Imagine a world where it felt easy to put your thoughts on paper and then out into the world to be met with cheers of, “That’s exactly what I was looking for! Here, take my credit card and my firstborn. I’m ready to pay you for your genius!”

But then you go to put what you do and how you seek to serve your tribe into words and…

Hear that? Those are crickets. Lots and lots of crickets.

I know, I know. I can hear it now…

“Elizabeth, I’m not a writer.”

“Elizabeth, I’ve tried that and it doesn’t work.”

Listen, I totally get it. Not everyone is a writer by trade. But that doesn’t mean you can’t follow a process for capturing your voice and creating copy that actually gets your dream clients to say, “HECK YES!” So today, I’m bringing you tips from the Ashlyn Carter. She is a conversion copywriter and marketing strategist specializing in wedding & creative industries. Her launch funnels have generated upwards of $500k in revenue for clients. The nitty-gritty tactics she shares are literally going to change your business.

If you're struggling to get people to convert, if you feel like you don't know how to put what's on your heart into words in a way that people can trust you and want to work with you, keep reading!

Copywriting is the art (and science!) of words

The words you choose to tell your story are designed to coach your ideal audience, or convert prospects into clients/sales. In marketing, your brand’s images and visual assets are there to help you entice a client, but they don’t always help you close the sale.

Words do.

Copywriters craft messaging pieces such as website copy, email funnels, sales page copy, brand messaging in general, and product descriptions; basically anything that is going to help a potential customer decide if what you’re offering is the right fit for them.

Words provide clarity for customers, and clarity is king.

Writing your own copy is hard

It’s important to understand that all copywriters struggle writing their own content. Writing your own copy is hard because we have a tendency to not take the time to listen to what our internal voice has to say. But the truth is: to write good copy, you have to be a good listener. You have to be able to hear what your audience is asking for and deliver content that answers those questions, even before they ask them.

So if you’re struggling to write content, especially your own, here are some tips to help you master the art, and the science, of copywriting.

So where do you start?

Your homepage headline.

Unlike sales copy, where the content is highly specific, your homepage is different. Your homepage has to speak to a wide audience, capturing those individuals with a variety of budgets and needs, and that’s hard. The art is in how you talk about your business and your brand. Ask yourself how your audience is going to perceive your business, based on the way you talk about it.

Another key point you need to remember is this: The best copy is never in your head, it’s in your audience’s. It’s your job to get out there and understand your audience so you can write to their specific needs.

You need a brand voice

It doesn’t matter what phase in your business you are at, you need to hone in on your brand voice and make sure it reflects who you are and what your business represents. Your brand voice serves as the ground zero for your brand. Once you’ve established your voice, you are going to use that voice to craft all of your brand messaging including your elevator pitch, mission statement, core values, social media bios, and website content.

Once you write your mission statement and core values, you should compile that content into a single document that you’re able to reference as you start to craft the rest of your content.

And this content might change.

In those first few months of your business, as you grow, learn, and evolve, your language might change to better reflect your audience as you start to better understand who they are, what they need, and what their pain points are.

Your bio needs to be strong

You need to be able to tell everyone who you are as succinctly as possible, and having a strong bio makes that easier. A strong bio doesn’t just tell us who you are and what you do, but it should also tell us what you do differently, or better, than the competition.

You’re going to use this to pitch yourself. You will use it on your website, on social media, and to pitch yourself to podcasts or blogs.

Messaging is king

In this day and age, it’s pretty simple to duplicate visuals. You can easily replicate your color palette and imagery into different aspects of your business. What you can’t (and don’t!) want to be easy to replicate is your story. You want that to stand out and be uniquely yours.

Test your messaging constantly. You should always test your content on your audience to find out what works and what doesn’t - that’s how you will establish your best practices. So test your content, regularly, and if it converts for your audience, then you know it’s working.

That may sound crazy, but learn the “rules” of content writing, become a pro, and then break them. There’s no one “right” way to do something. If you’re doing things right, you’re constantly testing your content on your audience and finding out what works. Put on your blinders, ignore what other professionals are doing in your industry, and focus on what works best for you and your audience. Remember, the goal is creating content that converts - and you’re only going to create successful conversions if you stay true to your audience.

Be your own copywriter

So what happens when you’re not at a place in your business to hire a copywriter? Should you do it yourself? Should you take a course?

The reality is, as a business owner, writing is never going to go away. It’s one of those pieces of owning a business that is always going to need to be done, and if you’re not in a position to hire someone, you will have to do it yourself. But writing is a great skill to have, and it can be mastered.

As a business owner, you need to be able to sell your audience on your product or service better than anyone, and sometimes, outsourcing content can result in outsourcing the sales psychology of your offer.

So write the first, and even second, versions of your website content. Get familiar with your content and get comfortable talking about what you do and who you are. Get a solid understanding of your audience, learn how to write engaging subject lines, and learn how to write emails that convert. Identify the copywriting tasks that you realize aren’t your strong suit and outsource those. Maybe ad copy isn’t your strong suit - that’s okay - outsource it. But when it comes to your brand messaging, teach yourself how to write strong content.

This skill will help you in the long run.

**Your story matters**

Are you incorporating a story into your writing?

Next time you sit down to write, try story banking. So many people think a story has to be the grand idea or something major that happened in their lives, but don’t discredit your day-to-day. It’s in those little moments like when your kid said something funny, or when you stubbed your toe and you had to walk yourself through mental exercises so it didn’t ruin your whole day. Those little moments hold more value and more meaning than you realize - use that to your advantage.

Stop focusing on trying to remember what happened that one time when you were ten, and focus on those little moments, in your day, that could mean nothing to you, but could relate to your audience and help you close that sale.

Copywriting is hard work, but it is vital to success as an online business owner. There are templates, there are tools, there are resources to help you learn how to do it in your business. Check out Ashlyn’s podcast episode on Scaling Up for more tips on writing incredible copy!