WRITE BETTER, EARN MORE! (Part 2 of 3) Nine Tips For Instantly Improving Your Marketing Copy

by Peter Bowerman

In last month’s issue, we looked at the first three tips for improving any writing, but especially your commercial work:

Write Like You Talk
Lose the Weak Words and Tone
Give Your Audience Credit

Let’s get to our next three!

Make Every Word Pull Its Weight

While similar to the previous one (Give Your Audience Credit), this is less about assuming your audience is intelligent and more about just writing economically. Words should not be used to showcase your ability to fill up white space or as a forum for flexing your linguistic muscles. Words are the building blocks of a story or the case you’re making for a company’s products or services. Don’t have words just parading around, impressed with themselves, leaning on their shovels watching other words work, or, in some other way, taking up space (like I’m probably doing here ... ).

We could learn a lot from public signage. “Not Responsible For Lost or Stolen Articles.” The “We’re…” upfront is understood. “Keep Off Grass.” Not “You Need to…” “Yield.” Not “Yield to Oncoming Traffic.”

Check out the following pairs, the bloated “Before,” then the attenuated “After”:

Like many authors I know of who are just starting out…

Like many authors just starting out…

It’s a great field to go into for those of you who do not want to wake up that early.

It’s a great field for those who don’t like waking up early.

The following ghastly copy block comes verbatim from a piece I helped rewrite a few years back. …

You are most welcome to call our offices, toll-free, for any assistance you may need. We have staff members who have placed orders for millions of dollars of materials and they will be glad to make an effort to provide information that would be helpful to you.

If you can’t improve that, you need to find a new line of work.

Make Your Writing Disappear

When you write something, your goal should be to disappear from the process of information dissemination. While I’d obviously hate to have someone read something I wrote and say, “That’s lousy writing,” I also don’t really want to hear, “Wow, that’s really good writing.” Sure, my clients better feel that way, but, ideally, the ultimate reader of my words should just get the communication, without even noticing the words. 

Words should be the vehicle of a thought or idea, but they shouldn’t be a distraction. Think of it as the difference between two people. One quietly and effectively does their job, not drawing attention to themselves, but making sure the assigned “to-do” list gets done. No one has to come along behind him and finish what he didn’t. The other has to make a big show of what he’s doing, and, since he’s more focused on having everyone aware of what he’s up to, he ends up doing a mediocre job.

Cadence Is Everything

Good writing has a rhythm to that bad writing usually lacks. …Look at the following paragraph. Don’t focus on the choice of words themselves; I grant you they’re not so hot either...

The first step of our business process is to understand your goals. We follow that by determining the best avenue to get there. Our solutions always end up being simple, direct and effective. And the feedback we’ve received has been uniformly positive. Give us the opportunity to meet your needs. You won’t be disappointed with the results.

Something’s off, but what is it? Well, all the sentences are roughly the same length. Big problem. It’s too mechanical. This clearly isn’t how people talk. Mix up your sentences. Short and long. Like I’ve done in this paragraph. And no, a free-form, casual style like this isn’t appropriate in all cases, though it certainly does lend itself nicely to writing ad copy, direct mail and other more creative content. But know that the example above is never appropriate.

In the next issue, we’ll look at Tips 7-9: Stay tuned!

Copyright 2005 Peter Bowerman. All rights reserved.

Peter Bowerman is the author of The Well-Fed Writer (2000), an award-winning Book-of-the-Month Club selection, and its 2004 companion volume, The Well-Fed Writer: Back For Seconds (from which the above article was adapted), both how-to “standards” in the field of commercial freelancing. A commercial writer, business coach and seminar leader in Atlanta, his client list includes Coca-Cola, BellSouth, IBM, UPS, Cingular, American Express, Mercedes-Benz, Junior Achievement and others. Visit www.wellfedwriter.com for more info and to subscribe to his critically acclaimed free monthly ezine on commercial writing, THE WELL-FED E-PUB.