When a company commits to creating a new website, they sometimes balk at the idea of also paying for someone to write copy for it. Why add to the project’s costs? You know the language. Your 11th grade English teacher even said you have a way with words, and you certainly know your business better than anyone else.
And these days—as one client recently joked (um, “joked”) with us—everyone has access to ChatGPT.
The logic is sound. You can save money by writing the copy internally, with or without the help of AI, before handing it over to the team you’ve hired to design and develop your website. Such an approach feels practical, budget-conscious, and straightforward.
It also has the potential to become one of the project’s worst decisions.
You do know your business, of course. But how well do you know your audience? Do you know how they find your business? Do you know what they (really) think of your brand or products/services?
Often, a company’s attempt at DIY copy is more business-focused than audience-focused. After all, the business is what you know best, and it’s easy to write what you know. It’s often harder to write what your customers actually need. Thousands of my former first-year university students, at least for their first writing assignment of the semester, opted to write about how a piece of literature they were asked to analyze made them feel, instead of providing the analysis and argument the assignment required.
The College Board has a wonderfully succinct phrase they use to describe such a response. I learned it while scoring more than 12,000 AP English essays over the years: The student has substituted a simpler task. Because it was easier in the moment to write for themselves (and about themselves) than to write for an audience and deliver what what actually asked of them, they opted for the simpler approach.
Writer-focused writing is easier than reader-focused writing.
Twenty-plus years ago, Apple’s engineers obsessed over the iPod’s five gigabytes of storage and liquid-crystal display. But marketing understood that technical specs don’t sell products—experiences do. They transformed a mundane specification into an emotional promise that captured what the device actually meant to people’s lives.
The result? Well, see for yourself.
Great copy is a bridge to customers, and writing effective website copy requires a specialized skill set that combines marketing, psychology, conversion optimization, technical web considerations, and (of course) a facility with language and rhetoric. A company that outsources their website’s design and development but chooses to handle copy internally isn’t just tackling another writing task for which they may or may not have the bandwidth. They’re accepting responsibility for content strategy, research, competitive analysis, and understanding the technical constraints of web development.
The Time Investment Reality
The actual time investment is almost always underestimated. What seems like a straightforward task—”let’s just write about what we do”—typically requires 30-50 hours of focused work for a standard business website. This process includes researching competitors, analyzing your target audience, drafting multiple versions, gathering internal feedback, and refining your messaging based on input from various stakeholders. But that time estimate is for an experienced professional copywriter who isn’t figuring this stuff out for the first time. For a business owner or company leader who isn’t a full-time writer, such work can take even longer.
Plus, you must decide who on your team is going to write all that web copy. Whoever writes the website will be pulled away from revenue-generating activities, strategic planning, or other core business responsibilities.
It’s safe to assume that most of your employees—even if you have one or two marketers on staff—do not want the burden of such a task. People may not dread writing as much as public speaking, but it’s not far behind. Often their concern isn’t the act of writing itself, but the weight of responsibility that comes with articulating a company’s public messaging.
Website projects already involve many voices—executives reviewing messaging, department heads providing input, and team members fact-checking details. When you factor in meetings, revision cycles, and approval processes, the total time investment ratchets way up across your entire organization. Suddenly, the choice to save money by writing the web copy yourself comes with a substantial price tag in opportunity costs, not to mention the risk of staff burnout.
The Expertise Gap Problem
Even with unlimited time, internal teams often struggle with fundamental web copywriting challenges that aren’t immediately obvious. How long should homepage copy be to maintain engagement without overwhelming visitors? What information belongs “above the fold”—a term we’re not especially fond of, by the way—versus down the page? How do you write service descriptions that convert visitors into leads rather than simply inform them about what you do?
Such skills are not intuitively developed or demonstated; they’re forged through years of testing, measuring, and refining what actually works online. Professional copywriters understand conversion psychology, the subtle differences between written content that educates and copy that persuades. They know how to structure information for scannable reading, craft headlines that capture attention in seconds, and create calls-to-action that motivate specific behaviors.
Internal teams often lack context about industry standards. And often, they don’t see that their main differentiator is being communicated the same way by every competitor. Professional copywriters research your company’s competitive landscape, identify messaging opportunities, and develop strategies that internal teams typically miss.
Why I End Up Writing Your Copy Anyway
Here at Rare Bird, here is what happens on every project where clients insist they’ll handle the copy themselves: I end up writing some of it, anyway. Maybe not all of it, but more than the client expected at the beginning of the endeavor.
Project managers might call it “copy processing” or “copy handling”—they’re never quite sure what to name this inevitable phase of the project—but at some point, I’ll be called in to fill in the gaps or smooth over the rough spots.
It starts with the basics you didn’t consider. The homepage copy you submitted is 1,200 words, but the designer needs to break it up into smaller, digestible pieces to create a better user experience. You didn’t write headings or subheadings. You did write a lot of paragraphs, but the developer will need H1 and H2 designations, both for accesibbility and SEO purposes, which requires a slightly different approach to headline writing. You liked the card-based layout the designer proposed early on, but the service descriptions you provided for those need to be restructured and adjusted for length. Now you have to make them compelling and creative, but in one-fourth as many words.
Then come the elements you forgot entirely. Call-to-action button text that converts. Form field labels that guide users effectively. Error messages that help rather than frustrate. Navigation menu items that make sense to visitors who don’t work at your company. Footer copy, privacy policy language, copy for error pages (404 and so much more!), and dozens of other small but essential copy elements.
Each of these seemingly minor elements requires careful consideration. What should the copy say after someone submits a contact form? How do you phrase error messages so that they don’t cause even greater frustrations? What’s the difference between a “Submit” button and a “Get Started” button in terms of conversion psychology? Should your newsletter signup say “Subscribe” or “Join Our Community” or “Get Updates”?
The technical aspects of microcopy can add another layer of complexity. Alt text for images must be descriptive for accessibility while remaining SEO-friendly. Meta descriptions need to entice clicks while staying within character limits. Form validation messages must be helpful without being condescending. These aren’t glamorous writing tasks, but they’re essential for a functioning, professional website.
By the time we’re halfway through developing a website I’ve been told I’m not going to write, one of my colleagues—a designer or a developer, or maybe the project manager—has usually brought me in to write, revise, and fill gaps the client didn’t know existed.
There’s a better way. Approach copywriting strategically from the project’s beginning, before the web design and development begin, and treat it like the conversion-driving investment it truly is.
In part two, we explore how this approach eliminates costly revisions, delivers superior ROI, and turns your website into an effective conversion tool.
Avoid DIY copy pitfalls and launch your website with professional web copy. Let’s discuss how Rare Bird helps websites take flight.
You Might Also Like:
- Debunked: 10 Common SEO Myths
- The Marketing Partner Puzzle: Selecting the Right Agency
- Rare Bird’s Guide to B2B Content Marketing: What to Do (and Not Do)
- Pillar Pages: Leveling the Playing Field for Smaller Businesses
- Your Content, Their Terms: Finding Customers Where They Are
Sign up for Bird Feed, our monthly newsletter, to receive articles like this in your inbox.
