August 21, 2004
how to be a copywriter
So you want a writing job in the advertising business. Here are my two cents:
1. Be good.
If you’re good you can get any job you want, at any agency you want. If you’re not, then you can’t and you won’t. It’s a ruthlessly meritocratic business.
2. Getting good is mostly practice.
I wrote 12 ads yesterday. All good ones. Took me a couple of hours. I’m not some creative genius, I’ve just been doing it a while.
3. Work on the ideas, not the polishing.
Most books look the same (a “book” is your portfolio of work samples you send around the agencies when you’re hustling for a job). Yawn. Snore. More yawns and snores. Highly professional, highly polished, and full of second-rate ideas. You don’t notice how ineffective a marketing tool they are till there’s a recession on and you REALLY NEED to find a job.
4. Seek out the exceptional minds, avoid everyone else.
Life is short. You don’t want to end up in The Watercooler Gang.
5. Write like you mean the words.
“Being creative” is not the hardest thing in the profession. That’s easy. Being able to write about the client’s product with conviction, with passion, with genuine humanity is far harder. Most copywriters can’t do it. If you can do it, there’s always going to be a market for it. Be excited.
(read more here…)
6. Make the client think differently about his product.
This is the gold dust of the profession. This is what the client will really value over the long-haul. Hard as hell to do. It took me almost 10 years in the business before I made my first real intellectual breakthrough with Gerber Baby Foods. Now it’s pretty much all I do. Everything else is secondary.
7. Awards are overrated.
They’re fine for allowing a young rookie to get his or her name known in the business, but award juries are mostly biased, political, paranoid, incestuous, smug, nasty entities, a refuge for self-satisfied, backwards-looking mediocrity. Any business plan that includes their approval in the equation is highly flawed.
8. TV is still where the money is.
If you work in the mainstream of the business, your career will be rewarded in direct proportion to the number of TV spots you sell. Yes, there are exceptions, but they’re rare. This sad little factoid has pretty much sealed the death warrant on the standard agency business plan, but hey, it’s not my problem.
9. The business is in meltdown.
Everybody knows the “Job For Life” is dead, cold and buried. However, professionally you’re still expected to behave like that isn’t the case. There’s a disconnect. It won’t last forever. Smart clients know that agency business models generally suck and what’s on offer is expensive for what you get. We live in interesting times.
10. Everything you read about the advertising business is wrong (including this).
How do I know? Because there’s a new game in town. A new creature has come down the pike which will change the business forever. I don’t speak about it here, I save it for my clients. Rock on.
(For further thoughts about the advertising business check out “The Hughtrain Manifesto”. Thanks.)
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A great list. Particularly number 4 — seek out exceptional minds. My best work has always been when I’ve been associated with people with exceptional talents and thinking. It’s almost like a chemical reaction. It sort of reminds me of the Kurt Vonnegut book Slapstick, when the brother and sister twins physically touch their heads together. (Doesn’t make sense if you haven’t read the book.)
It’s hard to find people like that but, when you do, you do your best work.
Bill, now that you mention it: I did some of my best work when I partnered with a great graphic designer.
So…??? Sure, some of the flap you deliver is relevant and helpful, but like so many other copywriters, it is just the same ole same old story. I say, either you have it or you don’t — much like in every other profession in the world. Hey — this is news…ther are good writers and there are bad writers.
Great incentive to be creative. Here’s one I keep on my desk. Just remember “AIDA”. “It’s got to SING!” A — get Attention; I — arouse Interest; D — creat Desire; A — stimulate Action. Diane
Oh, puke.
Kate, “Either you have it or you don’t” is a bit too simplistic for my taste (life’s vicissitudes being what they are), but yeah, good point, and that’s exactly why “Be Good” is top of the list.
Write more with less
I must confess, Sir Hugh, your treatsie has piqued my curiosity. Tell me: Where can a mere mortal such as myself see some samples of your work? Despite your well-justified disdain for award shows, have any of your ads made it into any of the annuals (CA, One Show, etc.)? Are any posted on a website somewhere? Inquiring minds want to know.
probably the best claim ever:
you don’t need to buy one.
probably the best claim ever:
you don’t need to buy one.
Every ‘teach-yourself-copywriting’ book seems to have the same list today. All pretty hackneyed points, don’t you think? Except the fourth one of course, which is quite original…and completly wrong. Think about it. You seek out exceptional minds and then…what? Face it, those exceptional minds would be too busy trying to get their own BIG IDEA to help you with yours. So you never know…The watercooler may be the Fountain of Knowledge you’re looking for.
Actually, Asha I would agree with most of what you said.
Good copywriting advice is fairly common sense, as far as I can see. So there’s only so much help a wee list could give anybody.
I disagree with your last point, though. Bright folk like working with other bright folk, when the need and opportunity arises. Also there’s the social aspect. I dunno, I’ve always liked having people around to bounce ideas off of.
i have much idea, i want to work as a copywriter but have no chance in Viet nam… who help me how can i make everyboss beleive on me
I don’t know if I qualify as exceptional, but I like to bring a fresh perspective to my work and maybe I can do the same for you. Can point you to some of my work if u write.