<< Back to Blog page
Writing for business always serves a point. Whether it’s an email, a blog, or your website home page, you’re writing it for a reason. And how you write it matters. An email to a colleague is unlikely to be written in the same style or tone as one to a prospective client. It serves a different purpose – and the person reading it, or your target audience, will have different needs and expectations from it.
Understanding who you are writing for is the basis for effective communication. This applies not just to website copy and blogs, but all written communication. However, when you are writing for online consumption, you’ll need to factor in how your audience behaves online. And don’t forget, you are also writing for the search engines to a certain extent. They are a very specific part of your audience, and you need to be subtly targeting them too. And the key here is ‘subtly’!
Understanding your audience is one of the basics for effective website copywriting. Here’s why.
The importance of connecting with your target audience
When you understand your target audience and know who you’re speaking to, you can:
- Use language and a tone that resonates
- Address people’s specific needs or problems that need solving
- Connect with them emotionally
Connection builds trust and will make your copy more compelling. Copy that is too broad, too vague, or is off target won’t make this emotional connection. It’s also unlikely to be seen by the people you want to see it. You want to create a more focused ‘conversation’ that will drive action and increase conversion rates – and bring better results.
Understand your audience first to get your copy right
Misaligned copy can lead to high bounce rates, confusion, and lost sales. When you are writing for ‘everyone’ – or just not thinking about who you are talking to – you can end up appealing to the wrong people or no one. If the search engines show your content to anyone, it’s likely to be people who don’t really want what you offer. High bounce rates – people arriving on your website pages, immediately realising you’re not what they wanted and leaving – will damage your search engine optimisation.
If you’re writing for ‘everyone’, it’s hard for your message to resonate with your target audience specifically. Confusion over what you do, who you do it for, or why you do it can occur – and this doesn’t build trust either. If you alienate or fail to connect with your ideal customer, you’re likely to be missing out on sales. It’s also difficult to effectively optimise your content for the search engines if you don’t know what terms your ideal audience are searching.
What do you need to know about your audience?
1. Who they are
The level of detail you want to go into is up to you, but you need a clear idea of who you’re talking to. Some companies create a very detailed customer persona that include specifics like age, location, gender, job, income level, hobbies, values, life goals, and so on. Some will even give these personas names, photos, and backstories to humanise them.
2. What they need
Your target audience will have problems they’re trying to solve and desires they’re hoping to fulfil. They will have motivations and challenges driving their behaviour.
By identifying and acknowledging ‘pain points’, or the obstacles and frustrations they are experiencing, you show you understand them. This could be a practical problem, like a lack of time or an inefficient tool, or an emotional issue, like feeling overwhelmed or misunderstood.
What they want to achieve also matters. This could be something tangible, like making more money or improving their health, or it could be a more intangible aspiration like being more respected, or happier.
3. What motivates them
To communicate effectively, you need to identify the emotional drivers and the sense of urgency that will influence decisions, behaviours, and interests. Emotional drivers include fear, desire, belonging, ambition, and curiosity, for example. Urgency, like limited-time offers, seasonal relevance, or specific deadlines can reduce hesitation and encourage immediate action – but you need to understand what matters enough to move your audience to act.
4. How they speak
Effective communication means speaking the same language. If you understand the words and phrases people use, and how they expect to be addressed, you can create a sense of familiarity and inspire trust. Using the wrong words, tone, or approach can alienate people.
5. What their objections will be
If you know what your audience might push back on, you can address it and demonstrate you understand their concerns. This can help build credibility and reduce friction. Done properly, your language will feel natural, relevant, and persuasive.
How does knowing your target audience change what you write?
When you have a very specific target demographic, you have a level of clarity that will help shape your messaging. The insight you have allows you to adapt your tone, content, and messaging style. It makes it easy to find and capture your tone of voice. Words that resonate with a Gen Z audience are likely to be very different to those that would resonate with retired professionals, for example.
Aligning your content with the problems your audience is trying to avoid and the outcomes they’re striving for means you can bridge those gaps with your writing. You can speak directly to the hopes, fears, needs, and timelines of the people you’re trying to reach. Readers can see where they are now – and how they can get to where they want to be. And why they need you to do it.
Avoiding the common pitfalls
When you have your target audience in mind, you can avoid these mistakes:
- Writing from a company perspective instead of your customers’
- Using language that’s over-complicated, patronising, or full of jargon
- Creating content for your business, not the reader
- Forgetting to use relevant search terms and calls to action
- Focusing on features and ignoring benefits
Are you talking to your target audience online?
If you’re not providing valuable content that talks to your target audience online, you won’t be making the connection people seek when they decide how to spend their money. If you’re not talking the ‘right’ language, the ‘right’ people are probably not even going to see you. Take a look at your copy and assess it against what you know about your audience. And if you’re not sure who your audience actually is, it’s time to dig into that.
If you’d like help ensuring your online message will get through to the right people – and that they’ll take notice and act on it, please get in touch. A professional website copywriter can make all the difference.