32 replies to this topic

[orchid]

Hey Scottie, Jill and Copywriter!!!

Thanks for the warm welcome!!

[anthonyparsons.com]

O yes, welcome orchid. Nice!!!!!!!!

[Scottie]

They are those things you put on your table at weddings, ie. the little sugar lollies and decorations for each guest. Your a girl, what tha....

I'm really a groundhog, so now you know...

Hmnn, we don't have anything like that. I've seen favors at a wedding or two, but not often. I'm not even sure what a sugar lollie is! Learn something new every day...

Grr.. a quick search on the word on Google takes me to some directory sites which lead to sites with very little info.

A search on the MSN beta takes me directly to a page that sells these things (they look like fluffy fabric flowers.)

Who was more relevant? Hmnn...

[Jill]

Ok, we're off topic now, but I just did a search for sugar lollie on google to see what you were talking about, Scottie.

The #1 results only has the word sugar on it, not lollie, so that was a HUGE dud.

The #2 result, however, was a kind of recipe for something, and in it, it actually said:

sugar coated lollies (like Smarties, Skittles, M&Ms or gobstoppers)

So I guess they are just candies?

But more importantly, Google's #2 result was somewhat relevant.

Not sure what you found, but "fluffy fabric flowers"??? That doesn't quite sound right!

[OldWelshGuy]

Boboniers are traditionally sugar coated almonds wrapped in a tuile basket.

At least that is what the wedding favour companies I have worked with in the past told me.

From the old tradition of giving a fift to your guests in certain countries

How sad am I?

[OldWelshGuy]

On a more serious note, it really does depend on what and to who, as previously stated.

In something like the wedding favour market (or indeed the lower cost per item areas) . A picture really does tell a thousand words. Your visitors will want to visually decide, all they will be interested is what they look like, what they cost, and when they can have them. hardly any copy at all!

That's all well and good from a decision making angle, but how do you get them there without quality copy?

The copy to attract them would have to be along the lines of tradition and help with planning etc At least that is the way I have done it, lots of planning and wedding tradition help, brought them into the site, then on page links to the suppliers. How much copy do you need for this? the more the better IMO.


Horses for courses, as they say. Nothing worse than having asked a salesman the price, he continues to sell to you. just the same with copy. AIDA.

[Scottie]

I searched for "bomboniere"

In this case, I got pictures of the little thingies, but I don't know what they are exactly. So a little copy explaining the tradition of bombonieres would have helped on the product page that I was viewing.

OTOH, if you are looking for a bomboniere, you probably know what they are, otherwise you wouldn't be able to spell it.

[anthonyparsons.com]

Yep, I had to look it up the first time to scottie. My wife ended up explaining to me what they where....

Your right on the nose with that OWG. They are sugar coated almonds, though they are also other things also. The term relates to many different items, but it generically named for the candy you place on tables at weddings. Wedding favour is another name for the same thing.

I think it really depends on what continent you live to what they are called. Hey, Oz and all, the land down under, that's what we call them. Specifically, the name in ref, is for a Sydney based company that sell locally only.

[jbelle]

Based on OWG's comment that bombonieres are sugar-coated almonds, I did a quick Google search for bombonieres +jordan (because in the US, these are traditionally referred to as "Jordan Almonds"). This description was available through the first result:

Bomboniere is the traditional term given to the small packages of Jordan Almonds that are presented to guests at Middle Eastern, Greek, and Italian weddings.  The sugar coating represents the sweetness of marriage and the almond, the bittersweet life.  Five Jordan Almonds per guest is traditional.  Typically the almonds are wrapped in tulle or organza rounds and tied with pretty ribbons.  Our  "extra fancy" almonds are shinier and slightly larger than lesser grade almonds.

It makes you start to realize just how many keywords you should take into consideration; for this little paragraph, it might be wise to work in the terms "favors" or "take-aways," for example.

Also, additionally off-topic: these are a popular, traditional wedding favors with several meanings behind them. The almond itself symbolizes the sweet (sugar) and bitter (almond) sides of life. Given in bunches of five almonds, they symbolize health, wealth, happiness, fertility and long life. They are traditionally given in indivisible numbers (3,5,7, etc.) to symbolize the indivisibility of marriage.

I'm sure there's also a thousand other meanings attached to them, too.

[Jill]

Ewww...I hate those jordan almonds.

[copywriter]

Well, as I said eariler:

Several factors go into making the decision about copy length including:

communication style of customer
how familiar the product/service is in the marketplace
the price of the product/service

and several other factors.

For example, if you're dealing with CEOs and corporate heads, chances are they won't tolerate copy longer than about 300 words or so on a page whether the product is old, new or anything in between. They make decisions fast and want the bottom line only.

On the other hand, if you're dealing with the average Joe who is a blue collar worker, they make decisions very slowly and require a lot of information on anything slightly new.

There is no correct answer to the question "How long should copy be." That's like asking "How long is a piece of string?" As long as it needs to be

[Ruud]

God, yeah, how long should it be... I don't think so much in terms of 'words' as I do in key presses....

See, some of my sites use the same kind of font-size and line-height as you see here in this forum. Some other pages have a larger font-size, larger line-height. Same article would get to be 1.5 to 2 x as long... page length speaking.

I work in 1024x768 mode and have found that if I open one of IE's sidebars I'm pretty much at a 800x600 view of my site. So, using a sidebar to limit my own screensize I go to the page in question, hit !page down!, !page down!, !page down! - and that is where I want my article to go to a next page or end.

Tutorials I put on one large page.

Ruud

[Randy]

In my mind how much text to put on a page has less to do with Search Engines and much more to do with what type of visitor you're hoping to attract.

Some personality types prefer longer, chattier text. Others prefer shorter "just the facts" copy.

There is no general answer in my book. You have to first know Who you're writing for, and what they expect.

[copywriter]

You're right, Randy. The SEO stuff comes *after* the target customer stuff.

[respree]

In my view, you really serve two masters; the Search Engines and Your Visitor.

I think the challenge is in finding the right balance.

Personally, I get overwhelmed by 1000+ word articles on one page, how matter how interestly its written, and my instinct is to move on.

If you do write a long article, I find it much easier on the eyes when authors break it up into serveral pages; Page 1 -> Page 2 -> etc. and kind of break the article into pages with logical sections (typically separated by a change in ideas).

My 2 cents.