How to Write Better Copy for Authors

Copywriting for authors 101

You’re an author who needs copy for your website, your Facebook page, your Amazon page. “This shouldn’t be too difficult,” you say to yourself, “I’m a writer after all. This is what I do day in, day out – put words on paper.” So, you pour a coffee, sit down and open your laptop. But an hour later you find yourself staring at a blank screen and a blinking cursor. Why is copy for authors such a struggle?

Because writing copy for authors is a completely different discipline to writing a book, especially a work of fiction.

Photo credit: Annemarie Gruden

But don’t panic. As a writer of both fiction and copy, I’ve picked up some tips over the years and I share five of them here to get you out of that (copy)writers’ block. I also had a great interview with a content strategist whose website copy exemplifies how to write webpages your audience wants to read. Read my interview with Kristen VanderHoek for more copywriting tips.

1. Start copy with your reader, not your book

Before you put pen to paper (or open a new document) ask yourself who your audience, or reader is. How much time do they have? What do they spend their time doing? What do they normally read? What might they need, enjoy, love, hate, want? It sounds simple, but when it comes to writing a webpage, a bio or a book summary most people start with what they are offering, what they ‘sell’. Turn your ‘sell’ on its head and start with your customer, not your product. I write more about that here.

One technique is to start your copy with a question, for example the main challenge or desire of your target audience (the answer to the ‘need, enjoy, love, hate, want’ question above). Something like “have you ever felt/wondered/wanted …?” You can then go on to explain how your book will meet your reader’s need.

2. Tell a story

You’d think this would be easy for fiction writers, but you do need to shift gears. Think of your reader as the protagonist. They have a desire or challenge and your book will help them meet or overcome that.

Put very simply, here are some of the key elements of story:

• Character
• Problem/conflict
• Attempts at solving the problem/conflict
• Result

Let’s say you’re writing your bio. Instead of listing your qualifications and work experience chronologically, you could structure it as a story:

A middle-aged mother with a fulfilling career and home life (character) innocently accepted a friend’s invitation to attend a conference. The disturbing story she heard at that conference kept her up at night (problem). She had a job, two children to care for and an international move to organize, she didn’t have time to write (conflict). But she knew people had to hear this story so she started learning all she could about fiction writing and carving out time in the margins of life to write it down until she had her first complete manuscript (attempts and solving the problem and the result – a book).

3. Identify the hook

This topic deserves its own blog post, or series of them, but I’ll skim the surface here. If you’ve written a query letter, you’ve heard that you need to identify the hook – what it is that will entice the reader in. Often this is the problem or conflict of the protagonist, or the inciting incident in which they find themselves early on in the book. It could be a question or a mystery. It’s the “oh no” or “what if” moment.

When it comes to writing copy you need to start with a hook. Remember, your reader is your protagonist now. What is their challenge? What would they like to have? You might start with a question, as I suggested above, or you might start by painting a picture of a desired outcome: “What if you could …?” Another option is to provide a vivid description of a scene which begs the question “what happens next?”

4. Beginning – middle – end

Once you’ve found your hook, don’t leave your reader there. Just as we were taught at school to write a beginning, middle and an end, you need a similar structure with your copy. After your hook, explain how your book or writing solves the problem you laid out. For example, if you’re writing your bio, describe how you fell in love with writing or list your books and how they make readers feel.

End your copy with a call to action. Ask yourself what you want people to do once they’ve read what you’ve written. Do you want them to buy something? Do you want to know what they think? Do you want to expand your writing community? It’s important to consider this because it will impact how you conclude your copy. Even a bio page can have a call to action. For example, “I’d love to hear the story of how you fell in love with books. Write and let me know.”

5. Answer the ‘W’ questions (and the ‘H’ one)

• What – am I offering?
• When – am I offering it? Is there a book launch, book signing etc?
• Where – is it available? Include links to buy your book(s).
• Who – am I? Read my post about writer brand if you need some ideas here.
• Why – have I written this?
• How – will this piece of work make my readers feel?

While it’s engaging to start your copy with the format of question or story, you do need to make sure your piece contains all the important information. Re-read your first draft and make sure all the questions are covered. You’ll be amazed how easy it is to forget the basic information, like what time your book launch starts 🙂

Do you want your website or social media profiles to attract more readers? Then take a good, hard look at your copy. Your website is meant to do a different job to your book – it’s a sales tool designed to pull people in to reading your book. Which means the way you write your website has to be different to the way you write your book. If you write great fiction it doesn’t necessarily follow that you can instinctively write great copy. But, it is a skill you can learn. Try out some of my tips above and let me know how it goes.

If you’d like help writing more engaging copy for your website, social media profiles or business, get in touch. I love helping authors and entrepreneurs write better copy.