Writing the Same Service for Two Audiences

One service, two buyers

An electrician rewires a kitchen for a homeowner one week and looks after the lighting in a property manager's six buildings the next. An accountant does one family's tax return and a company's year-end.

The work is much the same. The buyers are not.

The homeowner is spending their own money, once, on their own house, and worries about mess, price and letting a stranger in.

The property manager is spending somebody else's money, regularly, and worries about insurance, invoices and what happens when a resident complains.

A single page written for both usually serves neither: too formal for one, too thin for the other, and long enough that each wades through answers meant for somebody else.

How the two buyers differ

• Whose money: their own, or a client's or employer's.
• How often: once in ten years, or every month.
• Who else decides: a partner, or a council, board or owner.
• What worries them: mess and cost, or liability and complaints.
• What they need from you: reassurance, or paperwork.
• How they pay: on the day, or on an invoice with terms.

The third is the one most service pages ignore. A property manager rarely decides alone; they need something to forward to a strata council or an owner, and a page written for a homeowner gives them nothing to forward.

The questions each one asks

Homeowners ask how much, roughly, and how soon. Whether you clean up, whether they need to be home, whether a permit is needed, and what happens if something goes wrong.

Property managers ask about your insurance and workers' compensation coverage, and whether you can send the certificates. How you notify residents, what your payment terms are, and who answers after hours.

The overlap is smaller than it looks. Both care about quality and price, but they search with different words and want different proof.

Separate pages or separate sections

Where both audiences bring substantial work, give each its own page, written from start to finish for that reader.

Separate pages also match how people search. A homeowner types the job and the town; a property manager adds words such as strata, commercial or maintenance contract.

Where one audience is small, a clearly headed section on the main page will do, as long as it is genuinely separate: its own heading, its own questions, its own way to get in touch.

What does not work is alternating sentences, the page that says homeowners and businesses alike in every paragraph.

Make the split obvious at the door

Visitors should be able to pick their side within seconds, from two clear links near the top of the home page and each service page.

Word them the way each buyer describes themselves. Homeowners, and strata and property managers, beats residential and commercial, which are the business's words rather than the customer's.

Then keep each page on its side. A manager who clicks through and meets a photograph of a family's backyard wonders whether they took a wrong turn.

Different proof for different readers

Homeowners want evidence you can be trusted in their house: reviews from people like them, photographs of finished work at homes like theirs, the name of who will turn up.

Managers want evidence you are low-risk: the kinds of buildings you look after, how long you have held contracts, insurance and safety details, and references they can call.

Mixing the two weakens both. A homeowner skims past insurance limits; a manager learns little from a review praising a friendly crew.

A worked example

A tree service with two crews works for homeowners and, more and more, for strata complexes and commercial property managers.

Its site had one services page, written mainly for homeowners: removal, pruning, stump grinding and storm clean-up, with photographs of backyards and a quote form asking for a home address.

Property managers who found it phoned with the same questions every time: insurance, workers' compensation coverage, notice to residents, invoicing the strata, and whether the company would quote on a yearly maintenance plan.

Several asked for a written summary to take to council, and the office manager wrote much the same email again and again.

The company split the page. The residential page kept the backyards and the quote form.

A new page for strata and commercial properties covered insurance, notice to residents, invoicing, yearly plans and after-hours storm response, with a one-page summary councils could download.

The home page gained two links near the top: one for homeowners, one for strata and property managers.

Writing each version

Write each page as if the other audience did not exist. Start with the reader's situation, not the service: a tree leaning towards the house, or a council that wants hazards dealt with before winter storms.

Use their vocabulary. Homeowners say backyard and quote; managers say common property, scope and work order. The same job described in each set of words reads as two specific offers.

Keep the facts identical. Prices, guarantees and safety practices must agree between the pages, since some readers will see both.

Forms and replies

A homeowner's form asks for an address and a description. A manager's may need the property name, the number of units, a purchase order number or a council deadline.

Send each form to whoever handles that kind of work, so the reply comes from somebody who speaks that buyer's language.

Individuals and companies too

The split is not only homeowners and managers. A cleaning company cleans homes and offices. An IT business looks after one family's laptops and a firm's network. A locksmith rekeys a house and manages an office's master keys.

In each case the test is the same. If the two buyers ask different first questions, they need different first paragraphs.

The counter-case

Some businesses have one real audience and an occasional exception. A second page for a handful of commercial jobs a year adds upkeep without helping anyone; a short paragraph will do.

Splitting also doubles the writing, and both pages have to be kept current. Two half-finished pages are worse than one good one, so start with the audience that brings the most work.

But where both bring real work, each deserves its own explanation: separate pages or clearly separate sections, with the questions each actually asks.

The order to write it in

1. List what each audience asks on the phone.
2. Choose pages or sections by the work each brings.
3. Name each audience in its own words.
4. Write each version as if it stood alone.
5. Match the proof to the reader.
6. Give each its own form and inbox.
7. Check the facts agree across both.

Step one is the one that does most of the writing. The questions staff already answer by phone, sorted by who asked them, are the outlines of the two pages.

Helping each visitor see which side they have landed on is covered in visitors who cannot tell where they are.

Frequently asked questions

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.