How Did I Get Into Marketing and Website Copywriting?

My window emblem at my office.

I never planned on getting into marketing & copywriting, much less into consulting and teaching others about how to do it effectively. I’m sure, nobody from my childhood would have ever expected me choose this career path either, mainly because not many people actually listened to me when I was younger. Which was understandable, as I talked nearly constantly. Also, I did mainly talk about what I wanted to hear, not what those around me were interested in hearing. Obviously, to get into marketing I had to find new ways of connecting.

Looking back, my life didn’t seem to work out particularly well for quite a long time. I tried a lot and learned a lot, but jumping from one topic to the next left me pretty scattered. Therefore, to get into marketing I needed to get focused. To become a professional, I needed to listen, and stay centered with what I was doing. Also, I had to learn to think about other people in a different way, connecting with them, instead of just writing at them.

I remember creating my first website for a client, doing what I thought would work. When a friend of mine tore my website apart with his critique, I was irritated to say the least. At first, I didn’t want to believe my site could be so bad. However, when he re-wrote some of the copy, I was shocked. What he had written was much more effective at matching the mindset and experience of the website’s audience. That’s when I got really interested in learning about marketing & copywriting, specifically.

Building my knowledge and skillset in a more systematic way felt confusing at first. Fortunately, I had a clear motivation. Because of my interest in sustainability, medicine, personal development, and artisanal craft, I had come across many businesses that were struggling with offering their products or services in a coherent and relatable way. Therefore, helping businesses that actually try to make a positive difference in the world, and using marketing to make them more successful, made a lot of sense to me.

I received jumpstarts from conversations with friends who clearly knew what they were talking about. I signed up for online courses and read all the articles that I could get my hands on. On top of this, I was lucky enough to get 1-on-1 mentoring from an experienced business communication expert over several years. What I learned from him completely shifted my perspective of how language can be used to create comprehension and trigger emotions. In order to gain a deeper understanding of what others are doing, I studied, analyzed, and critiqued the pages of many seemingly successful websites. However, I didn’t realize how much my learning had progressed until the feedback I got from my clients made me aware of it. Evidently, what I wrote created exactly the outcomes I wanted for my clients.

Marketing is actually pretty simple. Although your message and content often won’t look like a story, it’s no different than storytelling. You need to say what your audience needs to hear in a relatable way, otherwise they cannot connect. Although at the same time, marketing is not simple at all. You need come up with the right ideas, find the right words, and deliver all of that in a congruent way. When someone is reading your copy online (the words on your website, Facebook, or Instagram), you are temporarily the guide of their attention. Your job is to keep them connected, every step of the way. If you miss a step, you lose them. Good marketers are just good storytellers.