When you write web copy you want to tell people all about what you do. It’s really important that they understand what you can deliver or they won’t buy what you are offering – right?

Wrong! Nobody is interested in what you do – they’re only interested in what they get. If you review what you’ve written in the past and count the number of time you’ve written ‘we’, ‘our’, ‘us’ or your company name, then compare it to the number of times you’ve written ‘you’ and ‘your’ in the same piece of web copy – you may get a surprise.

However, this doesn’t mean you can’t tell people what they get – simply that you need to think about how you do it. If you can present your web copy in terms of what that does for them, you’ll still get your message across – in terms that the potential customer wants to read.

There are probably thousands of websites – probably tens of thousands – offering similar services or products to yours – all with web copy written in the hope of attracting new business. Whether or not you have competitors you probably think that you’re unique – and with good reason.

We are all unique – and, it doesn’t matter how many people do what you do – you’ll do it differently in some way. The challenge is letting people know what that unique aspect of your service is – and using the web copy on your site to convey that.

So how do you work out what exactly it is that people really like about you? The answer is simple and obvious – ask them! You may be surprised at the responses!

When you know what it is then use it! Use it in the web copy and use it in the headlines. This will make your web copy much more compelling – as long as you keep it focused on the reader.

If you don’t know you have a problem it’s impossible to fix it! However, that’s the situation that most website owners (and many web designers) are in.

What am I talking about? Well there are two things that you need to know about web copy:

Most people are aware that the message needs to be compelling – although there are plenty of people who don’t know what constitutes ‘compelling’!

Few people don’t realist that it doesn’t matter how good the message is if the web copy is in the wrong place, if it’s the wrong size, the wrong colour or fighting for attention with lots of other stuff.

To make your web copy really work you need to have cracked both of these.

When you’re creating web copy for your site you need to be absolutely clear on the reason that people buy your services. If you guess you’ll probably guess wrong! Be assured it isn’t because you are the only person delivering a particular service, or product; there’s very little that’s unique these days.

Don’t flatter yourself that it’s because your service or product is dramatically better than anyone else’s either, no matter what your current web copy may say!

So, if that’s exhausted your idea of why your customer buys – why don’t you ask the ones that have done already? You might be surprised at the answer. When you’ve got the answer – or answers – rewrite your web copy with that in mind – particularly the headlines.