How to Speak Your Audience’s Language

In order to write an effective sales page, it’s absolutely essential to speak the language of your target market. If you can manage this, it will resonate with your audience and they’ll listen to your message. If you write in the wrong language, your audience will be turned off and click away.

Write the Way You Talk

How you should write for your audience depends on your audience. There is only one truly universal rule, and that’s that you need to write in a conversational tone. If your writing is stiff and formal, no one will want to read it. It should read like a good friend talking to you.

By the same token, be careful that you don’t sound too casual. “Too casual” means you’re using slang, using too many idioms, writing in language that might be offensive or inappropriate, or using Internet abbreviations like “lol.” You should also make sure you don’t have any spelling, grammar, or usage mistakes.

Learn Your Audience’s Language

The first step in learning your audience’s language is to know exactly who your audience is. Research your target market and create an audience profile that includes whatever data you can discover about them. 

To learn your audience’s language, connect with them and listen to them. Pay especially close attention to the words they use that are related to your products or services. For example, if you’re using the word “online entrepreneur” but your audience generally says “Internet businessperson,” the latter is what you should use for your sales page. Try to imitate the cadence, phrasing, word choice, and dialect they use.

Avoid industry blogs and websites. Look for the voices of your genuine audience members speaking.

Social Media

Social media is probably the best way to passively learn your audience’s language. Look at what your audience posts on social media. Join Facebook groups where your audience is talking. Search hashtags related to your business on Twitter and read tweets.

You can be more proactive by starting discussions among followers of your page or in groups. Ask a question, ask for opinions, give your opinion and ask for ideas, put a call out for tips, and so on. 

Interviews

Conduct interviews with your target market. The purpose of these interviews doesn’t have to be just to hear how they talk. You can use them for other marketing purposes, such as to get feedback on a product or ask them about the problems they’re facing. 

Even though it’s not the main purpose of your interview, it’s a great way to experience firsthand how your audience talks. 

Face-to-Face Encounters

Take advantage of any face-to-face encounters you have with your target market and listen to how they talk. After the conversation, reflect back on it and jot down some notes on anything in particular that you remember.

Your Competitors

Check out your competitors’ sales pages to see how they talk to your audience. You should only do this if the particular competitor is successful. Make sure they’re actually selling their product and that they have an engaged audience. 

You may have an idea already about how your audience speaks, but use objective data gleaned from the above sources. You need to know for sure, and you might learn something surprising.