Branding and Copywriting Overview for Website Content Collection

Transcript

Hi! Michele here with “Bergh Consulting” and in this video, we’re going to cover the next portion of the Content Collection form for your website project. So this page we left off of in the last video and I want to just move along to the next section here and this relates specifically to branding. So all you’re going to see at first is one question: “Have we done a brand package together?” If the answer is yes, you’re not going to have to fill out several fields that you’d have to fill out otherwise. If your answer is no, because I’m going to have that information already for you because it’s something that we’re working on together. If you answered no, then there’s going to be some other questions that pop up. Some of these might be easy for you to complete and some of them may not. If you’ve worked with somebody else on branding or you’ve already identified some of these pieces yourself, then you might have an easy time filling them out. If you’re finding that you’re struggling or you don’t have answers for these, please go ahead and select that you were not able to answer the questions fully and would like to discuss branding further. These are going to be instrumental in completing your project effectively. And this is kind of a bare minimum that I need to have. If you have all of this in the form of a brand guide that someone else has created for you, you can upload that later and just say see attached brand guide for this and be done with this section.

The branding package would be a separate rate if we do need that. This is something that we’ve probably already discussed. So hopefully, this section is easy for you to complete. And we’re just going to– okay. Since.

That was short, I’m going to move right into the content collection portion, the copywriting specific piece. This is really something that you want to look at is that what you type here, is exactly what’s going to be on your website. I’m not going to put something up that I feel could benefit from some tweaking. So I would have a conversation if something, if I had some questions about something. But overall copywriting is also a separate service and if it’s not something that we included in this project, then I would be looking to copy and paste what you put here. I’m going to generally read it but I’m not going to be looking for spelling or grammar or punctuation pieces and I’m not looking to tweak it, unless something catches my eye stands out that I think we should talk about. So assume that it’s going to be copy and paste kind of a situation onto your website.

These first three pieces go in what we call the “hero banner”, who you’re doing your work for, what makes you unique and what’s the one thing you want them to do. These pieces if you struggle with them at all, personally if you haven’t gone through a complete branding process with somebody. So there are different variations of branding processes and a full branding process versus something like a mini branding process is going to likely include identifying your “ideal client”, “what makes you unique” and those types of things for your brand as a whole. But if you haven’t done that, your ideal client, there’s a few easy ways to identify that depending on what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. Sometimes your ideal client looks very much like you. And if that’s the case, then you can describe yourself in one sentence: what is it that, you know, what makes you unique as your ideal client in who you’re working with. If you’ve been doing this work for a while but are just getting a website added or refreshing your website, then you might already have clients that you work with that you love, and your ideal client would probably look very much like your favorite client that you work with. So if that’s the case, then use that person to describe your ideal client here. If you haven’t done the work that you’re doing before, and this is new for you or a new audience, then I would do some visualization. That’s what I would suggest and imagine who that ideal client would look like and then describe that here.

“what makes you and your services unique in one sentence”: this is something that can be really challenging for people but there’s a few ways that you can approach it that make it a little bit easier to do. One is if you’ve done values work and you’re clear about the values that you possess or values that you incorporate into your business which may be the same, then those values very likely make you unique. It’s not to say that nobody else in your business has those same values but it’s likely that most of them or many of them are getting into the business for something that’s completely different. I wouldn’t use things like saying, you know, we provide great customer service, or we have a unique process unless it’s really truly unique and you’re sure about that. I would focus more on looking at what you individually bring to the table that makes your services unique.

So an example of that one that has stuck with me for years because it really hit me early on in my career doing this with people was an organizer and I tended to think of organizing as something that someone with more of a type A personality was really good at and they wanted everything just so. And that’s who I thought that an organizer likely was. It’s what they brought to the table which wouldn’t necessarily be something unique. But in this situation, this organizer did what she did because she had experienced a pretty significant amount of trauma in her life and organizing was the way that she was able to effectively move forward in her life because it was something that helped her feel like everything had a place, she had control, the clutter was gone. So it created a more peaceful environment for her and looking at that organization as a form of working with trauma that someone had experienced in their life was a completely different way of looking at it for me. And that is truly something that made her unique and sharing that, that you know, she is sharing this information. She is doing these services because she personally has experienced a lot of trauma in her life and this was a way to help people feel whole and peaceful and be able to move through their life more effectively is a very powerful statement. And that is what I encouraged her to share in terms of what made her and her services unique. It’s really important to narrow down one thing. I know that we generally have more than one thing listed on our website that people can do, but you want to gear them and guide them into one thing. What if you could only choose one what would it be.

This next section, sometimes it’s easier to fill this out before you fill out the ideal client and what makes you unique because it’s a little more wordy. But it’s really a growth of these two sentences as well. If I’ve read this part and I understand who you work with, what you do, and why it’s unique, and what you want me to do, but I’m not quite ready to make a decision, I’m being guided next into this section. The “What you do and why it’s so important” and it’s not a long paragraph it is a short paragraph but, it provides a little bit more insight into that. So if you’re struggling still with these top two questions about your ideal client and what makes you and your services unique, try writing this one first.

The next section of the website are “benefits”, three benefits to working with you. We typically work with three. I have two spots here for testimonials or reviews of you and your work. Couple thoughts about these, if you don’t have them yet, if there’s people that you can ask go ahead and ask because their best. By far best to have on your home page. You want that social proof. If you don’t have them and you don’t have someone you can ask because you’re new, that’s okay. But then what I would suggest is looking for some sort of a quote that really embodies your philosophy and how you do your work and find at least one of those to include on that home page. If you have very long testimonials, I’ve placed some long ones on my website and you know, that’s fine too but also just don’t hesitate to break them apart into smaller pieces. You don’t have to include everything somebody said about you particularly if it doesn’t necessarily fit in this space if it doesn’t really make sense. So don’t hesitate to break them apart and use just small sections of a review or testimonial if you prefer.

We generally look at up to three services. You may not have three, if you have more than three, then we’re looking for the three priorities. What are the three biggest ones that you are doing and you wanna keep these. I know these look like big boxes but you wanna keep them fairly short. They’re really just a very quick summary. And then there’s typically a section about “You and your business” limit this to one paragraph similar to that “What and why” section at the top. I’ve put a few things here if you don’t have a bio to consider, you know, “Hi! I’m Michele. I am a website master”. And I might say something like people have referred to me as a “WordPress fairy”, “WordPress rockstar” things like that because they’re kind of fun and quirky and memorable. So you don’t have to do it in this exact order. But it’s kind of a mini bio. So you can have a larger bio if you have an about page on your website you don’t have to. But think of this in terms of a mini bio. Here are some suggested questions to help you with that flow and then if you’re looking for more suggestions, I’ve included a couple of links for websites here that have questions that you could fill out.

You can have multiple ways for someone to contact you. But I want to know what is the way that you prefer because that’s what we’re going to focus on the website, is getting people to contact you the way that you prefer. It is okay to take other ones but it’s also nice to have everything resonate well with you, be kept in one place and that’s where we’re gonna focus. And the process to working with you these three easy steps, the goal of this section is really just to say it is so easy to work with me to get started. It’s not overwhelming. It’s not stressful. And for you to write these things here is generally I’ve got a couple of suggestions here but generally, step one is what do you want them to do. You want them to call you? Do you want them to email you? Do you want them to schedule a call on your scheduler? Whatever that is to reach out to you, to make that initial contact, that’s what you want to put for step one.

Jumping over to step three is going to look very similar to what you put down here, what can someone expect after working with you. What is it, how is their life or their business going to be better because they worked with you? What is that thing that they’re looking for? What is that problem they’re wanting to solve? And then the step two in the middle is likely going to look something like we’ll work together to come up with an ideal plan or create a personalized plan or, you know, and work together to meet your goals something like that. So it’s a little bit more generic but you don’t have to include every detail of what that plan is just that, “Hey, we’re going to work together. We’re going to come up with a plan that works for you.” Just make it feel really simple. And then this piece here may be a little bit more wordy than what you have for step three up here or maybe a slightly different take on the problem that you’re solving or how you’re making their life better and it is a required field. So either copy what you have in this one or if you want to expand on it just a little bit, go ahead and do that here. And then once you’re done, you’ll be able to save and continue later if you need to take a break or click next, and I’m going to stop this video here and come in with another one next.