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Tanner:
This week on the show, Eden Bidani, a conversion copywriter, joins me to talk about the role of copywriting and digital marketing and how good copy can have a profound effect of the success of your marketing campaigns. Eden in as an expert in copywriting, and she shares a ton of valuable tips on how to make sure your website actually converts users into customers.
Welcome to the show. I’m super excited to have you go ahead and introduce yourself to the audience.
Eden:
My name is Eden Bidani. I’m a conversion copywriter. I specialize in high converting ads, landing pages and website copy for SAS and tech and some direct to consumer businesses.
Tanner:
Awesome. So how did your career get started in copywriting?
Eden:
Well, I didn’t actually start in copywriting, I started about 10 years ago in direct sales. So I was walking the beat. I was doing telemarketing or I was doing direct selling with product demos and all of that kind of thing, which was really funny because I was kind of the opposite of what I studied at university. I studied anthropology and sociology. So the short story is that I was looking for a job over the summer and a friend offered me to become a salesperson with them. And I ended up loving it. So that became the job. And so then I was writing, I was writing the sales scripts. I was writing the pitches. I was writing in for information packets for the products and things like that.
And then we were using those same scripts to actually train other sales reps. And then once we moved to Israel, I was actually writing copy for a long time before I even knew it was actually called copy and that it was a separate industry as well. So when we moved to Israel and I was looking for a suitable job where I didn’t have to spend 10 hours a day on my feet selling I actually realized that I could take those same selling and writing skills and apply that online. And I’ve been doing that for over five years now.
Tanner:
Awesome. It’s pretty amazing, you know, we have this idea of what we’re going to end up doing in life and then, you know, an opportunity comes up and suddenly everything we thought we knew completely shifts and we find something that we really like, right? So what would you attribute your success to?
Keep polishing your skills and just trying to keep pushing yourself to get better.
Eden:
That’s really hard to say and I’m being completely transparent. The first three to four years of this, it was a struggle. I started out like most people because they don’t know where to start out. So I started out with a content mill, we were working like $15 for a webpage or $18 for a web page that at the same time, like, wow, if I could do 40 web pages a week, you know, I can make a decent living, but of course, you know, it doesn’t work out like that. It’s just putting in the work again and again and again just trying to keep polishing your skills and just trying to keep pushing yourself to get better.
In addition to that it’s just keep applying, keep showing up just to keep showing up just to keep trying to keep pushing forward and then just to keep expanding even if you move forward just in tiny increments, if you make one tiny step forward with every new project or every new client that you work with, suddenly you look back and you can realize you can see really how far you’ve come.
Tanner:
Yeah, and that’s a really good point. Now when you get started with your career, rarely do you find success right away. It’s all about, like you said, growing a little bit every day and just, you know, learning and inching your way forward as much as you possibly can on a daily basis. So I think that’s a really good point. So let’s get into a little bit more about what you do with copywriting. It’s really just strategic messaging that speaks to a prospect’s needs, right? What impact do you think studying anthropology has had on your copywriting success?
Eden:
That’s a really good question. I was discussing this with someone the other day because the core of anthropology is that critical thinking is actually teaching you to see the world through someone else’s perspective, not judgment, not judging, not being judgmental, not trying to be manipulative, not trying to abuse that relationship, but to actually just try and communicate with someone on a really deep, intense level. So what anthropologists used to do is they used to go and conduct what’s called ethnographic study where they used to go out to remote communities to actually try and find and try to learn about and understand these people. So they collect both qualitative data and quantitative. So what they do is they wear the same clothes as the people or the tribe that they, they go out to investigate, they’d eat the same food.
In terms of copywriting, what you’re always trying to do is you’re trying to write for the customer’s perspective. And so it actually gives you this uncanny ability to actually see the copy from someone else’s perspective as you’re writing it.
They basically become a member of the tribe. And some of them married into the tribe, or they offered them other than to get married and become an actual part of the family or of the tribe. So they would conduct this research within the same environment that their subjects were actually already answered. It was very natural. So they were able to really get this deep understanding of how they looked at the world, how their culture, how their language, how their food, their dress, their finances, how everything kind of shaped the way they look at the world and the way they perceive things. Then it’s kind of taking that perspective back and then comparing it to what you know, and not being judgmental, but saying, okay, so this is how they see the web, and this is why they think A, B, C, and D.
And they’re just trying to understand it and then actually drawing on that community, that good communication to actually help in some cases to help create positive change where, where it’s needed in some of those instances, it’s something really powerful. So in terms of copywriting, what you’re always trying to do is you’re trying to write for the customer’s perspective. And so it actually gives you this uncanny ability to actually see the copy from someone else’s perspective as you’re writing it which is really powerful in terms of making sure that it’s directed towards the customer. It’s not just coming from the company’s perspective, like top-down, it feels like you’re talking to a friend at a party and rather than the boss is calling you into their office to talk to you.
Tanner:
Yeah. Right. It’s about showing empathy towards their perspective, like you mentioned. So I think that anthropology actually probably set you up for a whirlwind of success in copywriting. Would you agree with that?
Eden:
It feels like it, it’s not what I would’ve expected, but I think it’s definitely been an advantage.
Tanner:
Awesome. So, you know, I think that a lot of marketers and businesses really overlook the power of good copy especially when it comes to building landing pages typically for our sales funnel, do you think the copy or the design should come first with the landing page?
Eden:
That’s a really good question. And it’s always going to be the copy. I wish I was a designer. I wish I had those skills, but I don’t. But because usually the copy drives the structure of the page. So you need to know what messages are going to go the page before you can actually build a structure around it. So there’s a lot of great landing page templates out there. There’s a lot of fancy things. There’s a lot of amazing things that you can do with landing pages, but in terms of making sure that the right messages are in the right place, where you need to use copy and where you can use media images, videos, gifs, everything, to actually support the copy, where that needs to come usually from the direction of the copywriter to make sure that it all the messaging flows in the right order and actually to help it help facilitate conversions as much as possible.
Tanner:
Yeah. And I completely agree with that. So we build a lot of websites with our agency and we always do the copy first, whether it’s us producing the copy or it’s a client. I think what typically happens is if you do the design first, then you’re stuck trying to make the copy work for the design. And you end up with either a lot of fluff that you didn’t necessarily need, or just some really unnecessary copy in there. Or, you know, maybe you were just trying to fit it in a certain box and it doesn’t really make as much sense as it possibly could. So things like that are really important. What do you think are some elements that most people forget to include on their landing pages?
Eden:
I think, oh, especially for any page, I think it’s kind of a pain problem section. Even if they’re already extremely aware that they have a pain and they’re proactive about it, or they’re currently using a solution for it, it helps people understand how your product fits into their lives simply because, you know, the products, the products that we make, they’re great. They’re fantastic. But they’re always a means to an end. They’re not an end in itself. Even a Louis Vuitton handbag. You don’t just get it for the bag, you get it because it gives you a social status.
It’s Alan Kennedy, it’s all these kinds of things as well. There’s a lot of value tied up in the bag, but it’s not just the bag itself. It’s kind of owning that part of the brand. So it’s the same thing just by highlighting how it fits in. What’s kind of the transformation as well though, what life is like after this, or some people are really good at painting the pain or problem section as well, but then I forget to leave out how amazing life is after they were there, bought the product, they start using it. So what the difference is or how they see that it’s actually improving that life. I think those are the kind of the elements a lot of people tend to forget.
Tanner:
Yeah, those are really important things any day by expressing pain points that your product or service solves, you’re actually speaking directly to the prospect, right? And that’s how they say, okay, this actually might be right for me. And I agree with you, a lot of businesses and marketers really overlook the customer transformation, which is really important. Another thing I think is really important is, you know, when you’re using imagery on the landing page, you can’t just put a picture of the product, right? It has to be a real world application part that also ties into the customer transformation. Right?
Eden:
Absolutely. Absolutely. You have to give it context. So it’s the same, like if you’re putting copy on a page, if you can support the copy with an image, and I’m going to say is that you can use less copy because the image helps lift up the power of the copy and the copy of the image and vice versa. So they interact with each other. And so you need to have that context as well in the image, you can’t just have a picture of a box. It’s like, Oh, that’s great. It’s a box. Like who’s holding the box. Where are they holding it? What are they doing with it? What’s kind of that experience, you know, in an unboxing video, it’s not just, Oh, here’s a box and here’s, here’s a nice product. It’s like, what’s actually going to happen. The expressions on people’s faces, what happens when they open the box? What’s going on? These emotions, all these crazy things.
Tanner:
Yeah. And then also another thing that I think gets left out a lot is what’s the process of purchasing the product or the service, right? I mean, if you lay out the steps really easy to understand your conversion rate, it’s going to dramatically increase. Right?
They know what’s going to come up to the button. And so they’re actually more qualified when they clicked through.
Eden:
Absolutely. I think, I think in this digital age we all know what’s behind a CTA button. We know it’s a button. We know it’s called a CTA, but like everyone knows it’s a CTA button. You know, that you click on it, that you’re going to go somewhere else. But a lot of people forget what to tell people what happens after that button? Like, what happens? Where did they go? Where did they go in terms of their process after they click on it? And that definitely is one thing that sometimes people forget, they say, you know, apply now. And it’s like, so what happens if I click the button to apply? Now, if you’re applying for something, what happens if I click order now, where do I go? Do I get taken to a checkout page? Do I go to the website? Do I go to a form that I have to fill out? It’s going to take me 10 minutes to fill out. It’s going to take me one minute to fill out. Is someone going to call me on the phone? Like actually laying out just the process of what’s going to happen. Even if it’s just a one line mention like a one line of microcopy just to actually have that context. So that reduces any risk for them in terms of clicking the buttons. So they go, okay, I know what’s going to happen next. I don’t need to guess. I don’t need to think. I don’t need to click through, see, it’s something I don’t like and bounce back then. They had that choice already in some instances actually creates more friction or less friction, but there are benefits to both in terms of creating more friction, then at least they’re more qualified. They know what’s going to come up to the button. And so they’re actually more qualified when they clicked through, in terms of if a leader, a customer. Yeah. So there’s, there’s a lot of different ways that you can you can play with that.
Tanner:
Yeah. I completely agree with you. Everyone is on websites all day long. Right? I see a lot of companies kind of just like not being very transparent about certain things and that’s because they want really high conversion rate, right? Like you’ve just mentioned the net banners may not be qualified when they come through. So it’s really important to say, Hey, you know, if for example, we do websites, you know, we don’t have pricing on our website. Right. So a big tool that other agencies use is like we work with budget starting in 5k or something like that. Like just that loan. Your conversion rate is going to go down, but the quality of the leads you’re going to get is going to be way better.
Eden:
A hundred percent. So it’s exactly like that. You could put a liner, you could ride on the CTA button, like click here and you’d get a hundred bucks. You’re going have a hundred percent conversion rate. Everyone’s going to want a hundred bucks. But if there’s not a hundred bucks waiting for them on the page that comes after, you’re going to have a hundred percent bounce rate, no one’s going to stick around. They’re just going to leave. So it’s exactly like that. Just a small line of micro copy can really help qualify the lead. So you’re actually strategically reducing the conversions at the top of the funnel, but then it means by the time they actually get you get to them on a call or actually speak with them, we’re actually in the sales process, they’re actually much further along. We actually have a higher close rate or the higher quality of leads coming through that are much easier to close.
Tanner:
Yeah. That’s a really good point. Let’s take a minute and talk about homepages. I think we could probably agree that most homepages get the majority of the traffic of a website. What are some ways that we can improve our conversion rates on our homepages?
Eden:
So I think that really depends. It depends on the type of industry, like if it is asset tech or if it’s e-commerce, it depends on who the audience is as well. Again, if it’s a direct to consumer, if it’s something that it’s more mid market or even enterprise level. So from my experience, there were a couple of different kinds of homepages and it’s deciding what your homepage is. What’s the purpose of the homepage. That’s going to help drive conversions from that page. So a lot of companies treat the homepage as this kind of mishmash of, oh, let’s put that here and let’s put that there. And let’s just put a bit of everything on each page, you know, a bit of everything altogether so that they have the full story and people land on this homepage and there’s information at them from every direction.
And they have no idea what this person to click on and where, oh, here’s a button, here’s another button, here’s another button. They’re all different colors. Where am I supposed to go? So there’s a couple of different ways to do that. So it’s also combining with the UX to make sure that it’s not confusing in terms of the direction. But a couple of different ways. Are you treating your homepage like your landing page, or are you treating it like almost really like a landing page? Or are you treating it like a signpost? So when you come to a crossroads, you come to a signpost, it says this way, left this way. Right. You know, here’s where you could take this direction. You’ll end up here and take this, you’ll go and up here. So if you’re treating it like a landing page, so if it’s a SAS or if it’s a product led SAS, then you can go straight and sign up for an account or a free trial and things like that.
The homepage still acts like a landing page for your main conversion driver.
And you could treat your homepage like the landing page, and then they can still click through because many people know these days that there’s going to be a menu most of the time. So they know they can scroll back to the top or scroll down to the bottom and look for other information, if they need it, you don’t have to include more links on the page or anything like that. You can really just say, okay, treat it exactly like the landing page, especially if you’re going to be sending traffic there from paid ads. So say you have a brief pain problems section, and then you have like a Y S page or about us. And then you can actually flesh that out, even more on the wire about us page.
But then the homepage still acts like a landing page for your main conversion driver. But in terms of different websites. So it can be a signpost to see you have a couple of different offers going on at the same time. So just trying to make it clear that from the beginning that this is our company, you know, and we have a couple of different ways how you can get to the information that you want. And almost like a little blurb, you know, turn, if you turn left, you go through, if you want to learn more about us, click here. If you want to learn more about the process, click here. If you want to see products, click here, kind of that thing. But then so again, it depends on the industry. It depends on the product. It depends on the kind of office that you have, but there’s a few different ways of structuring it to actually help drive more conversions.
Tanner:
Yeah. That’s really interesting. You know, I think unless you have like a lot going on your website, it almost seems like you should be treating your homepage as a landing page.
Eden:
Yeah, absolutely. For example, maybe a business that has multiple different market segments, they may want to do the signpost. But you know, if you’re growing out for one specific market, that should be a landing page. Again, there’s a tendency to sometimes have like a lot of pages because of SEO, there’s a lot of things that will come into it. But at the same time, sometimes you don’t need so many pages. If you can explain it in fewer pages or less pages. So there, again, if you can, the homepage can act as a landing page and then it could do a lot of the heavy lifting for you in terms of provisions. Again, unless you have a lot of different offers and then you can send them to direct pages for those different audiences or those different use cases, for example, for the product.
Tanner:
Awesome. So what’s one piece of advice that you’d give anyone looking to improve their copywriting skills?
Eden:
I would say practice, just keep practicing, it’s a skill, it’s like a muscle. So the more you work at it, the better you’ll get at it, just because you keep practicing just by keeping on trying. I think that’s probably the strongest thing and a lot, and even a lot of the old school copywriters will tell you, go sit down and take out an old print ad and copy it by hand and then copy it. Just copy it out by hand, actually word for word, because then you get to learn, you don’t judge, you learn by doing, not just by reading and studying. So just by copying out these old ads by hand, then you can actually go and you will automatically start to absolve the techniques. So you get to see the rhythm that they use in these in advertisements or in other landing pages. And it starts to naturally seep into your own writing as a result.
Tanner:
Yeah, I think that’s great advice. I mean, learning by doing is always going to help you more. I’m curious though, are there any online resources that would maybe give someone a head start?
Eden:
Yeah. Everything that I really learned about copywriting that has been really effective for me is from copy hackers. I’ve taken some of their paid courses as well. They have a lot of free resources, which are excellent, but they also have some paid courses, which are also excellent. And it’s just a funny story, before I even signed up for one of their courses, I was supposed to write an apt description for an app and I didn’t know how to do it. So I went and Googled like, yeah, okay, I’ll do it because this is back in the, you know, I was trying to get any job. And I actually looked and I Googled how to write an apt description. I came upon an girlfriend and my way great read through it when, and wrote the apt description. And then the client actually pasted it into the app store, like word for word. And I was like, oh, so this is what it looks like. It was really funny. And that and three is on and it’s still there. So that’s awesome. But yeah. Yeah. So they teach you that there are techniques to it as much as a practice. It’s not just jumbling. Again, I don’t get to promote them. I just think they’re doing a really good job of helping copywriters learn than to write really well.
Tanner:
Very cool. So what would you say your secrets and scale are? Probably both personal or business. What do you think is the secret to scaling business?
Eden:
I would say listening, having the ability to listen. I took on something at the beginning, in the early beginning of last year that I decided I was pretty much going to hop on a discovery call with anyone who asked the requested one. And I learned so much about what people are looking for in a copywriter. If they’ve been burnt by a copywriter before what they’ve struggled. And the more you talk to people, the more you just listen and you learn about what they’re really looking for and what they really need help with. And just by listening to clients, and customers as well, when they talk about the companies that they work with, just the kind of information that they give you really helps you write very strong and effective copy, because you’re really using the customer’s own. They have existing customers that are talking in that love the product. And so you’re just taking that and amplifying it rather than trying to create this sudden, this amazing piece of copy from scratch that you dream up somehow. And you don’t know whether it’s going to work or not. So just, just listening I think, and then you can get tons of different ideas for both business and work, any way you want to take it.
Tanner:
So what’s a good way for anyone to get in contact with you?
Eden:
Yeah. The best way is to just come and find me on LinkedIn.
Tanner:
Awesome. So we’ll link up your profile in the show notes and thank you again.
Eden:
Okay. No worries. Thanks. Thanks for having me. It’s been a pleasure.