Cambridge Business Association
Web Copy That Sells
Book

Web Copy That Sells

The Revolutionary Formula for Creating Killer Copy That Grabs Their Attention and Compels Them to Buy

Maria Veloso
AMACOM, 2009
First Edition: 2004
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Recommendation

Writing for the Web is different than writing for print, but what exactly is the difference? Veteran copywriter Maria Veloso has pondered this question and provides some solid, standard answers in her useful, straightforward manual, which helps copywriters produce great sales copy for the Internet. While maximizing the sales opportunities copywriters find on the Web, Veloso also explains how to adapt traditional emotive ad copywriting to meet the Web’s restrictions, from the physical limitations of a Web page to the distractibility of the average online consumer. She explains how to use opt-in offers and how to write B2B and B2C copy. getAbstract recommends her practical, entertaining book to Web copywriters, particularly novices, who want to boost sales and better understand the strengths and weaknesses of their medium.

Summary

Writing Irresistible Copy

Quick! What’s the most important element of any Web site? Graphics? Videos? Colors? Flash animation? Nope. It’s the written word. Two major studies report that most Web visitors pay attention to the words first. This is especially important to understand if you want to sell online. More than 175 million Web pages compete for people’s attention, so good Web copywriting skills are a business survival tool. Internet sales copy has the same goal as print advertising copy: to compete for the reader’s time and attention. To write evocative Web sales copy, start by following three rules:

  1. Don’t make your ad look or read like an ad – About 3,250 ads bombard people every day. The last thing visitors to your Web site want to see is another ad. Since most people go online to get information, your headline should tell them how to get more of it. Make your sales pitch part of a larger informational strategy. Respected adman David Ogilvy found that ads don’t have to look like ads; they can look, for example, like newspaper editorial pages. Six times more people read articles than ads. Useful information magnifies this appeal...

About the Author

Veteran copywriter Maria Veloso is director of the Web Copywriting University and the former Director of Creative Web Writing for Aesop Marketing Corporation.

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