What would Bonnie Raitt do (to your website)?
Page from the Playbook Dept.
If you're stumped about how to make your website as charming as it needs to be to win you even more subscribers, ideal clients, and friends, you're in luck.
Stella Orange laboratories has a fool-proof technology to help you turn up the ole "website charm."
And if you find that your site falls short of the charm that you display on a regular basis in your "real" offline life, this technology will also help point you in the right direction. Towards a charming, money-making website.
See, the first thing about a charming website is that it sings. Hence, the involvement of Ms. Raitt, a famous singer. When your website sings, your cash register will start humming along, too.
So, singing is important.
Now, there are absolutely copywriting "tricks of the trade" that help you dislodge readers from their armchairs and into your coterie of admirers, subscribers, true believers, and fans. (In other words, your tribe.)
But today, we're talking about something different. The "song" of your website. The swing. The charm of the thing. And it's capacity to convey your passion, competence, and ability to get their problem solved once and for all.
Because there are a whole lot of websites out there that follow the standard copywriting formula for "closing the sale," but they're about as exciting as Wonder Bread. It's like the Supreme Court on pornography: even if you can't quite define what's going on with these sites, you know them when you see them. They allegedly intend to empathize with your problem, stir your emotions, and dangle the quick & easy "solution" in front of you...
...but all that is lost in the cacaphony of the yellow highlighter and velveeta headlines that aren't really fooling anybody.
(Okay, I admit: it's simple economics that they are fooling *somebody*. Otherwise they wouldn't be there. But you, for one, and I, for another, aren't convinced.)
In the rubble of all the ballyhoo on those websites, I give you: "The Bonnie Raitt Test" for charming websites:
Let's give them something to talk about
A little mystery to figure out
Let's give them something to talk about
How about love, love, love, love
If your homepage doesn't give the people something to "chew on" (real content), a little mystery, and a whole lot of love (the heartfelt emotion AND the courtesy of simple, clear organization AND a really sweet offer to take you for a test drive), it's probably not all that charming. And the good money says that if it's not charming, you're probably not using your website like the marketing draft horse that it's meant to be.
So keep this in mind as you set out to launch or polish up your website. Be as charming, attractive, authentic, generous, and clear on the web as you are in "real" life, and it will come back to you in spades. Let the Bonnie Raitt test be your guide, and keep on doing good work. And as always, let me know how it goes.
