You’re likely familiar with the finding that over half of communication is non-verbal.
So perhaps you won’t be surprised to learn that your copy is “saying” a lot more than you think it is. That’s because tone of voice is at play, influencing how visitors read your copy and relate to your company.
Fortunately, tone of voice can be deliberately created, managed and optimized.
![How Does Product Copy Format Affect User Engagement? [Original Research]](https://cxl.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/study3_aoi_figure-320x160.jpg)
Product page copy is something that, generally, gets ignored.
Not just the content, but how it is formatted.
In this 3 part study from CXL Institute on eCommerce product pages (part 1 here, and part 2 here), we wanted to explore how elements of a product page affect users’ visual and value perceptions.
This experiment looks at how users view a page and read product text descriptions when the text format changes.
When trying to boost conversions, whether it’s on a signup screen or a landing page, it’s a default for many optimizers to generate hypotheses based on best practices and what’s generally “known” to be a problem.
A landing page that doesn’t display well on mobile is a perfect example. Someone might shout “it’s not responsive” and then resize the page properly for mobile use.
But that won’t solve the real issue… because the truth about most low converting landing pages on mobile isn’t just that they don’t resize properly, but that they have been written, designed, built… with no mobile context in mind.
Can you remember the last time your parents scolded you for swearing?
Throughout childhood, we’re conditioned to believe that swearing is inappropriate and crass. You could offend someone, it makes you seem uneducated, it’s unprofessional in the workplace… the list of reasons we’ve been told not to swear goes on and on.
But how bad is swearing, really? Is there a chance that it could be beneficial in business and optimization? As with most things people have told you that you absolutely should not do, there’s a chance you should be testing it.
If I gave you a 750 page book and a 150 page book, which one would you guess to be the better (more valuable) book?
Who are you more likely to trust to tell you the truth: a preschool teacher or a used car salesman? A firefighter or a magician? A child or a politician?
Some people are simply deemed more or less credible based on surface-level factors. The same is true for websites. [Tweet It!]
You have to know what makes your site the child or the politician.
When writing copy for a landing page, especially for a B2B site, do you write in plain language that everyone can understand or do you use technical jargon?
Most common wisdom has said that jargon doesn’t work in copy, but that’s a blanket statement that may not always be true.
According to Google Trends, the term “conversion rate optimization” is an official “breakout”, meaning “searches for that phrase have jumped by +5,000 percent” over the last few years.
Day in and day out, you’re surrounded by copy. You’re watching TV commercials, you’re seeing PPC ads in your search results, you’re visiting SaaS pricing pages, you’re shopping online for a new office printer… the list is endless.
It’s easy to look around and think, “Yeah, I could have written that.”
Whether you’re just getting started with copywriting or you’ve already written a few dozen landing pages, it’s important to know that copywriting mistakes are not few and far between.
To avoid making them yourself, it’s important to be aware of the most common (and costly) copywriting mistakes plaguing sites.
Let’s say you just started using a new SaaS product. Who do you think would be able to explain the product to you more clearly: an engineer, a marketer or a customer service representative? You’d think the person who helped bring the product to life (the engineer), right?
His definition, however, would likely be more detailed and complex, thus, more difficult for you, a first-time user, to understand.
As it turns out, marketers struggle with clarity, too. And it’s hurting your conversions in surprising ways.