Category Archives: Copywriting

Communicating Across the Generation Gap

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Did you know that there are now six generations interacting with businesses and organizations as purchasers? Whether you call them customers, clients, donors, investors, subscribers, or any other name, each generation was shaped by what was going on in the world during their childhood and teenaged years. Those events influenced each generation’s thinking, including the values they hold, their expectations for behavior, and the way they like to communicate. And this has implications for crafting a marketing message and approach.

The Generations
According to leadership coach Bea Fields, president of Bea Fields Companies in North Carolina and co-author of Millennial Leaders: Success Stories from Today’s Most Brilliant Generation Y Leaders, here is an overview of each generation:

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A Review of the Basics… Copyright for Copywriters

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The digital revolution has made it very easy for us to access material from files, web sites, and the Internet. We all freely copy things we like and send them to others, use them on our social network sites, or add them to our presentations and reports. The ease with which we can claim material for our own use may be obscuring the fact that much of this use could violate copyright laws.

For more…
http://www.macgra.com/1202Printips.pdf 

Writing That Sells… A Guide to Effective Copywriting

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If everything begins with a sale, then we are all selling something to somebody. Some of us are selling products or services for cash, while others (such as charitable organizations) are selling the idea that their cause is worthy of support. Even people who offer things for free are selling something – that what they are providing is useful.

For more…
http://www.macgra.com/1111Printips.pdf 

Improve Your Writing… Understand Grammar

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An interesting and perhaps unanticipated result of the growth in social media for marketing is an increased need for good writing skills. Blogs, drip marketing, opt-in electronic newsletters, and other “new media” require both useful content and good writing to attract and keep readers.

The elements of good writing are simple: grammar, spelling, punctuation, and capitalization. By mastering the rules and conventions, you will make your writing easier to understand and more enjoyable to your readers.

Grammar explains the forms and structure of words (called morphology) and how they are arranged in sentences (called syntax). In other words, grammar provides the rules for speaking and writing that give us a common way of using language so we can more easily understand each other.

http://www.macgra.com/1101Printips.pdf

Content is King… Direct Mail or E-Mail Marketing

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Amid the ongoing debate about whether direct mail or e-mail is the best method to market to customers and prospects, very little is being said about the one thing that is crucial to the success of both – the message. Unless the message is relevant to the audience and persuasively presented, it doesn’t matter how it is delivered. So while the discussion about direct mail versus e-mail continues, focus on developing good content and honing your writing skills.

Why market with mail?

The objective of both direct and e-mail marketing is to persuade a customer or prospect to take action, either now or later. When a seller consistently and regularly sends a communication such as a mailed post card or a newsletter (either mailed or web-based), a buyer is more likely at a future time to take the action desired by the seller. In other words, direct or e-mail marketing is less about an immediate sale than about positioning the business or organization to be top-of-mind when the potential buyer is ready to make a purchase.

This is especially important in business-to- business selling where the sell cycle is often long (especially when compared to business-to- consumer), and it is hard to stimulate demand. Direct mail is also important during an economic downturn when either budgetary constraints or the unwillingness of the purchaser to spend money creates a long sell cycle for both businesses and consumers.

http://www.macgra.com/1008Printips.pdf

My Word… Copywriting Skills for Business

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A fundamental skill for all businesses and organizations is to use language effectively in sales and marketing materials. The task of creating the text for these materials is known as copywriting. The purpose of copywriting is to persuade the reader to act – to respond to an advertisement, to buy a product or service, to donate to a cause, to join an organization.

Copywriting is part of direct mail marketing post cards, self-mailers and sales letters; display advertisements; brochures; press releases; white papers; catalogs; and all other marketing communications material. Copywriting differs from technical and business writing because it is persuasive rather than expository. Like technical or business writers, copywriters may present information, but their primary goal is to influence the behavior of readers. Copywriting can also violate the rules for standard business writing to achieve a desired effect or to make the writing more interesting.

http://macgra.com/0906Printips.pdf

Double Duty: Writing Copy for Advertising and PR

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Consider how much writing it takes to support your company or organization’s advertising materials – brochures, direct mail pieces, newsletters, sales letters. Now consider the importance of regular, ongoing public relations activities – press releases, publicity, promotions. Wouldn’t it be nice if all that advertising copy could also be used for public relations support? In this issue of Printips, we’ll discuss advertising and public relations, and how you can write effective copy for both.

To fully understand the similarities and differences between advertising and public relations, it is useful to have a working definition of each:

Advertising: activities that bring a product, service, business, or organization to the attention of current and potential customers.

Public relations: activities that promote public understanding of a company or organization and its products or services.

Note that while advertising is focused on selling something to current and potential customers, public relations is about promoting and protecting the company or organization’s image.

http://macgra.com/0411Printips.pdf

Editor’s Choice: Editing Copy Written By Others

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It can be a tricky situation – editing copy written by others. Whether your task is to compile and edit the company newsletter, review the boss’s PowerPoint presentation or prepare the company marketing material, the job of copy editor requires diplomacy and discipline. The diplomacy is necessary to avoid alienating the writer (and losing your editorship); the discipline is required to impose standards and create consistency. To help with this delicate balancing act, it is useful to have an editor’s toolkit – measuring devices that transform your editing from subjective to objective.

http://macgra.com/0206Printips.pdf