 |
| Samuel Johnson by Sir Joshua Reynolds |
Samual Johnson (January 20, 1759)
Isn't it amazing how little has changed in advertising over the course of 256 years? We either do things well or we do things badly and it isn't hard to figure out which of the two we see more often in advertising.
I grew up with my father telling me at every opportunity that "Simplicity is Most Profound"...
As I have become more involved through the years with helping other businesses to promote their products and services on the internet, my father's words have come back to me time and time again with ever increasing effect.
Businesses have a tendency to want a complicated message. They generally believe that their message cannot be boiled down to a singular, simple thought without becoming meaningless to the consumer.
When I first began writing for effect, way back in High school, I thought I was God's gift to teachers. I was brilliant and my intellectual desire towered over that of my peers. Back then, I thought that good writing was showing off my command of the English language by stuffing every page of every essay with as many flowery descriptions and as many complicated words with as many syllables as possible.
Then in my Junior year, the English teacher began destroying my sense of self and my papers by counting every unnecessary word against my grade. The first few papers came back looking like they had been painted over in red. I had to rethink my entire strategy for writing. The new paradigm (demanded by a real teacher) was writing to convey meaning in the simplest and most specific terms.
All of that to provide this simple tip. When writing your ad copy, write the entire message you want to convey to your audience. Be thinking of your audience (customers) as you are writing. Think of why your customers are buying your products or paying for your services. Be thinking of what it is that distinguishes your business from your competition. Then, once you have written for effect, start taking away unnecessary words until you have refined and distilled your message to your customers down to its very essence.
More likely than not, you will have better ad copy from this process than if you paid a pro to do it for you. NOBODY knows your business like you do and so there can be nobody that can sell your business better than you can.
