What I do
It seems that many of my friends still don’t know what I do as a copywriter. All I tell them is that I’m in advertising or that I write ads or that I sell hotdogs by the beach so perhaps a brief explanation is in order here.
It’s best to start by making clear what I don’t do.
1. I am not a data entry clerk. ‘Copy’ in copywriter doesn’t mean transferring lines of text by hand from one page to another. ‘Copy’ here is used as a noun and refers to a body of text. If you are still unconvinced, you are a cretin.
2. I do not deal with copyrights.
3. Just because I am a copywriter doesn’t mean that I can write movie scripts, telemarketer scripts, emcee scripts, your marketing essay, the Bible etc.
4. I am not an English guru. Sure, I have a working knowledge of the language and I can tell a noun from an adjective but if you ask me to explain what an infinitive is, split or otherwise, I’ll refer you to my friend, Mr. Shoe.
5. I am not a liar. It’s interesting to note that advertising executives come in below lawyers in trustworthiness ratings. For that, I blame the suits. But maybe that’s a little unfair. After all, everyone knows that it is lines like “You could be a millionaire, NAMEXXXXXXXXXX, if you reply today and if you are chosen as the winner and if you have affixed all the damned seals and if you have ordered our lovely clocks and if you have exactly 6 toes” that have covered us in shite. But let’s just blame the client (or certain major publication) for that.
So what is it that we copywriters do? Very fundamentally, we are hired to write copy that persuades a consumer to take action. This action most often takes the form of parting with hard-earned money to purchase a product or service that they don’t need. But it’s more than that. There have been many ads for public service organisations such as PETA, the Red Cross and Amnesty International among others to raise public awareness and call for greater participation.
I like McCann Erickson’s corporate slogan “Truth Well Told”. It captures what every copywriter seeks to achieve – an ad that packages the truth in a palatable way. Of course, the converse of that, as Adrian informed me, is “Shit Well Sold”. I don’t wanna think about that option.
Copywriters are idea generators. But they’re not alone in this. If you are a copywriter, you will most likely spend your days brainstorming with and trying not to kill your art director partner. This is the dude who, on the one hand, could help you come up with that award winning idea but who, on the other hand, will also bug you endlessly to cut or add copy depending on what he smoked half an hour ago. You, in turn, will continually tell him to shove it and change the point size instead to which he will reply that he isn’t your bitch and suggest that you take your pen and stick it in your eye which will make you remind him that his parents were never married which in turn will agitate him to make fun of the pudenda of a female biologically related to you after which both of you will storm into the servicing guy’s cubicle and inform him that he is a sorry-faced ass for writing such a crappy brief.
Which brings me to the brief. This is not something you cover your nether regions with nor is it something you wear on your head. It is a set of essential information that forms the foundation and sets the direction of the creative work and it is often written by *gasp* a suit. I haven’t seen a brief in 4 months but in my previous agency, this was mostly done with the CTRL C and CTRL V shortcuts which resulted in a chunk of text worthy of a copywriter’s glowering glare. (Comments, Gavin?)
But it isn’t so much the brief as the briefing that creatives dread. Chirpy suit strides into the room declaring that it’s a wonderful day. Creatives lift heads from table and wonder what day of the week it is and what the hell this lunatic is doing beaming like that. Suit declares that the forthcoming pitch is VERY EXCITING and VERY EXTENSIVE even if it’s for (and this is John’s example) Sin Wah Oyster Sauce. And so on and so forth. Suits are a different species of advertising professional. I don’t know how they do it but I respect them for being able to take shit from the client and then come back and take shit from the creatives without hurling themselves out of windows. No agency could do without them.
I see that I have digressed. This was supposed to be about me. Never mind. There is no copywriter without the agency anyway.
It’s best to start by making clear what I don’t do.
1. I am not a data entry clerk. ‘Copy’ in copywriter doesn’t mean transferring lines of text by hand from one page to another. ‘Copy’ here is used as a noun and refers to a body of text. If you are still unconvinced, you are a cretin.
2. I do not deal with copyrights.
3. Just because I am a copywriter doesn’t mean that I can write movie scripts, telemarketer scripts, emcee scripts, your marketing essay, the Bible etc.
4. I am not an English guru. Sure, I have a working knowledge of the language and I can tell a noun from an adjective but if you ask me to explain what an infinitive is, split or otherwise, I’ll refer you to my friend, Mr. Shoe.
5. I am not a liar. It’s interesting to note that advertising executives come in below lawyers in trustworthiness ratings. For that, I blame the suits. But maybe that’s a little unfair. After all, everyone knows that it is lines like “You could be a millionaire, NAMEXXXXXXXXXX, if you reply today and if you are chosen as the winner and if you have affixed all the damned seals and if you have ordered our lovely clocks and if you have exactly 6 toes” that have covered us in shite. But let’s just blame the client (or certain major publication) for that.
So what is it that we copywriters do? Very fundamentally, we are hired to write copy that persuades a consumer to take action. This action most often takes the form of parting with hard-earned money to purchase a product or service that they don’t need. But it’s more than that. There have been many ads for public service organisations such as PETA, the Red Cross and Amnesty International among others to raise public awareness and call for greater participation.
I like McCann Erickson’s corporate slogan “Truth Well Told”. It captures what every copywriter seeks to achieve – an ad that packages the truth in a palatable way. Of course, the converse of that, as Adrian informed me, is “Shit Well Sold”. I don’t wanna think about that option.
Copywriters are idea generators. But they’re not alone in this. If you are a copywriter, you will most likely spend your days brainstorming with and trying not to kill your art director partner. This is the dude who, on the one hand, could help you come up with that award winning idea but who, on the other hand, will also bug you endlessly to cut or add copy depending on what he smoked half an hour ago. You, in turn, will continually tell him to shove it and change the point size instead to which he will reply that he isn’t your bitch and suggest that you take your pen and stick it in your eye which will make you remind him that his parents were never married which in turn will agitate him to make fun of the pudenda of a female biologically related to you after which both of you will storm into the servicing guy’s cubicle and inform him that he is a sorry-faced ass for writing such a crappy brief.
Which brings me to the brief. This is not something you cover your nether regions with nor is it something you wear on your head. It is a set of essential information that forms the foundation and sets the direction of the creative work and it is often written by *gasp* a suit. I haven’t seen a brief in 4 months but in my previous agency, this was mostly done with the CTRL C and CTRL V shortcuts which resulted in a chunk of text worthy of a copywriter’s glowering glare. (Comments, Gavin?)
But it isn’t so much the brief as the briefing that creatives dread. Chirpy suit strides into the room declaring that it’s a wonderful day. Creatives lift heads from table and wonder what day of the week it is and what the hell this lunatic is doing beaming like that. Suit declares that the forthcoming pitch is VERY EXCITING and VERY EXTENSIVE even if it’s for (and this is John’s example) Sin Wah Oyster Sauce. And so on and so forth. Suits are a different species of advertising professional. I don’t know how they do it but I respect them for being able to take shit from the client and then come back and take shit from the creatives without hurling themselves out of windows. No agency could do without them.
I see that I have digressed. This was supposed to be about me. Never mind. There is no copywriter without the agency anyway.
2 Comments:
It's better for you than it is for me; I can't say what I do.
I guess that makes me... mysterious.
~A.
Don't you have some sorta code name in your line of work? Russian Doll or Big Bunghole sound plausible.
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