Spare Your Hair and Your Copy

We just completed a major re-design project for a client and wanted to share a story. The project's scope included work for writing site copy, which included some original writing, along with revising and paring down existing content.

The client chose an outside copywriter, who took ten hours to write the Home page copy, and the Home page consisted of approximately 100 words total.

That's close to the amount I just typed above. Scary, right? Plus, we had 199 pages left to write. Red flag #1.

Red flag #2: The writer just didn't know how to write for the Web.

Most clients assume that their print writers can easily transition into writing Web copy, but oftentimes they don't realize that writing for the Web is a massively different undertaking than writing for print.

Here are a few reasons why:

1. In a nut shell, print writing is long-form, and Web writing is short-form.
2. On the Web, users don't really read copy. In fact, 79% of users report that they scan it.
3. Communicating tone becomes a challenge, because now you have half the time and space to represent the brand voice.

With any future contractors you use for your Web copywriting projects, make sure they pass this basic criteria:

1. Possesses at least 2 years of Web writing experience.
2. Sends three representative samples of their Web work.
3. Offers credible references who can verify the writer has met expectations, budgets, and deadlines.
4. Provides you with a reasonable estimate based on industry-standard rates.

In the end, we took the copywriting task in-house and were able to successfully deliver quality work well under budget (even including the overage from the original contractor).

Luckily, the client was spared from the often-relayed tales we hear about excessive time, budget, and hair loss due to this common mistake.

Hopefully this will help others in the same situation. Please feel free to pass this on!