The Perspective of Your Copy

We’ve talked about the importance of consistency in your copy. But that doesn’t mean you are always going to be making the same pitch the same way every time you tackle an email or your Web site copy.

You need to make a series of choices about your copy that will serve as writing guidelines. There are truly no right or wrong choices to make here, simply decisions. Each choice provides a framework for unifying your message and defining the boundaries that will allow you to make your point. Once you've made a choice, honor the integrity of that perspective and stick with it. If you discover it's the wrong choice for the project, then start over.

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Here’s the catch: as you write, don't vacillate between the perspectives. Copy is always most effective when it says one thing really well. Particularly if you are preparing copy for ongoing emails, there’s always tomorrow to get your point across in a different way.

Intellectual copy presents new information in an attempt to lead readers to a new conclusion. Emotional copy tells readers what they already know to be true, subtly inserting a new perspective that influences them to feel differently about the information. Before you put pen to paper, you must consciously choose whether your writing is going to appeal at an intellectual or emotional level.

The past tense speaks of what has already happened. The future tense speaks of what might happen. The present tense speaks of what is happening right now. There is a presence in the present tense; because it places the reader directly in the action, it most effectively engages the brain. But there are times when you need to evoke the experience of the past or the promise of the future. Consider which perspective will give your copy its greatest impact.

First person perspective is that of the speaker: I am standing. Second person perspective is that of the reader: The copy starts with “YOU are standing in the snow, 5 ½ miles above sea level…” Third person perspective is that of the outsider: They are standing. In general, people tend to find first and third person perspectives less engaging. Second person perspective puts you right there in the action - you, the person you care most about. To your readers, it's them. When your goal is to persuade action, the “understood you” is extremely powerful: it’s the imperative call to act (“Click here”); it's the avenue that will lead your readers to the richest, most satisfying mental imagery.

Business owners like to think their products or services are money-driven: “It has always been and it will always be about price.” But it’s only that way because we think about it that way, because advertising promotes products and services based on price. Yet these days, particularly in the United States, the customer is more often interested in saving time. There are probably a few exceptions to that. If your product saves both time and money, you have to make a choice of which to use in your copy.

Case Study: Max-Effect Before and After

John Morana knows how to design killer ads for the Yellow Pages. What he can do would knock your socks off. Trouble was, his Web site wasn’t knocking anybody’s socks off. Now, John, being a veteran reader of me (!), had already made a few changes. And they were good improvements.

But not good enough. So he called us. And, together, we got down to brass tacks.

Wanna see why John is now in the enviable position of having to turn away business? Then read on!

Certain aspects of John’s site were well done. In particular, his text was formatted for scanning and skimming: it was blocked nicely; key text was bolded; benefits were bulleted. The text itself made effective use of hyperlinks that appealed to different personality types. His navigation elements were simple and consistent. The phone number was prominent.

But he was only getting one or two leads a week. Folks just weren’t getting past the home page. So we scrutinized that first.

It didn’t take long to find a big problem. Aesthetically pleasing John’s old home page might have been to a designer, but it screamed “Don’t Bother!” to prospects. The background was black (a somber, sometimes negative color). Various text elements were red, or purple, or teal … sometimes yellow. Most dispiriting for the potential client who landed there, much of the copy was reverse-type grey.

This sort of design creates usability problems. And if you’re an ad designer hoping to get prospects to believe your ads are going to get folks to take action, you want to do everything to promote your credibility. How credible do you look when folks aren’t even persuaded to get past your home page?

The new home page look and feel is brighter, conveys energy and, most important, highlights the copy that is critical to Joe’s conversion process: once you’ve focused on the central headline, you are quickly drawn to text that is benefit-rich and includes hyperlinks as internal calls to action.

John’s old home page copy was fairly benefits-oriented. It did include a degree of self-congratulation, but the key problem lay elsewhere. The old copy read:

Now, instead of 13 samples, you’ll find only two. But each is paired, in before and after fashion, with the client’s former ad - the one that ran before John worked his magic. The juxtaposition highlights John’s abilities with startling clarity. Anyone looking at that page who needs an ad is going to be impressed.

 

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GROK is taken from the landmark novel "Stranger in a Strange Land", by Robert A. Heinlein. It is a Martian word that implies the presence of intimate and exhaustive knowledge and understanding. Our "GROK" is a keen observer of the world around him and he takes a particular interest in the World Wide Web. The folks at Future Now like him a lot because he's taught them that "sometimes the price of clarity is the risk of insult."