How To Make Persuasive Text Copy For Your Web Site

Whether it's e-mail or a Web site page, copy that's persuasive, easy to read, and measurable maximizes results. Save customers' time and bolster your bottom line by writing and laying out content that works online. If visitors arrive on your site and don't read what you've written and don't take the action you desire them to, your marketing and Web development dollars have been wasted.

Words, despite their considerable seductive power, are largely overlooked on Web sites, large and small. Many companies eager to spend tens of thousands of dollars on photography, graphic elements, coding, even Web analytics nevertheless shell out very little to improve copy.

Persuasive copy has an explosive effect on conversion. XGaming, builder of X-Arcade, an industry-grade game controller and product line, enjoyed a conversion increase of over 200 percent, due largely to improved site copy.

Knowing X-Arcade's customer base was key to improving the copy. That information reveals relevant benefits to feature and highlight. It also helps determine the appropriate tone and attitude for copy.

X-Arcade, Before and After

The home page copy before:

"Play Thousands Of Arcade Classics On Your PC

Relive your favorite classic arcade games, like Ms. Pac-Man, Space Invaders, Robotron, Galaga, Donkey Kong and Street Fighter! The X-Arcade Kit includes all the hardware and software you need to play thousands of arcade classics on your PC for free!

Never Purchase Another Arcade Controller Again

The X-Arcade separates itself from the crowd with the video game industry's first lifetime warranty, indestructible parts and support for any video game system or PC. These great benefits will ensure the X-Arcade is the last joystick you will ever need to buy!"

It's notable the copy attempts to employ customer-focused language, evidenced in this case by generously using you and your.

The home page copy after:

"Relive Thousands of Arcade Classics

X-Arcade is a line of bulletproof industrial quality game controllers and gaming products that inject the ultimate arcade experience into your PC, MAC or game console...

Install your X-Arcade and instantly relive those adrenaline-pumped moments in the arcade, battering the joystick, pounding the buttons, grinding your teeth, and tasting the thrill as you make your mark as the game's top scorer. Your X-Arcade Kit arrives stuffed with all the hardware and software you need to play thousands of arcade classics on your PC.

The only thing missing is a place to drop in your quarters...."

Here we applied "Frosting," a technique named after Robert Frost. Frosting gives life to what would otherwise be dull copy. Instead of writing "gaming products that give you the ultimate gaming experience," we wrote "gaming products that inject the ultimate arcade experience." "That inject" brings the sentence into the present tense. It also adds spice and associative meaning to the copy.

More from the "after" home page:

"Built like a friggin' tank!

Flimsy plastic is swell for Tupperware and skirt hangers, but shouldn't you be demanding MORE from your game controller?...

Every molecule of your X-Arcade product is constructed with industrial grade materials, no dollar store plastic. It literally feels like an arcade game machine."

This copy uses a technique called "Franking," from the photographic style of Robert Frank. It requires you to select a few details and use them suggestively, rather than outright. What's suggested here is the reader's current game pad is woefully inadequate, reinforcing his motivation to move beyond the ordinary game pad onto the X-Arcade.

The most effective means to tout product features includes a headline that first states the benefit. Each listed feature substantiates the claim by placing the reader in the copy, then offering specifics in customer-focused, present-tense language.

Here's How To Improve Your Web Site's Copy:

HOW TO MAKE PERSUASIVE WEB SITE COPY