How to Write High-Converting Copy
It’s about appealing to user needs
Growth solves all problems. One key element of growth is knowing how to write great copy for your landing pages, ads, etc. Admittedly, I’m no copywriter. However, I do know how to understand users and that’s 90% of the battle when it comes to writing copy that converts.
You need to deeply know your users’ needs, wants, problems, and challenges. I have previously written on how to understand user pain points. If you haven’t read it, I’d recommend going and skimming it before continuing here.
Once you understand your users, you can start writing great copy. Appeal to their desires, headaches, and the way they speak. One tip is to have one user segment in mind. It’s easier to write for one person than everyone.
For the sake of simplicity, let’s imagine we are writing copy for a landing page. And more specifically, copy above the fold, meaning what a user sees on their screen before they start scrolling. It’s the most important real estate on a landing page. It is what creates the first impression of your brand. It will influence bounce rates and conversions the most.
The main purpose of great copy on a landing page is to capture attention, communicate your value proposition clearly, and guide the user toward a single, focused action.
Elements of High-Converting Copy
A landing page has three key elements: The header, subheader, and call to action (CTA).
The headline is the hook or the attention-grabber. It should focus on the outcomes or benefits your product or service provides, not the features that make your product or service great. This is why understanding the motivations and the pain points of your users is important. Use your understanding to get at their emotions.
The subheader supports or explains the header. It provides context and details on what you are offering, who it is helping, and/or how it helps. Depending on what you need to convey, it can be a one-liner or a couple of quick bullets. Most importantly, it needs to be concise enough that people will take the time to read it. If you can’t distill what you do down to a few key bullets, then you need to refine how you explain what you do
The CTA is what you want the user to do. The CTA should be action-oriented and provide enough insight into what happens next if they click. Make it difficult for visitors to say no. On ad platforms such as Facebook, you won’t be able to customize your CTA, but you can find something that works best for your product or service.
Avoid These Mistakes
Avoid wording that feels high-committal. At this stage, users are weary about committing without learning more. If asking for user information on the landing page, avoid asking for too much. An email will do. Don’t ask for their full name, date of birth, and password information. Too many fields to fill out introduces unnecessary friction.
Ensure you don’t have multiple CTAs. Having one button doesn’t mean you have only one CTA. Your copy itself may be a CTA and competing with what you actually want a visitor to do. Keep the messaging simple and aligned to do one thing. If you try to boil the ocean with your copy, your visitors are going to boil their brains trying to understand your offering. Visitors should be able to succinctly share in their own words what you do and how it benefits them after seeing your landing page or ad.
Avoid generic copy. “The future of tech is here” doesn’t tell me how you solve my immediate problem. It’s classic for B2B SaaS companies to be vague in their copy. If you are making people scroll or click around to figure out what you offer, you’ve already frustrated your landing page visitor.
Examples
DoorDash
There are probably a few different reasons why one would want to be a Dasher for DoorDash. One may be to make some extra money on the side. Another may be to have more flexibility in their schedule. This landing page emphasizes the value of flexibility. Being your own boss and working your own hours is very attractive to a segment of DoorDash's Dashers, which is exactly why they speak to it on this landing page. Notice that they don’t try to talk to everyone, but instead focus on one type of user.
Branch Furniture
Picture an office manager trying to get desks and chairs for a rapidly growing team. No one wants to order from Amazon or Ikea and spend hours reading directions and putting furniture together. Branch’s copy directly addresses this huge pain point and speaks to how they solve it through professional installation. It makes a pain point in someone’s job pain-free. Additionally, the CTA explains the next steps. By clicking, you are on your way to building out the perfect office.
Twinwood Adventure
This landing page focuses on the emotional benefits of indoor skydiving. Twinwood Adventures knows they are in a competitive market. They aren’t just competing against other indoor skydiving facilities, but against anything that is adrenaline-inducing—think mountain biking, boating, cliff jumping, etc.
They know potential customers likely have multiple tabs open doing research to look for something fun to do on the weekend. By including key aspects of deciding where to spend money (e.g. price, discounts), it helps potential customers make a quick decision and book a session.
My only knock on this landing page is that it has a phone number to call and a button for a discount, which could cause confusion on how to move forward. The only reason why this isn’t too bad though is because the phone number and the discount button lead to the same place, which is booking an indoor skydiving session.
Optimizing Your Copy
Now, getting your landing page or ad right from the start is almost impossible. Create multiple landing pages and test different copy. A/B test single lines to understand what resonates more and converts. Use AI to help you make your copy more concise and capture the tone you are going for. Gather qualitative feedback to understand how people feel and comprehend your copy. The more feedback and data you can collect, the better your copy will get over time.
Remember, writing copy to convert isn’t about explaining everything. It’s not about appealing to everyone or sharing a comprehensive list of features. It's not about having a Master's degree in English. It’s about appealing to the needs of target users and getting inside their minds. The more you know what they are thinking, the better copy you will write. So spend the time upfront understanding your users and the copy you write will become exponentially better at converting.