MarCom Professional

With 55 million updates on Twitter every day and several million more on Facebook, it’s no wonder marketers are excited about social media.

Whilst making a message that goes ‘viral’ is more pot luck than a defined strategy, you can certainly improve your message’s chances of being shared by including links to social media sites.

You’d have thought adding links to Facebook and Twitter in B2C marketing emails was a no brainer these days. It doesn’t cost anything to do, and it offers pure, sweet ROI.

But according to dotMailer’s annual ‘Hitting the Mark’ study of 36 leading UK retailers: More...

They’re often no bigger than a small sentence, a phrase or even a single word.

But they have the power to stop forms being abandoned and visitors leaving; they can even improve what people think about your brand.

What am I talking about? Why, microcopy of course.

It might be the sales letter or landing page copy that gets all the adulation.

But short, punchy lines of microcopy can be just as potent in directing people to take action.

Micro copy has 3 basic uses:

1. Microcopy tells people what to do – Pithy lines of copy used in forms help people to fill them out correctly, provide the information you need and avoid them being abandoned after a flurry of error messages. More...

Ever witnessed ‘death by PowerPoint’? This is the phrase coined by the US military for the mind numbingly dull 30+ slide briefings they have to sit through.

But it’s not just the length of PowerPoint presentations that’s under attack.

According to the NY Times (via Seth’s blog), there’s growing discontent amongst senior brass at how the complex process of winning a war is being broken down into simple bullet points.

The humble bullet point is being blamed for stifling discussion, halting critical thinking and clouding decision making.

But whilst the US military might not be a fan of the humble dotted symbol, bullet points are one of a copywriter’s most potent weapons. More...

As you know, I only post when I think I have something worth saying (rather than to feed Google’s spiders) and that’s not going to change.

I’m not going to have time to write a proper post for you again this week (and probably not next week either). So instead you might be interested in reading one of the articles I’ve written for the bda blog:

• What Twitter and Rupert Murdoch Can Teach You about Marketing
• Is the iPad just about clever marketing?
• Why has M&S Changed its Strapline? Just Because

Hopefully, I’ll be back to a normal weekly blogging schedule soon. More...

Do you ever find yourself staring at a blank screen with your head in your hands desperately trying to think up the perfect line to open your sales letter with? The cursor, which hasn’t moved for the last 10 minutes, continues to blink back at you, taunting your lack of copywriting creativity. Sound familiar?

Leads are like the seal on an unopened can of food. Unless your opener is enticing enough to persuade people to want to keep reading and devour your words then they’ll be left to go stale, no matter how carefully they’ve been prepared.

So how do you write an intriguing opener that makes people eager to read what you have to say? Well, one idea is to dip into your swipe file for inspiration (you do keep one don’t you?). More...

What do you think is the the most important element of your copywriting? The headline? The benefits? Or the product itself?

Well, this was the topic of Eric Graham’s (aka The Conversion Doctor) recent video – ‘My #1 Conversion Boosting Secret Revealed’ – and I don’t think I’ll be sending any shockwaves by revealing that it’s understanding your reader.

In the rush to get websites live, emails sent and direct mail in the post, assumptions are often made about the target audience’s hopes and fears. But this can be a mistake, because copy is read by individuals, not a homogeneous group. More...

As you know, there’s an abundance of horribly written corporate websites out there – with too much back slapping self praise and not enough focus on the customer.

For us copywriters, this presents an opportunity: if you can point out to a company why their website’s copy is ineffective, they might ask you to give it a makeover. Many companies complain about how poor their websites are at generating sales - often weak copy is to blame.

Here are a few classic corporate web copywriting mistakes you might want to point out: More...

Based on these two examples, the new era of transparency might not be too far away and has serious implications for the claims you might be occasionally tempted to drop into your copywriting.

‘iPad sucks’ – 644,00 Google hits

Following the success of the iPhone, it’s no wonder people were expecting something special when they heard rumours about Apple’s latest gift to the world of technology. More...

Admittedly, you miss out on getting to know people face to face. But phoning can be a great time saver, with conversations more ‘to the point’ and productive.

Recently, I’ve been working on a number of case studies, which have involved interviewing people in various places. To avoid spending the time slot (and wasting busy people’s time) frantically scribbling down notes, I’ve been using a free MP3 Skype call recorder so I can allow the conversation to flow freely knowing I can play them back at leisure to pick out any juicy facts I’d otherwise miss. More...

Do we procrastinate because of our fear of success? Is it our fear of failure? Or are we just lazy? Whatever the reason, it’s a common problem amongst us freelancers.

Well, this year I thought I’d make it my resolution to try and kick the habit for good. ‘An impossible task’ I hear you say, but as with every bad habit I’m hoping it can be overcome with the right strategy and frame of mind. Otherwise that novel is never going to get written.

Here are a few procrastination tips that might help:

1. Switch off the internet – The internet is one of the biggest distractions known to man. More...