There’s a chain of thought copywriting is a black art reserved for marketing and sales material. While the thought carries some merit, it’s also a misconception. As business professionals, we discuss ideas, and write proposals and reports every day. All these tasks have a persuasive element. The stronger the sentiment in the message, the greater the likelihood of success. In a written document it’s the words sentence and paragraph structures that create the positivity towards your thoughts. It’s the tone generated by the words that drives your audience to your way of thinking, to your call of action.
The Art of Writing Persuasive Text
Copywriting is the art of writing persuasive text with a goal to drive a target audience to take a particular course of action or guide their way thought process.
Whether communicating ideas, promotions, sales, or just wanting to increase brand awareness, it’s important to strike the right tone. Your message should resonate with your target audience and drive them to the call of action you want them to take.
All too often within businesses that promote quality and value over price, people blame lost opportunities on competitors undercutting on price. Joe Bloggs came in with a lower price is something I hear all too often. During post-mortems it becomes clear the deciding factor was the lack of positivity generated by the passive voice used to convey the offers.
Passive Voice Creates Negativity
Research shows that passive voice and poor syntax automatically slows the reader down and confuses the message, subconsciously drawing them into a negative frame of mind. In a competitive bid scenario, when comparing apples-for-apples, a buyer will always opt for the better feel-good factor. This becomes clearer when price is not the deciding factor, which it isn’t in high value projects.
Active Voice Increases Uptake
It’s important, therefore, you use an active voice in all written communications when desiring a positive decision. There are words to avoid when improving your text. Little changes to the way you write will increase your uptake.