Making Your Copy Dance

My wife loves the TV show “So You Think You Can Dance”. And she should, she’s a dancer and a dance teacher and she has her own Children’s Creative Movement DVD. I’m usually around when she’s watching “So You Think You Can Dance” and will sometimes sit down and rub her feet while she watches. Yes, you read that correctly – my wife LOVES to have her feet rubbed!

But, feet rubbing is NOT the subject of today’s post! Back to “So You Think You Can Dance”…

I don’t really know all the ins and outs of the show, but it they have professional choreographers who create the dances the couples dance. Each couple has a different dance and choreographer. Each couple is judged on how well they perform their dance. A few episodes ago, one of the dance couples had to dance a tribute to breast cancer victims. Without speaking a word, their dance moved the judges and most of the audience to tears.

Judge Nigel Lythgoe said about their dance: “Dance can express so many emotions without words.”

The dancers, while great dancers, could not have generated this much emotion on their own: it was the combination of the choreographer’s skill and their skills that created such a successful dance.

It’s the same thing with writing. Obviously when writing you’re using words. But like dance, you’re also sending a message, or multiple messages. The words you choose and the way you put them together can send several messages – either intended or not. You may unintentionally sabotage your efforts with an underlying message saying the opposite of what you wanted your words to say. Or you may send a confused and jumbled message, which is less damaging, but still not good.

Good writing should bring the reader into your dance. It should be smooth – no blocks lying on the floor for them to trip over, or holes for them to fall into. It should build emotion as it draws the reader in closer and closer. By the end of the, you and the reader should be locked in an emotional and mental pirouette.

I bring this up for two reasons.

One, I’ve been spending a lot of time the past few weeks reworking the sales page for one of my products.  I used a very labor intensive method to do this – kind of a copywriting makeover so to speak. I think the end will justify the means. It seems to be easy to not work so hard on copy for your own products.

I think that we tend to believe in our own product so much that we think it will sell itself and therefore skimp on the copy. The correct approach is to divorce yourself from your product when you write your own copy! That’s the approach I took. It’s a lot of work but it produces a much better sales page.

Two, I recently read a letter that a client mailed out to their customers. I knew the why they wrote the letter – and what they were trying to say. By the time I got to the end of their letter I was scratching my head! I fired off an email asking them if I could rewrite it for them but it was too late, they’d already mailed it. Now it wasn’t a bad letter, the people writing it are all smart and educated, but they’re not writers. Plus, I’m naturally over critical of these things I’m sure. The biggest issue was that it was hard to follow – lots to trip over. I had to reread a couple of really long sentences – more than once. It also contained information that was not important to the main message. This had the effect of getting my mind whirling and wondering about this and that instead of the main message.

This was not a marketing letter, it was informational only, but I took the opportunity to remind them that everything you hand a customer or potential customer contains a marketing message. Even if it’s not an “ad”. It affects that person’s impression of your business: either positively or negatively. Taking the extra step to have a copywriter review and edit (or rewrite) any and everything that comes in contact with your customers and potential customers: this can take you from average to exceptional.

Copywriting is choreographing words and creating emotions – this is part of what makes customers out of visitors and browsers.

Until next time,
Fred