The Science of a Great Slogan

November 27, 2007 | 7 Comments

Whether it’s writing a billboard ad, news story or blog post, the most important part is nailing your headline message. It’s your witty slogan or hard hitting headline that will grab attention. Then once you’ve hooked people’s interest you can start reeling them towards your call for action.

But perfecting the impact of your slogan or headline can also be the most agonizing part of composing your copy, and is getting harder all the time.

If you were to listen to the panic on the falling effectiveness of advertising you’d think the days of clever metaphors and witty wordplay in copywriting were numbered. The consensus being that people are saturated with so many ads that they’ve simply become oblivious to the daily downpour of slogans and sales messages.

But devices such as metaphor, alliteration and rhyme are just too effective to ever die. If people are getting ad weary then this just raises the bar for copywriters to think up ever more ingenious ways of breaking their language’s rules, and spark interest with each combination of five or so words.

The best way of selling might be through education and informative value. But there will always be room for an inventive strapline or two.

However, finding the right combination of words to hook people onto your message can be a tricky puzzle. Some ad writers might like to think that the next great tagline will just materialize when they’re out walking the dog, or relaxing in the garden to recharge their alpha waves.

In reality, however, a great slogan will often only appear after hours of brainstorming, and many reams of paper.

Wouldn’t life be great if there was a scientific approach that could be applied to how a strapline is formulated? What are the principles that explain why a certain combination of words can sell millions of trainers, and others just leave people cold?

Well, I was directed via N3W Media’s blog to an article by Nick Padmore in which he uses a list of the 115 best slogans, headlines and taglines to assess their defining characteristics. Then through a process of elimination, Nick concludes what is the greatest piece of ad copy of all time.

So, was it the US Army’s ‘Be all you can be’, AT&T’s ‘Reach out and touch someone’ or Felix’s ‘Cat’s like Felix like Felix’?

Just follow the link for insight into a true professional’s infatuation with the English language, and discover what is ‘The Greatest Copy Shot Ever Written’.

Posted by Matt Ambrose | Filed Under Blog, Copywriting

My Blog Grows into a Fully Functioning Website

November 19, 2007 | 8 Comments

I’ve recently been hearing more comments on using WordPress to build an entire website. I’ve always kept an ear open for these sort of discussions because my blog is where people will land when they search my key phrases, rather than on my business website (I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before, but I’m one of the top sites in Google for ‘copywriter’).

Well, I’m pleased to announce that The Copywriter’s Crucible is no longer merely a blog but an entire website, with its own individual home page.

I bought the ‘Revolution‘ theme from Brian Gardner (one of the best wordpress designers around as far as I’m concerned), which I’ve customized to reflect my own branding and business requirements.

Now when people arrive looking for a copywriting service they’ll be greeted by a more professional looking home page and (hopefully) won’t immediately click away because they think they’ve been misdirected to an online diary.

Having a WordPress based website offers numerous advantages over something I’d stapled together in Dreamweaver: it’s easier to update, it provides an RSS feed to help drive my marketing, improved SEO, commenting functionality for visitors and an endless supply of plugins to keep it motoring along at peak performance.

I think everybody should, by now, be in agreement that static websites are dated and inadequate for marketing online. With my new template design, I intend to prove why you need a constantly evolving web presence if you want to attract visitors and convert them into customers.

Posted by Matt Ambrose | Filed Under About, Blog

Are You Ready to Greet Curious George and Doubting Thomas this Christmas?

November 14, 2007 | Leave a Comment

It would appear that online shoppers on both sides of the pond are oblivious to the credit crunch, and are whipping out their credit cards faster than ever. Nearly half will be increasing their online spend this holiday spend, with Â£40 billion added to shopping carts in the UK alone this Christmas.

This year’s increase is just part of the continuing shift online as shoppers become more familiar with the net, and choose to avoid the crowds, cues and high petrol prices for the comfort of their own home.

With competition fierce, the quality of the online experience could make the difference between a bumper Christmas or the tightening of belts for retailers.

Knowing how to provide a user friendly, intuitive website, and preventing shopping carts getting abandoned at the checkout, is all about understanding the mind set of your customer.

Part of any copywriting project is to get into the head of your target prospect; to understand the needs, wants and desires that will trigger them to buy.

The same process applies online, but now there’s the added complication of how people respond to websites, and being able to build trust when they can’t touch.

Well, eStara (who specialize in click to call software) have put together a breakdown of the different visitors you can expect at your website (via bsofb.blogspot.com):

Runaway shopper – spend hours wandering the aisles, seemingly relaxed, filling up their shopping cart but then they panic when the reach the checkout, and do a runner. They make up the majority of your visitors and need reassuring.

Doubting Thomas – has only recently started browsing online and is used to doing everything in person. They’ve read about online scams in their newspaper and they’re not about to fooled. Thomas is going to need convincing why you can be trusted to deliver what you promise.

Hail Mary – knows exactly what she wants and where to get it but, like Doubting Thomas, she feels buying from you would be a leap of faith, and will also need convincing.

The Gambler – is shopping around for a particular service but wants to limit the risk. With so many websites offering the same deal, he’s going to need to know why betting his chips on you is going to come up trumps. How do you differentiate yourself from the competition in a crowded marketplace?

Curious George – is intrigued and would be happy to buy if you can answer all his questions, which are numerous. A common visitor to high-tech outlets.

So, whichever shopper visits you this Christmas, make sure you’ve put some thought into how you’re going to gain their trust and reassure them throughout the sales process.

In the run up to Christmas, UK high streets will become warzones of competitive discounting to snare every last weary shopper.

The online world might not be quite so cutthroat, but if you don’t want to just get sucked into competing on price find other ways of differentiating yourself and offering value to your visitors.

Posted by Matt Ambrose | Filed Under Blog, Marketing

Can You Write Shorter and Simpler?

November 8, 2007 | 8 Comments

As shocking as it might be to some writers, not everybody reads regularly.

In fact, most stop reading books after they’ve left school. It’s questionable whether some even started.

Many would suggest that TV and other modern distractions are causing literacy levels to drop.

If reading levels are falling, will writing standards have to as well?

Last week it was announced that the reading age of the UK’s school children hadn’t improved since the 1950s.

With manufacturing and other industries uprooting and heading East, it’s hardly surprising that the government has desperately poured Â£500 million into trying to create a more literate future workforce.

However, the failure to get more children hooked on books is an entrenched problem that’s going to be difficult to shift.

Â£6 billion is already being spent on a similar scheme aimed at the UK’s adult workforce. It’s believed that half (16 million) have a reading age that’s little better than that of an 11 year old upon leaving primary school, worrying indeed if your future lies in trying to build a nationwide high-tech service industry to rival China.

The US might also be facing a similar problem because last week Bob Bly questioned ‘Is Reading Dead?’ in response to the suggestion that the average 15 to 19 year old reads for less than ten minutes at weekends.

But it’s not just teenagers that are struggling to find the time or inclination to bury their nose in a novel.

Brian Clark’s ‘Teaching Sells’ course is geared around converting educational literature into easily digestible chunks.

People are getting so book shy that they’re prepared to pay to be spoon fed knowledge, rather than brave their local library.

If the collapse of reading skills becomes a pandemic then internet writing is the form most likely to survive.

Web surfers scan words and have the attention spans of goldfish, so writing for the web already has to be concise, and you have to keep it short and simple, if you want to get your message across.

Long words and sentences the size of paragraphs are a literary species best suited to the offline world, and could become endangered if adequate reading levels can’t be sustained.

If people aren’t reading and getting less adept at processing words with their brains, will writers eventually have to start simplifying their language?

Are you going to have to start eliminating four syllable words from your vocabulary altogether? And wielding an axe to every sentence that can survive the trauma of being split in two?

I think such an apocalyptic vision for western writers is still a long way off.

But it might be a good idea to start learning Chinese just in case.

[If you've found this post of interest then I hope you might consider nominating The Copywriter's Crucible for Michael Stelzner's shortlist for this year's best blogs for writers. I somehow smuggled my way into the shortlist last year, but didn't quite have enough momentum to break into the final ten. Hopefully, with your support, this year I can go all the way]

Posted by Matt Ambrose | Filed Under Blog, Copywriting