The Forgotten Side of Optimisation

You are a business (or charity, or entrepreneur) and the conversation is about marketing.

For most people, when they hear the word 'optimisation' their mind thinks of SEO...

Search Engine Optimisation.

Which is all about getting you, your website or web pages as high up the rankings of Google (and other search engines) as possible.

SEO remains a bit of an obsession for some people. They will happily spend hours and hours (and a fair chunk of their hard-earned cash) to 'win' the battle of the rankings and reach for top spot. For some it's as if this is the ONLY thing that matters (if you were wondering, t's not).

And there are plenty of people out there who say they can achieve the 'Holy Grail' of #1 spot for your name, business or keywords. Maybe they can. Maybe not. That's a different discussion for another time.

I do know the world of SEO is complex. I do know there are some dark arts to it (some treading or overstepping a fine line on legality). I do know it's getting harder and harder to be successful with SEO.

As always, it's buyer beware.

The point I really want to make is that SEO is not the only way to optimise to improve your marketing and revenue results.

You can optimise your marketing through changing and testing the words on the page. Online. Offline.

As a copywriter, I naturally get asked to write fresh copy for websites, campaigns, video scripts and sales funnels. But I also get asked by people to take a look at what they already have - to see if I can make it better.

By better, I don't mean grammar or syntax.

We are talking results. Impact. Conversion. Outcomes.

Many businesses seem to be missing a trick here. They put together a bit of copy and then just leave it. No monitoring. No testing. No tweaks. No fine-tuning.

It puzzles me.

Good copy won't save a bad product or service. It won't help much if you make a poor offer, or make the wrong offer at the wrong stage of the buying process.

But words DO make a difference.

Take any part of your marketing and the chances are it involves the use of copy (even if it's a video). It's the simplest thing to review each part and ask yourself the question.

How can I improve the words on the page for better results?

It works for everything.

Social Media ads.

Retargeting.

Landing pages.

Emails.

Nurturing sequences.

Sales pages.

Long copy and short copy.

Website.

Web pages.

Sales letters.

Leaflets.

Brochures.

Adverts.

And, yes, even the traditional chalk-scribbled A-board outside a shop, cafe or salon can benefit from the right words.

When you review, test and tweak the copy you are in the business of optimisation.

SEO may get all the attention and noise.

But forgetting about the power of optimised copy leaves you with a cost.

It usually presents itself through a lack of lead generation, lower conversions, lost revenue, missed "oh, so nearly" sales and a touch of myopia by the owner.

You can (as so many do with SEO) just keep on guessing. Or learn about copy properly (reading a handful of blogs won't get you too far, by the way). Or ask for a little expert help to smooth things along.

There are plenty of really good copywriters out there who 'optimise' copy for a living. They can write for you. Fine-tune existing copy for you. They can even teach you if you're sure you want to keep doing it for yourself.

What will your A-board (or web page, or email, or letter) say tomorrow?