It's all about how you say it

‘C'est le ton qui fait la musique’ my mother used to say, ‘How you say it is often as important as what you say. Was she right? To answer that question, I looked at 117 online experiments of five companies in which we changed the wording of information on the Web site.

About such copy tests is often disparaged: ‘It's ‘just’ a copy change, how much of an effect can that have at all? Wouldn't we be better off working on that big redesign or new functionality?’

The results of the 117 online experiments we conducted show that this derogatory attitude toward copy-changes is unjustified. In 38 cases, the A/B testing for a significant increase in conversion. In other words, about 1 in 3 times, changing how it was said for a positive effect. This is similar to other types of changes.

In contrast, copy changes are a whole lot easier and faster to build and implement than larger (functional) changes on the Web site. You don't even need development with it. Looking at it this way, my advice is obvious: do more A/B testing with the wording of information on your website!

In this blog, I share a method for improving text on your website. The best way to do this is to write in your visitor's language.

The benefits of writing in your visitor's native language

Writing in your visitor's language is a knife that cuts on many different sides:

• The text is easier to understand. The less effort visitors have to make, the less likely they are to drop out. In addition, easy-to-understand text increases the likelihood that your message will come across as you mean it.
• Using the right language creates a sense of recognition and closeness with your visitors. People feel more engaged and addressed when they read content written in their own language.
• Speaking the language of your target audience builds trust and credibility. It shows that you understand the needs and culture of your audience, which contributes to a positive image of your brand or message.

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Using ChatGPT to speak your visitor's language

To learn to write in the language of your visitors, it is advisable to regularly read what they write about you and what words they use to do so. For example, look at customer feedback, survey responses and customer reviews on your own website or at parties such as Trustpilot or Kiyoh. Regularly reading through all these customer voice data can take quite a bit of time. Fortunately, there is now ChatGPT to speed up this process considerably.

Step 1: Collect customer voice data 

Collect the feedback, survey responses and customer reviews you can find in an Excel file. In addition to the customer voice data you have available, you can scrape online customer reviews from the websites of Trustpilot or Kiyoh, for example. You do this by using the tool Octoparse download and this step-by-step guide for scrapping customer reviews to follow.

Save your collection of customer voice data as a csv file.

Figure 1. Screenshot of scrapping customer reviews in Octoparse

Step 2: Use your customer voice data to train ChatGPT

Instruct ChatGPT to train itself with your collected data. To ensure that all data is included, it is best to use a ChatGPT splitter. Copy the contents of your csv file into the splitter. Then copy the split components into ChatGPT.

Step 3: Ask ChatGPT to (re)write text in your visitor's words

Now you can ask ChatGPT questions about the content of the customer voice data. What are the main benefits visitors experience with your product? What problems do they encounter?

Write a prompt asking ChatGPT to (re)write text in the exact words visitors use (see image).

Figure 2. Sample prompt asking ChatGPT to suggest USPs written in your own customers' words

A/B test which wording produces the best results

Once you have gone through the steps, it is then a piece of cake to write different variants of USPs, product descriptions, headers and other text on your website. Which variant will yield the best results is not always easy to predict. Take, for example, the following variants of the same message on Van der Valk's website. Either one caused an increase in the number of hotel rooms booked. But which one?

Figure 3: Which wording of the same message results in more hotel rooms booked?

Fortunately, it takes little effort to set up an A/B test in which you only modify text. Most experimentation tools have a visual editor that allows you to run a copy test easily and quickly without any coding knowledge.

That way, you can find the exact wording that appeals most to visitors in no time and increase your website's conversion rate by speaking your visitor's language!

(PS variant B worked best for Van der Valk)

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