Amazon.co.uk Review
The most effective modern advertisements--in newspapers and magazines, on posters, TV, radio, Web sites or anywhere else--tend to carry very few words in relation to pictures or other "visuals". For example, a recent poster advertising
The Economist read "Blunt, yet sharp". So it looks easy but don't be deceived. Actually the fewer the words on the page the more challenging they are to write, as Dominic Gettins--award-winning campaign writer for many companies including Microsoft and currently board level copywriter for Euro RSCB Wnek Gosper--makes clear in
The Unwritten Rules of Copywriting. It's all down to hard work, persistence and application. "When friends tell me they like an ad of mine, they seem to think I'm a very clever person," Gettins says. "If, in conversation later, I let drop that I wrote over a hundred scripts for a particular brief, with every word and visual carefully thought out, they look at me aghast."
Gettins's book, based on series of seminars he ran for the BBC, sets out some rules and ideas for potential or less experienced copywriters, although much of the advice about grammar, simplicity, succinctness, avoidance of long words and rejection of most participles could usefully be applied to any kind of writing. Mark Twain's "Eschew surplusage" is one of his favourite quotations. Gettins argues that detailed research is vital. You must know the product, the client and the precise "audience" you're targeting with your words. Have one individual in mind to speak to with your copy, he recommends.
As you might expect it's an immaculately written and highly readable guide with never a wasted word in sight. He includes lots of photographs--entertaining as well as educative--of effective ads as examples. And did you know that "slogan" is derived from "sluaghghhairm", Gaelic for "war cry"? It's a cut-throat business, advertising. --Susan Elkin
Review
"Dominic Gettins shows that only when you know the rules can you break them. If you like, it's a shortcut to the sort of knowledge gained by trial and error over many years by the icons of the advertising business -- a good read, full of clear discussion and written without being patronizing." -- Direct Response, July 2000
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