website ideas (Photo credit: Sean MacEntee)

Have you ever done this?

Found a bright shiny website with whistles and bells, looking pretty and inviting.

So you decide to stay and look round. Then you discover that although it looks like it will be informative, the website content lacks something…you cast around for the word…what is it again? Oh yes, I know. It lacks INFORMATION!

The content is lacklustre and the information is badly written, poorly punctuated and there’s a few spelling mistakes for good measure. There are some keywords, but they seem to have been sprinkled liberally rather than used sparingly and in context. Perhaps the owner of the website has written it for themselves, or perhaps they have relied on a web developer to write it for them. After all everyone can write, can’t they? We all learn to write at school. It’s just a matter of stringing a few sentences together and bunging it up on a website.

What’s the result of this cobbled-together content?

Visitors don’t stay around. If you’re selling something, then they may not bother to see what it is. They may proceed to buy, but then they were going to anyway and if they’ve seen it cheaper on another website then they won’t bother. There’s no interest to keep them here, nothing to learn and no real information that they can use.

What lessons can you take from this as a business owner?

• Bright shiny websites are all very well, but it’s the content that keep people around
• Everyone might have learned to write at school, but only certain people have kept in practice
• SEO is an art which is learned. Just adding keywords here and there will not do the job of carefully crafted content which has been optimised for SEO
• The website has ten seconds to attract a visitor’s attention. Give them something interesting to read and keep them for longer

Talking to a copywriter can help save your website. Organise your information, create interesting content on relevant subjects and your website will instantly improve. Copywriters can create landing pages to entice visitors further, sales pages to help pitch your products and informative articles which can help to sell for you.

If your bright and shiny website also has sparkly and exciting content to match, then your website visitors are going to come back again and again.

Sarah Charmley is a freelance copywriter who specialises in making web content bright and shiny too. Contact her using the form for a personalised quote to save your website. 

If one of your resolutions in 2012 is to raise the profile of your website, then have you considered updating or increasing the content to be found on your site?

Providing useful and informative articles are a good way to keep visitors clicking around your website and encouraging them to spend money with you. It also helps your website look fresh and new. You might want to update your ‘About’ pages, your portfolio or your business information if you provide a service. You may want to improve product descriptions and make them more imaginative.

It’s not enough just to have a large amount of articles and stuffing them with keywords does not make them interesting enough to keep your visitors interested in looking around your website. These articles have got to be the real deal – interesting and full of information on the subject that is your business. Choose an eye-catching headline that reflects the body of the article. If you have a long article, then break it up using relevant sub-headings so that it is easier to digest.

Laura of About: Marketing has written a blog post on this very subject. She knows the value of good content for any website. She enjoys writing and her articles are always useful.

But all this planning and writing takes time. You might have many calls on your time at the moment and the writing gets put off and left to one side – perhaps even left altogether.

Don’t underestimate the value of freshly written content and don’t put it off any longer. Why not outsource it to a copywriter? They are used to creating content that is rich in information, context and professional. Then you can get on with the million and one other jobs that are jostling for your attention. Using your resources effectively can help your business to really take off this year.

Know your strengths and if writing has never been one of them, then outsourcing that particular job might be the best decision you ever made.

Sarah Charmley is a freelance copywriter, editor and proofreader. For a copywriting quote that has been tailored to suit your business, email sarahthecreativewriter@gmail.com

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What is it about the New Year that makes it such a new start? September can seem to take on this role because of the children changing classes but it seems that January 1^st is much more motivating every year.

It’s time to evaluate what you have been doing with your business in the previous year and what you want to do with it this year. The best way to do this is to write your goals down.

Although the past year has been reasonable, it could have been better. My first goal in 2012 is to find more regular clients rather than one-off clients. I hope to achieve this by targeting my markets better and offering regular services such as producing newsletters and writing blogs rather than just articles. I enjoy doing newsletters for various subjects and have the right software to produce a good proof as a PDF which is acceptable to most printers.

My second goal is to take some time for myself creatively. There are other markets that I would like to get into but to achieve this, I will need to put some time in on my own work so that I can polish my writing and bring it to the right standard. This may involve changing some of the things I do on my website, but not immediately.

My third goal is to ensure that a good work-life balance is struck for me. There have been some issues on the domestic front recently that may involve some decorating work which has the potential to affect my work time. I will need to find a way to balance this to ensure that work is regularly coming in.

And finally I would like to attend the occasional networking event this year so that I can make some face-to-face contacts.

How about you? What are your goals this year? Let’s check back in six months and see how they are going!

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It’s a scary thought – you came into business, excited at a new idea, buzzing with the possibilities that lay ahead and laughing in the face of failure.

Six, twelve or eighteen months on, the realities have hit: you have experienced the ups and downs of running a business: you have got to grips with accounts, day to day expenses, marketing, invoicing and perhaps stock flow. You have discovered the bad bits of running a business.

Of course it’s not all bad: sometimes your invoices will flow, your customers will pay you on time and you can enjoy being a small business owner and think that all’s right with the world. It seems to be the case, however that business can be feast or famine: either everyone wants your services or no one wants your services. There seems to be no steady flow of work.

First of all, you need to keep a steady head. Take an honest look at your business. What are the good and bad points? Where are problems arising and how are you dealing with them? Check the invoices, check the cash flow and check the customers that you are talking to. Are you doing all you can to keep your customers happy?

Once you have taken stock of your business, then think through what you need to do to improve the bad points. Do you need to increase your marketing? Do you need to set time aside regularly to chase up invoices? Do you need someone else on board to take on the little tasks that are filling your day when you have more important needs to take care of?

Decide on up to three points of action, write them down, pin them to the noticeboard and put them on the calendar then act on them. Do what needs to be done to keep your business afloat. Take the action you need to take and get your business back on track.

It’s your business. Whether it succeeds or fails depends on you alone. You can choose to take the steps to improve it and move it to the next level, or you can choose to let it fail. Sometimes events happen that are beyond our control and in that situation things change and there may be little you can do. Where you have it in your power to instill a change for the better, then do it.

Your business may thank you for it.

Sarah Charmley is a freelance copywriter, editor and proofreader who can use her skills to improve your website and give it that professional touch. You can get in touch with her by using the form on this website.

Related articles

• Does Your Small Business Need Cash Flow? Try This… (entrepreneurs-journey.com)
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It’s been a while since I posted.

We’ve had Easter Holidays and a Royal Wedding in the UK. Then our family had a French student for a week, a week in Guernsey then two weeks of working frantically to catch a deadline or two. It’s been a busy time and this blog has suffered as a result. I have genuinely not found time to update it. So today’s post is all about what you can do when life gets in the way.

For me, I need a way to kick start my marketing again. The summer holidays are around the corner. The advantage of summer holidays is the lack of need to get out of bed too early to take the kids to school. The disadvantage is the fact that the kids are at home!

As a UK copywriter, working from home, I do need some semblance of peace and quiet. It is easy to get distracted from your work by the children. Finding some work-life balance can be even more difficult. Thankfully, my children are old enough to amuse themselves for a short while. I normally trade with them – a morning’s work for an afternoon of fun and we make sure we get out and enjoy ourselves. Any work that I do not complete in the morning I finish in the evening when the children are in bed and this seems to work for us.

After a long time when you have been snatching hours here and there to keep up with your business, it can be difficult to organise your thoughts and decide what to do first. A copywriter’s business is mainly marketing in order to find new and existing clients that need some work doing and it can be difficult to carry this out in bits and pieces.

I enjoyed reading this post by Laura Lake at About: Marketing today. I am subscribed to her newsletter and always enjoy her posts. She suggests a 90 day marketing plan to help keep you on track. This time period suits as it will take you through the summer holidays and out to the other side. Check it out and see what you think.

Could a 90 day marketing plan help you?

Do you have any tips to share about working at a small business during the summer holidays?

Related articles

• How to Have a Good Holiday as a Small Business Owner (thecreativewriter.co.uk)
• Some Ideas for When Running a Small Business Gets Tough (thecreativewriter.co.uk)
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This week I have an extra teenager in the house: a French exchange student. She has been here for one night and is obviously finding the whole situation very strange as she does not speak a lot of English. There is a lot of laughter, a lot of pointing and many mispronounced words and she has gone off to school this morning, no doubt looking forward to sharing her experiences with her friends in her own tongue, but it got me thinking. How often do we make sure that our message is coming across clearly and succinctly? Or is our message misunderstood?

Naomi Dunsford of Itty Biz wrote a blog post last autumn. She suggested that small business owners needed to ensure that their customers knew what they were selling and that it was important that they check that they get their message across. This led to a post on this very website where I made sure that I explicitly explained what my message is and what services I offer.

Check the Message of Your Website

It can be a bit difficult to examine your own website and promotional literature subjectively, so you might wish to enlist the help of trusted friends. Ask them to look over your work and check it through while considering the following questions:

What is the message of this writing?

Is it clear from the writing what is being sold?

Can you easily find which company is selling the product on the information and can you find their contact details?

Do you have any questions about the product or service that have not yet been answered?

The answers may surprise you. Use their responses to inform your work when you next redesign the leaflet or website. Add information, make sure that the contact details are clear and ensure that your message is coming across loud and clear.

Writing Emails

Just as important as your website and promotional literature is how you come across when writing professional communications. I had a message from a potential client recently. He had been contacted by several copywriters after he posted about a job on a forum. He had chosen to answer me because some of the communications he had received from other people had contained spelling and grammatical errors. If you are a copywriter, then your work must always be proof-read and checked thoroughly. Even I let errors go occasionally, but I do my best to ensure that the work is as perfect as possible.

Emails can seem impersonal, brusque or even rude! If you have a tendency to write short emails, then it is best to have someone to check over them that you have got the tone right. There are probably more misunderstandings over emails than anything else. Don’t forget to use a spellchecker, but always read through yourself as well – spellcheckers do not pick up words that are spelled correctly but in the wrong place.

Pick your words with care, check that what you have written is as grammatically correct as you can make it and proof-read before sending out email will all help to ensure that your communications are professionally produced.

Make sure that your company is sending the right message to your customers to ensure that there is no misunderstanding about what you can offer them.

Related articles

• Should You Employ a Cheap Copywriter? (thecreativewriter.co.uk)

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There’s something about being a small business owner that makes it difficult to stop being a small business owner. Even when you’re at dinner, taking the kids to school or even on holiday, then you still have a million small jobs to do: marketing, improving your website or even actually working. How do you manage to switch off and relax when it is time to take a holiday?

Taking a holiday is a must every year for every working person. Time to relax and spend time with your family will help to cement your family relationships and bring you all closer together. Whether you shut down your business completely or whether you have staff on which you can rely to keep your business running, when you work for yourself, taking time out with no holiday pay can be difficult.

Here are some tips for trying to relax even when you can’t:

- Plan ahead. Make sure that all orders and accounts are taken care of before you go away. Schedule jobs for after your holiday and if there are clients who just cannot wait then offer them to other small business owners you can trust. Tell all your clients that you will be away and give them the dates that you will be back.

- Ask a good friend in the same line of business to be a contact for your customers in a time of emergency then do the same for him. Make sure that you trust each other, though.

- Leave the mobile at home. If you have a separate work mobile and personal mobile then that is so much the better. You can leave the mobile at home and deal with any issues when you get back. Don’t forget to set an ‘I’m out of the office until xxx date’ message and your clients will be waiting for you when you get back.

- If you really can’t go a full two weeks without checking email, then why not log into an internet cafe just once halfway through the week? Then you can be reassured that everything is fine and that you can continue enjoying your holiday.

- Sometimes when your brain is enjoying some downtime, then fresh ideas and problem solutions can occur to you. Don’t get stressed that you are nowhere near a computer, but take a pad and paper to jot them down to explore when you get back.

Planning and determination are the key elements of switching off when you go away for a holiday. Everyone needs to relax and your business will be the better for you having had a good time when you are away. You will come back refreshed and ready to face the small business challenges again.

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Every so often, it’s helpful to run a ‘best of’ blog post particularly once you have picked up your blogging rate. Here are the top five blog posts on The Creative Writer in March in my humble opinion. Feel free to share any posts that have helped you this month.

OK, going to break my own rules here – this wasn’t strictly published in March but on 28^th February, but Google Algorithm Change Rocks Content Websites was a blog post about a big change on Google. The effects of this change, known as Panda is still being assessed, but it affected some pretty big sites such as Suite101 and Hubpages, making those organisations take steps to improve the quality of their publishing. Some people are still concerned about the effects of this change, but I think it will all even out eventually and that great content is still king.

How to design a successful leaflet began life as a sample for a company, but turned into an interesting blog post. I have had a hand in designing leaflets, but as part of a committee and that can be a difficult thing to do, with everyone having their own opinion on how it should look. Some useful tips here.

Regular blogging can make a difference. I have noticed it on my own website: my stats are still steadily rising since I started making a commitment to blog three times a week. Try it and it could work for you.

Writing compelling copy offers an insight into the copywriter’s mind which is a dark and murky place… just kidding! Actually this suggests an idea that might help your company write copy that can help convert visitors into customers. Try it and let me know how you get on.

Form alliances with your fellow freelances is a great suggestion which can lead to more work for both of you. Find people that you can work with and get alongside them to the benefit of you both.

So these are some of my better blog posts this month that I think contained real value to the people reading them. Let me know what you think and please ask any questions that you would like to know the answer to.

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It’s a difficult one. On the one hand you want to collect email addresses for a mailing list (always giving your customer an opt-out clause) allowing you to send special offers, promotions etc. However there is evidence to suggest that the more screens that you send your customers to the less likely it is that they will buy. How often have you been frustrated by a retail website that insists on your registering with it even before they will check the stock for you?

At the most extreme case, one catalogue website insisted that they had the item in stock all the way to the checkout at which point it refused to process the sale because the item was out of stock in that particular colour. In itself that was annoying: I had registered purely to buy the item in question. However the icing on the cake was when the bills arrived! I had three or four bills, each announcing that I owed them precisely nothing! What a waste of paper! It has so put me off the website that I am most likely never to buy anything from them ever. However I remain a registered customer. At least I could unsubscribe from the emails.

This experience has put me off registering for websites and I am far more likely to buy from a website that allows me to buy as a ‘guest’ rather than a member. The majority of people have not had my bad experiences, though and if it is the only way that your customers can receive your goods or services then of course they are going to join.

You still need to examine your landing copy carefully and monitor the statistics from your website. If the landing page is not successfully converting visitors at a high enough level then you might need to tweak it so that it works more successfully. The thing to note is that you are unlikely to get it right straight away. The important thing is not to give up.

Some websites split test. They set up two landing pages and send traffic to each. They then monitor the results and go with the more successful page. If this is important to you, then this is a route that you may want to take.

It is not just the ad that is important, but the page on which the ad directs the customer. Make sure that the E-commerce side is simple for a user to navigate – a shopping basket which is visible and shows the contents, a list of items in the shopping basket and a big ‘Checkout’ button all help your customer to buy easily from you. Make postage and packing charges clear and transparent. Make sure that your customer can get all the information they need from the first page and ensure that any product photos are not only clear and easy to see, but include an enlarge option and even a 360° view if you are feeling extra techie.

Collect reviews from your customers, family and friends, find out what works and implement it – these are the key ingredients for a successful E-commerce website.

Related articles

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For small businesses, it can be difficult to have the skills to do all that your client may want you to. Your client may be looking for a web designer who also has graphic design skills, or they may look for someone who can design mobile apps as well as designing an e-commerce website.

You might not have the skills necessary to complete all the work, but do you know someone who does?

Teaming up with other small businesses can be a way to compete with bigger companies who can afford to have people specialising in different aspects of website work in-house. You both gain from the business and the client can have everything that they need for their website to work. You can have people who you go to for web design, mobile app design, graphic design, copywriting, in fact anything that you think may be required by future clients. The small companies that you form alliances with may also be able to reciprocate and send business your way too.

How do you find companies that you will be able to work with?

Business forums can be a good way to find business partners. Joining forums can be a good idea to raise the profile of your company and enable local people to find you, but it can be a place where all kinds of business people gather to answer questions posted and chat about business issues. You can normally get a good idea of what kind of person someone is by their replies. Many business forums allow private messages or pm so you can open a conversation with someone and find out their rates. It is best if their rates fit in with yours so that there is not too big a discrepancy.

You may also meet people when you contact companies to advertise your services. As you get to know people and work with them, you can get a good idea of whether or not you would work well together and whether you would recommend this company. This should encourage you to always produce your best work, as you never know who might recommend your company.

Business networking meetings can help you to meet people that you might be able to work with. It is preferable to know the person that you are recommending and that means spending time with them and getting to know how they work.

If you are a business owner, and particularly if you offer a service, then you cannot just wait for the opportunities to come to you. Mingle and meet people; you may never know when your next job is going to come along, but you will be in the best possible position to meet all of your clients’ needs if you can form some friendly networks with business people that you trust and that you know you can whole-heartedly recommend.

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