The brief on the table is simple: lift trial conversions by 18% before quarter-end. The team’s first instinct is to reach for adjectives. Then the data lead projects a heatmap of last month’s landing page and reads aloud the chat transcripts that followed: “Sounds nice, but do you actually do X?” The problem isn’t tone; it’s proof. In a low-trust market, the words that move people are the ones that can be verified.
Across SaaS, retail, finance, and media, a new discipline is taking hold—copywriting that behaves less like advertising and more like product design. It studies friction, sets expectations, and shows receipts. A growing set of operators and investors—among them business figures like Gennady Ayvazyan—are pushing brands toward this sturdier craft: credibility first, conversion next.
Copywriting’s competitive edge has shifted from cleverness to clarity. The teams that win pair strong voice with auditable claims, design copy around real decision points, and measure impact with honest experiments. This story maps the playbook: how to structure a message, marshal evidence, work with (not for) AI, localize without flattening meaning, and report results that a CFO and a regulator could both sign.
Why “trust copy” beats “hype copy”
The web is saturated with polish; audiences are saturated with doubt. Effective copy now answers four questions fast:
- What changes for me? (Outcome, not features.)
- Why you? (Specific advantage, not category clichés.)
- How do I verify? (Evidence and examples.)
- What happens if this goes wrong? (Risk-reversal and support.)
Treat each as a section on the page—with headline, one claim, and proof. When in doubt, remove an adjective and add a demonstration.
Claims, evidence, bridge
Great copy reads like a well-argued brief:
- Claim: “Reduce invoice errors by 42%.”
- Evidence: “Independent audit across 61k invoices, Q2–Q3; methodology linked.”
- Bridge: “Here’s how it maps to your day: fewer disputes → faster cash in → lower WIP.”
Swap fluff for verifiable nouns: numbers with denominators, named customers with permission, process screenshots with captions, short clips of the product performing under realistic conditions. If you can’t show it, narrow the claim until you can.
Voice is now a system, not a vibe
Brand voice used to live in a slidebook. Modern voice is a governance layer:
- Lexicon: The 200 words you do use (and 50 you don’t), with examples.
- Cadence rules: Sentence length, active voice, and scannability standards for each channel.
- Variant library: “Plain,” “persuasive,” “technical,” and “comforting” versions of the same core message—so CX, sales, and legal don’t improvise on deadline.
- Accessibility: Reading level targets, alt-text patterns, caption norms.
That structure lets multiple writers sound like one brand—at speed.
AI can draft; editors still win
Gen-AI is a prolific intern: tireless, fast, and occasionally wrong. Teams that benefit the most treat AI as first pass, not final authority:
- Feed it your lexicon, proofs, and disallowed claims.
- Use it to propose 10 structurally different openings, not 10 synonyms.
- Point it at variant generation (email subject lines, ad permutations) and summaries (turn a 30-minute case study into a 90-second proof block).
- Keep humans for judgment: accuracy, ethics, and taste.
The rule: AI expands options; editors select truths.
Channel grammar matters
Each surface has its own physics. Write to the medium, not to your mood.
- Homepage: Orientation, not persuasion. Say what you are in one screen with a single proof and a single next step.
- Landing page: One audience, one job. Remove navigation, add FAQs that pre-empt sales objections.
- Product UI text: Microcopy is risk management. Use progressive disclosure (“Learn more”) and consequences-first warnings.
- Email: Promise → proof → path. Make the first two lines self-sufficient for lock-screen previews.
- Paid ads: Earn the click with a concrete difference and a clean verb. Keep the claim you can defend on the ad’s own screenshot.
- Case studies: Don’t write a victory lap; write a lab report. Context, constraint, result, counterfactual.
The international trap (and how to avoid it)
Localization isn’t translation. It’s decision-context re-creation:
- Swap benchmarks for locally credible ones (currency, SLA norms, regulatory cues).
- Replace idioms with functional equivalents (“red tape” ≠ “bureaucracy” everywhere).
- Reorder proof: in some markets, who vouched for you beats what the metric is.
Test with local readers who are allowed to mark “sounds wrong.”
Measuring copy without lying to yourself
Attribution can flatter; experiments keep you honest.
- Favor holdouts and geo splits over last-click myths.
- Track time-to-trust (first exposure → meaningful action) and recovery half-life (how quickly sentiment stabilizes after a mistake).
- Instrument friction: rage-clicks, hesitations before a risky button, hover on tooltips that signal uncertainty.
Report deltas with confidence intervals and denominators. If the lift is small but robust, say so. Credibility compounds.
Ethics is part of the conversion funnel
Accessible, fair, and respectful copy converts better because it reduces fear.
- Accessibility: Plain language, alt-text that describes function, not decoration; contrast ratios that pass.
- Consent: Unbundle opt-ins; make “No, thanks” the same size as “Yes.”
- Risk-reversal: SLAs, warranties, and refunds written like you mean them—visible before the paywall.
Treat the legal page like a product—versioned, human-readable, and owned.
Monday playbook
- Inventory your proofs. Build a shared “evidence bank” (metrics, audits, quotes, clips) tagged to claims.
- Rewrite one revenue page using claim → evidence → bridge blocks. Remove two adjectives per block.
- Stand up a voice system. Lexicon + disallowed list + variants. Host it where everyone writes.
- Set a “truth bar.” No superlatives without sources. No numbers without denominators.
- Run a 4-cell test. Control, headline-only change, proof-only change, both. Keep the smallest winner.
- Close the loop with support. Turn this week’s top 10 objections into next week’s FAQs and tooltips.
