Case study: How a copywriter for architects defined a new brand voice and drove online visibility for a new practice

When a new Harrogate-based practice needed a copywriter for architects to refine their website messaging, they turned to me to ensure their new content would engage prospects, deliver against SEO objectives and reflect their new brand.

Grace & Morris is an architecture practice in Harrogate, Yorkshire, which provides a full planning, design and project management service for high-end residential properties. The team behind Grace & Morris had already established a successful practice in Leeds and wanted to differentiate their new venture, with a lifestyle-focused appeal that would appeal to affluent homeowners.

The brief

The team had built their own website and – wary of outsourcing their vision to others – had written their own website copy. The marketing manager was keen to use a copywriter for architects who could optimise the copy and give it a ‘lift’.
The team’s brief was simple: “Review the website copy and ‘polish it up’ so it works as hard as possible.” The team had an SEO expert lined up who was ready to optimise the website once the copy was finalised.

How we worked

We started with a project kick-off call. This allowed the team to share everything they needed and for me to ask questions. The two owners and the marketing manager joined this call which was essential to make sure all I could gather all the important information. This call also gave me an insight into the team dynamics so I knew the best way to communicate with them.

Many businesses find it difficult to articulate their brand tone of voice, and this architecture practice was no different. I shared my tone of voice form to help the team express how they wanted to align the copy with their visual branding. They reviewed this and completed it together before passing it back to me. I then talked through the responses with the marketing manager to make sure I understood the rationale behind their responses.

Once I had all the information I needed, I started work. I created a first draft, wrote up my suggestions and rationale for certain elements and then sent this to the team for them to review.

The feedback process

The architect owners and marketing manager discussed the first draft copy together and input some of it into the website so they could visualise how it would work. We then had a feedback call to agree on the next steps. I took this feedback on board and made the changes we’d agreed.

Once these two rounds of work were complete, we handled further small tweaks through quick phone calls and emails. The team showed me how the copy appeared on the website, which allowed me to adapt the messaging so it would look good and be easy to read.

“Laura’s professional eye refined our content with a perfect balance of commercial focus and respect for our brand tone of voice”

Timeframe

This was a relatively small project, and took four weeks from kick-off call to final approval for all content, including case studies.

Results

The website was finalised in good time for the pre-launch campaign, supporting the architecture practice’s programme of activity. Despite initially planning to optimise the website copy for SEO, this wasn’t needed. The copy I’d written already delivered against SEO requirements and is (at the time of writing) currently sitting in the top half of the first page of Google results. The team continue to write their own high-quality blog articles and case studies which are helping support this position.

You can visit the Grace & Morris website here.

Here’s what Tina Hutchinson, the marketing manager at Grace & Morris said about working with me:

“Like most businesses, we feel passionate and protective of our brand, so finding a copywriter who appreciates that, who is experienced enough to challenge constructively and move at pace can be tricky. We were lucky enough to find Laura to do just that!”
“I am proud to say we had created a solid foundation internally, but Laura’s professional eye refined our content with a perfect balance of commercial focus and respect for our brand tone of voice, all whilst creating a cohesive flow that enhanced the overall user experience.
I’d feel confident to recommend Laura to anyone looking for expert input to take their content to the next level.”