If You Are Not Developing Your Online Copywriting Skills, You’re Toast. Really.
Follow the news at Advertising Age.
Follow Bob Garfield. Read his book, The Chaos Scenario.
Here is what you will find out …
The world of offline marketing is sinking fast. Think Titanic.
Ad agencies are crumbling.
Promotions companies are closing their doors.
The U.S. Postal Service is bleeding red ink.
How come?
Because billions of dollars are moving from offline media to the web.
This isn’t just some scary scenario. This isn’t about what might happen in the future. This is what is happening now. And not a little bit at a time. The change is tectonic. It’s massive.
If you think you are going to build a freelance copywriting business in the world of traditional media, it isn’t going to happen. Traditional media is now old media. And soon it will be dead media.
Maybe you think I’m being overly dramatic. If so, read this from Forrester Research, May 2009.
"Although most forecasts have hedged at smaller growth rates, the Forrester reports notes that in one recent survey more than half of online marketers reported plans to increase interactive budgets by taking money from areas which are not performing to par. One of those areas is direct mail, which could lose as much as 40% of its market share. Newspaper advertising is another likely loser; this should not be surprising with news that many papers are cutting off print circulation, merger with their biggest competitors or are going with an online-only format."
And this …
"The Washington Post reported recently that “In the past year alone, the Postal Service has seen the single largest drop-off in mail volume in its 234-year history … That downward trend is only accelerating. The Postal Service projects a decline of about 10 billion pieces of mail in each of the next two years, going from a high of 213 billion pieces of mail in 2006 to 170 billion projected for 2010.”
Now read what Anthea Stratigos of Outsell Inc. said in a recent interview in Forbes Magazine.
"To scale that, compare the total U.S. TV and cable advertising revenue for 2009, which is about $66 billion. The marketing dollars companies now spend on their own sites is equivalent to all TV ad revenue for the year."
What is she saying? She is saying that $65 billion in marketing budgets is moving from offline media to the web.
Get the idea? If you are retiring in three years and want to keep going in the world of offline media, you might just make it. But if you are building a freelance copywriting business with high hopes for a bright and profitable future, you would be mad not to focus on online copywriting.
The opportunities online are not only wide open, but they are growing exponentially. Billions of dollars are moving online every month.
Every company online needs quality online copy. They need homepages written. And sales pages, landing pages, content pages and every other kind of page.
Not to mention email, e-newsletters, blogs and social media.
As for the companies with all their site pages already written, they need them improved. They need to increase the time spend per page. They need to increase conversion rates.
To get a big slice of this massive, fast-growing market, you absolutely must get the training you need to become a true professional in new media. You can’t call a prospective client and hope to get work if you only have offline copywriting training.
You need to upgrade your skills now.
You must get ahead of the crowd.
Either that, or go down with a fast sinking ship.
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Excellent information. Print yellow pages have been losing market share for the past 15 years. This article hits the nail square. Yellow pages will be the last to go because print yp still provides certain results. YP publishers are shifting market strategies to the net each day. Convincing 100% of businesses to dump the print yp and shift to electronic yp is the goal. YP publishers still haven't figured it all out yet but they will real soon.
YellowPageGuy – September 5, 2009 at 2:32 pm