Enthusiasm Wins
A post on Copyblogger today inspired me. It opens,
Whether you’re promoting a product, a program or just an idea, exuberance sells. One of the reason blogs can be so effective is that their writers tend to show more enthusiasm than polish. And that’s not a bad thing—if you have to pick one over the other, enthusiasm wins.
As Sonia Simone says, enthusiasm can’t be faked. Likewise, I’ve always found it MUCH easier to write compelling copy for people who are excited about their products or services. When I have to struggle to find new ways of selling something through words that aren’t founded on some degree of passion, I’ve already lost the battle.
For example, several years ago, I was asked to write some copy. When I questioned, "What am I trying to convey?," my source responded, "That we’re better."
As Christopher Walken says, "Wowwy Wow Wow wow!" I couldn’t wait to get started writing engaging copy for a service that has no unique goals!
Seriously, it was among the greatest challenges I’ve faced from a writing perspective. I felt forced throughout the exercise, and when I finally delivered the product (taking longer than originally expected, since I didn’t have the personal energy to drive a quick flow of ideas), I wasn’t proud of it. Amazingly, the stakeholders thought it was great, and they found mild returns once they implemented it in their collateral.
But I wonder how my writing would have changed—and how many more conversions we could have encouraged—had the initial sell been wrought with admirable enthusiasm to energize the team and its writer.
How much prodding did you do to get more info from that company? I think part of the job of professional writers (and not that I am one, but have a communications degree so know a bit about it) is to extract relevant information from users and convert it into useful writing (or media).
The company I work for does a very good job at having conversations with our clients and making sure we have the whole story down, and almost forcing answers from our clients in order to get that perspective of what they want. It’s tough, but essential I think.
That said, enthusiasm is contagious. If a client isn’t excited or doesn’t have the right outlook, it’s hard for you to fake one for them.
Hi Ben—Thanks for the comment. The only way I was able to write anything in this particular circumstance was to prod seemingly endlessly; what it ultimately came down to, however, was that they had basic answers to my questions, but ultimately the stakeholders were only slightly invested in the overall success of the product. It was literally something one of the higher-ups just commanded be done, with little legacy or context or passionate purpose. I’m not sure how common or uncommon such a scenario is, but I now know that it doesn’t help anyone involved to feel personally attached. And it comes at the expense, for me anyway, of creating some super compelling copy.
Yeah, and there are no doubt going to be times when that sort of thing happens I suppose. It’s a shame, but the business world is a tricky one, and a lot of them are definitely not as efficient as they could be.
Steph & Ben: I agree with you both. Sometimes you have to draw information like blood from a company (yes, I said that). At the same time, I’ve also been in situations where I’m writing copy for something that clearly sucks. It’s hard to do, it feels like you’re selling your soul. However, the topics that I’m enthusiastic about, I could write about those forever.
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