If Content Marketing seeks to engage and attract the target audience through educational, quality content, copywriting will be the differential for the strategy to be effective, as it encourages the reader to take action.
The big secret, both for copywriting and Content Marketing, is to deeply understand who will consume the content. Thus, it is possible to bring the reader and their universe into the narrative and solve their doubts in the best possible way.
This is done through the production of rich, quality materials such as blog posts, infographics, e-books, whitepapers, webinars, and so on.
Some techniques must be adopted to ensure that copywriting is a successful strategy. Below, we list some important ones.
First of all, define your persona. It is important to define age, sex, occupation, interests, hobbies, and any other type of information that is relevant to understanding the profile and behavior of these people. Avoid making and relying on assumptions about your audience.
In this way, it will be possible to create content oriented to your potential customers, with a style and approach that comes close to their reality, increasing the possibility of conversions. Speaking of approach, it is essential to establish the tone and language that will be adopted in your content. This will increase the chances of creating a connection between your brand and the reader.
The title is the first contact your reader has with your content and is also one of the most relevant elements for search engines. There are several title formats: it can start with numbers, suggest a question, present the topic and then make a call, make a provocation, among many other ways.
The important thing is that it is straightforward — that is, that the subject is very clear about what the content addresses, or what solution it delivers —, contains the keyword, and does not exceed 55 characters, to ensure that it appears complete in the search results page.
In order for the reader to understand the message and know what must be done, it is recommended that you use verbs in the imperative, mainly in the title, in the subheadings, and in the CTA.
Humanity has used analogies and metaphors since ancient times to clarify ideas, and there are some reasons why this strategy works so well.
First, people are more receptive to familiar information. After all, the effort used to understand a totally new concept is much greater than necessary to understand something that is already known or implied.
In addition, our brain builds new memories from others, establishing connections between them. Therefore, if you can bring up a concept that is familiar to the reader and associate that information with the idea that you are transmitting, the chances of solidifying the content in their mind become much greater.
However, it is important to avoid direct comparisons with the competition, especially if your lines reduce other companies products or services. In addition to being unethical conduct, this type of attitude arouses suspicion.
If you use numbers in the title, whoever is reading will already have a sense of how many tips will be given throughout the article. For example: “Learn about 9 important metrics for a call center”.
If your intention is to prove the information that is being given, to give even more credibility to what you are saying, quote data and research—without forgetting to link the URL from which you obtained the information. A good example is to use expressions like “according to researchers…” which give the impression that the message is true.
More important than talking about the characteristics is to explain the benefits and the experience that the customer is about to acquire.
Remember the sales rules we talked about right after we defined the concept of copywriting? We don’t like the idea of being convinced to buy something, and when we do, it’s for emotional, not rational reasons.
By listing the characteristics of your product or content, you appeal only to the rational side.
However, focusing on describing the benefits and experience, the connection is emotional and the next step becomes something more natural. Just be careful with one thing: exaggerated promises are not copywriting. It is just misleading advertising.