There is often a lot of debate around using long or short sales copy on websites. Internet marketing gurus often use long copy to sell their products, but is it right for every situation?
The question to ask when considering long or short copy is, “What am I asking of the reader?”
My rule of thumb is:
As the value of what you’re asking increases, the longer the copy may need to be to persuade the prospect (give them enough reasons) to buy.
For example, selling an item over $1000 directly with copy is a high investment that may require long copy. Whereas, asking for a lead (getting the reader’s contact details) is a low value investment, and generally short copy is optimal for the task. We’re only asking them to trust us with their contact details, not their money.
I think people often make the mistake of thinking that long sales copy will generate more enquiries. However, most of the people who successfully use this sort of copy use it to directly sell something, not to generate a lead.
About the author: As the owner of a web marketing business, I’ve spent the last 7 years studying ways to boost the conversion rates of my clients’ websites. Today, our best websites convert up to 20% of visits into leads and 50% of leads to sales. The target for our clients is a minimum 5% conversion rate on visits to leads which is staggeringly more than the typical website at 0.1%.
Bitemark specialises in designing, building, writing, managing and marketing websites with high conversion rates.
