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The Books, The Information, The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe! OH MY!
You've read 10 expert books on copywriting. You've handwritten 30 sales letters. You haven't made a cent copywriting. Here's why....
These ten books on copywriting go into detail about benefits vs. features. They give you secret sales tactics that have made millions. They give you everything you need to know about writing advertisements, sales letters, emails, etc.
BUT!!!!
They do not take into account..
-That you are starting fresh on the internet.
-You do not work for an established agency.
-You've never written a single piece of copy in your life.
-Copy that you will be writing for clients on Upwork and from referrals will be vastly different than copy written 50 years ago.
Let that sink in...
I bet your are waiting to hear why I made a Wizard of OZ reference mixed with a Narnia one..
Dorothy was walking down the yellow brick road with her little pooch Toto. She was headed on a journey to kick a$$ at life. There was a fork in the road. One of the paths led through a dense jungle. The other path was short and clear as day. This path led to a wardrobe. (Fantasy land)
"Which path should I take Toto?"
"Bark bark!"
"I guess I'll check to see what's the wardrobe."
The wardrobe was filled with old books full of life's secrets. Dorothy figured that if she read about life's secrets then she would be able to kick a$$ at life!
"Hurray!"
Dorothy sat and read. Hours and hours passed. She read about how to be happy. She read about how to get through tough times. She read about living in the moment. She read about the best ways to kick a$$ at life. She read, and read, and read.
With a stiff neck and and achy back, Dorothy got up and headed for the dense Jungle. Immediately, Dorothy encountered a nice Faun. Half Goat half man. She read about Fauns and she was excited to meet one! But suddenly...
The faun started viciously attacking and ripping Dorothy's Face off! She was screaming something awful. There was a huge mess that the Lolipop Guild had to clean up soon after. They even had to change some of the yellow bricks on the ground because the blood had stained in between them.
Poor Dorothy. If only she knew that fauns had become infected with a hatred towards humans with dogs. This was long after the books were written. After the ice war. Maybe Dorothy would have been more careful if she didn't read that fauns were nice creatures.
The moral of the story? I'm not sure.
Maybe it is that reading books about will not give you real world experience, and could possibly hinder your growth.
Handwriting an old sales letter will not give you experience writing copy either. Why?
Each and every product solves it's own problem.
A great advertisement will only work for the product or service that it was written for.
Writing a sales letter for an old product does not work because you will never be selling that product in that time, place, situation, etc. There are so many factors that will change an add. Even for the same physical product. You need to write and solve problems for your customer based on their needs. Without real world experience you will not learn this. Because you wont solving any real world problems.
I guess what I'm trying to say is...
The books do not teach you relevant real world experience. You can only do that by putting your copy out there, testing, and getting feedback from it. Yes, you do need to know some information about how to write copy. But most of what you need you will learn on the way.
As MJ DeMarco has once said, and pardon me if I butcher the quote, "A+B=C."
If I want to get C, why would I first learn ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOP? I could just learn A+B and learn from the process. Then, when I need to get F, then I will learn U.
Just don't be like Dorothy. Learning from books won't give you the fear or the confidence you need to get real world experience.
So what should you do if you want to become a good copywriter?
Start applying for gigs. Learn how to solve each problem for your clients as they come along. That is the first step to the journey.
That's how I made my first dollar copywriting. And the lesson I learned.
Good luck.
You've read 10 expert books on copywriting. You've handwritten 30 sales letters. You haven't made a cent copywriting. Here's why....
These ten books on copywriting go into detail about benefits vs. features. They give you secret sales tactics that have made millions. They give you everything you need to know about writing advertisements, sales letters, emails, etc.
BUT!!!!
They do not take into account..
-That you are starting fresh on the internet.
-You do not work for an established agency.
-You've never written a single piece of copy in your life.
-Copy that you will be writing for clients on Upwork and from referrals will be vastly different than copy written 50 years ago.
Let that sink in...
I bet your are waiting to hear why I made a Wizard of OZ reference mixed with a Narnia one..
Dorothy was walking down the yellow brick road with her little pooch Toto. She was headed on a journey to kick a$$ at life. There was a fork in the road. One of the paths led through a dense jungle. The other path was short and clear as day. This path led to a wardrobe. (Fantasy land)
"Which path should I take Toto?"
"Bark bark!"
"I guess I'll check to see what's the wardrobe."
The wardrobe was filled with old books full of life's secrets. Dorothy figured that if she read about life's secrets then she would be able to kick a$$ at life!
"Hurray!"
Dorothy sat and read. Hours and hours passed. She read about how to be happy. She read about how to get through tough times. She read about living in the moment. She read about the best ways to kick a$$ at life. She read, and read, and read.
With a stiff neck and and achy back, Dorothy got up and headed for the dense Jungle. Immediately, Dorothy encountered a nice Faun. Half Goat half man. She read about Fauns and she was excited to meet one! But suddenly...
The faun started viciously attacking and ripping Dorothy's Face off! She was screaming something awful. There was a huge mess that the Lolipop Guild had to clean up soon after. They even had to change some of the yellow bricks on the ground because the blood had stained in between them.
Poor Dorothy. If only she knew that fauns had become infected with a hatred towards humans with dogs. This was long after the books were written. After the ice war. Maybe Dorothy would have been more careful if she didn't read that fauns were nice creatures.
The moral of the story? I'm not sure.
Maybe it is that reading books about will not give you real world experience, and could possibly hinder your growth.
Handwriting an old sales letter will not give you experience writing copy either. Why?
Each and every product solves it's own problem.
A great advertisement will only work for the product or service that it was written for.
Writing a sales letter for an old product does not work because you will never be selling that product in that time, place, situation, etc. There are so many factors that will change an add. Even for the same physical product. You need to write and solve problems for your customer based on their needs. Without real world experience you will not learn this. Because you wont solving any real world problems.
I guess what I'm trying to say is...
The books do not teach you relevant real world experience. You can only do that by putting your copy out there, testing, and getting feedback from it. Yes, you do need to know some information about how to write copy. But most of what you need you will learn on the way.
As MJ DeMarco has once said, and pardon me if I butcher the quote, "A+B=C."
If I want to get C, why would I first learn ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOP? I could just learn A+B and learn from the process. Then, when I need to get F, then I will learn U.
Just don't be like Dorothy. Learning from books won't give you the fear or the confidence you need to get real world experience.
So what should you do if you want to become a good copywriter?
Start applying for gigs. Learn how to solve each problem for your clients as they come along. That is the first step to the journey.
That's how I made my first dollar copywriting. And the lesson I learned.
Good luck.
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