If You Suspect It's Bad,
You're Probably Right
The first night of last year's AWAI bootcamp I found myself in a conversation with two aspiring copywriters I'd just met.
They asked me if I had any copywriting advice to offer up. I didn't want to give them basic advice like "write great headlines" or "sell the benefits, not the features." I wanted to give them something a tad unique.
After I gave them my advice, they both agreed it was good advice. So I thought I'd share it with you today.
You see I've been the victim of not taking this advice more than once throughout my copywriting career. And if you've written any number of headlines and leads, you may have been victimized too.
Here's how it comes about…
You're sitting in front of your computer trying desperately to come up with a great headline and lead. You hit on something you think is a unique angle. You pat yourself on the back for being so innovative.
You edit it a bit. Try to make it better. All the while in the back of your mind, you have a sinking feeling that it's either not that good or the approach you're taking simply won't work.
Then, because of these doubts, you start to convince yourself that it does indeed work. Sure the approach is a bit different, but that's just you breaking new ground.
So you move forward with it.
But all the while in the back of your mind you're thinking it might not work. But when those thoughts reappear, you go back into "convince yourself mode" and everything seems ok again.
So you finish off the rest of the promo. It might take two weeks. It might take four weeks.
Then you show your masterpiece to another copywriter. They spend 30 seconds reading your headline and lead and they tell you what you already knew: it doesn't work.
They offer a simple suggestion.
Why not just make a list of benefits find the biggest one and then turn that major benefit into your headline and lead? In other words, forget what you thought was a major copywriting innovation. Go back to the basics. And lead with the biggest benefit.
So if you suspect your headline and lead don't work, you're probably right. If you have access to other copywriters run it by them. Send out a mini-review. Organize a peer review. Get some feedback. And get it early. It will save you oodles of time, money and frustration.
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