The most common feedback we get after a copy refresh is some version of 'it sounds like us.' That sounds like a low bar. It is not. Most website copy sounds like a press release written by someone who has never met the business owner. Getting copy to sound like a real person, the specific person running this specific business, is harder than it looks and more valuable than most people expect.
Start by talking, not writing ¶
The best copy we have written at Jibble & Mesh started with a conversation, not a blank document. We ask founders to describe their business as if they are talking to a friend at a garden party who has just asked what they do. Not the elevator pitch. The actual answer. That version is almost always more interesting, more specific, and more human than anything they have written down. Record it. Transcribe it. Start there.
The about page is not your CV ¶
About pages are where copy goes to die. They are full of founding dates, mission statements, and lists of values that every other business in the category also claims. The about page should tell a story with a specific turning point. Why did you start this? What did you get wrong at first? What do you know now that you did not know then? Those are the details that make a reader feel like they are dealing with a real person.
Cut the adjectives, keep the nouns ¶
Adjectives are where copy gets vague. 'High-quality,' 'passionate,' 'dedicated,' '.' None of these mean anything because every business claims them. Nouns and verbs are where the specificity lives. Not 'we use quality ingredients' but 'we buy our flour from a mill in the Willamette Valley and our butter from a co-op outside Salem.' The second version is longer and better.
Read it out loud before you publish it ¶
If you cannot read a sentence out loud without stumbling, it is not ready. Website copy is read at speed, often on a phone, often while distracted. If it does not flow when spoken, it will not land when read. This is the simplest editing test and the one most people skip.
If your website copy is not doing what you need it to do, a Copy Refresh is a contained, fixed-price way to fix it. We rewrite up to five pages and leave you with a voice document so you can write consistently going forward.