Words aren’t just words. Writing is one of the oldest and strongest tools in marketing. It can be informative, creative, emotional, serious, funny, and everything in between. It comes in hundreds of different forms from the lyrics of your favourite song to chapters of your favourite book.
The written word is powerful, but only when it’s used correctly.
To use it correctly for marketing purposes, you need to understand the different forms of writing there are. The two main types being content writing and copywriting.
Yes, there is a difference.
While they are similar in many ways, their differences drastically set them apart. These are the differences between copywriting and content writing, and how to use both in your marketing materials.
What is copywriting?
Copywriting is the art of writing for marketing purposes. The main goal of writing copy is to convert traffic into leads and leads into sales. It is a short, punchy, attractive piece of text that is meant to grab the attention of readers and convince them to act or buy your product or service. It is commonly found in marketing strategies such as:
- Digital Advertising
- Website copy
- E-mail newsletters
- Product catalogues
- Sales landing pages
- Radio commercial scripts
- Trade show materials
With copywriting, the first goal is to sell. This means creating urgency around the product or service and making the advertisement as memorable as possible. This can be done through catchy headlines or jingles. Writing copy is about finding unique selling points and making them irresistible to a reader in a creative, (but not complicated), way.
What is content writing?
Where the main intent of copywriting is to sell, content writing is more about building brand awareness and trust. Content writing can be educational, inspiring, or entertaining for your audience to read. Typically, it’s seen in more long-form marketing strategies, such as:
- Blogs
- Social media posts.
- Digital features in magazines or newspapers
- Newsletters
- Videos, podcast, or webinar scripts
The main goal of content writing is to generate more organic traffic to your business’ website via search engines. A big misconception with marketing is that every strategy you use needs to have one common goal of selling a product – but this is not the case. Advertising your business is a large part of a marketing plan, but so is brand awareness, and product education. You can have the greatest product in the world, but if people don’t trust your business, they won’t buy it from you. That is where content writing comes in, and why it’s important not to confuse it with copywriting.
For example, if you’re a business owner and you hire a copywriter to write blogs for your business, your blogs will not perform well. Why? Because people don’t want to read 1000 words of someone trying to sell them something. They want to read 1000 words of something that will educate, entertain, or inspire them. That’s how you build relationships with your audience, shape your brand’s image, and build brand loyalty with your customers. It’s an indirect way of having people buy your product by attracting them to your business.
Copywriting vs. content writing – which one is better for your business?
The answer depends on what your marketing strategies and goals are. If you are strictly looking to increase sales, copywriting would be better. If you’re a new business looking to build awareness and increase website traffic or search engine rankings, content writing is the right choice for you. At 3SIXTY Marketing Solutions, however, we think a good marketing strategy has a little bit of both. It’s important not just to know what to write, but how to write it and where to share it. Having trouble finding the right words to get started? From writing engaging, informative content to catchy, memorable copy for your advertising, we can do it all — even in your business’ unique tone of voice. We can also create and control your marketing strategy for you, so you can take care of what you do best; running your business. To get started, give us a call at 705-252-4180. We’ll talk about ideas, strategies, execution tactics and then we will take care of the rest. We’ve got all your marketing needs taken care of – that’s why our slogan includes “no prob-llama!”
