Confession time: I love promoting other people’s work - I struggle to do the same with my own.
It’s a classic case of the “cobbler's kids have no shoes”, if you substitute “shoes” for “marketing” and “website.” I know all the tricks, tips and copywriting psychology. I know the results I could get for my clients. The problem was: I was too close to the subject to clearly stake out my offer on my website.
So, I got help to get out of my head. If you’ve ever struggled to articulate what you or your business offers, read on!Round 1: Conscious Research
I reviewed my meeting notes, results, reports and everything I’ve done for clients in the past year. In particular:
- What they asked me.
- What problems and solutions kept cropping up.
- What has changed (hello AI predictive analytics!).
- What made them happy or relieved
I also did an internal audit, thinking about which clients lit me up, and the work felt like a joy to do. It’s not fair to anybody if the fit is not right. Email marketing involves data handling, product launches and the client’s reputation - it’s as intimate as it gets without going into the finance reports.
Finally, I benchmarked my services against my competitors, using Perplexity and SEMrush.
Once I had all of that assembled, it was time for….
Round 2: Claude - Unconscious Research
Feel free to use ChatGPT or any other tool for this if you are using the same process. I wanted to extract what I didn’t know I knew without overthinking it.
My prompt:
I want to write a brief for my copywriter about my website, so he or she can create targeted, compelling, high-converting copy. Please help me nail the brief by asking questions designed to uncover my target market, my products and services and my USP for the home page.
Adapted for you:
I’m planning to launch {this product} for {this category/audience}. Help me nail the offer, unique selling point and hook by asking questions about my market, audience, company and results. I also want to know the likely objections and expectations of my target audience and where they typically look for {this product}. You can review my website {www.website.com} and compare it to close competitors to create more relevant questions. Once you have enough information, please provide three options for the offer, USP and hook, taking into account my brand voice and positioning.
I then used speech-to-text to talk to Claude (into my phone), answering the questions the LLM threw at me. They started generic, then narrowed for each section. I answered 30-40 questions in total and ended up with a comprehensive brief that included pricing, branding, specific sections and CTAs. I added in my own internal research to create something accurate and as close to true as possible. Since I planned to incorporate a human perspective and strategy in the next round, I did not tell Claude to be a specific expert.
Tip: Talk into your phone and do a quick sanity check before pressing “submit.” Otherwise, your “robot chatbot” can morph into “rubber glue-gun” through spell checking or guesswork, without you realising.
Round 3: Human Copywriter
I work with copywriters throughout the week, so I know it's much more than the words on the page. I wanted an outside, detached perspective, backed up by sales experience and human psychology.
I also did not want to waste their time. When you hire an expert, the more accurate information you can give them upfront, the better and faster their results. Hence, the research and preparation beforehand.
My copywriter distilled my dense brief into three pages of copy, changing it from generic to impactful, using my brand tone and voice. It was worth every penny because I was not second-guessing myself or my audience.
Tip: Stay human to stand out and edit without mercy.