During the training, we learned the Sanskrit (the ancient language of Hinduism) word “svadhyaya,” which roughly translates to self-study. To embrace svadhyaya means that we must contemplate and examine ourselves in order to grow. Learning about this concept not only made me examine my personal life but my work life as well. Simply put: I wanted to know how I could be a better writer. Luckily, there were many lessons I learned during my training that were also applicable to creating better content.

If you’re currently a writer or even a digital marketer who occasionally writes, here is a list of 5 of the most memorable lessons I learned during my training that will help you strengthen your writing skills:

Beginner’s Mindset Leads to More Creativity and Openness

“In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few.” -Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind

Being a beginner is challenging because there is so much that you don’t know. But it can also be rewarding because the possibilities are endless. When you’re a beginner, your knowledge doesn’t serve as a roadblock. It’s about the practice and the process, not about seeking absolute perfection.

The first time I created a yoga sequence, I didn’t have to worry about repeating what I had already done a million times. I felt completely open to create whatever I wanted. It was okay that it was messy and imperfect because I was new and that was to be expected. With that expectation, I found a certain amount of freedom.

Even if you’ve been practicing the craft of writing for decades, you need to try your best not to have self-judgment when you write. Too much self-judgment can stop you from ever putting pen to paper or being open to new ideas. And with proper attention and editing, ideas that seem strange or idiotic at first can turn into strong pieces of writing.

What if you’ve written about the same topic many times? Or the new client you’re working with is very similar to one who you worked with a year ago? Bringing your expertise and prior knowledge to your work is imperative, but it’s also important to remain open to what might be different about the work in front of you. Be curious. Dig a little deeper. Continue to push yourself past the realm of what you think you know. In the end, you’ll strengthen your writing skills and your knowledge base.

Don’t Wait Until You Know Everything to Give it a Shot

This lesson goes hand in hand with being a beginner. If I waited until I knew everything before I allowed myself to teach yoga, I would never teach. This same ideology applies to writing. Being okay with not knowing everything leads to curiosity and curiosity leads to taking a more deliberate approach to your work.

One of the best ways that we can apply this to our job as writers is to test the copy that we create. Testing is synonymous with learning. Testing is admitting that you don’t know the answer yet and that you’re okay with that. It could also mean that you’re pretty sure you know that what you’ve written will work. Testing can verify whether or not you’re right.

Let’s say that you’re working on a website that sells yoga pants. You want to push people through the funnel faster, but you’re not sure how to write the call-to-action copy. An excellent way to determine what does and doesn’t work is to A/B test your copy over an allocated period of time. Here’s an example from Lululemon. Currently, the CTA copy on their website says “Must-Have Bottoms.” But if the conversion rate wasn’t high enough, Lululemon might try changing the wording on the CTA to find out if a different phase elicits more clicks.

Cultivating Your Voice and Tone is Essential

In yoga, the most powerful tool you have is your voice. Through your voice, you give cues and adjustments so that your students don’t injure themselves. And it’s through the tone of your voice that you show your authenticity and set the mood of the class.

When you write for the web, it’s important to know your voice and tone beforehand. Defining your voice and tone helps you articulate your value and define who you are. Whether you’re writing copy for your newsletter or social media platforms – when your content reads well and people trust the person who is speaking to them, they will move through the sales funnel with greater ease.

When communicating, your tone varies depending on who you’re talking to, what you’re talking about, and the messages you’re trying to convey. Just as in conversation, your written tone and voice (or your brand’s) should have a distinct personality, style, or point of view. That voice should take on different tones depending on the situation and the audience to whom you’re addressing. If you haven’t already, develop a company-wide voice and tone guide to keep your communications on-brand and on-message. If you already have a voice and tone guide, look back on it to refresh your knowledge and check to see if it’s still in line with your brand, especially if you wrote the guide a long time ago.

Don’t Make Assumptions

During my yoga training, we read “The Four Agreements” by Don Miguel Ruiz, which offers a simple, but powerful code of conduct to transform our lives. I’ve read this book a few times before, but the third agreement, “Don’t make assumptions” stuck out to me in a way that it hadn’t before. Ruiz says:

“We have the tendency to make assumptions about everything. The problem with making assumptions is that we believe they are the truth. We could swear they are real. We make assumptions about what others are doing or thinking…”

When you’re writing content, it’s incredibly important not to make assumptions. If you assume that you’re providing the information that users want and need, you’re missing out on an opportunity to provide them with what they’re actually seeking. You might be well-versed in your brand or product you’re selling, but at the end of the day, your customers know their needs better than anyone else. And although you might truly believe that you’re not making assumptions about what they need, you won’t know unless you ask them.

The Best Teachers Are Also the Best Students

The best yoga teachers I’ve practiced with keep their sequences, themes, and music fresh. Their secret? They are perpetual students and share what they learn on a daily basis with their students. This is also true when you’re a writer. If you want to strengthen your writing skills, read as much as possible. Reading other writers’ work can give you new ideas around subject matter and languaging. And the best part is that you can read about subjects other than writing to get better at your craft. Reading fiction and non-fiction of any subject can help strengthen your writing. If you do want to read about writing (so meta!) I recommend Nicole Fenton, Ann Handley, and the Gather Content blog.

Remain curious, learn from those around you, and ask a friend or coworker to edit. Different people will give you different types of edits, which will strengthen your work. If somehow everyone is too busy to edit your work, our CEO Ian Lurie offers his advice on self-editing and using apps.

Whether you write all the time or try your best to avoid it, my hope is that this post will spark your creativity. Perhaps you will think about your work in a new way the next time you sit down to write. Good luck!

The post Be a Better Writer: 5 Lessons Learned From Yoga Teacher Training appeared first on Portent.

Thinking about how much mountaineering tools make my adventuring life easier, made me wonder what tools I could use to make my work life easier, which is why I came up with a list of the best online tools to research blog topics. If you currently write for a blog, and don’t want to drive yourself crazy coming up with blog ideation here is a list of my favorite online research tools:

1. Quora

In Content Strategy for the Web, Kristina Halvorson and Melissa Rach write:

“Great content meets users’ needs and supports key business objectives. It keeps people coming back for more.”

When you’re ideating, it’s important to think about what’s going to make people return to your site. One way to do this is by answering people’s questions.

But how do you discover what questions people are asking? If you don’t have the time or budget to interview users, or you just want more ideas, try using Quora. Quora is a website where questions are asked, answered, edited and organized by its community of users. Its sole purpose is to solve people’s problems by responding to questions, just like you do with the content on your website.

Let’s pretend your company sells coffee beans. If you search “coffee”, it pulls up questions people asked around the topic. The inquiry below is an excellent potential topic to explore on your blog:

Try typing in different keywords and seeing what questions come up, some will most likely be potential blog topics or help you verify your current ideas.

2. Answer The Public

Answer The Public is another tool that collects questions. But instead of using questions from users within its site, they’re provided by Google & Bing. These questions are put in a shareable, visual list and the data is shown in question, preposition, or alphabetical form, and then exported to a CSV file or as a PNG.

For example, if you search for “hotel” this time, it brings up questions like “What hotel was used in The Shining?” and “Are hotel prices negotiable?”. You can then mold these questions into potential blog posts such as, “Learn About the History of the Hotel That Was Used in The Shining” or “How You Can Save Money By Negotiating Your Hotel Price.”

3. Google Keyword Planner

A search engine’s goal is to match up a searcher’s intent with a quality piece of content that satisfies that purpose. When someone enters a query into the search bar, the engine will attempt to find the most relevant pages to display in its search results.

A great tool for discovering what potential customers are searching for is the Google AdWords Keyword Planner. This tool allows you to research new keywords and ideas using specific targeting features, and filters or broadly related keywords and their search volumes and trends, or you can expand your research to Google product categories or your existing landing pages. Although Google will hide info for certain terms with extremely high volume, not only will the keyword planner tool provide you with the average search volume for specific terms and phrases, but it can also show you how competitive the market is for that query and how expensive a paid search bid might be.

One of our favorite ways to use the Keyword Planner is to find the Wikipedia page for your topic and then plug that into the “Your landing page” field. Some of the keyword ideas from looking up the Wikipedia page for “Hiking” are:

• “hiking boots”
• “walking holidays”
• “backpacking gear”

Once you uncover what real people are searching for, you can either optimize your current content for those keyword phrases or create new content.

4. Ubersuggest.io

In Storytelling for User Experience, Whitney Quesenbery and Kevin Brooks write:
“While brainstorming is a technique that’s been around for a long time and is practiced widely, it is not always as productive as you would like. While it is good to collect all the wild and crazy ideas a team might have, what might be more useful is to have a sort of ‘brainstorming helper,’ something that can trigger creative ideas – or at least ideas that are different and new for that team.”

One of our favorite tools to kick off a brainstorm is Ubersuggest, and the way it works is simple. Type in a keyword, medium (web, images, news, etc.), language and region, and click suggest, and it will pull a list of relevant keywords in alphabetical order. The length of the list is dependent on the specificity or broadness of your keyword.

Here’s an example of how to use Ubersuggest to initiate a brainstorm. In this scenario, you work for Denali National Park & Preserve in Alaska. Oh, and don’t forget to set the mood for a great creative marketing brainstorm.

First, type in the word “Alaska”. Next, pick a random group of keywords. Let’s go with “E”.

After that, choose 2 or 3 topics to focus on, and create a tree chart, narrowing it down until you unearth new blog topics. In this example, we narrowed it down to the top “Employment” and came up with the blog post, “The History of Work Camping in Alaska.”

Repeat this exercise a few times with your team and you’ll have dozens of new blog post ideas.

5. Buzzsumo

One of the best ways to generate new content ideas is to take a peek at what other people are writing. We’re not suggesting you copy what you see. Instead, use your findings on Buzzsumo to initiate a brainstorm.

Buzzsumo shows you what content performs best for any topic or competitor without having to search the web yourself. You can also sort results by social network to figure out what topics performed best on what site.

Since we love the outdoors, we’ll use that example again. This time, imagine you work for an outdoor gear company based in Bend, Oregon. Type in the search query “hiking” and you’ll see topics such as:

• Doctors Explain How Hiking Actually Changes Our Brain
• 10 California Hiking Trails with Insane Paranormal Activity
• “Camping With Dogs” Instagram Will Inspire You To Go Hiking With Your Dog

Here are a few examples of how these search results can turn into ideas for new blog posts. By changing a few words in the previous article titles, you have new content for your blog:

• 5 Reasons Why Hiking is Great For Stress Relief
• 5 Ghost Town Hikes in Oregon
• Follow These Oregonian Instagram Accounts for Hiking Inspiration

There are other sites that pull articles from across the web. Try paper.li, which allows you to enter keywords or an article URL to discover similar articles on the same topic. If you don’t want to keep revisiting the site, they will collect and send you content via email. Alltop is another site that gathers content from across the web. Type in a keyword related to your industry and see what surfaces.

6. Reddit

Reddit may seem like a place where you find trolls, not new content ideas. But there are 234 million unique users discussing different topics on Reddit, all which you can use for ideation research.

Reddit is also made up of thousands of communities called “subreddits” where users post links, stories and videos. Users vote to determine which posts rank the highest on the subreddits.

Let’s go back to the coffee example. If you go to Reddit and search “coffee”, you’ll find the coffee subreddit and topics such as:

• What coffee accessory can you not live without?
• Coffee festivals
• How can I make coffee for my wife that is more like the fancy shops?

You could turn these results into blog posts such as:

• “Coffee Accessories You Need to Own Now”
• “Coffee Festivals to Attend in 2017”
• “How to Make the Best Cup of Coffee for Your Loved One This Valentine’s Day”

Explore the different subreddits and see what ideas you come up with. As of 2015, there are 853,834 subreddits, and it’s likely you’ll find some that are relevant to your industry.

We hope you’ll experiment with these tools the next time you’re staring at your screen. And if you need ideas for non-promotional content for your social channels, some of these work well for that too.

Do you have any favorite ideation methods? Let us know in the comments below!

This post was a joint contribution led by Katie McKenna who resides on Portent’s Social team and works regularly on Content nerdery, with contributions from Zac Heinrichs of Portent’s SEO team. They both hate silos.

The post The Best Tools to Write Killer Blog Posts appeared first on Portent.

If you’re working your way down the “must-have” list of digital marketing needs for 2016, organizing a coherent presence across social media platforms like Facebook or Twitter would get slotted in right under “Setting up my website.” At least it should.

Social media fosters brand loyalty and community, increases sales, and helps strengthen SEO, and it accomplishes all of that while simultaneously helping you drive awareness of your brand by communicating directly with your customers. But creating a comprehensive social media plan takes time and resources. And, sometimes, carving out time and resources just isn’t possible.

Hiring an intern to organize your social media efforts may seem like a great solution. But you’ll realize – quickly – that a social media specialist needs to understand business communication and strategy, and that’s just not something that most interns bring to the table. So, instead, you might consider hiring an agency or a freelancer for support. But outsourcing comes with its own unique challenges. It’s usually more expensive. It requires strong communication between you and the partner you bring in. And, perhaps most importantly, it means you have to trust someone else to be as excited as you are to grow your online presence.

Determining which route to take for outsourcing your social media efforts is difficult. There are many factors to consider as you make this decision and, frankly, it’s challenging to weigh all the possible criteria, as well as setting your partner up to meet and exceed your expectations.

Luckily, we’ve laid out a 10-step checklist that should help you get your ducks in a row when it comes to outsourcing your social media efforts:

1. Set clear goals for your social media channels

Social media is a flexible and versatile tool, which means it can be easy to get overwhelmed and lose sight of organizational priorities. To combat this, determine clear, channel-specific and macro business goals from the onset of the project and stick with them. For example, you can set a specific goal such as increasing your Facebook likes by 25% by the end of Q4 in addition to a broader goal like improving your company’s reputation.

Perhaps you don’t know what your goals are yet. If that’s the case, ideally figure them out before you hire anyone. Without goals, whomever you hire won’t have direction, making it difficult to properly measure their success. Your agency team may be able to help coach you through this critical goal-setting stage, but the stronger the guidance you can give them about your overall goals and how you believe social media efforts fit in, the more they’ll be able to build that guidance into the right strategy and tactics.

2. Consider which channels to focus on

From YouTube to Pinterest, there are many social media channels your brand can call home. Each has different benefits, which can make it tempting to sign up for every platform. As a rule, we recommend focusing on three to start; it’s better to have a few strong social channels backed by strategy than several low-performing channels operating without coordination and a plan. The best way to figure out which channels to focus on is to determine where your customers spend the most time. Doing so will allow you to reach more qualified prospective customers and drive higher ROI on both your time and any ad spends. Start small, move slow, and build from there.

3. Prioritize your tasks

Paid advertising. Content creation. Page optimization. There’s a lot you can sink your time into with social media, so it’s important to prioritize. For example, if you’re under pressure to increase sales, you may be inclined to dive into conversion-centered paid advertising. However, you need brand awareness and user-friendly content before you can successfully engage and ultimately go on to sell. To figure out which aspects of your social media efforts to prioritize, you’ll need to do a deep-dive assessment.

4. Audit your social platforms

Don’t hesitate to make an initial investment in hiring an expert to conduct a social media assessment, even if you don’t end up fully outsourcing the work. Think of it as taking your social media efforts to the doctor. An expert will do an overall health examination by checking your channels against best practices, user needs, and competitors. Then they’ll ask questions such as:

• Are there active communities on your social platforms you can strengthen to expand customer loyalty?
• Snapchat is popular right now, but does it make sense for your business?
• Are you properly leveraging images on Twitter so you can maximize your engagement rate?

If particular areas need work, the expert will determine a way to fix it. And once you have a possible solution, you can determine whether your internal team is capable of handling the work themselves.

5. Determine your budget

Hiring someone may seem like an excellent solution, but you need to know if your budget can realistically support it. For example, if your budget is modest and your time is limited, it may be best to hire a community manager instead of a strategist.

On the one hand, the in-depth approaches and advertising plans that a strategist will deliver typically cost more money because of the level of expertise required to execute, although these larger campaigns usually have a higher potential ROI.

If you have a smaller budget, but still need help creating content and managing customer service, a community manager might be the right choice for you. If you’re not sure how much money to allocate, refer to your goals so you can determine where you need the most help.

6. Identify your audience

Who are you trying to reach on social media? If you don’t know your audience, you can’t determine your voice and tone, which guides the type of content you’re going to publish and how you’re going to position that content for your audience. Defining your audience will also give your internal or external team clear direction – and ultimately set them up for greater success.

Social media is also an excellent way to learn about your audience. Through both organic and paid social media efforts, you can determine information such as what types of images and copy resonate with certain fans, as well as their location and when they are most active online. Not only will you improve your effectiveness on social, you can and should use these insights to strengthen your other digital channels. For example, content that leans into copy or themes that prove effective on social media can be repurposed as blog posts or evergreen content.

7. Decide which parts of your social media efforts to outsource

Outsourcing your entire social media effort could make sense, but it’s likely you’ll be handing off certain aspects such as community management or advertising. Mapping your business and staff needs against your budget will help you decide.

Try asking yourself the following questions and discussing your answers with your team to come to a conclusion:

• What is the most time-consuming aspect of our social media efforts? And should it be consuming that much time?
• Which social platforms need more attention and what is the main priority of each?
• Are we ready to launch social advertising? If so, do we have the internal resources and budget to be successful?
• How rapidly are we able to respond to customer comments on our social platforms?
• Are there any social platforms where we don’t currently have a presence but should? Do we understand how to set up and optimize these platforms?
• What opportunities do we have on social that we’re not currently capitalizing on?

Good news: you’re already taking the first step by reading posts like this one.

8. Ask yourself if you really need to outsource

Given the right resources, it’s entirely possible to manage your social media efforts by yourself. Learning how to create basic posts and respond to incoming messages is easy. However, from new ad formats to entirely new platforms, keeping up with the continual changes and specific trends on social media can be a job in itself. Outsourcing, which begins with the initial audit, can help you identify where your opportunities are and allow you to focus on building your business. Outsourcing may be a higher cost up front, but could ultimately save you money in salary and sanity.

9. Make sure all the layers of the marketing stack are in place

Businesses and marketers often think social media is a quick win, especially when it comes to advertising. It makes sense – everyone wants to achieve an immediate ROI. But it will be difficult to see an ROI on social if you don’t have the other pieces of the marketing stack, like content and analytics, in place.

For example, let’s say you create compelling ads, but your website content isn’t well-organized or well-written. If your ads are successful, your click-through rate from social media will be high, but your conversion rate and time on page will be low. And if you haven’t correctly set up your analytics and tagging, or aren’t consistently watching the results, you won’t be able to diagnose the problem or identify your successes.

Digital marketing is an ecosystem. Act accordingly, and you’ll be more successful in the long run.

10. Choose between freelancers and agencies

As someone who has done both the freelancer and agency thing, I’ve seen the pros and cons of both. Agencies typically have larger and more flexible teams, allowing them to meet challenging deadlines and give you a broader range of experience across various specialties. However, agency prices are typically higher than freelance. This is justified when you have a large budget, need in-depth strategies and ongoing expertise, but less so when you have a small budget and mostly need community management.

Because social media is a series of platforms, each with a known, yet rapidly changing set of rules, many times your decision will come down to choosing someone who is dependable, experienced, and provides a quality service. Do your research both online and through your personal network to find someone you can trust and will enjoy working with.

Whether you choose to hire someone outside your company to help you with your social media efforts or keep it in house, creating a successful social media program is an investment. Just like the other aspects of your business, it requires care, attention, and patience to be successful. We hope after reading this checklist you feel armed with the knowledge you need to find the right partner or people, and give your business’ social media efforts enough attention to thrive.

The post Checklist for Outsourcing Your Social Media Efforts appeared first on Portent.

The fear of scarcity permeates our culture. People believe they don’t have enough. They spend time calculating how much they want. And when they see what others have, all they can think about is what they’re missing. In Buddhism, this concept is called “The Hungry Ghost.” Hungry ghosts are beings with tiny mouths the size of a pin and large, empty stomachs. They live in a realm where they’re never satisfied and their craving is ceaseless.

As marketers, we are sometimes guilty of bombarding people with content that plays on this hyperawareness of lack. But it doesn’t have to be this way. I’d like to propose that selling products can be symbiotic with sincerity.

Being a marketer who also lives by a Buddhist philosophy may seem like an oxymoron. But words are powerful and we need to be mindful during every step of our writing process. One way I do this is by following a Buddhist doctrine called The Four Elements of Right Speech.

Thich Nhat Hahn touches on this doctrine in his book, The Art of Communicating. He writes:
“Loving, truthful speech can bring a lot of joy and peace to people. But producing loving speech takes practice because we aren’t used to it. When we hear so much speech that causes craving, insecurity, and anger, we get accustomed to speaking that way. Truthful, loving speech is something we need to train ourselves in.”

This way of talking and writing isn’t always natural, so we have to practice. We must be mindful and respect our audience through our words, just like we do when we talk to a dear friend. This may seem like an idealistic, impossible and perhaps even idiotic proposal. But I’m not asking you to be perfect. I’m simply asking you to join me in exploring another approach to your marketing copy.

Let’s dig into how the Four Elements of Right Speech can apply to marketing content:

1. Tell the truth.

Don’t lie or turn the truth upside down. If you twist the truth, there’s a chance your customers won’t trust you. If they buy your product and it doesn’t live up to their expectations, they’ll end up disappointed. Luckily, your product doesn’t have to be the sexiest or most innovative to sell. Maybe it has another utility – like price or convenience. Sometimes copy on the web is deceitful, so stand out by being straightforward and honest. Lean into originality. Here’s an example from REI. I spend a large chunk of my paycheck there because I trust their products to hold up in the often-crappy Pacific Northwest weather.

“With a trail weight of 2 lbs. 12 oz., the updated Big Agnes Copper Spur UL2 tent lets you and a friend enjoy a gossamer-light load and plenty of living space on your 3-season adventures.”

This copy evokes excitement about camping, but it’s still straightforward. It’s doesn’t stretch the truth. It has a light trail weight and is good for 3-season adventures. They don’t claim that it’s “incredibly innovative” or “the tent of your dreams”. And it doesn’t have to be either of those descriptions to make me want to buy it.

2. Don’t exaggerate.

There’s a lot of pressure when selling products. The competition is intense and you need to make your way through the noise. How are you going to set yourself apart from all the other brands? It can be easy to exaggerate (even slightly) in your marketing. But writing great marketing copy doesn’t mean you have to be clever or flowery. In fact, sometimes getting back to basics is the best you can do. Showcase why you’re special with simplicity and honesty. Here’s an example from MailChimp, an online email marketing solution that writes personable copy.

Mindful copywriting is truthful and it solves customer problems while also being respectful. If marketing writers were monks, MailChimp would be well on its way to enlightenment. They use a voice and tone that’s warm, but clear. They persuade the reader by speaking directly to them and their needs without exaggerating what MailChimp can do for them.

In Everybody Writes, Ann Handley says:

“We all have easy access to a publishing platform and a potential audience. We all have great power to influence, educate, entertain, and help – but also to annoy, irritate, and…sometimes…fritter away our opportunity entirely. So the challenge for companies is to respect their audiences and deliver what the audience needs in a way that’s useful, enjoyable, and inspired.”

When we write, we start with a blank screen and the best intentions. But we often get lost in the process. Writing isn’t always easy. It’s hard to say what we mean and sometimes all we can do is stare at the screen. When we’re trying to persuade it’s easy to exaggerate to get our point across. If you’re in doubt of what you’re writing, stick with simplicity. Notice certain words that may come up in your writing, such as:

• Best
• Innovative
• Ground-breaking
• More *insert adjective here*

Unless your company actually is the best or most innovative, cut these words from your copy. And always ask yourself if you’re exaggerating, even if it’s just a tiny bit.

3. Be consistent.

This means no double-talk: speaking about something in one way to one person and in an opposite way to another for selfish or manipulative reasons.

Before you can sell your product to new customers, you need to build trust. One of the most effective ways you can do this is through being consistent in your communications. Think of a long-form story vs. a tweet. Sometimes the channel and audience need a modification to tone, but your voice should still be consistent across content types.

In Content Strategy for the Web, Kristina Halvorson and Melissa Rach write:
“When you tackle defining your organization’s voice, start by looking at any brand materials you have. The voice might already be defined for you. Consider how it feels, what values live behind it, the different media in which it might manifest.”

It doesn’t matter whether you’re eating at a restaurant or browsing web content. People expect and deserve consistency. If you’re not consistent, you risk confusing and frustrating them.

4. Use peaceful language.

Don’t use insulting or violent words, cruel speech, verbal abuse, or condemnation.

It may seem obvious, but this type of language still creeps into our marketing copy. It may not be insulting or violent, but it may be negative. Here’s an example of how you can turn negative copy into positive copy:

Negative: You won’t receive exclusive wardrobe deals until you sign up for our newsletter.

Positive: Sign up for our newsletter to receive exclusive deals on hand-picked items from our personal stylists.

Dropbox does an excellent job of positive copywriting. Let’s look at an example:

“Dropbox works the way you do. Get to all your files from anywhere, on any device, and share them with anyone.”

I love that Dropbox’s copy is so creative and understanding. Many companies would choose to write negative copy, such as the following: Are you constantly losing or unable to share your work with others? At Dropbox, we help ease your file frustrations.

While neither cruel nor condemning, this type of content speaks to The Hungry Ghost in each of us. It plays on our fears of losing our work and tries to provide a solution. So it makes me happy that Dropbox found a friendly and helpful way to write their web content.

As Nicole Fenton and Kate Kiefer Lee write in Nicely Said:
“Show your thoughtfulness. Make the reader smile. You can even give them a little encouragement. Put yourself in the reader’s shoes and check your tone to make sure you’re being polite. If you need the reader to wait for a moment to fill in extra form fields, a simple ‘please’ or ‘thank you’ goes a long way.”

Similar to exit overlays, negative copywriting might raise your conversion rates in the short term, but are these techniques causing you to keep the customers you ultimately want to win over? I suspect not. Look at your cohort analysis to prove this to yourself or your CMO, once you’ve tried writing with true sincerity for a while.

There is no perfect formula for writing. But if you inject mindfulness into your writing process and look at every word you write, you’ll get closer to selling with sincerity. As marketers, we should be passionate about our products. And I believe passion – not fear – is what makes a great and lasting impression.

The post How to Write Sincere Marketing Copy appeared first on Portent.