If you ever do any public speaking, or give presentations for work, you probably obsess a little over getting rid of all those Ums, Ers and other “fillers” that creep into your language.
Speaking coaches will train you to avoid them when speaking live. And audio engineers will edit them out when producing recorded speeches, presentations or training products.
But… it turns out that Ums and Ers actually have an important function.
I get this kind of pushback all the time.
Traditional copywriters and marketers suggest that conversational copywriting is somehow a compromise.
That it pulls its punches.
That’s it’s just copywriting lite.
They say that work at its best, copywriting HAS to include traditional, hard-selling tricks and techniques.
I think they’re wrong.
If you’re involved in marketing online, you’re doubtless aware of the power and benefits of automation.
Modern online tools allow you to target your future customers, entice them with the best offers, pull them into a powerful sales funnel, send out a series automated emails and then land them as customers.
The better your landing pages, sales funnels and email sequences… the higher your conversion rates.
The process truly is a marvel of modern technology. It really is.
And yet…
When someone tries to sell us something, we prepare ourselves for the onslaught.
We raise our defenses. We hide behind filters. We prepare our rebuttals and get ready to say NO.
Why such an extreme response? Because we are used to the sale process being adversarial.
And we know that an experienced salesperson has a hundred tricks and schemes in his playbook. He’s been doing this for years. He has been trained to win, to demolish objections, and to close the sale.
It’s little wonder we go on the defensive.
Of course we do. We’re under attack.
At least, this is the way things used to be.
A short while back I was listening to a couple of colleagues discussing customer loyalty.
They more or less agreed that when a customer has made two or more purchases from a company, it would be reasonable to tag them as being loyal.
I don’t agree.
A few people have asked me whether conversational copywriting is simply a different name for web content.
That’s a reasonable question.
The short answer is no. But with a few shades of yes.
Take a look at the labels in the image above and we’ll figure out exactly how and why conversational copywriting sits where it does – right in the middle, between sales copywriting and editorial content.
Step by step…