How many times have you skimmed over a marketing email and just pressed ‘delete’? Probably daily, right? That then begs the question, how do you create conversational content and get someone to not just easily delete what you send?
Most marketing messages are cringeworthy. Humans crave real. Your readers want a human touch to your marketing pieces. But…easy words, hard business practice. 
It’s easy to write something that’s grammatically correct–well, sometimes. But it’s a challenge even for the most adept writers to compose a conversational piece that connects with readers. So if having engaging, conversational, persuasive content is a must with your marketing, where do you start?
Before we get in where to start, have you thought about Text messaging as a way to market? I recently read a great article about it, https://goo.gl/u2UJ1R that you might just find eye opening.
- Write to your audience. Think about how you would talk to these people if they were in front of you. Visualize them standing next to you as you compose your content. Don’t just write to your audience though; write to your BIGGEST fan! Your writing will sound more enthusiastic and less “thank you for subscribing”.
- Don’t showboat. Skip the jargon; nix the gobbledygook. You wouldn’t talk to your best friend that way; so why talk that way in your marketing? The point is to be conversational; this isn’t your college English class. For example: “The zenith for deflated tire solutions”sounds way more complicated than:“We fix flat tires.”
- Make the conversation go both ways. When you’re writing, ask questions! You can’t see the person on the other end of the conversation, so sometimes we forget to engage them. If you’re a one-person business, use “I,” “me,” and “my.” And if you write on behalf of a team, feel free to use “we,” “us,” and “our,” when appropriate.
- Have a personality. Think of your favorite coworker right now. I know you have one. Why are they your favorite? You share stories! The same goes for your content. Use personal anecdotes, share your mistakes, tell your readers why you’re writing to them! It goes a long way.
- Vary your sentence structure. Most marketing sounds extremely robotic. Face it! Long sentences are a chore to read. To make your content more readable, chop up long sentences. To be fair, in school, we were commended when we used complicated sentences. College taught us to stuff our writing with Latin and Greek. That’s all well and good in the right setting. But that’s writing to impress. This is writing to engage in conversation. Unlearn what you know and put your readers first. Again, think of how you speak. Your message is probably simple most of the time:
“Nice shirt. Looks good on you.”
NOT
“That shirt you are wearing seems to portray your personality and hug you in just the right way and says to me that you are a person who knows shirts. Good on ya, mate.”
See what I mean?
Creating conversational content is not only a sign of good copywriting which is sure to pull your readers in like a magnet. It is also going to make your content more appealing. Here’s the bottom line when it comes to creating conversational content: if it sounds like writing, rewrite it.
