One of the most important steps to take before speaking to your customers through your web copy is learning what they want, and what opinions they have about you and your competition.
But what if you don’t have the budget to pay for expensive research data or conduct focus groups? Targeted market surveys can cost up to $10,000 to reach a sample of just 1,000 people.
The advent of social media over the past decade has resulted in more and more people voluntarily sharing the valuable information market researchers pay for on sites like Facebook and Twitter. eMarketer predicts that the number of Twitter users alone will skyrocket this year to over 18 million, and March 4, 2010 marked the 10 billionth Twitter status update. That’s 10 billion times people have posted information online for all to see about what they are doing, thinking, and buying.
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Canadian Business’ Paul Brent recently suggested in Dewing It Alone that the power of social networks could render traditional marketing departments obsolete. It certainly seems to be putting the nail in the coffin.
Marketing spend is rapidly shifting online as businesses are realizing they can get more bang and reach through the Internet. To be sure, the Internet has already killed the old music institution and transformed TV. Case in point: the appeal and effectiveness of traditional 30-second commercials are fading fast, and new players and methods are taking over.
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Thanks to the Internet, businesses no longer need to outspend their competitors to outperform them on the marketing front. Small companies can go toe-to-toe with established, deep-pocketed 
enterprises, virtually overnight.
But how? By leveraging the value a well-versed website designer brings to the table. Regardless of a business’ size or industry, a proficient website designer can help:
- Achieve a desired image and appeal to specific markets
- Enable prospects and customers to quickly find relevant information and easily complete tasks
- Build a customer base and increase leads, sales and revenues
Oddly, businesses frequently fork over significant marketing budgets to PR firms, radio, TV, and print publications. According to PricewaterhouseCoopers, businesses spend about $400 billion on advertising annually, much of the money going to traditional channels, like television commercials. However, when it comes to their website — the marketing hub that pulls all marketing operations together — business owners often tighten the purse strings.
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Someone in the printing business recently suggested to me websites are “overrated.” I was blown away. A website is not just a piece of the marketing pie; it’s the actual hub that connects all the marketing strategies and tactics, online and offline.
Regardless what business or industry you’re in, websites have evolved into the base of operations, where prospects and clients inevitably go to gain product, service, and company information.
Of course, other marketing elements play a role: postcards, e-mails, PR, commercials and much more. But these sources frequently push people to a website. Even TV commercials are trading in 1-800 numbers for website addresses.
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The article Web copy motivators notes fear is a powerful influential factor on and off the Web. But, as Yes!: 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive
notes, it can also be counter-productive.
Research has demonstrated that fear-arousing communications usually stimulate the audience to take action to reduce the threat. However, Author Robert Cialdini explained, “When the fear producing message describes danger but the audience is not told a clear, specific, effective means of reducing the danger, they may deal with the fear by ‘blocking out’ the message or denying it applies to them.”
As a result, they may be paralyzed into taking no action at all.
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Posted on Jan 22 2010 5:40 pm by Web Copywriters
tags: Website Conversions
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category: Writing for the Web |
2 Comments
