In a nutshell:
G ‘No one reads ads. They read what interests them.’
G ‘No one is waiting to hear from us.’
G Try telling the truth.
G Avoid high passion subjects you don’t care about.
G Will you be proud of it in 30 years’ time?
Thought No. 2 – Write like you speak
We’ve established that boring is bad. So how can you write bril-
liant copy that’s as engaging as it is effective? One of the best
ways I’ve found is to talk to your reader as if they’re sitting in
front of you. In other words, have a conversation. And that
means thinking of them as real, live, human beings.
22 brilliant copywriting
M02_HORB7347_01_SE_C02.QXP:M02_HORB7347_01_SE_C02 2/6/09 09:48 Page 22
The idea that a conversational approach to persuasion yields the
best results isn’t exactly new. Queen Victoria complained that
Gladstone talked to her as if he were addressing a public
meeting. She preferred Disraeli, who spoke in a less pompous,
hectoring tone. My advice is that you follow Disraeli’s example,
even if your audience is far from regal.
Selling stories
Stories and conversation walk hand in hand down the path of
persuasion. Take a look at the web-
sites of a few established copywriters
and you’ll soon come across phrases
like ‘corporate storytelling’ and ‘the
power of stories to inspire action’. I
think it’s easy to overdo this angle
but there’s no denying that true
stories offer tangible proof of
abstract claims and work brilliantly as persuaders, particularly
when it comes to selling ideas. That’s because ideas often need
images in the form of stories to make them feel real. Without
these images, an idea – even a really good one – can appear
hopelessly abstract. The question becomes, how can you relate
your idea to something the audience already understands? And
the easiest way is, you guessed it, with a story.
Presenting information in story form also helps make it personal
as our minds automatically try to make sense of what we’re
hearing and apply it to our own lives. These stories can be sur-
prisingly short – it’s not the volume of information that stirs the
soul; it’s interest and relevance. Nor do they need much in the
way of context – if the story is embedded within another body of
text in a way that doesn’t draw attention to itself then it’s likely
to be even more effective (something Jesus understood). And
don’t worry too much about detail – the audience will happily
fill in the blanks without realising they’re doing it.
Three key thoughts 23
true stories offer
tangible proof of
abstract claims and
work brilliantly as
persuaders
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24 brilliant copywriting
One word of advice – in order to work, a story needs a bit of bite.
Typically it must resolve some antagonism. It’s often said that
‘conflict is the essence of drama’, and it’s much the same with
corporate stories. Dig deep into your client’s world and you
might be surprised what comes up.
The art of conversation
Stories dovetail nicely with the idea
of copywriting as a kind of conversa-
tion with the reader. That means
adopting some of the strategies of
spoken, rather than written, English. In practice that means
don’t write anything you wouldn’t say in person. I’m not sug-
gesting you throw all formality to the wind, simply that the
warmth and casualness characteristic of conversations has a
much wider application than you might think.
brilliant
tip
Stories really come into their own when you’re trying to illustrate a
company’s values in action. Here the best approach is to tell your
readers a micro story that makes your point and then let them draw
their own conclusions. I recently wrote a piece for a major retailer
that illustrated their value of ‘can do’ with a story about how
branch staff heroically beat back severe flooding to stay open when
all around them shut up shop. Another way to put this is ‘don’t
claim, demonstrate’. Stories are a great way to bring this rather
abstract piece of advice down to earth. And remember, an
organisation can have multiple micro stories – you can tell the story
of the need they fulfil (in other words, their market story), how they
fulfil it (their product or service story), and what’s so special about
that particular organisation (probably a people story).
don’t write anything you
wouldn’t say in person
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Admittedly we’re not always expert conversationalists – as
Henry Miller said, ‘We don’t talk, we bludgeon one another with
facts and theories gleaned from cursory readings of newspapers
and magazines’ (and for copywriters he could have added web-
sites, last year’s annual report, brochures, factory visits,
interviews and so on). Nevertheless it’s an effort worth making,
for the more interesting the conversation, the more likely your
audience is to engage and the more successful the outcome is
likely to be.
So a big part of brilliant copywriting is writing as if you’re having
an informal, informative conversation with your reader. Tell
them the basics, anticipate their questions then give them some-
thing extra. Most of all, make it real
and make it interesting. Good conver-
sations invite listening, and interest
is a key part of that process.
Conversation allows you to talk
about a product or whatever in a way
that overcomes resistance because
people are predisposed to listen (providing the conversation’s
any good, of course). And if that happens you’re well on your
way to a sale.
In a nutshell:
G True stories offer tangible proof of abstract claims and work
brilliantly as persuaders.
G Think of copywriting as a kind of informal, informative
conversation with the reader.
Thought No. 3 – Believe you’re brilliant
As a copywriter you’re paid to create on demand. Sitting around
waiting for the muse to show up isn’t really an option, so all bril-
liant copywriters need a few tricks up their sleeves to help them
Three key thoughts 25
the more interesting the
conversation, the more
likely your audience is to
engage
M02_HORB7347_01_SE_C02.QXP:M02_HORB7347_01_SE_C02 2/6/09 09:48 Page 25
have great ideas as and when they need them. I’ve heard this sort
of no-nonsense professionalism described as ‘blue-collar writ-
ing’, and it’s something I’m very proud to be associated with. No
technique for producing ideas can guarantee results, but this
section should tip the odds in your favour.
Yes you can
The most important thing I can tell you about having ideas is to
believe you can do it. I realise that sounds like a piece of sick-
making self-help nonsense, but you have to believe or you might
as well give up and get a nice job at your local library. Or to put
it another way, whether you think you can have great ideas or
you can’t, you’re probably right. Confidence is everything. If you
believe, it will somehow happen.That’s because the solution exists.
No matter how impossible the problem sounds, no matter how
difficult the brief, it has an answer. In fact it has an infinite
number of answers. And the first step to finding them is knowing
they’re out there.
Look for connections
Creativity is an act of association –
it’s about taking two unconnected
ideas and finding a way of bringing
them together to produce a new,
third idea that somehow means
more than its constituent parts.
Creating new combinations of old
elements depends on your ability to
see relationships between uncon-
nected ideas. It’s this ability to spot a promising link that is the
hallmark of creativity and – by extension – brilliant copywriting.
So what do you actually do?
The first thing is to force yourself to think that what you have to
do is easy. Start thinking of yourself as someone who can create
26 brilliant copywriting
creating new
combinations of old
elements depends on
your ability to see
relationships between
unconnected ideas
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