A while back, I attended a webinar for small businesses on how to design a good website. The person who was presenting the webinar stressed the importance of paying for a professional service – that in the long run you are better off getting a professionally designed website than trying to save money by purchasing a cheap template website or doing it yourself. I agree with this completely.
However, she also commented that when it comes to copywriting, you should do it yourself, because hiring a professional copywriter is a waste of money.
Now, there are loads of people who claim to be content writers who can barely speak English and “write” articles by taking old articles other people have written and putting them through a machine that “rewrites” them by substituting words with synonyms (which are often completely inappropriate within the context), in the end creating articles that can barely be understood, let alone capture a reader’s interest or make the reader want to purchase anything.
And there are “writers” who think that writing for the web means learning which keywords are good for SEO and making sure that there are the right amount of them in the article – without any thought of style, the needs of the reader or the outcome you expect from the writing (a sale, a return visit to your site, etc.).
The person presenting the webinar may have been thinking of these types of writers when she said you are better off doing it on your own, and if she was, then she was correct.
But truly good copywriting can make a world of difference. A good copywriter understands your readers, knows how to interest and entertain them and how to encourage them to take action. A good copywriter will understand the principles of marketing and will have studied a subject such as English literature, journalism or creative writing to an advanced level.
It goes without saying that a good writer for the web understands basic spelling and grammar, which is why I thought this article was interesting:
