Treecard’s audience-specific headline

Is it egotistical to include your own work in a swipe file? 100%. And we're not going to make a habit of it. But getting 161,000 sign ups on day 1 made it feel like we should include it.

The brief Treecard gave us was to write a hero headline for their website — for a debit card that plants a tree every time you spend — aimed at a millennial audience, without any of the usual sustainability copy lingo.

Our first attempt was to try something sticky and rhyme-y like "plant a tree with every coffee". But, let's be honest, that's a bit crap. And it felt like the customer was paying extra for the tree, too. Not what we wanted. Straight in the bin.

And after more (and more) crappy headlines, we broke our own rule (always making the customer the hero) and wrote this instead.

And it worked for two reasons.

The first is that it's super specific. "You buy Gaga tickets" isn't "you go about your daily life" or "you spend money on the things you love." It's Gaga tickets. Which immediately signals: we know who you are. We're not talking to everyone. We're talking to you.

And we know from the research we looked at Frida that 74% of consumers say brand loyalty is built on feeling understood and valued. And being super specific is one of the fastest routes to that feeling. The more specific the reference, the more the right reader feels seen, and the more the wrong reader self-selects out. Boom.

The second reason is that it shows the product in action, it doesn't describe it. Most hero headlines try to do too much — describe the product, communicate the mission, establish the tone, and inspire action all at once. We just wanted to make sure the reader understood the mechanic on a gut-level by the time they'd read 7 words.

This is called experiential copywriting, where copy makes the reader mentally simulate using or experiencing a product rather than learning about the product. Studies have shown that this leads to significantly stronger purchase intentions than analytical, feature-based copy. Essentially, our brains rehearse the experience of using the brand before we buy it, which creates a feeling of familiarity and desire for that product. Smart, eh?

Here's how to steal this: take a look at your headlines and ask yourself whether there's a way to rewrite them so the customer experiences your product, they don't just read about it. Can you use sensory words? Tell a story? Get really specific with the details?

The more a customer feels like they already know your product, the more they'll want to buy.