Copy Not a Cure-All

A surprising number of business owners view copy as a cure-all. They believe sales copy can fix whatever problems they may have in their business.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but copy is not a cure-all. It will not make up for a bad product, a bad offer, or a bad list.

Let’s Look at a Real-Life Example…

A client came to me with a problem: her site wasn’t converting as well as she wanted. I could see a few big problems right away, and told her so.

She decided to hire me to rewrite the copy on her primary landing page. So I did. The copy went live, and I thought it was a significant improvement over the old version.

A couple weeks after the new copy had been put up, my client and I exchanged a few emails (edited for clarity).

<–Start Conversation –>

CLIENT:

We put up the copy you gave me and everything went lower than it was… so we added photos and still nothing… I liked what you wrote, but I am sad that nothing has gone forward… will it take a month or so?

RYAN:

What was your conversion rate before? What is it currently?

I can help, but need to know some numbers.

Has traffic tapered off or has it been steady?

CLIENT:

We have had only 112 visits and 2 orders from the time the new info went up. Before that I had at least 5 orders in 2 weeks… I thought that was very bad, that’s why I called you. :)

My web guy said it was because I lowered my daily money to AdWords. I was at $30.00 a day and I lowered it to $10.00 a day. I just couldn’t afford the monthly bill.

This is all so beyond me… and I thought I would be rich and famous long before this! :)

RYAN:

Hmmm… it’s hard to compare results. For instance, 5 orders out of how many visitors?

It may be that the new page is converting better. Two orders out of 112 visits is 1.79% conversion rate. Not great, but certainly not bad.

If we don’t know how many visitors it took to get five sales, then we don’t really have any basis for comparison.

It sounds like at the moment you have more of a traffic problem than a conversion problem. Although with a split-test, we may be able to improve the conversion rate a bit.

Ultimately, it’s not about how many sales you get… it’s about how many sales you can get at a profit.

It does you no good to get five sales worth $100 if it costs you $300 in advertising.

But if you can get two sales worth $30, and only spend $5 in advertising, that’s much better.

<–End Conversation –>

As you can see from our email exchange, my client slashed her daily AdWords budget from $30 to $10, which probably reduced her traffic by at least 66%. Assuming no change in conversion rate, this would automatically reduce the number of sales by 66% as well.

But with no “before” numbers available, it’s hard to say if there was an improvement or not. Based on the information she provided, the numbers seem to indicate the conversion rate actually went up.

The bottom line is this: my client expected a miracle. She got good copy instead.

Copy Is a Multiplier

It is important to be realistic about what sales copy can and can’t do.

If you have a good source of quality traffic, a solid product, and a reasonable offer, then good sales copy can multiply the sales you get. Depending on your volume, an extra half point tacked onto your conversion rate could mean thousands of extra dollars a month.

But let’s look at the flip side. If you have only an okay source of mediocre traffic, an average product, and a weak offer, then good sales copy will not rescue the project. The copy might get you a few extra sales, but you won’t experience the breakthrough results you’re looking for.

There are too many other variables negatively affecting the project — variables that are, for the most part, completely outside the expertise of your average copywriter.

What Is Copy Worth?

It all depends on where your business is. Copy isn’t worth much to a person who has no plan, no product, no marketing savvy. But copy that converts is worth a fortune to a business owner who has the other critical pieces in place: traffic, product, offer.

(Here I’m speaking of what the copy can actually do in terms of real results. It is entirely possible for a person without any business sense to overvalue copy. And it is possible for a person with a well-run business to undervalue copy as well.)

All is to say, copy is worth the most when all the variables are working together in harmony. Copy is worth less when those same variables are missing or out of synch with each other. Which, really, is just another way of reiterating my main point: copy is not a cure-all.

-Ryan M. Healy