The recent BBC story about poor spelling costing UK businesses millions in lost revenue wasn’t really a surprise to us. Mistakes in written communications not only undermine a company’s professionalism, but are often symptomatic of bad copy – copy that isn’t doing its job to convert customer interest into sales.
We’re all taught to write in infant school, so it’s easy to think that our whole lifetime’s experience of writing equips us adequately with this essential business skill. However, effective written communication is a little trickier than you might at first think, even if you ARE au fait with the ‘i before e’ rule and know how to use a semi colon properly.
Get it right
We can’t stress enough that word-perfect spelling and grammar is of paramount importance, not just for general reasons of trust and credibility, but also because mistakes could give misleading information. For example, knowing the difference between ‘complimentary’ and ‘complementary’ means that you won’t ever fall into the trap of offering something for free, when you merely intended to describe it as being the perfect match with another product or service. If you’re a bit shaky on how to use hyphens, where the speech marks should go in a quotation, or when you should use ‘affect’ as opposed to ‘effect’, then it’s a good idea to brush up on your writing skills.
However, effective copy doesn’t just require good spelling and grammar. It also needs to convey all the right business messages in a suitable voice and tone, in a concise and accurate manner. In short, you need to strike the right chord with your target audience, and you need to do it quickly. Speed is particularly of the essence with online – the web entrepreneur quoted by the BBC in the aforementioned article stated the window of opportunity to make a good impression is ‘about six seconds’ – so it’s even more important that words are chosen carefully and sentences crafted to ensure that your point is made swiftly. This type of writing isn’t taught in mainstream education, so many people aren’t already equipped with the requisite skills to do this effectively – however, if you’d like to learn them, we do offer bespoke workshops in written communication.
Fresh perspective
Added to the difficulty of ensuring your writing is technically correct, and strikes the right note when it comes to tone, business owners and managers have an added complication to contend with – perspective. You know huge amounts about your industry, and can go into great detail about this and that, using all the relevant lingo. Many struggle to step back from their business activities enough to be able to keep their copywriting clear, concise and jargon-free – and understandably so, since they are so involved in the daily detail that it’s difficult to take an outsider’s perspective. But customers are technically outsiders, so although tailoring marketing communications to meet their needs may be tricky, it is absolutely essential. If you don’t convey your offering in the right way, they may not realise you’re exactly what they’re looking for…
This is where professional copy writers (like us) come in. We not only have an immaculate grasp of spelling and grammar, a stylish turn of phrase, and years of experience when it comes to finding the right voice to convey the right messages, we have the benefit of an outsider’s perspective – it’s easier for us to communicate on your customers’ level, because we’re not so ingrained in the daily workings of the business. Whether you’re looking to communicate with the trade or consumer audience, we can take care of all your copywriting needs, from blog posts, social media and websites to brochures, direct mail and magazine editorial, leaving you free to focus on your main business activity.
