| January 26, 2026
If you’ve ever Googled ‘copywriting’ and come away more confused, you’ve found the right article to help straighten things out. By the time you finish reading, you should know what copywriting is and whether or not you need it.
Copywriting? Copyrighting? Content? What’s the Difference?
When I first heard of copywriting while studying for my business degree, I thought that was when you copyright something to prevent people from stealing your ideas.
It’s actually something completely different!
That’s copyrighting (note there’s no w): taking the legal action to claim ownership of an idea or any other intellectual property.
Copywriting is writing to help convert or convince your audience of your message. Think about anything from “you’re not just buying an organic, non GMO, grass-fed hand lotion- you’re joining a movement,“ to “click here to order your life changing lightbulb today!“
Isn’t that marketing?
Well, yes. Copywriting is an essential part of any form of marketing. (Marketing, by the way, isn’t just “selling stuff”; it includes anything and everything that a company does to get its product or services in front of the right eyes. It’s a broad term.) Some forms of copywriting you might be familiar with include email campaigns, ads, newsletters for brands, sales pages, and phrases like “See what’s new!👇”. Even a simple “hey :)” counts as copy, if it gets you to open the email.
Copywriting is an aspect of marketing and it’s also a form of content, but copywriting and just plain content have two different focuses.
Content writing is focused on informing or entertaining the audience, like a recipe or a report on the latest sports-ball game.
Copywriting is focused on moving them to take ACTION! Buy now! Make a donation! Vote today!
Whenever content begins to dip its toes into a more persuasive style, it becomes a form of copywriting. There’s overlap there.
I like to think of it this way: content writing is like a map of tourist destinations while copywriting is telling me where to turn.
(And copyrighting is a “no trespassing” sign.)
Where Copywriting Shows Up in Your Business
So now you know what copywriting is. Yay! But where does it live in your business?
Pretty much anywhere you communicate with customers.
Which is basically the whole site.
Yep. The whole thing, except for any parts you keep to yourself.
Even if you didn’t plan for it, you have some copy (shorthand for copywriting), loads of it even, on your site or social media posts right now.
(Here’s the thing: you might have decent copy in some of these places and cringe-worthy copy in others. That’s normal. Most business owners are great at what they do but understandably struggle to talk about it in a way that lands with customers.)
The Homepage
Let’s look into some specifics, starting with the website homepage.
The homepage is where first impressions happen. Someone lands on your site and takes maybe 3 seconds to decide whether it’s relevant to them or not.
Good homepage copy answers their questions before they’ve even scrolled. “What do you do?” “Why should I care?” Boom. It’s all right there, at the top of the page.
Bad homepage copy says something like “Welcome to ABC Company, where we leverage synergistic solutions to optimize your vertical integration.” (What does that even mean?)
But wait, doesn’t that “bad” copy answer the questions you just mentioned? What’s wrong with it?
Good observation! Look a little closer, though- there’s nothing meaningful in there. “Synergistic solutions”? Does that mean software? Consulting? Gadgets?
And “optimizing vertical integration” sounds pretty cool but offers nothing concrete. It’s just a bunch of corporate buzzwords.
You could almost use that blurb for any company.
This is the death knell of bad copy. I could slap this sentence on a consulting firm, a software company, a logistics business, a marketing agency… and it would be equally meaningless on all of them. Good copy is specific to YOU.
So how do we fix it?
The solution depends on what kind of work they do, but let’s say ABC Company is a business consultant.
BAD: “Welcome to ABC Company, where we leverage synergistic solutions to optimize your vertical integration.”
Yuck. No substance. Meant to dazzle and look impressive rather than say anything helpful.
GOOD: “We help small businesses grow without the chaos. Strategy, systems, and support for founders who are tired of wearing every hat.”
See? No vague buzzwords, a clear target audience (small businesses), and it addresses a specific problem or outcome (grow without the chaos of wearing every hat).
Much better.
The “About Me”
Wanna know something? The “About Me” page isn’t actually supposed to be about you- it’s supposed to be about your customer and about how you can help them.
Yes, they wanna know who you are and why you’re qualified, but what they’re really asking is “can this person solve my problem?”
Good “About Page” copy weaves together your story with the needs of the customer. Bad copy resembles a resume in paragraph form.
Product/Service Descriptions
This is where a lot of businesses fall into something called the “feature trap” of bad copy, which is where they just list features and specifications without actually explaining what they do for the customer.
“Our mugs are 80 grams of double-walled aluminum with a silicone bottom.” Bad.
“Our double-walled aluminum mug will keep your drink hot for you, even when you forget about it on the countertop. The silicone bottom prevents slips and spills, and the metal body is highly durable- so your toddler can’t break it!” Better.
E-mail Campaigns
Whether it’s a welcome series, a newsletter, or an abandoned cart nudge, emails are relationship-builders. They’re how you stay in touch without being pushy. The copy in these needs to feel personal and valuable, not like you’re shouting into the void or, worse, like you’re a robot reciting features.
Social Media Captions
That little blurb under your Instagram post? That’s copy. It’s what turns a scroll into a stop, a like into a click, a lurker into a follower. It doesn’t have to be long (in fact, shorter is often better), but it does need to connect.
Landing Pages
These are your heavy lifters. These pages specifically designed to get someone to Do The Thing, like sign up for your email list, buy your course, book a consultation, etc. Landing page copy needs to be laser-focused: what’s the offer, why does it matter, what should they do next?
What Good Copywriting Does For Your Business
Let’s get practical. What’s the actual ROI of investing in professional copywriting? What changes? It clarifies your message. This is the big one. Good copy takes the jumble of thoughts in your head—what you do, why you do it, who it’s for, why it matters—and distills it into something clear and compelling. When your message is clear, people instantly understand what you offer. They don’t have to work to figure it out. Clarity is kind for your customers and profitable for you.
It builds trust. People buy from people they trust, and trust comes from feeling understood. When your copy speaks directly to your customer’s actual problems, when it sounds like a real human who gets it, trust builds. When your copy is vague or generic or sounds like it was written by a committee (or, let’s be honest, by ChatGPT with no editing), trust evaporates.
It differentiates you from competitors. In most industries, the actual services or products aren’t that different from your competitors. What sets you apart is how you talk about what you do and how you make people feel. Good copy highlights what makes you you—your approach, your values, your personality. It gives people a reason to choose you beyond just price.
It converts. This is the measurable part. Good copy turns browsers into buyers, visitors into subscribers, cold leads into warm prospects. It does this by understanding what motivates your audience and speaking directly to those motivations. It removes friction and answers objections before they even come up. It makes the next step obvious and easy.
It saves you time. Here’s an underrated benefit: once you have copy that works, you stop endlessly tweaking it. You stop second-guessing every word on your homepage. You stop rewriting your About page at 11 PM because you’re convinced it’s all wrong.
Good copy gives you confidence that your words are working for you, so you can focus on actually running your business.
Why DIY Copy Often Falls Flat (And Why That’s Okay)
Let me be clear: I’m not here to shame anyone’s DIY copy attempts. We’ve all been there. I’ve written some truly terrible copy for my own business. (I once described my services as “holistic solutions for your brand narrative.” Holistic? What was I thinking?) But there are some really common reasons why the copy you write for yourself often doesn’t work the way you hope:
You’re too close to your business. This is called the “curse of knowledge,” and it’s a real problem.
You know your product or service so intimately that you forget what it’s like to encounter it for the first time.
You use jargon without realizing it’s jargon.
You skip over explanations because obviously everyone knows that part. (They don’t.)
You assume people care about the things you care about. (They might not, at least not yet.)
You’re writing features, not benefits. I mentioned this earlier, but it’s worth expanding on. Features are what your product has or is. Benefits are what your product does for the customer—how it makes their life better, easier, safer, more fun. Most business owners instinctively write features because those are concrete and measurable. But people don’t buy features; they buy better versions of their lives.
Your tone is off. Either you’re being too formal and corporate (because you think that’s what “professional” sounds like), or you’re being too casual (because someone told you to “be authentic”). The right tone depends entirely on your brand and your audience, and finding that sweet spot is genuinely hard when you’re writing for yourself.
You’re burying the important stuff. You start with context and backstory and explanations, and by the time you get to the point, your reader has already left. Or you’re so worried about sounding “salesy” that you never actually tell people what to do next. Good copy gets to the point quickly and isn’t afraid to ask for the action you want.
You’ve rewritten it so many times you can’t see it anymore. You’ve stared at that homepage for hours. You’ve tweaked every word. You’ve asked your spouse, your friend, and your dog for feedback. And now you have no idea if it’s good or if it’s garbage because you’ve completely lost perspective.
All of this is completely understandable. You’re running a business, not a copywriting agency. The fact that you’re even thinking about your copy puts you ahead of a lot of people.
But here’s the truth: sometimes the best thing you can do is hand it off to someone who can see what you can’t.
When to DIY and When to Hire
So how do you know when your own copy is “good enough” versus when you need to bring in a professional?
Here’s my honest take:
DIY is totally fine for:
Social media posts when you’re just starting out or when you’re sharing quick updates. The bar is lower here, and authenticity often matters more than polish.
If you’re a small business owner posting about your day or sharing a behind-the-scenes moment, your own voice is probably perfect.
Internal documents, like team memos or process guides. These don’t need to be marketing-level persuasive—they just need to be clear.
Quick website updates, like adding a new product to your shop or updating your hours. If the infrastructure is already working, small additions don’t usually need professional help.
Consider hiring a copywriter when:
You’re launching or rebranding. First impressions matter, and this is when you need your message to be crystal clear and compelling. It’s worth the investment to get it right from the start.
Your website isn’t converting. You’re getting traffic, but people aren’t buying, signing up, or reaching out. That’s often a copy problem, not a design problem. The words aren’t doing their job.
You’ve rewritten something ten times and you still hate it. At this point, you’re too deep in it. Fresh eyes and professional expertise can break you out of the loop.
You need a sales funnel or email sequence. These require strategic thinking about customer psychology and the customer journey. A professional can map this out in a way that actually moves people through your funnel instead of just… existing.
You want to sound like yourself, but better. A good copywriter doesn’t replace your voice—they refine it, clarify it, and make it more effective while still sounding like you.
Your time is better spent elsewhere. Here’s the business calculation: if you can make more money doing what you actually do (your service, your product) than you’d spend on a copywriter, it’s worth hiring out. Don’t spend 20 hours writing copy if you could spend those 20 hours serving clients and making three times what the copywriter would cost.
The short version? If it’s important and public-facing, and you’re not confident in what you’ve written, it’s probably worth getting professional help.
Ready to Improve Your Copy?
Whether you decide to hire a copywriter or tackle some improvements yourself, the most important thing is to start thinking about your words as a strategic tool, not just filler between your logo and your contact button.
Your copy is working for you 24/7—on your website while you sleep, in emails long after you’ve sent them, on social media when you’re spending time with your family. It’s worth making sure it’s saying the right things in the right way.
Want to do a quick audit of your current copy? Ask yourself these questions:
Can a stranger who lands on my homepage understand what I do in 5 seconds or less?
Does my copy focus on benefits (what changes for the customer) or features (what my thing has or is)?
Is my About page actually about how I help my customer, or is it just my resume?
Do I have clear calls-to-action telling people what to do next?
Does my brand voice sound like me, or does it sound like corporate jargon?
If you answered “no” or “I’m not sure” to any of these, that’s a good indication your copy could use some work.
Want to talk about your copy specifically? I work with small businesses to clarify their message and write copy that actually converts. Whether you need a full website rewrite or just want someone to look at your sales page with fresh eyes, I’d love to chat.
And hey—if you’re still on the fence about whether you need help, that’s totally fine. At minimum, I hope this article helped you understand what copywriting is and why it matters. That’s a solid start.