EP. 22: Website Copy that Converts with Dietitian Turned Designer Nina Mills

Show Notes

In this episode of Dietitian Turned Designer, Courtney sits down with fellow dietitian and copywriting expert, Nina Mills.

They discuss the importance of writing relatable copy and human communication in the healthcare field, the challenges of balancing professionalism and warmth in copywriting, and the impact it has on client experience.

Nina shares insights into crafting personalized websites, optimizing website copy for skimmers, and demystifying SEO. They also chat about the customer journey and the significance of ethical copywriting in attracting the right clients. Don't miss this insightful conversation between two dietitians turned designers!

 

 

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What is Tech Savvy Dietitian: Websites, Local SEO & Marketing for Dietitians in Private Practice?

Websites, local SEO, and marketing strategy for dietitians in private practice. Hosted by Courtney Vickery, web designer and dietitian, helping you build a site and online presence that actually gets you clients.

In each episode, we'll tackle the practical side of private practice: websites that actually convert, tech tools that don't give you headaches, and strategies to streamline your workflow. Whether you're drowning in admin tasks or just starting your practice, we're here to help you spend less time managing your business and more time doing what you love - helping your clients.

Join us as we chat with successful dietitians and practice management experts who've figured out how to make technology work for them, not against them. We'll share real solutions for real practices, focusing on what actually works in the world of weight-inclusive care.

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 Hi, everyone, and welcome back to The Dietitian Turned Designer. I'm excited this week because I have another dietitian turned designer, Nina Mills. Hi, Nina. Hey, Courtney. It is so good to finally be chatting with you in real time. You know, the global clock is a killer for us between Australia and the States.

I know I have so many, I've said this before, but I have so many like awesome people that I talk to that are in Australia. So I'm used to being out here at seven o'clock at night cause it's like the perfect time for us to kind of meet, but yeah. So tell us a little bit about what you do. Yeah. So I design websites and I also write SEO infused copy for other weight inclusive small businesses with the idea of, you know, helping to bring them more aligned clients so they can avoid the time suck that is social media and get on with dismantling diet culture.

But I'm also a working dietitian. So I own feel good eating. It's a private practice in Melbourne, Australia. , and that's, I provide weight inclusive nutrition counseling for people across that spectrum of, , People who identify as chronic dieters all the way through to people who have, , clinical eating disorders.

So yeah, feel good eating is the dietitian side of things and butter digital is the website SEO copywriting side of things. Sounds very familiar. So how many nutrition people do you still see? I'm curious. I probably do, if I was to have everybody be neat and tidy in my calendar, it would probably be a day a week.

Okay. Yeah. That's how mine used to be. I kind of have dwindled down to basically none. It was like three days a week and then it was two, then it was one. And now I haven't been accepting new people and I still have like two clients that I see like maybe once a month at this point. And I'm sure they're, they're going to transition out soon.

Which I've been working with them for like three years now. So it's awesome to see how far they've come and that they're. So no plans to take anyone on once everything's been all done, it'll be fully. It'll be, I don't know yet. I like still have my side up. Obviously, I still get people signing up for my emails all the time.

So I still have the email list and tons of resources. And that's really what it is right now is I refer people in the community to it for resources like books that I recommend podcasts that I recommend, and then the downloads that they can get for free. And then I still have some online courses, like mini courses on body image and postpartum body image.

And. You know, diet talk around the holidays and things like that. So, it's, you know, I don't know the future of it. I'm not ready to like shut it down by any means. I think it's a good resource to have and you never know. I don't know. Right now, my main focus is My studio because I am so busy with it that I don't have time to see any other nutrition people But yeah, so tell us they've all heard my story of how I got to this point.

So tell us kind of how you went from Dietitian world into design world. Yeah, so I've been dietitianing for a while now and when I Actually, it was back in 2010, I did the, became university qualified nutritionist first before I became a dietitian. And it was after getting my nutrition qualification that I was sitting there going, Oh, I have all of this nutrition knowledge and how do I tell the world about it?

So I found WordPress, I found WordPress back in 2010 and I'm like, right, I'm going to fire up a blog and start telling everyone about energy balance and calories in and calories out and vitamins and minerals. All of the classic, young, naive, nutritionist kind of vibe, which I really cringe on now. But that was kind of the start and it was like I was off to the races from there.

I really enjoyed, I enjoyed writing and I also enjoyed the tech side of things. And. It's just kind of continued on from there in moving from being a nutritionist into a dietitian and not really having the funds to outsource. I'm like, I have to learn all of this stuff for myself in terms of how do I, how do I set up a business online and how do I market it and how do I maintain it?

So I have done a lot of upskilling and a lot of training in website design, copywriting, SEO, marketing, all of that kind of stuff. And in my attempts to outsource since, I've hit snags in working with other graphic designers, website designers who just don't understand white inclusive care. They don't.

And. Incredibly frustrating process, revision process of communicating that, Hey, I don't want you to design me up a website that has thin white women in bendy yoga poses. Like that's not, that's not my brand. That's not my business. That's not what I want to communicate to the people that I want to work with.

And then that's what I get back. So I was kind of like, well, I'm going to have to keep doing it all myself. Yeah, no, totally understand that was the same way I had a blog in 2010 2012, but mine was on blogger that which is doesn't exist now because Google gets up on everything it does apparently.

But I'm curious, what was the name of your blog? So I started out as what's for eight. Okay. Mine was fitness with a fork because I have this weird thing for alliteration apparently. So, so yeah, but I was the same way. I was a fitness instructor and yoga instructor. So it was all like when everyone would do those, what I ate in a day posts.

all the triggering stuff. But yeah. So speaking of people not understanding what weight inclusive care is and how to implement that into design and copy, can you tell us some examples or some stories about people that you've worked with where they were like, wow, you actually really get it and what it was that you did for them that made them realize that you were the right fit.

I think

it's, it's a tricky, Or no, it's an interesting one to talk about because I've been doing the dietitian thing for a number of years and the weight inclusive space in Australia and in Melbourne, we are very close. Yeah. So I have built a network of colleagues and it was just me saying, Hey, I'm doing this thing now.

Is anyone interested that people like, Oh my gosh. Yes. Yes. You, you're what I'm looking for. It's, and that's, that's kind of what I get whenever anyone fills in an inquiry form or we hop on a zoom call to have a meeting. It's like, Oh, it's such a relief to know that you're here. And that same thing that I just mentioned that I, I felt frustrated with.

It's like, I don't have to explain to you. What weight inclusive care is. I don't have to explain to you what non diet nutrition is. It's like, you already get it. It's like, we're, we're sort of already on the same page and there isn't any of that education piece that has to happen before we can get to work.

We can just get to work. Yes, exactly. I've had the same experience. Like when I first started, you know, telling people that I was offering this, like in the very beginning, I took on six projects at once because everybody just kind of was like, what? That's great. Please help me. And they just immediately trust you because you're.

you understand and you do what they do so they know like this is going to be an even less stressful process because I don't have to reinvent the wheel here with someone who doesn't understand what I do and wants to put an apple with a tape measure on my site or a scale or something crazy. So yeah, is, you know, they kind of.

Automatically get that no like and trust factor a little bit easier because it's a that's what people mean. I think when they say a niche or a niche, whichever way people want to say, I like saying, I don't know. But you know, I think that's what they mean by that. Not necessarily that you have to just pick something and force that picking something.

It's the people that. You are naturally drawn to and they're naturally drawn to you and you get excited about working with them. Like, that's what I think of when I think of a niche. It's not like I went out and said, you know, I'm only going to work with dieticians. I went out and just said, I'm going to be values based and I'm going to only work with weight inclusive businesses.

And that happens to be mostly dieticians and therapists, but you know, I work with hair salons and other businesses too. I'm like, as long as you don't promote weight loss in our values are in alignment for the most part, then, you know, I, that's the people I want to work with because they get it. Yeah, yeah, 100%.

I work with a bookkeeper too with that, that same sort of thing. They contact me and said, Oh, I'm not a health professional, you know, is that okay? I said, Are you a, are you a decent person? Do you treat humans like humans? It's like, I, I can work with that. Yes. I focused on, The, the values of being weight inclusive. And then again, following my love of having words start with the same letter, my other values are integrity and inspiration.

So, you know, those things are kind of the foundation of my business, which is what I tell clients all the time. That's why we do the strategy piece and actually figure out like what your values are and that it's not just a list of things that you have to pick and then never remember again, like they should be in every decision that you make when it comes to your business and design stuff.

Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's not just a list of words you slap on the bottom of your about page and you forget about it. It's how you actually embedding that into everything that you're doing. Yes, exactly. So can you talk about what strategies you use to create copy that resonates with your clients target audiences?

I it's, it's maybe helpful to think about what copy is and isn't because I don't know if there's this, this sort of. idea that you know, just sit down with a blank Google doc and start writing. Isn't that what everyone does? It just spills out of us. I wish, I wish. If whoever is the unicorn out there who can do that, please come and share your secrets.

That is not me. That is not me. So the, the strategic part of it is. Like quite a comprehensive like a brand excavation which if people have gone through the process of getting branding done and doing that, and then they come and meet me and I'm asking them to do the same thing. It's like, it's a lot.

Yeah. But it is that same process of what are your business values? What is your why? Why did you start this business? What, what is it that kind of gets you up in the morning? It's, it's really getting to understand the clinician as well as the people that they love working with. It is getting them to share.

What it is that their people are actually saying to them, whether it is in session, whether it is on their initial inquiry forms, when they type in to say, you know, what do you, what do you want me to help you with? You know, what are, what are people saying what are people saying in the comments on your social media?

What are people commenting on your blog posts, replying to your emails, all of that kind of thing. It's like gathering all of the words that the people that you love working with say. And it's also having a little bit of a look around at what your competitors are doing as well to see what's, what's kind of out there.

And so yeah, I think of copywriting is it's not opening up a blank Google doc and starting typing. And it's also not, I'm like scared to say this. It's not getting your website designed up with a template and then going back and having a look at the spots that are left for text and just filling in the blank.

Yes. So when you say that, cause I do VIP days and I offer a template. And sometimes people want me to explain the difference because they're not quite sure like what a template is and it's so hard to kind of explain, maybe you can explain it better than me, but it's hard to explain how I can take your brand voice and your tone and your strategy and apply it to a design of a web page versus if I have a pre made template, we've got to follow.

What it says, no matter what your strategy is. So nothing wrong with that in the beginning, which is why I call it a starter website. But eventually you do want to kind of move to that custom piece that does speak more to your, your copy strategy. Totally, totally. We were talking before you mentioned Ashlyn Carter.

I'm a big Ashlyn Carter fan as well. All of the copywriters out there will say copy dictates design, that if you can start with, The branding and not just the visuals, it is the strategic part of that sits behind your brand, move on to the copy, and then you can kind of incorporate all of that into the design.

So it's super cohesive in terms of when you people land on there, there's this kind of sense of like, ah, yes, exactly. Like I'm at home finally. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, that's, that's kind of the strategic part of it is, yeah, not, not starting with a, with a blank Google doc or not not having, trying as much as possible to not try and like retrofit copy into a website template, but it is, it's that pulling together of all of your research and examining data and organizing information to craft those messages then that connect with the people that you really love working with and also help them to make a decision that they feel great about.

Yeah. So whether that is to work with you, whether that is to buy the thing from you, whether that is to sign up to your, you know, the thing that you're offering on your website, or whether that is, I'm feeling good that this person is not my person and they can move on. That's, that's what your copy is there for.

Attract and repel. I always tell people that, and they get shocked, and I'm like, no, you don't, you don't want to work with people that aren't a good fit, it's not good for either of you, so you need to repel the people that aren't a good fit, not like saying, be ugly, but just like be clear, kind is clear.

Yep, yep, totally. And then, you know, a lot of the stuff we talk about in the brand strategy process I do is the customer journey. And I feel like that's like the third piece of doing a website, especially I can't get started if I don't even know where we're going. So, you know, if they're not sure if they're going to do an application or an inquiry call, or you can just schedule the first session, like the strategy and the design and the words are different for each of those things.

And it's subtle, but it's definitely different. You know, do you have a blog that you want to take them to? Do you have a freebie that you want them to download? And then. Two, like going even further, it doesn't stop there. Like you said, you need to think about after you get them in, how do you help them feel like they're in the right place and keep them there?

Like, don't forget about them. But yeah, do you have an example or some suggestions for someone who is trying to, you know, get that piece of their customer journey together so that, you know, the copy is still resonating with them? I think it's, Sort of like this, sometimes a mindset of like a one and done, like I did my website copy, so I'm done a little bit.

But when it comes to, then writing like other copy for emails or even the onboarding emails, I'm not even talking about email marketing. I'm just talking about like the emails you send from practice better or simple practice or whatever you use. Do you have any tips for them on that area?

I, there's, there's kind of two things. Cause we can get really bogged down in our clients, and I mean we should, we care about them, so that's only natural, but also what feels good for us as clinicians. How is it that we want to work? I don't want to have discovery calls with potential new dietetic clients.

It's just not my bag. And so I'm not going to go, I'm not going to have that be my customer journey. I'll hop on my website, learn a little bit about me and then book a call. So having to think about how is it that you want to work with people? What is, what is your I don't know what feels energetically aligned, which may sound a bit woo, but, but literally, what is your energy?

What is your capacity for bringing on new clients? And then also thinking about these people who are humans who are coming with heavy stuff that they want to work on when you put that hat on and just thinking about what would be a great experience for them. It's then building that. Yeah, no, exactly.

You know, thinking about our clients, there tends to be anxiety that comes with their food stuff, anxiety about meeting a new health professional. It is maybe over communicating. Not as in reams and reams and reams of text, but it might be doing more reminders than if you were in a different type of industry.

It might be making sure that you have information on your website and also on your onboarding forms. It's like kind of read or anything along the way. Yeah, I don't know. Does that help? Yeah, no, definitely. I always say I'm gonna take notes when I have a question, when someone's talking and I never do it because I'm like, I'll remember.

I never remember. Because you said something and I was like, oh, I'm gonna ask that. But I was thinking about my own, you know, onboarding emails and not again, not talking about email marketing, but just like session reminders I go and see what the template in the system says. So, for example, I'm setting up a new membership for clinicians who want to learn more about technology.

And the templates that were already in there, like that if I hadn't gone in and looked at them and customized them, signed off with the word Cheers. And I would never say cheers. I'm in South Georgia, like, I mean, I'm in the South Georgia and I, we don't, I don't know anyone that says cheers. So it wouldn't have sounded authentic.

It would have been like. A little bitty things like that, they would have been like, that's a little weird. That doesn't sound like Courtney. That makes me, is this really from her? And then that trust kind of gets a little bit, little, yeah. So, you know, just thinking about how you sign off, I tend to use take care.

Cause I just. I feel like it's a happy medium and it's not over the top, but it's not to, you know, just thanks or bye. But you know, just little things like that, I feel like can make a really big difference. So I do remember what I was going to ask, cause you said not reams of text. And so I was wondering, do you have kind of a general guideline of how long a text should be on a website, like a paragraph or things that you do to kind of break it up for people like me that are skimmers?

I was going to say how long is a piece of string, but that's not actually accurate. There is this kind of Goldilocks, just right Place with a copy where you want to have enough words that you tell your people what it is that they need to know or feel through your copy enough words so that you're getting your keywords in there from an SEO perspective. Yeah. And enough words for, again, the, particularly our clients who like, this is a big deal.

to work with a dietitian and to start unpacking their food stuff. It's like, what is the, you know, how many words do you need to have them have that sense of relief of they found a person who might be a great fit? So I, if we're putting quantities on it, it's, it's kind of like 500, 600 words. Yeah, that's what I was thinking.

Not just tell people, like, this is what you need to do. Exactly. It depends on each situation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think it depends on the page as well. You know, your homepage is kind of your choose your own adventure. Where you want to kind of guide people to take the, the next step where you would like them to, but typically they're going to bounce off and go look at your about page or they'll go to your services page or maybe they'll go and check out your latest blog or your podcast.

So that one you've, you need to kind of tick all of the boxes, but it might not be too wordy. Your about page on the other hand, you might have a little more text on there to connect with people and really. to them that you understand where it is that they're coming from. But also then share a little bit about yourself as well.

Services is kind of, I don't know, almost a, a middle ground between those two, because you also need to do that connection piece. But then there's a sort of nuts and bolts of, well, this is how long my sessions are and this is how much they cost, and this is my cancellation policy and, and that kind of thing.

So yeah, there's, there is a. You don't want no words and you don't want to be too wordy. And for the skimmers, that's really where your headlines come into play. It is writing really compelling, catchy headlines that if you didn't do any reading other than the headlines and you just skim through those down the page, do you get a general gist of what the page is about?

Yeah, I always tell people if you put a paragraph on there with no header or bolding, I'm not going to read it. It literally looks like a blob to me and not compute. So I need I need the cliff notes. But yeah, I always tell them. Whenever we're looking at like the design and the copy of the page, I think about when I was an instructor, like a group fitness instructor, and we were always told to think about if there was someone like from CNN in the room, there was someone who, you know, was hard of hearing or hard of seeing, or, you know, all these different kinds of people that you need to accommodate in your class, not assuming that everyone is It's the same.

And it's the same to me for a website, like people that are skimmers, people that want the emotion, people that want the facts, , people that, want the whole story, like a novel, so just thinking about all those different people and then some, and making sure you're putting that together in a cohesive way, which is challenging.

Hence why they should hire you and me. Totally, totally. Cause it's overwhelming I think we get information overload because we want to do it right because I would imagine most dietitians are type A or so And perfectionist and we want to make sure we do it the quote right way So we tend to research and research and then get overwhelmed or at least I do So I think it's helpful to have someone come in who?

Has been doing it and has an eye for it to kind of help put the pieces together for you Yeah, yeah. And, you know, that's, that's what people can lean on is that different skill set and take some of that cognitive load off their plate. Yeah. Like that's, and that's what my you know, pre work questionnaires are all about.

It's like, just download your brain for me and then I can take it and I can move it around and organize it and turn it into what I'm Guessing from everything that I've now learned about you, you want to be on your website. Yep. I always, I have that disclaimer on every question. I'm like, you cannot write too much, literally just brain dump everything on here.

And then I will pick out what, when, what we need, there's probably a theme somewhere in there. So can we talk a little bit more about SEO and copy and, any things that you've learned along the way or any tips or suggestions that you have? I, they are two different services. In a sense and I think that's because SEO, there's like different components to your SEO.

There's the technical, there's the on page, off page, your local SEO, all of that kind of thing. When it comes to your copy, if you can write the most beautiful copy in the world and if you haven't considered SEO, then... Yeah. It may never get read. It might just, you know, kind of be in the dusty drawers of Google and no one ever sees it.

Which is a real, real shame. Yeah. So I would say don't forget about your SEO. And I think that's part of the strategic piece and the I like planning piece right at the start is, you know, and that customer journey as well of where do you want people to go and what are the things that they are telling you that they're searching for again, whether that is what they're writing on forms, but having a look at your analytics.

It's tricky when you don't have a website yet to get all of that information from But yeah, it's, it is important to be considering SEO as well. But again, there is this fine balance of infusing your copy with keywords. Not stuffing them with keywords just for the sake of like more is better and more if it's like throwing spaghetti at the wall, if I put a whole heap in, then hopefully we'll stick with Google's strategy behind that as well.

So if I mean, whenever I hear keyword stuffing, I think about there's another in all of the millions of Facebook groups. I mean, there's one where there's a guy that is also, I think he's a therapist and does SEO and he was talking about how Back in the day with SEO people with keyword stuffing, that was like true keyword stuffing.

Like they would use white text over a white background to hide it, but it would still be read by the bots and they would just stuff it everywhere. And I was like, Oh, that makes so much more sense. Cause I would be afraid if I'm keyword stuffing, if I say it like three times, like I don't want to get flagged for stuffing.

But then when he said that, I was like, Oh. But now, Google's changing its algorithms, , it's almost kind of, I don't know, I'm kind of getting to the point where , it's almost as somewhat frustrating sometimes as social media with all the changes they keep doing, which, granted, some things need to be changed with all the AI stuff, because, you know, it's not really fair if someone just spits out a An article from AI that they don't change at all to someone that put a lot of thought and research into an article and I was listening to another podcast today and she, it was, I can't remember her name off the top of my head, but she has a recipe blog and gets a million hits a month or something like that.

And she was just talking about what makes her different from other recipe blogs and how it's that human touch, like her pictures are her. They're her recipes that she developed, they're her stories and things that AI would not know and Google can can see that and know that. So I think that's an important piece is to remember to not just write clinically, but to write like a human that people can relate with.

Yeah, yeah, I really love that. I think we're regulated health. professions, and that kind of pressure of our regulators sort of sitting heavy on our shoulder can sometimes get in the way of us being a human. Yeah. And I, I think we can, again, balance, strike a balance between being professional, but also Being warm and personable and friendly because I don't know about you and how you practiced as a dietitian, but if I were to write very clinically and professional on my website and then the person shows up across my Zoom screen and they actually get me, it's going to be like, a big disconnect.

Yeah. For me, I'm laughing because I, yeah, for me it would definitely be because I, you know, I am a, I try to make sure my clients know that I'm a human as much as possible. I'm not gonna come in and a suit, not that there's anything wrong with that. It's just not me. And you know, ask a bunch of clinical questions.

I want to know how they're feeling as a human, like genuinely. You know, so , I wish we called it. Nutrition therapy, like I wish we were nutrition therapists, like speech therapists and physical therapists. That's just, that's another soapbox for another day, but it just, it bothers me.

Like, why can't we just have that instead of dietician? Because it doesn't make any sense. It doesn't, it doesn't. And it's kind of in the same way that we all get told you should put images of yourself on your website because people want to connect with a human. Same thing with your words. You know, the, the, your website aesthetic is going to capture people's attention and is the copy that's going to get them, like, keep them on your page.

And again, if there's an incongruence between those two things, it's going to feel very jarring and people are going to bounce away and look for somebody else who really does fit what, what it is that they're looking for. Yeah, if you just think about it I have so many people who sit across from me and say you're the first person I've ever told about X, Y, and Z when it comes to food.

And how do you start that process of building that rapport and that landing space for people on your website? Yeah, that's another thing about, not that I didn't plan to talk about videos, but that just makes me think like why I encourage people to at least think about putting a video of themselves talking on the site.

Because It just, again, just shows that you're a human sitting in your office talking. We're not talking about like make a production value video here. Just get a ring light and a decent mic and... Brush your hair and don't write a script. I mean, have it, maybe have an outline, but I mean, for me personally, I don't do well with a script because I will sound like I'm reading a script.

I need to just talk. But yeah, just literally just a few, even if it's like 20 second video, just, Hey, I'm so and so. I'm owner of this practice and I do this because bloop. I can't wait to meet you. The end. You know, that could go a long way with someone just seeing that video and just, you know, talking about woo earlier.

Like I believe in vibes and energy. Like you're going to feel they're going to feel your vibe and your energy and want to work with you. Yeah.

I feel like a lot of dietitians and people in general are always worried that we're going to sound sleazy and salesy and we're afraid to sell and I'm guilty of that too.

I had a mentor tell me that a few weeks ago, like you need to not be afraid to sell because what you do makes people feel so good. And they're like you, like when you do the design, when I do the designs for them, they're like, you make me feel so much. better about my offers and so confident because you put it together in a way that makes me feel proud to show it off.

So don't be afraid to sell. And so what do you do when you're working with someone and they are afraid of that? Copy does have that reputation of being sleazy and slimy and unethical. And making people feel bad or ashamed about themselves or, or, or like pressured into buying something. And to be honest, like copy has been used to do that.

Yeah. But as clinicians and businesses who give a damn and really care about our clients, it's kind of that we can take, take what we like and what like thinking about our colleague, Laura, you know, filter it through your values and see what actually aligns with your values and leave the stuff that Doesn't.

Because at the end of the day, we are running businesses, we've got bills to pay. And I mean, this, this goes to the broader systems of oppression and systems that are in place that kind of make us feel like we're on this hamster wheel of having to It's that because we care about people. But yes, at the end of the day, we need to earn an income from our business.

Cause that's the thing. If your website isn't earning money, then it's just a hobby. That's that's the classic saying. But if I'm thinking about I like that classic copywriting formula. PAS problem, agitate solution. It's like that first thing I learned. And then I was like. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's, I mean, it's, it's designed to like put the thumb in and really put pressure on the thing that the person is struggling with.

And then we present our offer or our product as the solution to take away their pain. And I just think that is really gross. But one of my copywriting mentors, Jay Chris Crowe, she has changed this a lot. It's like the PAS formula to be problem, acknowledge, solution. So rather than agitate, it's acknowledge.

So rather than twist that knife, we can be affirming the thing that they're struggling with, with compassion or Kelly deals she actually swaps things around. So rather than the PAS, she starts with the acknowledging and then identifies the problem and then presents a solution. But the problem, she says is.

identifying the external villain. Because again, a lot of the yucky stuff about copy is we are getting people to internalize the thing as a flaw or a problem within themselves. Shame. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We were trying to shame that copy in some instances tries to shame them. And I'm glad you put a word to.

That process that is different. Cause I was like, that's, that's actually kind of what I do because I don't like using the word agitate either. And I, I don't do like negative problems. And I try to, I like that you said, like affirm, like what their emotions are, because that's what I try to do in my copy too, is you don't, I don't want people to feel bad.

I want them to leave my website websites feeling amazing. And like, this is it not, I hope they fix me. Yeah. Yeah. And when I think about. that we work with and what they're coming to our virtual couch or our literal couch with it is coping strategies that they have developed in order to live in. Weight bias, weight stigma, patriarchy, misogyny, racism, ableism, like in a world that has a lot of systems of oppression.

And so that's why I really like Kelly Deal's approach to it in terms of naming the external villain, like naming that acknowledging the thing that they're struggling with and naming it as the thing that is external to the person so that they don't feel as bad about themselves. It's like, hey, this is a bigger problem.

Yeah, I definitely. Yeah, I'm like, I don't want to perpetuate any more shame. I get enough in my own head. Like, I don't want to put that on anyone else. So you mentioned Kelly deals. Who are some other people that would be inspirational for people to follow when it comes to ethical copy? Other than you, of course.

Thanks. She is really my go to when I, when I think about ethical copywriting. I also really enjoy Tarzan K. Yeah. I was thinking about Nat Topolian, I think is how you say her last name. I don't know if I'm pronouncing it correctly. I don't know if she's still, I don't know if she's still doing her like own business.

I feel like she got a job recently cause I haven't heard from her in a while. But she was the first one I saw that started talking about , And saying, putting a word to it as far as ethical copywriting and I was like, Oh, that's what I'm trying to do. And now I like there's, it's called something, it's not like sleazy copy where, you know, you're like, it sounds like a car salesman commercial or something, but yeah, no empathy and compassion and ethical copywriting.

And I think it comes back to what we were talking about before in terms of thinking about how. Who our clients are and what it is that they are coming to us with and what we know about them as people when we work with them and thinking about how do we communicate that? And if you kind of go into it with that intention, I think a lot of that sleazy stuff can fall out and it's then just presenting them with an invitation rather than a sale.

Yes, exactly. So do you have three takeaways or three, like, small things that they could do, like, in the next week or month as when it comes to copy? What would be your suggestions? The three takeaways, let me have a think. I think write what your people are saying, not what you would say. Mm hmm. So, you know, we say, make, make peace with.

food and heal your relationship with your body. But our people would say, I just want to be able to eat normally. Yeah. Put that in your coffee. The, the one that we've spoken about a lot is be a human, be a human. It's okay to be a human. You don't have to be that stuffy professional. And then that other one, which is just don't start with a blank page.

Don't start with a blank page. Do some of your research first gather and organize your data, have a think about SEO, and also start writing with what you know best, you know, you are going to end up having a blank piece of paper, but start writing again with those nuts and bolts of the things that you actually know, that factual stuff and get something on a page, and then you can organize all of the conversations you have.

The story piece and the emotional piece and the connection piece around all of that. And then hey, presto, you're going to have some, some copy there. That's, that's really, really powerful and aligns with your values and really connects deeply with the people that you want it to have hopefully more, more client inquiries coming in or more sales.

Definitely. Yeah, I know. That's awesome. So, I'm going to ask a fun question, but some people don't think it's so fun because they're like, that's too hard. Your favorite meal that you've ever had? My favorite meal that I've ever had? Yeah, you're right. It is really hard. What was the first one that came to your mind?

Because it's not necessarily have to be about the food, but the experience. The experience.

Oh, now that I'm put on the spot, I'm like, my brain has no meals in it.

You want me to tell you my two? Yeah, go for it. Go for it. I mean, just give you some time to think. So the first one is, , I had LASIK surgery like 10, 15 years ago and I don't know why, but I always remember this sandwich that I had after I had the surgery.

Cause I was so hungry. I don't know what was up, but we literally just went to this. So and got this like turkey sandwich. There's nothing special about it, but I just remember it tasting so amazing. And it never tasted that way again. It was just something about after the surgery, that sandwich was just.

It's so good. And it's just a plain old sandwich, like, I don't know what was so special about it, but I remember it. I think about it all the time. So I'm like, when can I get that high again from this, from a food like that?

So I can think of two. memorable eating experiences. And they, they were actually both while I was in Japan. So one was we'd been, we'd spent the day exploring around Hiroshima and needed to find something to eat. And obviously all of the restaurants and things being in Japanese, I don't really know what you're walking into, but just went pick.

And it was an amazing bowl of ramen and also just the best. I've ever eaten. And then also, and anyone who is on my feel good eating email list might have received this email where I talk about a latte and a Lamington that I had in a little cafe in I can't remember now off the top of my head, what area we're in, but I was really exhausted by that point.

And my nervous system was shot and we went into this cafe that had Advertise themselves as a Melbourne cafe. So it was a Melbourne cafe in Japan and that's, that's where I'm from. And I'm like, it's not going to be like Melbourne coffee. And I inhaled the aroma and I took a sip and I was in Japan, but in that moment I was back in Melbourne.

Yeah. That's so awesome. So now I'm curious, what's the difference between coffee there versus where you're from? So, coffee in Japan is actually really good. Yeah? Yeah. I'm not a coffee connoisseur, I, , I don't know. I didn't drink coffee until after I had kids, so I don't really, like, Dunkin Donuts is fine for me.

It doesn't really matter. I'm more of a tea person, so... will encounter... I plan one day. As long as I don't get, like, eaten by a spider or beat up by a kangaroo or something. Those are my fears. I will, I will bust that myth for you now. Okay, thank you. There is, there's like nothing, nothing. Perfect. Good. Well, I, you know, I think we talked before we got on and we're having so many spiders here lately and they're just giant and everywhere and on my door and they're not poisonous, but they're annoying.

And whenever I see a video though of those huntsman spiders, I'm like, that's just. I don't think I can do it. I know they're not mean, but they're so big. They are so big. I will be honest that we do get those in the inner suburbs, but kangaroos bouncing in the backyard. No. Man. Bluey lied to me. Well, where can everybody find you and learn more about you?

Yeah. Yeah. So I am over on Instagram. I'm kind of on Instagram. At butter. digital. And my website is butterdigital. com. au. All right. Awesome. Well, thank you so much for being here today and I'm sure I'll see you in our Facebook group. Thanks so much for having me.