Whether you’re reworking your website or building a new site from scratch, you can be sure of one thing: your audience is going to come in asking – “So what? Why does this matter? Why should I care? What does this have to do with me?” And if you can’t connect with them with power and passion in the first few seconds, you’ve probably lost them.
So – if you really believe your practice makes a difference in your clients’ lives – you need to let that passion, that magic, burst forth. Don’t just assert that your products, or services, or ideas will make your clients’ lives happier, healthier, or more meaningful – tell how and why. Skip the features – anybody can give a list of features – go straight to the benefits, the personal impact that your product or service or message offers. Don’t just tell how long you’ve been practicing XYZ – tell how you became passionate about it. Especially if you are a solo practitioner, don’t be afraid to be personal and speak from your heart. Let your words shine on the page – not through graphic gizmos, but with the sheer power of their meaning.
Especially if you have a message to share – if your message is the product with which you plan to change the world – your writing should leap from the page or screen, grab your reader by the lapels, lock eyes with them, and deliver your meaning like a shot of empowerment straight to their core: YES!
Be unexpected. Lull their senses with soft words one moment, startle them awake with a jangle of paradox the next. Make it easy for them to grasp your meaning by using simple language, then toss in one beautiful rich sesquipedalianism inspiring them to stretch. Leave them breathless, tantalized, titillated, hungry for more.
Make more available to them, step by step: book excerpts, podcasts, teleclasses, recorded workshops, connecting with their hearts – not just their heads – at every step. For your message to be transmitted like a virus, like dharma, it needs to be fueled and driven by a sense of love and connection; no matter the strength of your readers’ immune systems, they can’t deny their hunger for that energy. Let them feel close to you. Blog your activities, appearances, insights along your journey.
If a community has sprung up in response to your work, throw open its doors to your readers! Offer a page dedicated to the benefits your community offers to its members. Include an RSS feed or link to the daily featured blog post from the community on your site. Wax enthusiastic – this is the offspring of your personal passion, shared with others – let it speak, let it sing!
Open the door for your connections to multiply! If you’re on Facebook – and you should be – use the Networked Blogs app to link your blog to your page. Create a business page for your fans to connect through social posting. Create a group – if there isn’t one already – for your community to connect. And link, link, link – make sure that your visitors can navigate easily from one part of your online world to another…and that they can find links to your products or services, and the option to buy, wherever they are.
One spiritual client, in learning to optimize her website, referred to targeted keywords as “words of power.” Yes – when you’re seeking the words with the highest number of searches and the lowest number of competing sites, you are stalking the power of the search engines. When you find those magic-laced words, sprinkle them like saffron, rare and priceless, in your body content and – especially – in your headlines and links, just a word or phrase or two per page, repeated with discretion.
There are some businesses that run “for the love of the game.” This is marketing for the love of your clients, of the earth, of Spirit, of the greater work.
If you’re thinking at this stage – Yes, I have the passion, but this is all too much for my time and energy! – don’t worry. Here at Your Words’ Worth, we can hear your message, affirm your mission, and present your work, with power and passion, in your voice. We’ll identify the online marketing elements that will help you most and set them up for you, then give you the keys and the coaching to manage your web presence for the long term…or manage it for you if you wish.
If you are working from your heart, from your spirit, your practice deserves nothing less.
