Marketing your Website? Don’t be a Qwitter!

Ashton Kutcher has almost 4 and a half million followers on twitter. That’s equal to more than half the population of New York City. Dude couldn’t find his car, but he found 4,291,162 people that think he’s worth listening to.

How did he do it?

Ashton Kutcher was one of millions and millions of people–famous and not–that flocked to Twitter and started sharing, chatting, an selling to each other.

Of course Twitter, has been the hottest thing on the internet for two years and was an obvious choice for reaching that huge number of potential movie-goers, reality-show watchers, or whatever else he wanted his fan base to become.

But wait…

Studies show that a full 60% of people leave twitter after a month and never come back. Who are these people? For obvious reasons, I like to call them Qwitters. They heard about a fad, decided to follow it, and then for whatever reason, decided it wasn’t worth their time and lost interest.

Which is fine unless…

You’re an internet marketer. As a web marketer, you aren’t allowed to just stop interacting with your customers or selling your product–a web marketer should always have something to say about their service or product.  Tweet about a new offering, blog about your holiday–or comment on a friend’s blog mentioning it, create some fun link bait, or even post a couple of inspirational quotes. Anything is fine as long as you are asserting your existence an letting your customers know you are there and still believe in the message and stand behind your product.

But I don’t like Twitter!

And that’s fine. We’re the first undead marketers to tell you not to blindly follow web marketing trends. But no matter whether your platform is your twitter page, your facebook, your myspace, your blog, or your email newsletter, never stop letting you’re customers know you’re there.

The point is…

Even aplusk started with a big 0 as his follower count, but he tweeted everyday, stayed on target and never quit. Take the same attitude towards your website marketing. Remember to assert your existence and speak to your customers everyday in any way you can and never be a Qwitter.

Does Your Website Smell Like a Rat?

I can always tell when someone is being fake. So can you. It’s a gut feeling, a natural instinct that tells you that something isn’t the way it ought to be. Think about those expressions old movie cops used for when something just wasn’t right: this smells fishy, I smell a rat, etc. That’s because when something or someone is phony, it’s as tangible and obvious as a smell.

The same principle applies to your web copy, or anything you write about your business. If it’s fake, it’ll smell fake. That is, it will come off feeling forced or unnatural to your readers or potential customers.

Will your readers know why they don’t want to click the “go to checkout” button or even why they don’t want to navigate further in the site? Maybe, and maybe not. Some people are very good at understanding their gut feelings, while others just feel a sort of uneasiness that makes them want to go down to the next result on the Google page.

In either case, the reason will be the same: your writing doesn’t seem natural.

Natural writing sounds like it’s something you want to be saying in the way in which you normally say things in your everyday life. Of course there are matters of formality–slang isn’t appropriate for web copy because it doesn’t seem professional, and not everyone understands it. But the idea is simple: write the way you would naturally speak if you were discussing something you love with someone who would like to know more about it.

So for example, if you loved say, model trains and met a very attractive lady (or guy) at a Model Trains convention…how would you go about explaining to her the details of your thrilling new concept that will innovate model transportation as we know it today?

You would probably: explain your concepts well, make sure she understands everything you’re saying, and go into just enough detail to keep her interested in your concept without putting her to sleep.

The same principles should be in your writing whenever you’re updated the sales copy on your website or sending an email to a client. After all, you want to leave your reader feeling as clear as a spring day; not pinching their noses and clicking the close button.