The Meeting

Everybody was on the Zoom call.

Everybody had an opinion.

The headline was adjusted.

Words were reworked.

Logo size was changed.

Everybody agreed.

The big idea was lost.

Consensus cripples creativity.

Astronomer or Copywriter? Copy from Carl Sagan

Carl Sagan

Carl Sagan was an astronomer, not a copywriter. 

But the following words about the image below checks all the boxes for strong copy:

☑ It sucks you in.

☑ It keeps you engaged.

☑ It ends with a call to action.

But even if you don’t want to consider the parallels to copywriting, you can’t deny it’s a marvelous example of writing that makes you feel.

Photograph by the Voyager 1 space probe as it was leaving our solar system, 1990

"Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it, everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor, and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every 'superstar,' every 'supreme leader,' every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there — on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

"The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand. It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known."

 ________________________

NOTE: A nod to Carolyn Barclay who introduced me to this example of exemplary writing and drew a parallel to it and persuasive copy.  

When was the first time you felt old?

For me it was during an examination of my arthritic knees. It was my first visit with an he orthopedic surgeon and he brought in two interns to observe. 

The surgeon was rather abrasive as he showed the interns my x-rays and referred to them as “text book for a non-ambulatory patient” even though I was walking – with some pain but without the need of crutches or a cane.

That was irritating, but it was not what made me feel old. I'll get to that.

As the surgeon continued to hold court with his interns, he asked me to sit on the examination table with my legs dangling over the edge. He rolled up his chair, put his hands on the front of my ankles and asked me to push. I asked him, “How hard?” I caught a slight eye roll to his interns as he said, “Whatever you can manage.”

So, I pushed hard. Harder than he assumed I could based on my x-rays. And he and his rolling chair went sliding across the room almost knocking down the startled interns.

Following the exam, I was getting dressed and heard the interns talking in low voices on the other side of the privacy curtain.

“Did you see him push the doc across the room?”

“OMG, that was hysterical.”

“Yeah, that patient is …”

Here’s where I answer the question. I was expecting the the intern to refer to me as “crazy strong” or “a rock star” or “a real baller” or even “like a real life James Bond” … but, alas … he said:

“Yeah, that patient is one tough, old fucker.”

Old fucker? Not James Bond? Yep, felt old. Still happy about sending that smug surgeon on an unexpected ride, but knocked quickly back to reality.

Know Which Side Your Bread is Buttered On

Here's an exercise that will serve you well.

Take the classic ad below and change out "Avis" for your name or your company's name.

Where it refers to "rent a cars", change it to your primary product/service (copywriting, marketing, content writing, advertising, whatever).

Customize the rest of the copy to your business (e.g., "lively, super-torque Ford" to "engaging website copy").

In other words, steal this brilliant ad and change it to fit your business.

Don't publish it. Print it out and tape it to your wall.

Read it before, during, and after client calls.

And do the level of work that makes your client need you.

To make the exercise easier, copy and paste:

Avis needs you.
You don't need Avis.
Avis never forgets this.
 
"We're still a little hungry.
 
We're only No. 2 in rent a cars.
 
Customers aren't a dime a dozen to us.
 
Sometimes, when business is too good, they get the short end and aren't treated like customers anymore.
 
Wouldn't you like the novel experience of walking up to a counter and not feel you're bothering somebody?
 
Try it.
 
Come to the Avis counter and rent a new, lively super-torque Ford. Avis is only No. 2 in rent a cars. So we have to try harder to make our customers feel like customers.
 
Our counters all have two sides.
And we know which side our bread is buttered on.