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4 Reasons Why People Stop Reading Before the End of a Page

"The author is asking his readers to do the work he should have done himself." – Nick Usborne

Every page you create has a purpose.

It doesn’t matter whether it’s a sales page, a subscription page, an about page, a blog post, or any other kind of page.

You publish it for a reason. You want something to happen.

Maybe you want someone to share the page on social media. Or you want readers to sign up for a newsletter. Or register for an event. Or click through to a sales page. Or complete a purchase.

Scratch the surface and you’ll find every page has a purpose.

But that purpose is rarely achieved if people don’t read to the end of the content.

To maximize the number of people who take action, you need to review every page you write and ask yourself if anything is getting in the way of them reading it from start to finish.
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Join Us for a Free, In-Depth Workshop to Improve Your Sales Skills

Get Over Your Nervousness about Selling ... Forever

At Copyblogger, we love to teach! We really have a great time teaching copywriting, content strategy, search engine optimization, social media strategy …

The one thing we don’t teach? Selling. Because it’s not what we’re fantastic at.

Fortunately, we found someone who is fantastic at it, without being … a creepy weirdo. (There, I said it.)

His name is Tim Paige. He’s genuine, funny, nice, and seriously good at selling.

Tim’s going to be leading a free workshop for us to help sharpen up our selling skills.

(And let me be clear: I’ll be the first one in there, with my notebook open and ready to take a million notes.)

If you’d like to improve your selling skills for your product, service, course, or other offering, Tim will help you get there. Without making it weird.
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If Content Is a Performance, Is It Ever Authentic?

"You build an audience by performing. Ordinary is boring." – Stefanie Flaxman

Producing more effective content that helps you build an audience of interested prospects is a common theme in my articles.

In the past few months, I’ve written about ways to show how likable you are and how to make your writing personal, but not self-indulgent.

And I realized that neither of those posts mentioned authenticity, even though it’s a common content marketing topic among bloggers, podcasters, and video creators.

But I regard effective content marketing as a performance, so can it also be authentic?
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Want Better Results? Ask Better Questions. Here’s How

Want Better Results? Ask Better Questions. Here's How

First things first: Our workshop on effective selling with Tim Paige is back on the schedule!

We had to adjust the calendar, but we’ve got Tim set to teach us his low-pressure but effective techniques for sales. We’ll host the workshop (it’s free) on Tuesday, June 26 at 12:00 Noon Eastern U.S. Time.

I’ve had a sneak peek at Tim’s presentation, and I think it’s going to be very, very useful. And you don’t need to somehow get a “sales personality” to make it work.

You can get signed up here.
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Join the Copyblogger Book Club and Dive into a ‘Killer’ Resource for Content Writers

Love to Read and Learn? Join the Copyblogger Book Club

Did you know that Copyblogger has a book club?

It’s very new, so it would be understandable if you didn’t! We’re just in our second month, and this month we’re going to tackle an ultra helpful resource for anyone who wants to sharpen up their “killer” skill set — Ryan Levesque’s Ask.

Ryan is a friend of mine, but that’s not the reason I’m recommending his book. I find that even for those of us who are sold on the benefits of audience-friendly automation, the whole “where should I start” thing can be a lot to think about.

Ryan developed the Ask Method as a step-by-step process for learning more about your audience, then serving them better based on that knowledge.
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Why You’re Missing Crucial Opportunities if You Think You’re ‘Not Creative’

"Writers dance the line between creativity and structure, often so seamlessly we don’t realize we do it." – Loryn Thompson

I can’t stand hearing people say they’re “not creative.”

That happened to me recently, after I sliced a finger and wound up in Urgent Care. When the doctor heard that my fiancé is a graphic designer, he launched into a well-rehearsed monologue:

“Oh, my mom is a graphic designer; she’s so creative! I do some design too, but only really as an outlet. I’m nowhere near as creative as she is. I just do it to relax. I mean, I can’t read medical texts all the time.”

Eventually, his rant became more uncomfortable than my still-bleeding pinkie.
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