Do you want to know what some of the most impactful words in the English language are, in order to help you connect with your readers and sell more? Maybe I took a few liberties with my headline, but I bet it grabbed your attention.
I have an exercise for you. Go into a room where you are by yourself. In your most theatrical actor’s voice read the following list:
Impactful Words to Help You Sell More
You New
Free Suddenly
Because Miracle
Instantly Revolutionary
Now Startling
Announcing Remarkable
Introducing Hurry
Improvement Bargain
Amazing Compare
Sensational Challenge
Magic Wanted
Offer Easy
Quick
It’s kind of fun. It kind of feels like you’re on an infomercial. That is because these are the impactful words that make people want to buy. You, free, because, instantly and new are from a list of persuasive words Copyblogger published. The rest of the list comprises advertising magnate David Ogilvy’s timeless list of impactful words.
These are words that showcase the benefits of what your business has to offer. They help you connect with your customer. They help you differentiate your business from the competition. Using these impactful words in a strategic way can help your business stand out and sell more. Your headlines, calls to action, body copy, newsletters, sales letters, and even your elevator speeches can benefit from a stronger effort to engage your reader.
Here is another exercise for you. Are you alone again? Read this list in your most theatrical voice possible.
Business Jargon to Avoid
Empower Peel the Onion
Drink the Kool-Aid Low Hanging Fruit
Lots of Moving Parts Window of Opportunity
Best Practices Cut and Dry
Think Outside the Box Take it to the Next Level
Ducks in a Row Price Point
Ecosystem Body of Work
Solution Giving 110 Percent
Leverage Punt
Full Service Reach Out
Drill Down Synergize
Robust
This list sounds like the LinkedIn profile from hell, when you read it with a theatrical voice. That’s because all these words came off a list of business jargon to avoid from Forbes. They distract from the true message of your content, and their over use can make the reader want to cringe.
Why These Words Are Important
It can feel like studying which individual words to use can be a little too in the weeds for you (Surprisingly, not on the list of words/phrases to avoid!). But here’s the thing. There’s a lot of effort by businesses being placed on search results. While this is important, it can quickly become a misguided effort.
You might have web copy optimized to the point that it draws a significant amount of traffic. You might be bringing in quite a few eyeballs to read your work. But if the copy doesn’t resonate with the reader, no one is going to buy.
Search engines like copy that mentions the keyword a certain number of times. When businesses overuse that keyword instead of using pronouns, it reads extremely stuffy, and no longer sounds human. It’s easy to tell when a business is no longer writing to its readers.
Businesses want to write SEO content for the search engines, but unless your business is among the lucky who call Google a client, it’s not the search engines buying your stuff –it’s real, live people. Those people like well-written, informative, entertaining content. That’s where your impactful words come into play.
It pays to spend some time and effort connecting with the audience.
Some Simple Actions For You
- Pay attention to the words and phrases that make you want to buy. Next time you take action on a piece of web copy, determine what it was that made you want to act. You can use a notebook to write the word or phrase down for next time.
- Have you had some successful web copy or sales pages in the past? What phrases did you use? Write those down as well.
- Go through previous web copy and blogs. Incorporate the impactful words where you can to try and make the most out of already published web copy.
- Work these words and phrases into future web copy where it makes sense. These words can also help in networking, elevator speeches, and other places where you talk with your customers about your business.
- Compare different versions of copy. Do you want to try something new, but aren’t sure how it will work? You can always test different versions. Leave them up for two weeks at a time, and go with the web copy with more conversions.
What have you done in the past that works? If you are looking for ways to improve your web copy, these impactful words can help. If you are looking for some outside eyes, contact a professional copywriter.
Matt Brennan is a Chicago-based marketing writer and copy editor.
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