Is Your Copy Sloppy?

“Our handemade cards are awesome. Seriously!

We put so much work into these cards and we have sooooo many colors.

We can do custom orders to. Just email us for an estimate by email.”

I recently saw this on a web site I won’t name. The site design was eye-catching and the product was unique and beautiful, but I felt myself hesitating to order it. It took me exactly one nanosecond to figure out why. This description offers almost no information, is full of errors, and sounds like it may have been written by a seventh grader (and that is almost an insult to seventh graders).

Of course, this is an extreme example, but take a little surf around and you’ll see—there is a lot of shoddy writing floating around the intertubes. Which is unfortunate, because engaging, readable web copy is one of the most important tools you have for promoting your product or service. And it really isn’t that hard to create.

Technology has changed the way we access and distribute information, but the information itself comes to us the same way it always has—through the written word. After putting so much work into driving traffic to your site, the last thing you want to do is frustrate and annoy your visitors by burying important information in a lot of unnecessary text or misspelling the name of your own product (yep—I’ve seen that too).

Do yourself a favor and take a second look at the copy on your site.

We editor nerds talk about the three Cs when we’re working to improve a piece of writing:

Is it clear?

Can a visitor determine with a quick glance what exactly your product or service is? Sometimes when you spend a lot of time talking to other people who do what you do, you get in the habit of using short-hand phrases and insider talk that can be confusing to a newbie. Has that sort of thing crept into your web copy?

Make an outline or a bullet-point list. What are the highlights? What absolutely must be included? What kinds of questions can you anticipate visitors will have, and how can you answer them right off the bat?

Is it concise?

Does your copy get right to the point or is it a touch on the wordy side? Almost no one can write tight, clever, effective copy on the first draft. Did you spend much time paring down your words with some revision? Are you trying too hard to shoehorn keywords into sentences where they don’t fit?

The best writing is concrete, lean, and vivid. Put your copy on a diet. Cut out the fat (boring adjectives, passive voice, long or complex phrases that could be replaced with something short and snappy). Keep only the words that are doing work. You’ll be amazed at how much better the writing sounds when the ideas aren’t cluttered up with a lot of unnecessary filler.

Is it correct?

For the love of Pete, people—crack a dictionary. It was made for something other than propping up that wobbly table! Spell check is a good tool, but you can’t rely on it completely. Wikipedia, however, is a great electronic tool for grammar and punctuation questions. And please save the emoticons and chat-speak for…well, if you want to know what I think, you should save them until I depart from this planet, but that’s neither here nor there. In any case, they do not belong on a professional web site. Period.

Read over your copy before you post it. Read it out loud so you can hear how it sounds (this works like a charm to catch those errors your eye skips right over). Have a friend read it, or pay an editor for a half hour of her time. It will be worth every penny.

One final note that speaks to all three of the Cs: take a look at your design. Is your page bursting at the seams with information, images, and seizure-inducing graphics? Less is more. White space helps a reader isolate the piece of information he or she needs and digest it without getting distracted.

You work hard—represent that work to the world with professionalism and style! Happy writing, Ladybugs!

Guest Blog Post By Kelly O’Connor McNees

Kelly is a writer and editor. Check out Word Bird Editorial Services to see how she can help with projects big and small: www.wordbirdedits.com.

Want to Guest Post? Contact Katja Presnal

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