Posts by: Eric

The 8 Most Common Press Release Writing Mistakes

15 February 2010View CommentsEric

Getting ready to write a press release to generate coverage for your company? Before you put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard), take a look at these 8 common press release writing mistakes. Avoiding them can be your ticket to success.

1. A Boring Headline—When you send your press release out to journalists, you need to remember they’re sifting through hundreds of these releases. The first thing they’ll see on your press release is the headline. If the headline is bland and lifeless, your press release probably won’t even get read.

Your headline needs to immediately grab the reader’s attention. It should be strong and bold, but make sure it isn’t gimmicky or salesy.

2. A Misleading Headline—The only thing worse than a boring headline is a misleading headline. The goal of your headline is to grab the interest of the reader and to clearly communicate what your story is about. Don’t “cry wolf” in your headline just to get the attention of the reader… unless, of course, there really is a wolf.

Here’s a simple way to tell if your headline is misleading. Show only the headline to a few other people. Have them take a guess as to what the story’s about. If they aren’t even close to being right, it’s probably time to rewrite the headline.

3. Hype instead of facts—This is a press release, not an infomercial. Journalists are interested in delivering newsworthy content to their readers. A sales pitch is NOT newsworthy content. Not only will writing your press release as an advertisement cause it to end up in the trash, but it will also damage your credibility with the journalist for a long time to come.

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The Dos and Don’ts of Keyword Research

27 January 2010View CommentsEric

The success of both your organic SEO and your PPC campaigns rely directly upon keyword research. Target the right keywords, and you’ll get quality traffic from customers who are ready to buy your products and services. Target the wrong keywords, on the other hand, and you’ll get buried in the search results and/or get low-quality traffic that doesn’t convert.

• Do: Focus on long-tail phrases—Long-tail keywords are those phrases that are very specific to the product or service you’re selling. As an example, let’s suppose you offer dinner cruises in Galveston, Texas. Some potential long-tail keyword phrases include:

1. Galveston dinner cruises
2. Dinner cruise in Galveston
3. Romantic dinner cruise in Galveston, Texas

Now, these are just a few basic examples, but the point is that long-tail keywords very specifically describe what you have to offer. As a result, these phrases tend to be easier to rank for, and they often attract customers who are late in the buying cycle. This means a higher conversion rate from the higher quality traffic you’re receiving.

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The 5 Rules of Writing Email Marketing Subject Lines

17 January 2010View CommentsEric

If you’re running an email marketing campaign, your first challenge is always getting people to actually read your emails. Without a decent open rate, your campaign won’t have a chance of getting off the ground. That’s why it’s essential that you understand how to write compelling subject lines that simply beg to be clicked.

• Rule #1: Test. Test. Test.—A recent survey conducted by MarketingSherpa.com found that 40% of email marketers had high impacts on the return on investment (ROI) by testing their subject lines. Testing is the only way to determine what does and does not work for your campaign. You should be testing everything from the benefits you include in the subject line to the optimal lengths for your subject lines. Take what you learn, and continually refine your subject lines to be the best they can be.

• Rule #2: Focus on a benefit—If you want people to actually open your email, you need to let them know what’s in it for them. Focus your subject line on a benefit that resonates with the reader. It can be something as simple as “Save 50% on Sweaters This Friday Only.” What you don’t want to do is have a boring subject line like “XYZ June Newsletter.” Be specific and clear in delivering a benefit in your subject line. Continue Reading →

A Behind the Scenes Look at My Copywriting Process

14 January 2010View CommentsEric

Over the past few years as a freelance copywriter, I’ve worked on hundreds, maybe even thousands, of projects. During this time, I’ve developed a specific copywriting process I use to make sure I cover all of the bases and get my copy the best it can be.

Now, I’ve decided to pull the curtain back to give you a behind the scenes look at my copywriting process. In this post, I’m going to focus on the questions I ask all clients before I begin writing copy. This questionnaire helps me identify the angle I’m going to take with the copy as well as the main message I want to get across to those who read it.

Here’s a look at my copywriting questionnaire.

• Who is your target audience and what is most important to them? Understanding who you’re communicating with helps you better understand what motivates them to buy, which benefits they care about, how they prefer to communicate, and more. The more you know about your target audience, the better you’ll be able to connect with them.

• What do you want people to do when they read your copy? All copy needs to have a clear call to action. That’s why it’s important to identify what exact action you want readers to take. Do you simply want them to subscribe to your newsletter? Or are you looking to make the sale on the spot? Identify the desired action, and write a clear call to action that tells readers what you want them to do. Continue Reading →

Do You Make These 5 Headline Writing Mistakes?

11 January 2010View CommentsEric

Writing headlines isn’t some mystery that’s impossible to understand. In fact, it’s easy to write effective headlines when you avoid these 5 common mistakes.
• Mistake #1: Not communicating a benefit—If you want people to read your copy, you need to immediately let them know what’s in it for them. Buyers are selfish. If you don’t quickly communicate a benefit that they care about, they’ll leave your website for another. So, identify a key benefit of your products or services, and drive that point home in your headline. For example, if you’re selling a weight loss product, your headline could be something along the lines of “How to Safely Lose 10 Pounds in 30 Days or Less.”
• Mistake #2: Being unclear—Clarity is a key component of a successful headline. If people don’t understand the point you’re trying to make, the chances of them reading beyond the headline are slim. An easy way to determine if your headline is clear enough is to have someone outside of your company read only the headline. After they read the headline, ask them if they know what the rest of your copy is about. If they’re unable to identify the message, it’s probably time to rewrite your headline.
• Mistake #3: Trying to be clever— Puns and inside jokes almost never work because they’re unclear, and they can make you sound condescending. Don’t try to be cute. Don’t try to be funnier than you are. Like the previous tip on this list says, it’s all about the clarity of your headline. Clever headlines usually aren’t clear.
• Mistake #4: Sounding gimmicky—We’ve all come across headlines that sound a little too good to be true. Here’s an example: Make $10,000,000 a year working 4 Hours a Week! Headlines that sound too gimmicky will cause you to lose credibility, and as a result, it won’t perform up to par. Statistics and How-to’s can be an effective way to make your claims seem more legitimate.
• Mistake #5: Ignoring SEO—When writing headlines for the web, it’s important to try to include your main keyword whenever possible. Optimizing your headline for the search engines improves that page’s relevance for the targeted keyword. Additionally, it can help to increase the clarity of your headline as the keyword clearly describes what the web copy is about. Just be careful that the keyword doesn’t cause your headline to become clunky and difficult to read.

 

Which headline mistakes would you add to this list? Leave a comment in the replies.

Overcoming the Most Common Blogging Obstacles

11 January 2010View CommentsEric

When you first start a blog, you’re overflowing with excitement. You’re ready to share your thoughts with the world, and you might even have visions of making a lot of money with your blog. Fast forward a few months, and the excitement is gone. Rather than being something you’re passionate about, blogging now feels like a chore.

What happened? You’ve been tripped up by one of these blogging obstacles.

• Coming up with new ideas—Whether you blog once a week or on a daily basis, sooner or later writer’s block will rear its ugly head. You sit staring at a blank Word document just waiting for a fresh idea to pop into your head, but it never comes.

Thankfully, there are several things you can do to overcome writer’s block. One easy way to generate ideas is to get involved in conversations on Twitter with others in your niche. Just by watching your Twitter feed, you’re bound to come across a new idea for a blog post.

You should also spend time browsing through old comments on your blog. You might find that your readers present some of the best ideas for new post topics. It could be a question they brought up about an old post or something they mentioned off hand that you could take a step further in a new post.

What other ideas do you have for beating writer’s block?

• Lack of readers—Is there anything more disheartening than writing one post after another only to look at your stats and realize no one is actually reading your blog? A lack of readers can make any blogger question whether or not their efforts are worth the trouble.

The good news is there are easy things you can do to drive traffic to your blog. The first thing you should always be doing is optimizing your posts for the search engines. Just incorporate the basics of SEO (placing keywords in your title, url, and throughout the post), and over time, your traffic will begin to increase.

You should also take full advantage of social media outlets like Twitter, Facebook, ReddIt, Digg, Mixx, and other similar sites.

Read this post for more tips for getting blog readers.

• Finding time to network with other bloggers—Networking with other bloggers can help you in many different ways. First, it can help to drive traffic to your blog. See, when you network with other bloggers, they’ll be likelier to link to your posts, and you may even have opportunities to submit a guest post to their blog or have them submit one to yours.

Building relationships with other bloggers can also be helpful for positioning yourself as an expert in your niche. Suppose the opportunity for submitting a guest post does arise. This tells the readers of this other blog that the blog owner respects your opinion, presumably because you’re an expert.

Discover more reasons you need to start guest blogging.

• Standing out in a huge crowd—There are hundreds of millions of blogs online right now. Needless to say, the blogosphere is a little crowded. Perhaps the biggest obstacle you’ll face is standing out in this huge crowd.

As cheesy as it might sound, the best way to separate your blogs from all the others is to simply be yourself. Don’t try to copy what everyone else is doing. Write the way you talk. Share your unique point of view with readers. There are far too many bloggers who play it safe by just repeating what everyone else is saying. Don’t be one of them. Be yourself. It’s the one thing that truly makes you different from every other blogger.

What are your biggest obstacles to blogging? Share your thoughts in the replies.

Are You Making These Deadly Website Usability Mistakes?

03 January 2010View CommentsEric

Web usability is about providing the best user experience possible. The easier your website is to use, the likelier it is that your visitors will convert into customers. Ignoring usability guidelines, on the other hand, greatly increases the odds of frustrating and confusing your visitors, causing them to click “back” to leave your website.

To help you improve the usability of your website, I’ve come up with a list of the most common website usability mistakes people make. I’m sure I’ve left some important mistakes off this list, so please add to this list by leaving a comment.

• Confusing navigation—Web users have been trained that site navigation will usually be across the top or on the left-hand side of the website. Placing your navigation elsewhere could confuse them and cause them to leave your website. In addition to properly placing your website navigation, make sure the links are descriptive so that the user can easily find the page he is looking for.

• Difficult to read text—If visitors have a hard time reading the text on your website, you might as well pack it up and call it a day because your website won’t be effective. People shouldn’t have to squint really hard to read your text or need to highlight it because the contrast is so low. Make sure you use easy-to-read fonts, a proper font size, and a good contrast between the text and the background. Continue Reading →