Another thing is how you advertise your
self. Here is an extract of what we used in our about page on our website.
We at
White Desert Productions are passionate about Theatre and the Arts. We believe
that the arts save lives and enhance the quality of the life that we all live.
We believe that every single person has a story to tell and a way to tell it
that rivals everything else we know and that it should be told, and retold and told
again as we learn and celebrate what and who we are. We believe that the
arts are vital to our lives, our health and our future as well as our past and
our present. It is this belief that has carried us through 2012 and will carry
us into 2013 and beyond as we celebrate our partnership with The London Welsh
Centre as their official Resident Theatre Company.
Although
this is very interesting it doesn’t portray what we do as a company. I read an
article on IdeasTap that suggest not to be ‘Overly Wordy’, so I looked into it.
You’re overly wordy
I get it. Your art is important and
very worthy and you probably saved a kitten this morning on your way to your
eco-friendly performance space. But you don’t need eight adjectives in your
first sentence describing what you do. Keep it simple. If you can’t sum up what
you do in one (short) sentence, then it sounds like you don’t really know what
you do. If I read your About page four times and still don’t know, it’s not
clear enough and I’ll call someone else for a quote. (Five common About Page Mistakes, IdeasTap, 2013)
So we decided as a company to change it to
something more mature and less off topic.
White
Desert Productions, a new and exciting Film, Theatre and Events company taking
you to ‘The Oasis Of Your Imagination’.
Short,
simple and sweet!
This
intrigues the customer and tells them exactly what we are about. There are no
secrets between company and customer and they feel that there is an element of
trust. This is a very interesting tip to remember as there is no point in being
overly descriptive because people see right through it.
‘Besides, employers have
apparently said they find not
having a digital footprint “suspicious”, leading them to wonder what it is you’re hiding. Future employers
want us to have a past, it seems, just a consistent and unblemished one.’ (IdeasTap,
Daisy on Social Media, 2012)
You have to find a balance. It is vital to have an online presence, however, how you portray yourself online, is how others see you. What do you want people to perceive you as?
Bibliography
Daisy on Social Media. 2012. IdeasTap [ONLINE] Avilable at: http://www.ideastap.com/ideasmag/all-articles/daisy-on-social-media [Accessed 03
March 2013]
Five Common About Page Mistakes. 2013. IdeasTap [ONLINE] Avalable at: http://www.ideastap.com/ideasmag/the-knowledge/five-common-about-page-mistakes [Accessed 13 February 2013]
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ReplyDeleteDear Lisa,
ReplyDeleteoh my God. Firstly, as I started reading I thought I would like to give you some hints about writing the text more simple. After continuing I realized that you already know how to write text which is more interesting for your audience. Very good! Actually, I can only agree with you and all my studies during the last month about approving communication/advertising fits to what you said: "Make it short and simple". I read this sentence also in many books about Neuromarketing and it is one of the most important things for good advertising. This have different reasons. Firstly, and a very practical reason, the reader wether of a website or an ad doesn't have enough time to read a long text. Secondly, words are not very brainfriendly, we do using words only since 40.000 years. Word are coded pictures, which our brain has to decode. That is one of the reason why words are less effective and not easy to understand and therefore to remember. I can only recommend the book "Neuromarketing: Understanding the Buy Buttons in Your Customer's Brains." for further studies. You are right when you make the text or claim as simple as possible! Many advertisers or authors of a website do expect that more text, does look more professional. But the audience/readers have to understand and remember your business/product/service and more important what benefits there will have from your business! You are on a very good way! Your claims and statements should also answer one question: What are the main "pain" of your costumers? Means: what are mostly important for your audience concerning your service. How to do this in details is written in the book I recommended above. Another hint of me is to use pictures on your website! Better movies with audio! There are very brainfriendly. Focus on your main claim/pain of the audience. What do your costumers mainly expect of your business? But differ in this point from your competitors! Respect to you, because you have used in one sentence many books about brainfriendly and more effective advertising/websites recommended: Using the word "YOU" is very powerfull! And you did it twice in one sentence! Very good!
Great job!
Cathy