language that would've made Dr. Weiner's head spin. We're trying to be like computers, but we can't. A computer has perfect memory, perfect algorithms, perfect recall. It can know you better than you know yourself.

Unfortunately we cannot go back to a previous time; you can't cut smartphones or the Internet out from our culture; no more than you can remove your liver or lungs. It's transformed our entire society, whether we like it or not.

In French sociologist Jacques Ellul’s view, the bargain we make with new technology is Faustian; what problems new technology solves seems to take something away at the same time.

I remember a time when I used to (well, still do) blow up innocent pixels in flight simulators and first person shooters. My Dad couldn't understand the unrestrained glee I was having, using (simulated) weapons of mass destruction.

I said these disintegrated people weren't "real." Instead, "they" were computer-generated characters programmed to fight me and die trying. We can obviously distinguish between what's real and what's not (though deepfakes and other misinformation might muddy those already hazardous waters), but when we end up serving machines, we often lose sight of the human element.

Often, clients become folders, deadlines, and metrics. They're no longer people with struggles of their own, reaching out to me for help with something. I think in the PPC, CPC, "machine" algorithm age, many of us don't take the time to value a client for who he or she is.

A computer can't really recognise the value of something unless we tell it to.

We can.

It's hard, but I think it's worth doing.