Transcript
Speaker: And the FTS moment seems for the F this shiz moment. So you want to know when your client or prospect has that moment where they're like crying into their merlot and they're like, I'm done. I'm done. I will pay for this. I am so over this problem. This is not going away. If we can figure out that, we are going to be able to write good copy.
Speaker: Welcome to The Brands That Book Show, where we help creative businesses find more clients and build their brands. I'm your host, Davy Jones.
Speaker: Today's guest is Ashlyn Carter, a copywriter for Creative Women. She's had the opportunity to work with some of the biggest names in the creative industry, including Jenna Kutcher, Heather Crabtree, Hilary Rushford, and others. And beyond that, she's also a talented calligrapher, and her work has been featured in Southern Weddings and the Knot. Today, Ashlyn talks to us about how her business began and gives us tips for writing high -converting web copy on our own websites.
Speaker: All right, I am so excited to have you live with me, Ashlyn, and you're one of the first people that I thought of as I was putting together my initial list of interviewees. Well, that means the world. Yeah, no. And I've got the opportunity to hear you speak on a number of occasions now. And each time I hear you speak,
Speaker: You know, there's always something new that I pick up and you're such a talented educator and speaker that, you know, recently I'd asked you to speak to our core students and they love that. And so I asked them, you know, if you had.
Speaker: If you could ask Ashlyn anything, what's one question you would ask? So I have a whole list of stuff eventually that I'm going to have to get through. But before we get to that, today you're really here talking to us about some practical strategies for writing high converting web copy. Yes.
Speaker: and I'm excited to get into that. Me too. And I just want to pause and say I appreciate so much your kind words. I feel like if I could pick like where's the brother that like in this industry that I didn't get when I came out of the womb the twin I don't have. It's like you think in a like a marketing and so that it means a lot what you said because I do think you're a very shrewd copywriter yourself and um really really good online marketing.
Speaker: Thanks. Well, you know, to be honest, one of the reasons that I decided to start a podcast was because I get the opportunity. It's an excuse to learn from all the people that I want to learn from. So I'm excited to take what you talk about today and apply that to my own copy on our website, which is currently going through some updates that will be launched by the time this this podcast launch.
Speaker: And for those of you who are sitting at home, it's like high converting website copy. That kind of sounds like a little scary. Don't worry. We're going to ease our way into it. Because first, Ashlyn, you have such an incredible story. And I feel like especially in the last year or two years, you've sort of just, you've just blown up. You've come out of almost nowhere, especially on the copywriting scene. And I'm sure it's,
Speaker: You know, we can attribute that, I'm sure, to just how skilled you are in doing that, but then also kind of people realizing the need for good copy and what that can do to their websites. So could you talk about, you know, really when you got started, what was the first, you know, you have a corporate background, so how did you even get into, you know, tell us kind of the short story here. Sure thing. So there is the documentary, the founder, I'm sure you've seen that. McDonald's?
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So good, right? Okay. So Ray Kroc, you know, believe what you wish about him that he has that quote where somebody told him, McDonald's was an overnight success. He said, yeah, but that was the longest 30 nights sleep. You know, and so I think whenever anybody says size is kind, like it did grow fast, but my story is really messy and it's long and I've been doing
Speaker: on what I do now for a really long time. The audience just shifted entirely. Like you said, my background studied journalism and mass communication in poli sci. Never changed my major once. Loved it. The dream when you grow up as a little girl in a small town in Alabama is to work in the big city of Atlanta.
Speaker: That's what I wanted and moved over and started working in agency public relations and communications And so again being in Atlanta the clients that we serviced where the coca -cola Delta Airlines took away anything that's built here Those were the clients and the agency I was at and I
Speaker: loved agency life. I loved the speed, I loved the culture, I loved the fact that there was a beer cart that came around at five o 'clock. It was just like Disney World to work in. It was just fun and energetic and I just ate it up, loved what I did. But I worked constantly all the time and I ended up moving from there to work as a celebrity chef based here in Atlanta's publicist for
Speaker: in his 11 restaurants and he lured me over with the idea that maybe I could work a little less because I was working, like I said, constantly. And unfortunately, not just due to him, a lot to me, which I want to talk about, but didn't actually happen. And I kind of realized I was just very prone to workaholism and kind of like
Speaker: perfectionism and loved being busy and so one thing led to another and my my dear husband proposed and that was kind of this straw that broke the camel's back couldn't keep all the balls in the air because I haven't mentioned but throughout all of this my side hustle moonlight job to honestly just get a creative break was doing calligraphy for brides
Speaker: So all these things obviously can't fit in one life and so I started managing things like in the dumbest way ever but I started measuring what went into my body and then what I could get out through exercise and that just very quickly created this bank and before I knew it I'd full -on developed an eating disorder, studied ballet for 18 years so this should like there are some there are some patterns but
Speaker: I had to go into hospitalization. I was 27 years old and like obsessed with my job and then had to go on medical leave of absence, which I thought like I would never, uh, yeah, I was just so worried about losing my job, which is funny now because it was through that time in hospitalization that I sat there and I was like, you know what?
Speaker: this is not conducive, this is not fun, I'm not enjoying life right now. And that was the first moment I realized you could change that if you don't like it. So I started dreaming about the day, you know, maybe I could work for myself, maybe I could write for who I want to write for and control my own time and my own schedule. And I came home and complained one too many days after I went back to work and my husband was like, that's it, you're done. And I'm so glad he had the foresight to kind of call me out on that and push me to start my own business.
Speaker: I did not start out doing just copywriting at first, primarily to clicker fee and also did in all kinds of writing systems.
Speaker: I was going to raise my hand for it. And about, just a single about page, if they needed editorial copy for magazines, I was going to do that. I did everything. And it was through, I know we're both mutual friends with Christina Scalera, it was through women like that kind of being like, hey, you know what? And I'll talk about it later. Maybe you should lock into this copywriting for creative thing. You know, you seem to enjoy that the most.
Speaker: And so now that is we only service this year. We're only doing about five brides, cutting way down. And so calligraphy is still there. I've kind of learned to look at it as my creative outlet and a place to just have a rest and enjoy making something with my hands. But we write conversion copy for creatives.
Speaker: Yeah, that's awesome. And I want to unpack what conversion copywriting means, but, you know, your story and you just, I mean, you summarized it in like 60 seconds there, but there's so much there, you know, so I want to, I want to go back. When you're, when you're in your PR communications agency job, were you doing a lot of writing then?
Speaker: Yes, constantly. When I was in the agency, I did, and I didn't even know what copy was, so to anybody listening who's not quite sure what it was, I was writing copy for Delta Airlines without knowing that that's what that was. I just knew that we had to flesh out the words to go into the email marketing campaigns that we would send out to the SkyMales customers.
Speaker: So I did a lot of writing. I actually didn't do in working at the communications agency the accounts I was on as much pitching, which means contacting reporters and media relations. But I had done that in other jobs. So that was something I loved. But when I switched and started working for that shift night, the bread and butter of what I did switched from website copywriting and email marketing campaigns and
Speaker: playing big events for scoundrels customers to pitching just bread and butter media relations and pitching and that is a lot of writing too and um yeah so it was i feel like you know how when you're trying to figure out like what what is this what is the ashland size hole in the universe what is the thing i'm good at that i can step up to the plate and do people always say it's that thing that to you you're like what people think that's hard
Speaker: And to me, that's always been marketing writing. I'm like, I think I just, that was when I fell into the creative ecosystem and realized, wait, you mean people don't like writing their websites? Like, come on, that is the easy part. It's other stuff that I don't want to do. That, yeah. Yeah, I feel like people dread writing their websites. But calligraphy. So how did, you know, calligraphy at first just a, just sort of like a stress release for you. So did you just kind of pick it up on the side? How did that come about?
Speaker: So I remember being in Michaels, you know, the art supply store when I was like 11 and I saw a kid, I just, I always liked, I felt, I've always felt like I'm creative. If I have the balance within to work, like I think ballet, like I, like give me, give me the technique and I can go from there. I'm not really like a.
Speaker: on my own kind of creative person I don't feel like. And so that's why I fell in love with words and making words beautiful. I used to sit in the back of chemistry, didn't quite understand them all, and I would just doodle on my notes, just make really pretty words. And so people quickly started, like if they needed a chalkboard done or they needed name tags done for sorority recruitment, like I was always the one that they asked.
Speaker: And then somebody asked me to do their wedding, and about the third person asked me to do their wedding, and I was like, you know what, I should probably like actually learn, like look at me behind this. And so I did, and I just loved it. And I think after typing all day, it felt so good to make a piece of art that was not gonna, I kind of loved like, I like flowers, like beauty that doesn't last, there's something about it that's cool. And so it's never bothered me that it's paper, you know, it's not canvases, that's my,
Speaker: my medium of choice. We can talk more. I've been told a lot to cut, why don't you just split the business? Why don't you just cut it out? For a lot of reasons, I'm not going to. I love it. Now that it's not the main focus of your business, do you find that it still has that same therapeutic stress or stress -free nature to it again?
Speaker: I think it absolutely does. I also really enjoy that it reminds me what it's like to be in my client's shoes, especially the clients that I service that are in the B2C space that are still booking those book brides. I still know what it's like to try to book brides and fill out your calendar and do that basic bread and butter client work that's maybe not in the funnel mapping, course launching kind of realm that a lot of entrepreneurs grow to.
Speaker: Yeah, I feel like similar with wedding photography. You know, we don't do nearly as much wedding photography anymore, but it's crazy when you go down to just shooting 10 weddings a year, all of a sudden you have that much more time to get to know your clients. And so that, to a certain extent, now is...
Speaker: I wouldn't say it's more fun. We always enjoy working with our couples of course, but there's definitely a aspect of fun that we don't have when we're shooting 40 weddings a year. You nailed it. That's exactly what it is, yeah. So when you're working as a publicist, you have this calligraphy side hustle. Were you making money from that side hustle as you were working for this publicist?
Speaker: Yes, and I probably shouldn't say this, but I like didn't even, I, I mean, I don't know what, I charged just like kind of what I saw on Etsy and then, like I learned this from like the bottom up and then, um, I didn't, this is what I was going to say was like, I didn't like.
Speaker: market down as income because it was just like fun money. It was just like a hundred bucks here and there and I didn't know what I was doing. I just enjoyed it and enjoyed getting one job done and trying to get the next envelope batch that I could do after work. So yeah. So how did you make that transition? So your husband comes to you and says, hey, listen, you got to give up all this other stuff now. And so he gets you a laptop to focus on calligraphy, I guess.
Speaker: So what do you do from them? What was your first step? Did you feel overwhelmed? Like, oh, I got to imagine that leaving your full -time job, you left behind a salary and benefits to move into calligraphy, where now you're working for yourself. Like, what did that look like?
Speaker: Yes, I was convinced that you could never make more on your own. I was convinced, you know, and I was like, you know what, that's, um, which somebody had told me a mentor of mine, you know, she's like, no, like you can make as much or more. Like it's not, it's not stupid to leave your corporate job to work for yourself. But, um, I think about, I remember that first Monday, it was raining here in Atlanta and I sat in my office and I was like, Oh,
Speaker: Like I have got to book people because like it is this or nothing. I did not. I remember like when I was dreaming about starting my jobs and I'm going to have six months on, you know, clients ready to go, retainer work. Like I'm going to have, I'm going to be an editor and a couple of magazines around town. So I'll have that steady income. Like I'm going to do this right. And that is not what happened at all. So, so how did you, how'd you go find out, find those first clients?
Speaker: The first client, I pitched. I knew how to pitch. I knew how to put myself out there and make some recommendations. Hey, I see you regularly have this story in the magazine. What do you think about this idea? I could write it for you. Here's my right, blah, blah, blah, boom job. I did that a few times. I had those regular writing jobs. I had a couple of friends around town. I communicated pretty broadly to my network of
Speaker: you know, yuppies, friends in Atlanta, I'm moving. And of course, then the blog, hey, we need content for our corporate blog. All those jobs came in. So I took on a lot of corporate clients. I did not take on creative entrepreneurs at servicing at all for the first probably three or four months until a light bulb moment happened. But so that's how I got the writing jobs and then the calligraphy. I just started honestly posting about it on social media a lot and
Speaker: People started recognizing that hey, she's doing this full -time now guess we can book her So that's those first that first batch of clients, but it was still very Hustle -minded I think I was just I opted out acted out of a place of scarcity and just always worried the jobs were gonna run out and it was a very scary time So I just said yes to every single job that came in
Speaker: And do you think there is any value in that? And I know we talk a lot about finding your ideal client and certainly when you want to write copy for a specific client in mind. But do you think that there's any value when you're first starting out in kind of taking what came along? And it sounds like to me, copywriting and calligraphy, that kind of all happened at the same time.
Speaker: Yes, it did. It happened in tandem and like the essentialist, Greg McCow, I'm like, love her. And we was like, well, why did I do all these things at once? But I got that big moment where it shifted. I invested in Bonnie Bach, T .R .A.'s, a land retreat. And I remember buying the ticket when it was kind of first we were, I was still in my corporate job and I was seeing that this is something we were going to move into. And I just followed her on Instagram and it was on her email list.
Speaker: You know just learning about this creative world and she opened it for tickets and I stepped outside in the parking lot and I called Wes and I was like, hey This is a $4 ,500 investment. I think I can make it back when I do it and for some reason he said yes And that is when it whenever people ask me like what was that? How did you go from just like, you know, nobody not really, you know, I not even really
Speaker: not even really full -time into this, to having consistent, regular, high -end clients. And I really think it was getting in front of the women that I wanted to work with, but just investing in my education and going to a conference, meeting people. And I say that because what happened at that sat down with a girl that I was terrified to talk to over at Jalapeno Margaritas. Her name's Jenna Kutcher. And for some reason, she took notice of me and interested me. She started asking me, you know,
Speaker: This question just had her first miscarriage, so we connected, because I just got out of recovery. And so we were talking back and forth. And of course, we leave alone. And I'm thinking, OK, well, that was great. Nice to know her. I'll never speak to her again. She's a celeb. And then a few months later, she reached out. She said, hey, I saw that you, I know, remember, you did email marketing copy for Delta Airlines. Would you be interested in doing it for a course launch? I'm launching an Instagram course for the second time. It went well the first time, and I'm looking to up level. This is our first program that she ever
Speaker: did and I was like, I'm sure, would you trust me? And she was like, well, yeah, it's like, well, let's just try it. And that I always think about, like, I want to be that for somebody one day. Um, cause she just, she saw the skills that I had in a corporate setting and how I could apply those to something that was different yet also the same. And, um, that once I like, I had her on my, my client raster and I, um, started really learning that, that kind of changed again. I was like, okay, this is my sweet spot. Now this is who I can serve.
Speaker: And people trusted me because they looked up to her. So that was the turn the Titanic around moment, for sure. Yeah, and I gotta imagine that it was difficult trying to market to both brides on one hand. Yeah. And then business in general, especially. Oh, yeah. And that's pretty brutal. And it sent all those breakup letters to a bunch of corporate, you know. Yeah. I'm changing my clientele, you know, because I think they were like, what? Why? You know.
Speaker: Yeah. And so, I mean, it's crazy to think just the power of, you know, relationships and getting out there. And people always ask, and I feel like it's the simple, it's a simple answer. And so maybe, you know, I want to make it, you know, when people ask, I feel like they're always expecting maybe something that's more complex than it really is. But it's, you know, go out and meet people, you know? Yeah. It wasn't funnels. It wasn't ads. It was, it was relationships and niching.
Speaker: Yeah, that's right. And I think in the beginning, it's those things that don't really scale, but they compound. And so when you go and meet one person, and relationships I do, I think they compound. You meet one person, and then meeting that one person turns into meeting others and so on. And so I certainly found that true of our business. But that's so interesting to hear. That's how you got your first clients. And then after that, you can focus on things that scale, such as paid advertising and funnels. Yes.
Speaker: Yeah. I love how you said you're right. It doesn't, that was a great, that was a good sound bite, but you're right. It doesn't, it didn't, it looks bleak at first. Like you, you think you're like, why on earth would I a invest all this when I don't, you know, not ready yet to pay it all? Like it's not just sitting there in the bank. And then, um, why would I niche? Why would I say no? Why, why, why, why? And, um, it just seems stupid at first, but I always tell people like stick with it. You could be a generalist, but
Speaker: I've just not, in my, from the clients I've served and just my own experience, I've not seen generalist work scale as quickly, so. Yeah, yeah, and I think when you find, and I'm sure there's different copywriting techniques that can help with this, but I know even when we left Rising Tide Society, you know, we had, I felt like all sorts of skills and it was difficult to figure out, you know,
Speaker: which ones we were going to focus on, how we were going to serve, who we were even going to serve within the creative industry. And it just took time. I think part of it, going through that process of kind of taking everybody, I think sometimes can be helpful as long as you're trying to find those things that you actually enjoy. And then once you realize those things, it's starting to really be hyper focused on just that.
Speaker: Yes. So this seems to be a good time to kind of shift our conversation over to copywriting and really that's what I want to get into. So what is copywriting?
Speaker: Okay, so copywriting is the art and the science of words that elicit action. Pretty much any of the words that come alongside the marketing collateral that you have in your business, that is copywriting. I personally don't consider blog writing necessarily to be, that's something, I think a lot of people are like, okay, so yeah, kind of your blogs, but like that, to me that's content marketing, it's content. But copywriting, I'm talking about those words that make somebody take an action.
Speaker: all the words on your website, on your services page, any emails that you get, regular emails that are asking you to do something, any ad copy. I know you mentioned when we were ramping up for this call, this is such an old form of communications. Think back to those ads that you see, like when advertising first, how did that heyday in the 50s, 60s, Mad Men era, like that, is where copywriting really had its birth. So when you think about it in its simplistic form,
Speaker: It was the copy and advertising. Yeah, and that's fascinating to me because I do think that it's something that our industry is just waking up to. Yes. It's like how powerful that this can be. And I think that when you start identifying different copywriting formulas and strategies that you see them everywhere. You know, when you turn on the TV, you see them. Every Facebook ad you see from now on, you're just looking at it through a different lens.
Speaker: And I think it's so powerful that even knowing those things, we still get marketed to. Isn't that funny? Yeah, go down the funnel, so to speak. How many times I'll be on a funnel and I'll buy it. This is probably, I shouldn't say this either. I've written courses, course launch funnels, and they were in the process of building it out and I sell myself on it and then I bought it. That's happened to me twice.
Speaker: And I know the client's like, really? But yeah, we know all the tricks, but it still works. And I think that's a kind of fun quirk about copywriting, too. Yeah. I mean, just the power of understanding some psychology and implementing it. So what kind of copywriting do you focus on? Because I do think it is fairly broad, like anything else, like design. There's different kinds of designs. So what kind of copywriting do you focus on?
Speaker: Yeah, so definitely for creative entrepreneurs, that is my primary market and wedding industry specifically is something that, that's a passion project of mine just because I know it and I love it. But we do website copywriting, so the brand messaging that starts, that's the first pillar, it's the foundational element and upon that you can build your website copy, that's one service that we offer. And we also offer launch copywriting, which a launch copy, launch is really just a fancy word for a promotional period, right?
Speaker: the way that looks in the online sphere these days is it includes a lot of emails, a whole lot of emails, and they're all mapped together and funneled out, and then sales pages, which I think maybe your audience, we've all hit a sales page, right? You're in this business for a week and you hit a sales page. And then ads, which we also all hit all the time. So that's what we do. We don't do the blog content marketing writing. We don't do editing. I think once you start learning about writing as a service, you realize there's a lot of different
Speaker: facets of it. So that is something I think at first a lot. I was like, well, should I do editing too? But no, there are people that are very skilled, incredible editors. And that's a different thing. So that's what we do.
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Speaker: Yeah, so you had to I feel like you had to educate people on why this is important within within this industry. You know, this is something that I feel like I'm seeing more and more copywriters pop up. You know, I think in in large part, that's that's, you know, to a certain extent, I feel like you paved the way in our industry and saying, you know, hey, people, this is important. And this is why what are some things you did to educate people about the importance of copywriting?
Speaker: Yeah, so they're, I think they say too, like when they, when you see a saturated market, sometimes it's a good thing because that means there's a need. Go that way. I did not do that. I did the opposite. I saw an industry that I was working in and then over and over I saw people were asking questions in the rising type Facebook group and in other things and I was like, that is freaking copywriting. Like that's what that is. And I remember searching copywriter, copywriting in there. Cause I was trying to, I was like, where are the questions I can answer? I can answer all the questions about copy. Nothing ever came up. There was,
Speaker: Any search results I ever found for the word copy or copywriting were things that I had posted in there. So I was like, okay, well, this isn't working. I've got to figure out how to educate these people on, like the thing that they're asking for is called, it has a name and it's called copywriting. And so the first, one of the first, and this is kind of a copywriting trick, but anchoring, um, actually somebody pitched the other day something for me and it said,
Speaker: And do you listen to Ben Shapiro? Do you know who that is? No, I know who it is. Okay. Um, he, he said one time, he was talking about creative life, I think, or Skillshare. And he said, it's the Netflix of online courses that is anchoring. When you are able to communicate to somebody that doesn't know something, it's the blank of blank that helps them quickly.
Speaker: understand it and so i think i started looking and i was like how can i explain to these people what copywriting is and so i would kinda say it's the mood board for your words when i was trying to talk about for your yeah for your words when i'm talking about branding messaging cuz everybody had their logo their hex codes their color palette but nobody had any brand messaging so i was like well so anchoring was one of the first things that i did
Speaker: And then I also started in this, the big educational component came in when I committed to regularly creating content. Again, like you said earlier, the basics, right? But it was January of 2017. And I was like, I have made a lot of other people a whole lot of money. And that has been so great, right? You know, seeing the results from these course launches.
Speaker: I have not done anything for myself. I have not built my list up. I have not had a blog. Like when I think about it, I never email my 200 people on my list. And so I started committing to just like, I'm going to create regular content. I'm going to educate these people on it. And then if that leads to something again, crickets first, and then it takes that little uptick. Um, so those,
Speaker: Those were some of the strategies that I used when I first realized that the market needed to be educated. And I do think that in regards to your comment about other people, which I welcome, like there's enough to go around. There's like abundance, thinking with a mentality of abundance is so true and valuable. But I do always caution other people. If you want to truly find like that, that Kismet, that success fast, like,
Speaker: Do something that's not, where's the gap in the market? How can you fill the gap in the market? And I think that's why it happens so quickly. So, you know, other people that are, whenever somebody asks me about writing a copywriting business, I say, okay, what is the hole? What is the one thing you want to do? Like niche, niche, niche. And that is where sometimes things take off.
Speaker: Yeah, I think, you know, part of the reason that you've become so big, so fast is that you found that gap in the market. And at the same time, though, it did such a good job of educating people on your services. And I think, like you said, and it's not necessarily intuitive advice to go where a saturated market is, because, you know, when other people are doing stuff, it means that, you know, people are using their services, right?
Speaker: For you, you had the added challenge of educating people who didn't really know what copywriting was or meant or how important it is. And we're gonna talk about this in a second in the design process of a website. Because everybody has their mood boards. Everybody has different versions of their logo. This color, that color. But I wonder how many people listening to this have a brand messaging document.
Speaker: So that's that's crazy. I also love and this is one of the things that we tell people all the time if they're struggling to come up with the content to create go to you know the different industry Facebook groups that you're a part of. You know so go to wherever the people are that.
Speaker: that you're serving that are asking questions. And so if you're working with other creatives, the Rising Tide Facebook group, the Shoot and Share Facebook group, the Show at Facebook group, and take note of what questions are being asked over and over and over again. That is my favorite thing to do. If I'm ever, yeah, it is. There's just so many questions being asked and you'd be surprised at how many times they're asked. And so when you've answered that question on a blog post, you can reply to that person and just say, hey, I actually wrote an entire blog post about this, check it out.
Speaker: So I love that, you know, that was something that you mentioned. So where does copywriting fit in the design process?
Speaker: okay may ruffle some feathers but you like copy and you know design so i personally believe and i've been on both sides of the coin many many times copy dictates design um that is just it is just what has worked best um so my one of my first memories of this not quite working was when um delta .com we did a rebrand relaunch of that it was i can't remember now it was probably 2012 ish 13 maybe um so like we redid the whole website and
Speaker: The designers came to us they said we've got a 56 character count We need a headline for you know and like things like that and that you know We've got a subhead box needs this body copy needs can only be this many characters that was like pulling teeth. It was so hard to
Speaker: but you know we figured it out and worked with it but like I just think that there were times when the message was lost or could have been better if we could have gotten two more characters but the parameters were already set by the designers and they for some reason they couldn't change them so that being part of my experience and then on the other end I work a lot I know you know
Speaker: Jen Olmstead of Tonic Site Shop and Jeff. They're just fantastic people and incredible, incredibly gifted designers. And Jen and I have worked in tandem enough that she's designed many a sales page after I hand over the copy. And she then comes back at me and says, can we edit this down? Or I, she's, she's a journalism background. I edited this. Can you take a look at it? And that has produced some of the most highly converting sales pages that we've seen because she's then able to, um,
Speaker: kind of chicken before the egg instead of how we usually think. So that's my experience and that's my thought process. I think one of the really simple ways that you can apply that is don't write your copy in your website building platform. Don't get and show it and start trying to type your about page. Don't get in Squarespace and start trying to type your headline or your tagline or whatever, right? Everything like pull yourself creatively and mentally out of it, right? On whatever writing platform, there's some,
Speaker: You know, with people writing books, like Scrivener, there's a lot of really great writing tools. Google Docs, that's what we use for all my clients, and then several copywriting think tanks, that's what most of us use. Pull yourself out of it, write your copy somewhere where you can think, and if it can stand on its own, then it's gonna be good and highly converting, so.
Speaker: Yeah, I love writing a copy just in a notebook. And that's before it ever gets to a website. And I think that Chris and I, with some of our design clients, that ends up being one of the things that holds up the design process. Because there's not this understanding. And we certainly should do a better job of educating people about this specifically. But there's this idea that we're going to come up with a design. And then you plug in the words after that. When really, you need the content upfront.
Speaker: to figure out what that design is ultimately going to be for the page on that website. I know nothing about design. I've heard that being a few of my design friends have said, yeah, I'm waiting on the content. Yeah, exactly. And then that ends up taking. So that's great. And again, that's something that we need to do a better job of educating people about. So the process. Yeah, yeah. We'll never learn enough, right?
Speaker: So when you are working with a designer, do you, and you mentioned this with Jen, do you write the copy up front and then send that over? And how would you prefer, like are there best practices of working with a copywriter?
Speaker: Yeah. So one of the biggest things that I think I see is when I'm asking somebody as, as the copywriter, kind of similar to how a designer works, you're like, okay, I need the stuff. Like I need the raw material in which to craft from. And I think that a lot of times when it comes to our copywriting clients, I'm like, okay, give me soup to nuts, your whole client experience and process. Like I want to hear every bit of it. And you know, well, I plan and design wedding. So just everything that that entails. I'm like, no, but we need to know if like,
Speaker: you know, give it to me. What do you, what does that first call like? What do you talk about? What are the deliverables? I don't think, so that's my first tip. I think like when you can look at your process, your product, as a copywriter, and I'm sure you know this, these are your features benefits. You know, you always, you figure out the features and then you write the benefit for it, but I need the features. And so I think that one thing that we can do as creatives is really make sure that we know
Speaker: What all does your process include? What all are your quote unquote to use corporate speak your deliverables for every single bit of it? How many hours of call time? You know how many rounds of edits? All of these things I think you've got to figure out either before you sit down to write copy yourself or before you hand it over to a copywriter. So I think that and then the other big thing I think is foundational that people need first is an understanding of
Speaker: It sounds so basic, but who they are, what their vision is, what their mission is. We have so many clients.
Speaker: that come to us for the website copy that don't have a mission statement, a vision statement, an elevator pitch, they just have a title, and we need so much more than that direct copy. The person, like we'll pull the personality, and I think a lot of people think that is voice, and we'll pull the, you've got that innately, like we'll pull that out of you, but what we don't know is like your vision and your mission, and so all of those foundational elements I think you need to develop and spend time in too.
Speaker: So if someone's going about redesigning their website, let's say, should they find a copywriter, work on their content and copy first, and then reach out to a designer, or do you kind of prefer knowing right off the bat, okay, here's the designer that I'm going to be working with, you know, and so that you can establish a relationship with the designer as you go through the process?
Speaker: Yeah. I've worked both ways and I actually had a call with a client this morning and I said, okay, we're, I'm looking at your website now. Are you in the middle of a redesign? Like what? Cause people, I think, and that's something I've had to learn. Like you talking about like, um, kind of leading your clients. That's, we've had to learn that that is one thing that, um, has gone a few different ways that I think there's, it usually works best when either it's in tandem or copies first. I haven't seen it work as good on the other end, but, um, that, yeah, that's usually how we like to roll.
Speaker: Yeah, okay, so that's good to know. So now, if somebody is doing this on their own, so they're getting started, or not in a place where they can afford a copywriter, and again, these are all good things to know on some level on your own anyways. So what are some practical strategies that somebody can implement today?
Speaker: on their website to write high converting website copy to get people to book or to inquire or to take whatever action it is that they're looking for people to take.
Speaker: Okay. I love this question. I have three, three answers for you because I do think that your website 1 .0, maybe even your website 2 .0 need to be written by you. Um, I think it is, uh, just not the best investment of your money to spend a few thousand dollars on copy for your website. When you haven't had that product or been doing that, like you need to know your system. You need to know your process. You need to know your market. You need to know your story. You need to have all of that, like,
Speaker: I think I've seen that from working with a client who she was more on the front end of her business and she's not doing that anymore. And she said, however, you know, and we've all made investments in our business and then you shift and you pivot. But that's my recommendation. Know it well enough to DIY it, study it. You should do version one. Version two, when you start to be able to outsource, then start working with a copywriter. And I definitely think there's some things like
Speaker: the launch funnels that I was talking about. When you need to make a couple hundred thousand dollars or tens of thousands of dollars or even if you've got a five -figure launch off of a product, maybe it's a good investment if you can really see how that's going to come back. But what can you do yourself? You took my first one, but it's so good. The Facebook searching data mining, another really good place to look is Amazon reviews.
Speaker: That's one thing that I like to look up. But don't just stop by getting ideas. Bank them somewhere. I call it copy banking, swipe files, data mining, whatever you want to call it. How's those words somewhere? You want to know what they know.
Speaker: what they think, what they say, and what they do about this problem. Those are the big four. So if you can pull that information over. And I also, this is for free. I didn't know I was gonna, I usually don't tell this to people unless you're a student. I always say too, you want to get that FTS moment. And the FTS moment seems for the F this shiz moment.
Speaker: So you want to know when your client or prospect has that moment where they're like crying into their merlot and they're like, I'm done. I'm done. I will pay for this. I am so over this problem. This is not going away. If we can figure out that we are going to be able to write good copy. And so, um, that's my first tip. Spend a lot of time data, like I think to sometimes
Speaker: People's expectations of working with a copywriter is like, oh, I'll just give them my words and they'll just edit it and make it better and send it back. But a copywriter spends probably 70 % of their time in research and I'm just figuring out what, getting all these raw elements together. So that's my first tip, data mine, use Facebook groups, use Amazon reviews. Do you want me to pause or do you want me to keep going? No, I wanna unpack this just a little bit more. Okay, go for it. Can you repeat what you said earlier? So you wanna know four things.
Speaker: Yes. What were those four things again? What they know about this problem, what they think about this problem. So what they know are the things that like these are factual. What they think is when they're like,
Speaker: And that there could be a better way. What they say, what are, how are they communicate? I actually like saying, not just saying to themselves, but saying to other people about this problem. What are they doing to try to fix it? And these can be positive things. These can be negative things. They can be the positive, you know, they're listening to every single business podcast on the planet, but they just found out about entrepreneur world and they're so excited to dive in. You know, like, um, they always listen to Amy Porterfield every Thursday and they cannot wait and they go on a run in the morning. You know, like what I,
Speaker: She's a nurse, she wakes up, she, you know, I want to know very specifically whatever client avatar it is, what they know, think, say, and do, and you want to know their FTS moment too.
Speaker: Love that. I love the I love what you say about especially say, you know because I think that we communicate differently than our clients Especially we just know we just know more than them You know because because we're the professionals filling that service The big one for us was when we left rising tide society We were we were working with brands that convert that was kind of our tagline But people don't you know, they don't get excited about where convert
Speaker: You know? So, you know, just a simple word switch from brands that convert to brands that book. Which was brilliant. I think you need to realize how brilliant that switch was. That was so good. That was right. I think it's something that we, it's certainly not anything that we realized right away. It took a lot of listening and kind of, and realizing, okay, this isn't working, you know, how we want it to work. And so I think it's a lot of trial and error in fixing that.
Speaker: What about Amazon? So how would you use an Amazon review? Because I haven't heard that tip before. Yeah. How would I go about implementing that? The people that get on Amazon and write these really long reviews, it's very interesting to me, but they exist. And so why not look at what they're saying? So like, say you are a wedding planner, just going to use a very basic creative industry example. You're looking up books on how to plan a wedding. You're going to want to go down to that area and talk. You want to look for what they liked.
Speaker: that they learned? What was the best part of this? They finally figured out how to XYZ. What was left out from sometimes the negative reviews? People will be like, you know, they never helped me with this. This is really confusing planning a wedding and nobody ever showed us how to do this in the book. Those little moments can be gold gems. You can't always, sometimes Facebook groups help you get really right to that demographic, like you said.
Speaker: And join groups, I think too, it needs to be said, join groups that are, you're not, you're gonna be a fly on the wall. You're not gonna be, you're not the, it's like I'm in a couple of groups on brides for client work, obviously, but they're all brides. I'm not a bride right now, but like I sit and I listen and I take notes and I watch. So join a few groups like that as well. Yeah, and that's, so when you're part of those groups, do you ask questions ever or are you just listening?
Speaker: I have before for clients, I always am like, what do people think about like some of the things that I ask, especially like, would you be, which webinar title, which, what are you excited to sign up for? You know, your workshop and just see what people say. So sometimes I do ask questions.
Speaker: Yeah, and I'm sort of split on surveys. I used to be a big believer in surveys, and I still think that they have value on some level. But on another level, I feel like people don't, they don't know what they want, you know? And so their answer is, yeah, they don't reflect necessarily what they're actually looking for. Which is interesting. So anyways, point two. Point one was awesome. So I can't wait for point two.
Speaker: Well, I hope point two is going to look down. Learn to write a better headline. I think that, again, we're talking about a lot of basics today, but if your headline isn't being read, nothing else is being read. And I think a lot of times I'll see really bad, vague headlines in the creative world with words that we see all the time and words that
Speaker: just don't carry any weight, you know, like creating authentic brands or something, you know, like, no, like, cut to the chase, get to the point. I think I've got a blog somewhere on headline formulas, but headline formulas are plenty if you just want to run a Google search. But if you can get good at writing headlines and email subject lines, and then if you're good at those, start split testing them. Start split testing them on websites. I think a split test needs to run for a week before you can see, like a normal week, not like a Christmas week.
Speaker: before you can see like what, you know, did people react to that? Did people click on that button when it said that? Did people, you know, on a heat mask hover over that section or not? But that can be something that's really helpful too. But by learning to write a better headline, you're just, you're banking on yourself that the rest of it's gonna, the rest of your copy is gonna pull the weight. But the headline at least got their attention to look at it and decide if it was for them or not.
Speaker: And I think it's so helpful splitting things down or into the next step, thinking about what the next step is for people. So starting with the headline, you know, the whole point of the headline is to get them to click into whatever's next, right? And then thinking about that first sentence and the goal of that first sentence.
Speaker: And that was a real, yeah, I think that was a real eye -opening moment for me because a lot of this stuff can be really overwhelming, right? But it's, you know, it's just leading people through whatever you want them to do. And if you can break them down into little steps like that, starting with the headline, I think it makes a huge difference. Yep. That perfectly segues into number three. Excellent. Well done. So hit us with number three.
Speaker: OK, so you want to break up your copy. And I think she would be comfortable with me talking about it here. I recently built out a funnel campaign for Shay Cochran, an SE stock shop. And when we were going back and forth through the edits, I realized I need to do a little bit better job communicating about what is working in email copy these days.
Speaker: Big chunks is not working on websites or anything. People typically read in an F -shaped formation on the internet. They have for about, I think it's been about five years now, that's been kind of, you read that first sentence, half the second, jump. First sentence, half the second, jump. So when you're writing, especially email copy, there should be very few paragraphs. The best converting emails from entrepreneurs who are just killing it, it's even two words, line break.
Speaker: one sentence, line break. And I, um, I know sometimes when I, like when I gave that to Shay, she's like, okay, I don't want it to be like too unprofessional. And it is that balance that you want to strike, but that there's a couple of psychological things that are going on there. When people work their way down the page, they get that, that reward mechanism and their brain kicks in. So they feel like we're making progress. This isn't war and peace we're reading. Um, and it just visually breaks it up too. So I think that's something that I see all the time. There's just too many, um,
Speaker: It's hard on websites because a lot of times we want that beautiful column. It's so clean. But I don't have a problem with that as long as you realize that majority of people are not going to read your third and fourth sentence there. So just don't put that, you know, just know that. I don't think it's a problem. Kind of the same with bullets. Typically people read the first and the second and the last one.
Speaker: so they don't read those other bullets. And so just visually you can put things wherever. I think that that's a good thing to do, but just know that when a broken up copy typically performs better.
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, it's I think of just the emails that I get and I'm on a lot of different email lists because I'm so curious about what people are sending out and the emails that I want to go through or that I open and actually read through if it was just one long paragraph the chances of me actually reading through that slim but most of the people who send whose email list I'm on they do that, you know, it's one or two sentences break, you know, and it
Speaker: and it leads you through, you know, eventually to whatever their call to action is. But yeah, that's, I think, again, one of those eye -opening things, just when you start thinking about these kind of things intentionally, you know?
Speaker: And the difference that it can make for engagement. In emails, one thing that we always try to do is keep it short because we realize that the longer it is, the less likely somebody is going to get to the call to action. So we do our best to keep the call to action above the fold. Oh, that's good. That's really good, yeah. And then always have one.
Speaker: Yeah. Always have one, two. Yeah. And I found, you know, I've caught myself and especially when you're not doing this for mobile. And so this is kind of the, I think the design piece of that is that what's short on a desktop, it might not look short on mobile.
Speaker: And so I'll have three more sends. Because I do feel like, as professionals, we're working on desktops all day, but most people are, when they get our emails, are reading them from a mobile device. So we've noticed that, if I open one of my own emails up on mobile and realize, oh crap, it looks like a big paragraph, I can almost guarantee that our click rate's gonna be lower.
Speaker: Exactly. And I like that you mentioned the numbers. I think like the most fascinating thing about all of this is like there's really no, there was, what was it? One of my favorite copywriters mentioned a like quote unquote rule, uh, that she has not found true. I can't, I wish I could remember what the rule it was, but all of these suggestions that we're talking about, like try your audience.
Speaker: What is right is what your audience responds to. So test everything. Test constantly. Measure everything. The numbers don't lie. So whatever you're seeing work for your list and your numbers keep doing more of that. Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, for sure. So, most of this stuff we've been talking about, do -it -yourself copywriting. And if somebody wants to, you know, they're eating up what you're saying right now, which I'm sure they are, where do they learn more? My website is AshlynRights .com and I am on the internets on social media at Ashlyn S. Carter.
Speaker: Okay, awesome. And one question that I've gotten from, and I feel like I have to ask it, it wasn't in the scope of the questions that I sent over. Yeah, that's right. But when I asked our core students, hey, what's one question that you would want to ask them to answer, almost all of them said, you know, they struggle with their about page.
Speaker: So quickly, do you have any kind of off the top of your head tips for tackling an about page? Or maybe you've written a blog post about this already or something like that that you can direct people to.
Speaker: I think there's an about page blog post, and I'm revamping, I used to have a mini course on, a free mini course, and I'm revamping that, but I can run down the recipe real quick. So you wanna start with an attention getting headline, and kind of how we've been talking about today, this may not be, it's not about you on your about page, this may be that something they know, think, say, or do. This may be that FTS, that may be, the FTS may now reserve more for your work with me or your services page.
Speaker: But I did have one of my student the other day ask, I feel like I'm writing similar bits of copy on multiple pages of my website. And I was like, good, that's a good thing. It's okay if you're about page.
Speaker: doesn't feel as much as your LinkedIn, like your LinkedIn bio, like it's a good thing. It needs to be, it's marketing collateral, it needs to market. So you start with that attention getter, you reassure them that you're in the right spot. And then that's where you introduce yourself and your credibility. You want to reassure these people that you have what it takes, you've cut your chops, and so you dive into a little more of that and then you always end it with a call to action.
Speaker: You don't ever want them to land and I know you teach this on any page and not be ushered into the next place to go. You always want to let them know it is getting more and more comfortable or part of our landscape as a creative entrepreneurial group to have these longer about pages that show bits and pieces of your personality. That's a good thing. I mean, we have to do that. We know to a great quote. I put it in an Evernote quotes file and I put it in there. I don't have it memorized, but a brand
Speaker: has life and breath that breathes. So you want to flesh that out on your about page. There's no better place to talk about your story and your favorites, your likes, your dislikes, and create those connection points. But as far as the copy goes, that recipe I just ran through has to be there. But then, other than that, go crazy.
Speaker: Yeah, that's great. I like what you said at the beginning. It is for the person that you're reading about. I think the one thing that we teach is the about page. It's about you. It should have your story, but it's also about the person who's visiting your site. They should be able to identify their needs in there somewhere.
Speaker: So if somebody wanted to improve their copywriting skills, they can certainly go to, you know, and you'll have your course launching again sometime this spring, I assume. So I'll make sure, okay, April. So that will go in the show notes. What else, are there any other books or favorite resources that you have that people should definitely check out? Okay, so the first one, copy bloggers website is so great. I think that that is a great, especially,
Speaker: We talked about content marketing a little too. That one has a great overlap of content marketing and copywriting and conversion copywriting. So I think that's a great, and it's easy to understand. It's very applicable to your business. So copyblogger .com is one that I always recommend. And then two books, I actually recommended them to Meghan Martin. And I'm pretty sure she, I know she bought both, and I know she read one. She might have read the other. But she told me she really enjoyed them. The first is Influence by Robert Cialdini.
Speaker: It was written in the 80s, and he talks about the six levers that we've got to pull to kind of get people influenced and to buy from us or to book us. So that's really just, it's interesting, it's easy to read. He's a psychologist, but it's not overly sciency. And then the other book that I recommend is Breakthrough Advertising. That was written in, that's by Eugene Schwartz, it was written in like the 60s, I think, and it's just like the Bible. I think it is on Amazon for like, oh, it's been like 140 something, because there's very few in print.
Speaker: I won a copy one time and that's how I have it. But that book breaks down just the basic principles of headlines and features and benefits. It is the manual on copywriting.
Speaker: Okay, awesome. I've only read one of those three books, so I'm going to have to... I might take my time with the third one. Was it influence? Yeah, it was influence. So good. When I read it, I didn't realize it was written so long ago. Well, he updated it in 2007, but you can even tell now. You read a few of that and you're like, well, I'm not sure that would work today.
Speaker: But again, just to kind of the the however green human psychology is, right, you know, like the strategy or tactic might change a little bit. But these components of human of human psychology that things like writing tap into. Yeah, they don't they don't change. And so something from the 60s, I think can be can be used or strategies to be used today. And.
Speaker: You know, I think that everybody should take some time to improve their copywriting skills. You know, even if they get to the point, or even at the point where they can hire a copywriter. Like you said in the beginning, about people writing their own site at first. In version 1 .0, version 2 .0, we tell people the exact same thing for design. Design your first website, design your second website. There are so many resources out there. You know, there are templates for Squarespace, WordPress, show it, whatever
Speaker: content management system you're using. That's interesting that y 'all do that too. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Because you're aesthetic. I mean, you should see the first photograph we've ever, you know, the first wedding photos we've ever taken and how different they are from today. You know, I think they're still good, but the aesthetic is just a lot different. And so you don't want to drop, I mean, between
Speaker: you know, somebody doing branding, design, copywriting for you, that could easily be a 10K project right there. And so there's nothing I think that would create a bigger hurdle, unnecessary hurdle early in your business than hiring somebody to do all those things and realizing, you know, like we did even a year ago, oh wait, our messaging?
Speaker: not quite right, you know, we gotta fix it. Or who we thought our ideal client is, nah, that's not who it is, or I thought this is the style of photo that we were, you know, when we switched from digital to film, the aesthetic changed, you know? Fortunately, you know, I have Krista, so, and she kinda hates it, you know, when I'm like, hey,
Speaker: We should update our website. She's like, I really have been. We'll pay you with tacos tonight. Yeah, that's right. That's right. Well, Ashton, thank you so much for taking the time to share the things that you know, even things that you don't usually tell people in podcasts. You just share with your students.
Speaker: Yeah, but I think, again, this speaks to just how much you know. And so if you liked what you heard today, you need to go and check out Ashen's website. Put April, mark in your calendars that in April, Ashen's going to be opening the doors for a copywriting for creatives course again. I know that we have students that are also in your course, and they love it. So make sure that you mark that in your calendar. And vice versa.
Speaker: and go and follow Ashlyn on really everything, but Instagram for sure. Thank you so much, David. This is a blast. Yeah, well, we'll have to talk again soon.
Speaker: Thanks for listening to the Brands That Book Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider subscribing to the podcast on iTunes and leaving a review so that others are more likely to find it. For show notes and other resources, visit davianchrista .com.
