Training Marketer

HubSpot’s new Press Release Grader is an online application that evaluates and scores your press releases for free. (Special thanks to David Meerman Scott for sharing the good news with the marketing world.)

Just cut and paste the press release content into the tool, along with company information including your name, website and email. In a few seconds the site will come back with a “marketing effectiveness score” and specific suggestions on improvements.

Press releases are graded on basic factors most public relations experts stick to, along with factors from Internet marketing experts such as links and search engine optimization characteristics.

If you regularly create and distribute marketing press releases, check out the Press Release Grader and see how well you score.

Seth Godin points out the obvious in a recent post about “rough edges and attention.” Explaining that sometimes it’s the human touch that gets things noticed. Like a haphazardly placed sign on the back of a UPS truck or the list of specials on a restaurant table, “you notice it because a human being did it.”

Add a human touch to your marketing pieces, “you” is a powerful word. Remember that your customers are people. Think of how you communicate with family and friends. Try to extend that type of communication across to your customers. Talk to people like they’re people.

After you figure out your customer demographic, how do you know how to talk to them? What tone will fit best?

Copyblogger tackled that topic early last month in a post titled “Are You Talkin’ to My Generation?”

Your customers may fit into one or a variety of groups, that’s up to you to figure out. Copyblogger can get you started by breaking most consumers into four categories: the silent generation, Baby Boomers, Generation X and Generation Y.

Here’s their general breakdown of how each likes to be spoken to:

Silent Generation: respect for authority; conformity and adherence to the rules; law, order and duty; dedication, hard work and sacrifice.

Baby Boomers: personal gratification; personal growth, health and wellness; optimism and positive attitude; teamwork and being involved.

Generation X: diversity and global thinking; self-reliance and independence; life balance; fun and informal attitude; technologically literate.

Generation Y: confidence and achievement; sociability and collective action; diversity and morality; street-smart; optimistic and savvy.

“These days, it’s not enough to slap up a nice design and some well-written content. You have to get into the heads of your buyers and learn how they think – and why they think that way.”

A recent post on Velocity brings up a good point about most B2B technology copywriting - it’s boring.

Why is it boring?

• It’s written in passive voice.
• It’s full of industry jargon.
• It’s abstract instead of concrete.
• It’s all written in the third person.

“The best copywriting looks the prospect squarely in the eye and says, ‘I’m going to sell to you and you’re going to enjoy it.’”

Take some of your copywriting and try speaking to your customer in a way that they will listen - use the word “you.”

Speaking directly to your reader by using “you” creates copy that is engaging, more conversational and personal. While it may not be appropriate in all situations, it can help you target specific audiences and will help your readers hear a clearer, more direct message.

Test it out on some of your copy pieces. Write two versions, one in third person, the other in second (you). Then, let someone outside of your office read it, preferably someone who is completely unfamiliar with what you sell (for example, Mom or your teenage son). Tally up the votes and find out which version does better.

Copyblogger.com is a tactfully written blog focused on copywriting for online marketing success.

A post from last week gives some useful advice on how to keep your writing clear and direct. From product descriptions to landing page copy and everything in between, there are three “enemies” to stay away from when you write for the web.

1. Metadiscourse - a big word that means writing about writing. Examples include: “to sum up,” “I believe,” “note that,” and “I would like to point out.”

A sentence full of metadiscourse would look like this:

“I would like to point out that we should cancel the meeting.”

Get rid of the unnecessary words:

“Cancel the meeting.”

Get to the point, you don’t have to tell us that you’re pointing it out. You’re saying it, so we know it’s your opinion.

2. Redundancy - don’t use two words where you could just use one.

Examples: “Screaming loudly,” “past history”

3. Pretentious words - don’t try to impress us with “smart” sounding words. Say what you want to say, simply and clearly.

Examples of pretentious words and their better, simpler replacements:

Utilize = use
Comprehend = understand
Inexorable =  determined

Also, don’t forget who you’re speaking to. You wouldn’t use the same terminology for a product description when writing for a product vendor as you would a new customer on your website.

I’ve got to thank those gurus over at MarketingSherpa for sharing their tricks of the trade and some great copywriting tips. In a recent blog post, the author shares the wonder that is the ellipsis (you know “…”).

Especially on the web, people don’t read, they skim, catch a few words here and there, maybe read a sentence if you’re lucky.

This is why the bullet point list is so handy. You give the people what they want quickly in short lines.

But you can’t write up a landing page full of bullet points, which is when you can put some ellipses to use.

The art of getting a paragraph — or a long sentence — read is all about catching the eye. An ellipsis gives you five glorious letter-free spaces in the middle of the paragraph to grab the eye with. An example:

Acme’s widget helps you make more money … lower your costs … impress your boss … and keep your career going strong.

A word of caution - use your ellipses wisely. If you go too far it may start looking like you the period button got jammed on your keyboard.