Starfish, masks and copywriters.

It's been a while since I last posted here - I've been setting up my new website (same address as before but a very different look: http://www.greatcopy.info/), which has its own blog which has kept me busy.  Also I've decided to devote this blog to diving, so if you want to follow my pearls of wisdom about copywriting, words and life please go to http://greatcopy.info/blog/.  Actually, I've brought diving into the latest post there, too, but only because a word I came across was so appropriate to wreck diving.  I will try and keep them separate.  I knew there was a reason I called this blog "Starfish"....
    The thing is, I've become a bit obsessed with diving and I'm wondering how I can turn that into a business plan.  I did wonder about marketing under a fancy name the stuff I use to keep my mask clear, without telling anyone it's really baby-shampoo-and-water, but I'm not sure I'd get away with that!  [If you're a diver and have trouble keeping your mask clear, try it - it really works and it doesn't sting your eyes; "no more tears" is absolutely right.  I know spit's supposed to work, but I can't get enough of it together to do the job...  I ran out of the shampoo mix on my final dive last weekend, and I couldn't keep my mask clear at all.]
    Then I thought that there must be diving supply companies out there that need a copywriter. I haven't yet found a "hook" to approach them with; I'll have to think about that one. 
    The advice of everyone in the business is "You've got to specialise, find a niche to market to," and that would certainly be a good niche market.  It's big enough, though the major companies like Suunto probably have their own in-house writers, and it's something I know a bit about. 
    What I obviously need to do is get to one or two of the dive shows and meet some of the people in the business, get known (and, as it's business-related, I can put it on expenses.  I'm beginning to like this idea!).  The next one's Dive 2010 in Birmingham in October and there's rumoured to be one in Scotland but I can't find any sign of it.  It'd be fun to see all the kit, even if I can't afford to buy it, and get more of a feel for the lingo (that's one thing about a niche, you really have to speak the lingo fluently or you stick out like a little finger on a porcelain tea-cup).
    It's a plan of sorts; now to put it into action, starting with a warm-up email to all the Birmingham exhibitors.

    Ah well - I tried to keep it diving-related, but copywriting will keep butting in.  That's life!
  

Guess what I've just heard...

On Saturday I popped up to Aberdeen for the FSB conference.  The final speaker of the day was Kate Adie, news presenter from most of the conflicts around the world during the past umpty-tiddly years.  She was an excellent speaker (she's had a bit of practice!), amusing and incisive.

She was talking about why she loves being a journalist.  Basically her enthusiasm boils down to the fact that, as she put it, she's a grown up version of the kid in the playground who can say "Guess what I've just heard" and stun her listeners with the latest news.  She always got to be first with a story - and that doesn't stop being cool when you grow out of the playground.

Ms Adie also gave a brilliant illustration of the difference between telling a story and giving the facts.   She was covering a very poor country in Africa which had major problems with its education budget.  Rather than give the dry figures she visited a school where all the pupils gathered round their teacher while one of them was instructed to go and get something.  Very carefully the child carried out an object that was obviously very precious to them all; it turned out to be the school's one and only book.  As she said, that picture was so much more powerful than stating the facts could ever have been.

It's true of copywriting too: tell a story and you'll produce a much clearer picture in your reader's mind and, since people buy largely on emotion (with logic to back up the emotional decision, of course) that picture will sell far better than just stating the facts could ever do.  As long as you have a clear idea of your reader you'll be able to tell a story that will work for them, and you'll never have a problem selling.

If you can say "Guess what I've just heard" as well, you'll be well ahead of the game.  And you'll stay excited about your work, which means your readers will too. 

Any comments?  Fill in the box below and let me know what you think.

Charlotte Fleming
http://greatcopy.info/

24 highly effective headlines

I found this excellent advice on LinkedIn and thought it worth passing on. Hope you agree. You can use all these headlines in many different contexts - just alter to fit.

The first one is an absolute classic; the original version (dating from the very early 20th Century) was "They all laughed when I sat down at the piano. But when I started to play...".

You could also use a version of another favourite, "Do you make these mistakes in English?" - the embarrassing problem headline.

Anyway, here's the article - enjoy!

Author: Zeke Camusio of TheOutsourcingCompany

"From my own swipe file:

Underdog
They Laughed When I Told Them I Was Going to Be a Professional Weightlifter. Nobody Is Laughing Now.

Who Else?
Who Else Wants to Quit their Jobs, Spend More Time with Their Families and Make $87,000 per Year Working 2 Hours a Day from Home?

Are You Ready?
Are You Ready to Discover the Secret Marketing Formula that a Handful of Dentists in the UK Are Using to Get Thousands of Dollars a Month (Without Any Extra Work)?

How I Did It
How I Went From a Complete Rookie to Ski World Champion in Only 3 Years and How YOU Can Do the Same

How To
How to Lose 2 Pounds per Week for 8 Weeks Eating Ice-Cream

Niche Headline
For Busy Doctors Who Want to Cut Back Work Hours (But Don’t Want to Earn Less Money!)

If You Are…, You Can…
If You Are a Doctor Who Makes More than $100,000 per Year, You Can Pay 42% Less in Taxes!

Secrets
Successful Serial Entrepreneur Reveals the 6 Secrets that Helped Her Make Millions Selling Informational Products

Warning
Warning! If You Mess This One Thing Up in Your Mortgage Application, Your Banker Can Take Your Home!

Give Me… and I’ll Show You…
Give me 90 Seconds And I’ll Show You How You Can Have a Flat Tummy in 3 Weeks

Ways
5 Ways to Make More Money With Your Existing Website Without Getting More Traffic. Guaranteed!

Celebrity
What Would Brad Pitt Say if He Saw You Wearing This Dress?

Illegal
A Money-Making System So Easy that Should Be Illegal

Direct Statement
Get 1.25% Cash Back on All Your Purchases!

Question
Are You Sick of Your “Love Handles”? Don’t You Wish They Would Just Go Away? What If I Told You that You Can Make them Disappear with 2 Simple Exercises that Won’t Take You More than 6 Minutes per Day?

Testimonial
Microsoft Has Increased their Online Sales 142% in 2008 Using Our MarketPack. You Can Do the Same. Discover How!

Command
This Is Your Chance to Lower Your Long-Distance Call Costs. Take It!

Guarantee
Natural Cream Guaranteed to Completely Eliminate Your Acne in 13 Days –or 110% Money Back and You Keep the Product!

Problem/Solution
What Would Happen if Your Computer Crashed Right Now? How Much Valuable Data Would You Lose? Here’s How You Can Make Sure This NEVER Happens to You

Discount
5 DVDs. 5 Bucks. No Commitments. No Strings Attached. Act NOW!

Reasons
9 Reasons Why You Need to Stop Complaining About the Economy and Do Something About Your Business Right Now

Story
How a Single Mom with Two Kids Managed to Get Out of Debt and Save $20,000 in 11 Months without Working Extra Hours

News
Doctors Astounded by New Miracle Pill that Increases Chances of Getting Pregnant by 211%

Not This… But This…
No “Get Rich Fast” Scams. No MLM Lies. No “Build It and They’ll Come” BS. Just Down-to-Earth Tips for the Smart Business Owner.

And remember: you can combine two or more of these tactics into one headline!"

Jargoning on and on

As my regular reader(s) may know, I started learning to scuba dive in November and I'm now trying to get the kit together. I've found a dry suit with all the thermal undies for a very good price on eBay, and I'll be trying it for the first time in the pool on Monday, so fingers crossed that the obviously new zip has been properly fitted. I think I'll leave the undersuit off for the evening, just in case! It might be a tad too hot in the pool, too, as it's slightly warmer than the North Sea.

Next on the list is a boyancy compensator (BC, BCD or stab jacket), gas cylinder (or bottle), 1st stage, 2nd stage (regulator), BC air hose etc. As you may have noticed, there's a lot of jargon involved here - I had to look it all up on the internet because our training doesn't cover the intricacies of 1st stage, 2nd stage and so on - we're just told "This is your reg, this is the octopus (or AS), this puts air in your BC, this one's your gauge - oh and you'll need another air hose for your dry suit, of course".

That's all very well, but when you start looking for the gear on the 'net everyone suddenly gets very technical. They don't talk about regs and octopusses... not even for second-hand sales on eBay. I know there's an argument to be made for correct description, but not to the point of excluding people who need the right gear to stay alive 20 metres under the sea. Well, other people have obviously had this problem before, so when I Googled "scuba dive jargon" I found several lists explaining everything I need to know and then some. Thank heavens - and whoever wrote them! Like Scots, I can't speak the language very well yet, but at least I'm beginning to understand it.

Again, the other day I was talking to someone about wine-speak. I spent 15 years in the wine trade, latterly teaching evening classes to consumers, so I know quite a lot about wine-speak. It used to make my sister roar with laughter when I talked about a wine having "biscuits on the nose". Made sense to me, but she had a wee mental picture of a small dog sitting up and balancing a biscuit on his muzzle. When you're trying to describe the often quite small differences between one Champagne and another, you need a good list of flavour-associations; people in the trade know what you're talking about, everyone else just gapes.

One way and another, it all got me thinking about jargon and how so many people think it's OK to plaster it all over their web pages. It will be, if the only people who ever read the pages are in the know (e.g. a site written by an engineering company to be read by other engineers). But what if, like me with the scuba kit, readers know they need the stuff but haven't a clue what you're talking about? This is where a good copywriter can really help, by keeping it simple and using layman's terms if at all possible; if not, by creating a glossary that can either go on a separate page or in a box at the side of the page where the jargon's being used.

I also think some people use jargon to try and confuse you into buying stuff you don't need - I definitely got that impression when I tried to buy a new domain name at GoDaddy a few weeks ago (see "Website Drama in NE Scotland", below). I got so muddled and befuddled I just left the site and registered the name elsewhere, and I think a lot of people do the same.

So if you're writing a site for something that tends to use jargon, my advice would be to follow Henry Ford's dictum: KISS (Keep It Simple and Straightforward - that's the polite version anyway!). Avoid jargon like the plague. Cliches, on the other hand.... but that's a different story.

To find out more about GreatCopy go to http://greatcopy.info/ or phone +44 (0)1241 828620.

What's your market?

I bought two pairs of apparently identical trousers by mail order the other day. When they arrived I tried one pair on to make sure they'd fit, as sizes vary so much. They were fine. Then I tried the other pair on and they were a bit tight. Not bad enough to need sending back, but definitely smaller than the other pair.




It got me thinking. They were probably cut out by machine, so the pattern pieces will have been the same size for both pairs. Only when the pieces went to the (human) machinist did the size alter - but not sufficiently for them to be re-classified as a smaller size or to be sold as seconds. They're fine, just not the same as the other pair.


It's human input that makes the difference.




Same with writing. Two people can work on an assignment (say writing an article for a web site) and produce completely different pieces. Identical subject, different angle. Or, if it's a re-write to keep a web page fresh, they'll make different choices of words and change the whole feel of the article.


That's what makes copywriting so interesting: the individual slant each of us brings to a piece of writing. It's also why one person will write better for business-to-consumer (B2C) copy while another is better at business-to-business (B2B): the first will have a chattier style, the other a more formal, less sales-orientated one. Some lucky people can manage both and they really thrive.



B2C tends to fairly niched - you write a good sales letter for one business and its competitors ask you to write for them too. Writing for B2B is much more varied - you never know whether you'll be writing a Company Report for an oil company, a brochure promoting a conference venue or a website for a high-end leather-goods company catering to executives. You're still in the persuasion business, but you can leave out all the high emotion of B2C sales copy.



It can take a while to discover your style, but once you've found it you're half-way to finding your clients; you at least know which sector you're aiming for (B2C or B2B). They both pay well, once you've got a bit of experience under your belt, and there's plenty of work in both areas.



Which way do you think your talents lie? Worth a thought...