As creative entrepreneurs, our personal brand is heavily tied to our businesses, and our ability to build that know, like, and trust factor can make or break our sales in a saturated industry. Copywriting tips for creative entrepreneurs might look different from other industries, as we try to sell not just our service, but the experience we provide our clients as well.
Every time a potential customer or client interacts with you, whether it’s online on your website, Instagram, blog, Facebook, or even meeting you out and about doing your service, at events or shows, etc they are meeting with your brand.
During that process, they are building an impression of your brand and the experience they expect from you. Because of this, it’s critical to set up intentional brand touchpoints that help enhance that experience and create a cohesive impression of who you are as a brand!
I’ve found this to seem tricky to a lot of creative entrepreneurs, especially when it comes to personal based brands like photographers or other service providers. But even though it might seem tricky, it doesn’t mean it has to be 😉
The trick here is to remember that even though your business is named after you, your business is still a separate entity from yourself, and doesn’t have to be a full on replica of your own life!
In today’s blog post I’ll be sharing more about how you can use brand voice and copywriting to connect with your ideal client and ultimately bring in more sales.
Brand voice
You may have heard this before, but I want to encourage you to think about your brand as so much more than just your logo. Your brand truly is like an iceberg — sure, your fonts, colors, and logo is what people can easily spot and this can easily be changed (I would know about this, as a brand designer), but what truly matters, and will support and enhance a strong brand is how you’re able to incorporate all the other aspects of your brand beneath the surface.
Just like you should have clear guidelines for when you use what logo, what colors to use for your brand, and how your font system should be set up, creating similar guidelines for the underlying aspects of your brand, such as your brand voice, can truly help set you apart long term!
So how do we do this?
Great question!
Understanding your brand voice, and how it fits into the puzzle that is your brand is critical to building a solid brand. The brand voice is really those words and phrases that people come to associate with your brand, or that fit into that overall impression that you’re trying to create!
These words don’t all have to be words you’d normally use in your day to day life, but they need to serve an intentional purpose in your marketing. If you run a luxury brand, you might find that you need to use a different set of words than if you’re all about running budget friendly weddings!
Action step:
Look through your sent emails, Instagram DMs, and maybe even some instagram captions. Write down words that seem to come up a lot or words that describe the way you communicate, and from there, narrow this down to a list of 10-15 words that fit with your overall brand and how you want your brand to come across.
Are there words you’d never use? Write those down as well!
This really doesn’t have to be fancy, a simple list of adjectives or phrases to sprinkle through is plenty!
Looking for some examples? I’ve got you!
- Inspired
- Delicate
- Poised
- Cozy
- Calm
- Educational
- Minimalistic
- Whimsical
- Casual
- Friendly
Make it about them
Whenever we’re writing copy for our website (or any other stuff that we share) we tend to think we have to share so much about ourselves. Copy, by the way, is any written content with sales specific goals in mind. Basically, the words on your website for instance, is considered website copy — the main goal is usually to set up a relationship that will encourage a sale in the future!
This might sound harsh, but…
The people on your website don’t actually care about you as much as they care about themselves, that is. And the sooner you realize this, the quicker you’ll be on your way to selling more!
The ever famous example of this is the about page on your site. The place where we think we can finally roll out the red carpet and share our own story, let people in on our journey in our chosen creative field, and really show how much passion we have for what we do. However, this is actually the place we should be focusing the most about them.
Let’s look at an example, shall we?
“Hey! I’m Anna. Ever since I picked up my first 35mm film camera and looked through the shutter, I was obsessed with taking photos. I never wanted to put down the camera, and now, I can’t believe I’m lucky enough to look through my favorite 50mm lens every weekend capturing the most special day of all these couples’ lives.
I love coffee, my dog, and yoga pants.
Come say hi, wont you?
I’m gonna be pretty blunt and honest with you for a second — tough love warning — this will not sell, and most definitely not to the kind of client you want to work with.
I can’t quite see the future, but I can imagine a response or inquiry to this about page copy sounding something like:
“Hey Anna, I’m getting married on 10/10/20 – how much do you charge?”
Not quite the dream client we’re hoping for, right?
See, the problem with this one is that it is very much about the photographer. But even more so, it talks about technical things that the average shopper has no idea about, which can quickly lead them to feeling lost and unseen rather than excited and connected.
The one question that your client is wondering about this entire time, that you’re not answering is “ok, but what about me? Where do I fit into this picture?”
Let’s look at a different example, this one from the hero section of a wedding experience page:
The main difference here is that we are already calling out the ideal client here by saying your wedding day…
then, we continue on with common scenarios from wedding days, the ones that most couples are familiar with or dreaming of, making it easy for them to picture themselves there (no pun intended) in front of your camera or having you perform the service for them.
We’re not saying “all my couples” or “all these couples” but rather specifically calling this one person out, making them feel more seen and heard!
While you always want to share about you and your story, you want to make sure that every single word you put on your site is intentional and serves a purpose!
Action step:
Look through your about page or services page. At what point could your client be asking themselves “ok, cool, but where do I fit into this?” Or “can you help me with that?”
See if you can come up with some wording that can be reassuring or even better, convince them to take that next step with you!
Get in your client’s head
You want to know the best copywriting tip I ever heard?
Get in your ideal client’s head.
Oh but Ida, how can I do that?
Easy!
Ask them 🙂
Most of the words on my own website were actually written by … you guessed it, my ideal clients!
So how can you get those juicy website words that will help sell your services?
I recommend either chatting with ideal clients on marketing research calls or simply asking very specific questions in your testimonial form from your ideal clients!
For me, this looks like asking questions like:
- What fears did you have about working with a designer?
- Before working with Ida, my brand was…
- After working with Ida, my brand is…
- And so on, to truly get those website words that sell!
The key here is to not just get those “feel good” testimonials, but to really get more into how your ideal client was feeling before and after working with you. What kind of transformation did you help guide them through?
Action step:
Set up testimonial feedback forms through your CRM to collect valuable words from your clients that can be used as marketing materials! My CRM of choice, Dubsado*, makes this incredibly easy to do!
No ideal clients yet? Not quite booking those dreamy clients? No problem! See if you can set up some market research calls where you learn more about your ideal clients and what their pain points are! Offer up a gift card or just some free advice in exchange for their time!
Edit & Run the husband/boyfriend/friend test
Next up, we’ve gotta edit these words!
I once heard this quote from Twitter (through the wonderful Ashlyn Carter):
“Act like someone is giving you $100 per word you remove”
Bryan Harris
This isn’t English class (sorry to all the teachers turned creative entrepreneurs), and the rules you may have learned growing up no longer apply. It’s perfectly ok and even encouraged to write more like you speak. Switch up your sentence lengths, and make this as engaging and human as possible!
Read through it and see, are there any parts that sound like they don’t quite belong or could be removed? Well then remove them!
I also like to do what I call the husband test or friend/boyfriend test.
If you’ve gotten a little creative with the wording, read it out loud to your person of choice. These people truly know you the best, and will tell you if it doesn’t sound like you at all.
It’s fine if you use some of those brand voice words from earlier and they think they sound a little odd, but just make sure that the overall feel is authentic to YOU and how you normally show up! If not, you’ll struggle long term to be consistent with this!
Action step:
Edit your website to get rid of unnecessary words! People are busy and don’t have time for your rambling.
Run the boyfriend/husband/friend test to make sure your copy still sounds like you!
Tweak as necessary
The last tip, which might seem very obvious, but also easy to forget is to tweak your site as necessary.
Chances are, your business will grow, you’ll start attracting more and more ideal clients, and you’ll want to make sure that you refine your site to speak even more clearly to these people as you gain insight!
Are you ready to uplevel your brand and website? Learn more about our custom brand and website services today!
*this post contains affiliate links! This means I might make a small commission if you purchase, at no additional cost to you!
