Why you might rather hand it over to a professional

This blog site is all about helping you to writing your own marketing campaigns, websites, blogs, brochures, newsletters and more.

There comes a time though when you might prefer to call on a professional.

That's because a seasoned professional has experience of a wide range of businesses, markets, customers and the skills to create words that really sell a business.

By investing in professional help you are:
- focusing your time on your own core business
- bringing in expertise that you may not have
- making yourself accountable to someone else to get your marketing done and out there

On the other hand, the cost of professional help can be confusing. Is it by the hour - and if so how many hours will you need? What's included? What are you expected to do? How long will it all take?

To give you a clear picture of what you can expect, I'm developing a series of packages for smaller businesses.

First up is a service called Review and Refresh for the content of your website. Once you've been in business a while the chances are you'll be more aware of who your ideal market is and want to reassess your marketing to reach them more easily. With this package we'll work together to examine who that market is and how you can answer their needs and desires. And then I'll create content to fit into your current design of up to five pages or any new design you're planning.

That's just one option. If you've a website that's larger than five pages, we can cost that for you without any commitment.

And I'll be developing easy-to-understand packages for newsletters and more over time. Don't let the fact that the package isn't already there stop you talking to me about your marketing writing though. Drop me a line to start the ball rolling at kathy@wrightwell.com.

Rules that confuse

There are some rules in English language that are hard to understand and remember, but can really annoy your knowing readers if you get them wrong. These are a few that people have asked me about recently. Please feel free to add or argue.

Some of this is simply about whether you use UK English or US English.

Less and fewer Less of one thing. Fewer of several things. Less cheese. Fewer slices of cheese. That's why people complain about “Less than 9 items in your basket”.

: and ; The colon : is the one to use if you're introducing a bullet list. Use semi-colons ; for the middle of sentences. Even better, avoid using semi-colons at all. They’re just joining up two thoughts and in marketing writing you want to keep your sentences short.

-ise and –ize on the end of verbs Check if you’ve got a house style and go with that. If you haven’t just be consistent. Common practice is –ise in the UK and –ize in the US. On the other hand I was once told that actually –ize is the original old English, so just make your choice and keep to it.

Apostrophes It’s not easy. There's absolutely no need for an apostrophe if you’re just making a word plural. If you’re missing out some letters to join two words together, that’s the right time to use an apostrophe (it's, that's, you're etc). The tougher one is if you’ve got one thing owning another – the cat’s mother or even the cats’ mothers if you've got several cats.

More apostrophes On the same topic, there’s no need to put an apostrophe in a decade. The 1970s is fine.

Programme Where are you? If you’re in a US English territory, you may be perplexed by this spelling of the word because you probably always use program. If you’re in the UK, you’d use programme for a series of events, the brochure at the theatre and just about everything else - except a computer program.

Say “comprises of” out loud. Ugly isn’t it? Best to say “consists of” or “comprises”, especially as they’re grammatically correct.

Unless your products are actually being extraordinarily nice to each other, the likelihood is that they're complementary, not complimentary.

And here's one I've just seen at Hallmark, which really should know better. Baby stationary has come to a standstill, while baby stationery is something to write home about.

Who are you?

It's the simplest thing to start with, but it's amazing how many people forget this bit.

What should be in lights on your home page? On the front of your brochures? Not just your name, but what you do and who you do it for.

Get some friends of friends to visit your web site. People who know nothing about your business. See if they can tell what you're selling and why they'd want to buy it in your first few lines of copy.

If you're not absolutely clear on this, you need a re-think. Don't make your visitors work hard at understanding you. You need to work at understanding your potential audience and spelling it out for them. In their language. You only have seconds to convince. Make the most of it.