Want to see our work in action? Get a sample by reading through our case studies:

• Sherwin-Williams – Content Development for Kaleidoscope Magazine
• Specialized Business Solutions – Copywriting for Ad Campaign
• School Source International – Content Planning, Copywriting/Copyediting, Chinese Translation, Project Management
• Right Fit – Web Copywriting and Consulting
• Independence Excavating – Copywriting and Content Development
• Jakprints – Copywriting and Content Development
• Signature Days – User Research for New Website
• Spectrum Global Solutions – Copywriting

SHERWIN-WILLIAMS – Content Development for Kaleidoscope Magazine

The Fortune 500 company Sherwin-Williams decided to revamp their internal magazine Kaleidoscope, and wanted to expand the reach of their magazine coverage to spotlight success stories from their growing Asia-Pacific operations headquartered in Shanghai. The Wu Way’s knack for writing compelling content, interviewing skills, and fluency in Mandarin Chinese allowed Sherwin-Williams to deliver engaging stories in English about many of the front-line employees in Asia and showcase more of the company’s diversity.

With The Wu Way’s assistance, Sherwin-Williams was able to significantly boost coverage of their Asia-Pacific operations. Download a selection of The Wu Way’s Asia-Pacific coverage for Kaleidoscope.

Want to boost coverage about your Asia-Pacific operations for a global audience? Contact us today.

SPECIALIZED BUSINESS SOLUTIONS – Copywriting for Ad Campaign

Specialized Business Solutions (SBS) publishes the POS software program Keystroke, and sells it through dealers. They wanted to create an ad campaign that would build brand identity and perception among their dealer channel to 1) attract new dealers and 2) remotivate current dealers to sell more. GatherHouse brought The Wu Way in to provide copywriting services for the ad campaign.

We interviewed SBS to understand their business, audience, unique selling points, and company personality. Two important things emerged:

1. SBS wanted to be perceived as an honest company with an outstanding product and outstanding support to their dealers.
2. SBS had four major selling points: 1) great margins 2) personal service (they actually answer the phone) 3) breadth of the software itself 4) all software is sold through dealers.

We decided to base each of the four ads around one of these four selling points. With a little creative brainstorming, the Wu Way came up with a headline for each ad that reflecting the honest, supportive personality of SBS. After approval from SBS, we crafted friendly, conversational copy that spoke to their current and prospective dealers, while GatherHouse created a design that truly reached out and touched the reader. The result? See for yourself in these PDFs of the full, vertical ads:

1. Up to 60% margins and more. Honest.
2. Live humans answer your tech support calls. Really.
3. POS software so flexible, objections disappear. Absolutely.
4. You’re our only distribution channel. It’s true.

Interested in creating your own ad campaign? Contact us today.

SCHOOL SOURCE INTERNATIONAL – Content Planning, Copywriting/Copyediting, Chinese Translation, Project Management

School Source International (SSI), based in Beijing, China, offers learning resources and books to global educators through smarter supply lines for greater value. SSI came to the Wu Way because they needed to upgrade their website onto a more user-friendly CRM platform, as well as edit and create new content in English and Chinese.

We decided to bring in a web development firm with experience in CRM platforms, and they suggested we build the new SSI website using Drupal. At the same time, the Wu Way began planning the new content for the site. We suggested:

• Adding landing pages to the different sections, helping visitors to get an overview of all pages within a section;
• Breaking up their About Us information (which previously sat on one webpage) into several pages for ease of use;
• Creating a customer service page that would reinforce their service orientation, and make it easier for customers to contact them with questions or concerns;
• Section titles that enhanced website usability.

With a new content map in place, we worked with SSI’s marketing department to adapt their current brochure content for the web, tightening up the language and adding links and bulleting, where necessary. Since most of the Chinese translations came from SSI’s translator, we provided quality assurance by proofreading and editing the Chinese content. We also chose appropriate section titles in Chinese for usability.

To support the web development firm’s work on moving the website into Drupal, we managed the website development process. This included keeping track of all minute enhancements and fixes, and coordinating communication between all parties.

The results? Here’s what the CEO, Fritz Libby, had to say: “Web site looks awesome, thanks!!” Have a look at School Source International’s website for yourself.

Need assistance with building your website, or creating new web content (in English or Chinese)? Contact us today.

RIGHT FIT – Web Copywriting and Consulting

Right Fit is a flattering brand of jeans for the full-figured woman from Charming Shoppes. When Coexist, a web design firm, was brought in to give the Right Fit website a facelift and make it user-friendly, Coexist called on the Wu Way to help with web copywriting.

We studied the voice and feel of the previous Right Fit website, as well as complementary publications such as Figure Magazine, to craft seamless copy in specific website sections that was confident, cool, and inspiring to the audience. In addition, we also brainstormed the name for the online game, Right Fit Mania, and provided suggestions for how to make the webpages more user-friendly.

See our work in action on these pages:

• The Problem: Not all curves are created equal (body copy)
• The Study: Technology, fashion and fit collide (body copy)
• The Results: So revolutionary. So Right (body copy)
• Body copy for Lane Bryant, Catherine’s and Fashion Bug
• Right Fit Mania intro copy
• Figure and Figure Community intro copy

Need help with crafting a unique voice for your web copy? Contact us today.

INDEPENDENCE EXCAVATING – Copywriting and Content Development

Independence Excavating is one of the most accomplished construction companies in Northeast Ohio, and has a knack for tackling the challenging jobs that other construction companies shy away from.

They decided it was time to have a website that reflected who they were, and provided the right information to their target customers, collaborators and potential and current employees.

We were brought into the website development project as a part of Sprokets. Initially, FrantzID (a member of Sprokets) had worked with Independence Excavating to provide them with a clear vision for the website based on what their target users would want — including personas and scenarios, feature maps, and wireframes. Independence Excavating was so excited by the results of the discovery that they were ready to have Sprokets move forward with the production. Sprokets invited us to handle the copywriting and general content production.

Consistency in voice had been an issue in the former website — and the content coming in from the client. We made sure to keep the voice in a conversational yet businesslike tone, and consistent throughout the new website.

Getting the right information was key here. Independence Excavating has pulled off some amazing engineering feats, often making the impossible possible out the field. Yet some project overviews were missing the challenges, solutions and results of their efforts. We worked closely with Independence Excavating to fill in the gaps of information, and then wrote up tight project profiles that showed their impressive roles in each job.

Though FrantzID already mapped out the content in the wireframes, we needed to give some sections a major facelift. For example, the initial Relocation copy had only a short paragraph on Cleveland as the Economist’s most livable city, with a long list of institutions in the area and phone numbers — hardly enough to showcase the region. We turned around and instead wrote up a Relocation page addressing every aspect of relocating to Cleveland, highlighting the selling points of the region — from our world-renowned health care and cultural institutions to amazing park systems and celebrated cuisine. The result is a picture of the city that any Clevelander would be proud of.

In fact, Independence Excavating liked the copy so much, they decided to use it for their brochures as well.

Other Sprokets teammates on this project included Minch Design for the visual design, Jason Parkin for the flash, Reha Sterbin for the backend development, and Nontoxic Group for backend and technology assistance.

Need help with writing for your website? Contact us today.

JAKPRINTS — Copywriting and Content Development

Jakprints handles jobs for everyone from major players such as Tori Amos and the Cleveland Cavaliers to local churches and nonprofits.

To differentiate themselves from other printers — and help educate customers and employees — Sprokets was working with Jakprints to develop webpages that illustrated their full printing capabilities. Since the Sprokets team had worked so long with Jakprints, and lacked that “fresh perspective” on their service offerings, they brought us in to handle the content production and copywriting.

First, we interviewed Jakprints to gather information about what makes their capabilities unique, and what benefits are provided in each specific service. We also learned about the important details such as pricing, turnaround and how to order.

We took this information and created an outline for each set of capabilities. After outlining, we went to work on the actual writing, crafting text that was conversational, inviting and informative — just what customers would want. We also developed an overall headline for each page and a powerful introduction that summarized what made that set of capabilities stand out. The result? See for yourself on the Capabilities pages.

FrantzID provided content planning and interview support as well as backend assistance, Jim Kosem did wireframing, Minch Design and Dan Ott worked on the visual design, Reha Sterbin did backend creation, Nontoxic Group handled backend support and technology assistance, and Right Click Marketing brought it all together with project management help.

Need help with writing for your website? Contact us today.

SIGNATURE DAYS – User Research for New Website

Signature Days‘ CEO came to Sprokets with the idea of building a new website. After some discussion, he realized he needed a solid research foundation before getting into the website. It was major undertaking and he wanted to nail the business model and user experience the first time around. Signature Days contracted Sprokets to handle the work. Since there was an interest in China here, Sprokets thought the Wu Way would be perfect to step in and help with interviewing and creating personas.

After an initial interview, we sat down and determined target user groups — and narrowed down interview candidates, including a handful of folks from China. Interviews then provided a rich set of data that was used to create personas — profiles of the most important target users for the site. We modeled the personas in a number of scenarios, which the Sprokets team used to generate a map of web features.

Signature Days was wowed by the powerful and informative results. They ended up with a set of documentation that paved a clear path for the website, recommending the features and experience target users would want. Not surprisingly, Signature Days is continuing to work with Sprokets on the development of the website.

FrantzID did most of the documentation, the majority of mental modeling and project management, and contributed to the initial and ongoing market research. Jim Kosem tag-teamed with us on the interviews and creation of personas/scenarios. Right-Click Marketing and Nontoxic Group contributed to the market research.

Need help with planning your website? Contact us today.

SPECTRUM GLOBAL SOLUTIONS – Copywriting

Spectrum Global Solutions is a company focused on helping small businesses start up, improve productivity, or launch into international trade.

But you wouldn’t have known that from the bio I read of their founder, Michael Obi. Moreover, his original bio provided little insight into his personal strengths. So Michael came to me to create a bio that reflected who he was and exactly what he does as a business.

The new bio leaves the reader with no doubts about what Spectrum does, or Michael’s ability to deliver results. The new bio includes an introduction to the company in language that leaves no ambiguity about Spectrum’s services. Then, after stating Michael’s strengths, the bio provides examples of his ability in each area to demonstrate that he doesn’t just talk the talk, he lives it.

Need help with your bio or other collateral? Contact us today.