The Idea Writers: Copywriting in a New Media and Marketing Era


Teressa Iezzi - 2010
    A memorable slogan has been the cornerstone of every great ad campaign. In the past, writing one great headline could launch a career. But today's advertising campaigns are interactive, multi-platform and ongoing, and the copywriter's canvas is vast. At any given time, a copywriter may be conceiving a video game, writing a TV show, maintaining a Twitter feed, creating a mobile app or an interactive installation or, yes, writing a headline or a TV script. While the best copywriters have always been brand storytellers, now that story can play out anywhere. The digital revolution put control in the hands of the people - the audience - now no longer just consumers, but active participants in a brand's story. The art and science of advertising has gone from creating one-way messages to engaging audiences in ongoing conversations. A new ad landscape means new opportunities for writers who now have the incredible opportunity to push brand narrative to places it's never been before and to actually create something so useful or entertaining that it generates its own audience. It also means that many of the rules of the past - while exceedingly worthy of study - are insufficient to guide the modern copywriter. Co-published with AdvertisingAge, The Idea Writers outlines the changing landscape of the advertising industry while providing useful how-to advice. Filled with interviews from top creatives including: Greg Hahn, Nick Law, Jeff Benjamin, Tim Delaney, Rei Inamoto, Lee Clow, Steve Simpson, Rick Condos, David Droga, Gerry Graf, Ty Montague, Calle and Pelle Sjonell, PJ Pereira, David Abbott and many more!

The Adweek Copywriting Handbook: The Ultimate Guide to Writing Powerful Advertising and Marketing Copy from One of America's Top Copywriters


Joseph Sugarman - 2006
    In this practical guide, legendary copywriter Joe Sugarman provides proven guidelines and expert advice on what it takes to write copy that will entice, motivate, and move customers to buy. For anyone who wants to break into the business, this is the ultimate companion resource for unlimited success.

D&AD: The Copy Book


D&AD - 2011
    Though now outdated, the best-selling book remains an important reference work today—a bible for creative directors. D&AD and TASCHEN have joined forces to bring you an updated and redesigned edition of the publication, including works from the last 15 years. Regarded as the most challenging field in advertising, copywriting is usually left to the most talented professionals—often agency leaders or owners themselves. The book features a work selection and essays by 48 leading professionals in the world, including copywriting superstars such as David Abbott, Lionel Hunt, Steve Hayden, Dan Wieden, Neil French, Mike Lescarbeau, Adrian Holmes, and Barbara Nokes. Looking for the clues to well-written, effective, and compelling stories that make great advertising? Look no further.

Copywriting: Successful Writing for Design, Advertising, and Marketing


Mark Shaw - 2009
    Well-targeted copy and a strong brand voice are essential if you want to stand out from the competition.Copywriting shows how to write for all formats and contexts, from catalogs and products to advertising and websites. It explores the challenges of commercial writing, providing the tools to become a confident andversatile copywriter. Leading industry talents from both the US and UK are interviewed, major campaigns covering all areas of the industry are illustrated in color and examined in depth, and exercises and tips aid in developing writing, editing, and presentation skills.Revealing the secrets of this rapidly expanding profession, Copywriting provides the skills and techniques that will help you to thrive in the world of creative commercial writing.

Junior: Writing Your Way Ahead In Advertising


Thomas Kemeny - 2019
    Thomas Kemeny made a career at some of the best ad agencies in America. In this book he shows how he got in, how he's stayed in, and how you can do it too. He breaks apart how to write fun, smart, and effective copy-everything from headlines to scripts to experiential activations-giving readers a lesson on a language we all thought we already knew.This book is not a retrospective from some ad legend. It's a book that should be instantly useful for people starting out. A guide for the first few years at a place you'd actually want to work.Traditionally, advertising books have been written by people with established careers, big offices and letters like VP in their titles. They have stories from the old days when people could start in the mailroom. They are talented. That's been done. Who wants another book filled with seasoned wisdom? This is a book written by somebody still getting his bearings. Someone who has made an extraordinary number of errors in a still short career. Someone who has managed to hang onto his job despite these shortcomings.

How to Write Better Copy


Steve Harrison - 2017
    

Hey, Whipple, Squeeze This: A Guide to Creating Great Ads


Luke Sullivan - 1998
    Updated to include two extended final chapters with in-depth prescriptions for building a career in advertising, this edition also features a real-world look at the day-to-day operations of today's ad agencies. Among the most disparaged campaigns in advertising history, the Mr. Whipple ads for Charmin toilet paper were also wildly successful. Sullivan explores the Whipple phenomenon, examining why bad ads sometimes work, why great ads sometimes fail, and how advertisers can learn to balance creative work with the mandate to sell products.

Nicely Said: Writing for the Web with Style and Purpose


Nicole Fenton - 2014
    You’ll learn how to write web copy that addresses your readers’ needs and supports your business goals.Learn from real-world examples and interviews with people who put these ideas into action every day: Kristina Halvorson of Brain Traffic, Tiffani Jones Brown of Pinterest, Gabrielle Blair of Design Mom, Mandy Brown of Editorially, Randy J. Hunt of Etsy, Sarah Richards of GOV.UK, and more.Topics:* Write marketing copy, interface flows, blog posts, legal policies, and emails* Develop behind-the-scenes documents like mission statements, survey questions, and project briefs* Find your voice and adapt your tone for different situations* Build trust and foster relationships with readers* Make a simple style guide and collaborate with your team

Everybody Writes: Your Go-To Guide to Creating Ridiculously Good Content


Ann Handley - 2014
    If you are on social media, you are in marketing. And that means that we are all relying on our words to carry our marketing messages. We are all writers.Yeah, but who cares about writing anymore? In a time-challenged world dominated by short and snappy, by click-bait headlines and Twitter streams and Instagram feeds and gifs and video and Snapchat and YOLO and LOL and #tbt. . . does the idea of focusing on writing seem pedantic and ordinary?Actually, writing matters more now, not less. Our online words are our currency; they tell our customers who we are.Our writing can make us look smart or it can make us look stupid. It can make us seem fun, or warm, or competent, or trustworthy. But it can also make us seem humdrum or discombobulated or flat-out boring.That means you've got to choose words well, and write with economy and the style and honest empathy for your customers. And it means you put a new value on an often-overlooked skill in content marketing: How to write, and how to tell a true story really, really well. That's true whether you're writing a listicle or the words on a Slideshare deck or the words you're reading right here, right now...And so being able to communicate well in writing isn't just nice; it's necessity. And it's also the oft-overlooked cornerstone of nearly all our content marketing.In Everybody Writes, top marketing veteran Ann Handley gives expert guidance and insight into the process and strategy of content creation, production and publishing, with actionable how-to advice designed to get results.These lessons and rules apply across all of your online assets — like web pages, home page, landing pages, blogs, email, marketing offers, and on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social media. Ann deconstructs the strategy and delivers a practical approach to create ridiculously compelling and competent content. It's designed to be the go-to guide for anyone creating or publishing any kind of online content — whether you're a big brand or you're small and solo.Sections include: How to write better. (Or, for "adult-onset writers": How to hate writing less.) Easy grammar and usage rules tailored for business in a fun, memorable way. (Enough to keep you looking sharp, but not too much to overwhelm you.) Giving your audience the gift of your true story, told well. Empathy and humanity and inspiration are key here, so the book covers that, too. Best practices for creating credible, trustworthy content steeped in some time-honored rules of solid journalism. Because publishing content and talking directly to your customers is, at its heart, a privilege. "Things Marketers Write": The fundamentals of 17 specific kinds of content that marketers are often tasked with crafting. Content Tools: The sharpest tools you need to get the job done. Traditional marketing techniques are no longer enough. Everybody Writes is a field guide for the smartest businesses who know that great content is the key to thriving in this digital world.

Breakthrough Advertising


Eugene M. Schwartz - 1966
    This is not a book just for copywriters and other advertising experts but a book for every business owner, marketing expert or anyone who needs to increase sales.The reason why is because it deals with how to channel the forces in the marketplace which control sales.Put simply, Gene's book addresses the universal problem of all copywriting: How to write a headline — and an ad that follows it — that will open up a whole new market.

Reality in Advertising


Rosser Reeves - 1961
    Published in 1961, Reality in Advertising was listed for weeks on the general best-seller lists, and is today acknowledged to be advertising's greatest classic. It has been translated into twelve languages-French, Japanese, Spanish, Dutch, German, Italian, Portuguese, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish, Hebrew-and has been published in twenty-one separate editions in fifteen countries. Leading business executives, and the advertising cognoscenti, hail it as "the best book for professionals that has ever come out of Madison Avenue." (For typical comments see back of jacket.) Rosser Reeves says: "The book attempts to formulate certain theories of advertising, many quite new, and all based on 30 years of intensive research." These theories, whose value has been proved in the marketplace, all revolve around the central concept that success in selling a product is the key criterion of advertising. In the course of explaining his own hard-headed approach, Mr. Reeves shows why the ad campaigns for many products are just so much money poured down the drain. He has some devastating things to say about advertising's misguided men: the "aesthetes" and the "puffers" who put art and technique ahead of the client's sales; and he punctures many of the misguided philosophies which lower the efficiency of advertising, rather than raising it. But even more important is the thoroughness and clarity with which he explains many of the mysteries of how to write advertising that produces these sales. Here, in short, is a concise, forcefully written guide that has been called "a 'Rosetta Stone' for the advertising business"- an essential book for anyone who works in advertising, or uses advertising extensively. It is today required reading in hundreds of great corporations and many of the world's leading business schools.

Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die


Chip Heath - 2006
    Meanwhile, people with important ideas--entrepreneurs, teachers, politicians, and journalists--struggle to make them "stick."In Made to Stick, Chip and Dan Heath reveal the anatomy of ideas that stick and explain ways to make ideas stickier, such as applying the human scale principle, using the Velcro Theory of Memory, and creating curiosity gaps. Along the way, we discover that sticky messages of all kinds--from the infamous "kidney theft ring" hoax to a coach's lessons on sportsmanship to a vision for a new product at Sony--draw their power from the same six traits.Made to Stick will transform the way you communicate. It's a fast-paced tour of success stories (and failures): the Nobel Prize-winning scientist who drank a glass of bacteria to prove a point about stomach ulcers; the charities who make use of the Mother Teresa Effect; the elementary-school teacher whose simulation actually prevented racial prejudice.Provocative, eye-opening, and often surprisingly funny, Made to Stick shows us the vital principles of winning ideas--and tells us how we can apply these rules to making our own messages stick.

Damn Good Advice (For People with Talent!): How To Unleash Your Creative Potential by America's Master Communicator, George Lois


George Lois - 2012
    Offering indispensle lessons, practical advice, facts, anecdotes and inspiration, this book is a timeless creative bible for all those looking to succeed in life, business and creativity. These are key lessons derived from the incomparle life of 'Master Communicator' George Lois, the original Mad Man of Madison Avenue. Written and compiled by the man The Wall Street Journal called "prodigy, enfant terrible, founder of agencies, creator of legends," each step is borne from a passion to succeed and a disdain for the status quo.Organised into inspirational, bite-sized pointers, each page offers fresh insight into the sources of success, from identifying your heroes to identifying yourself. The ideas, images and illustrations presented in this book are fresh, witty and in-your-face. Whether it's communicating your point in nanosecond, creating an explosive portfolio or making your presence felt, no one is better placed than George Lois to teach you the process of creativity.Poignant, punchy and to-the-point, Damn Good Advice (For People With Talent!) is a must have for anyone on a quest for success.

So You Think You Can Write? The Definitive Guide to Successful Online Writing


Julia McCoy - 2016
    Written by Julia McCoy, who spent years of her life teaching herself the elements of successful online writing and launched a writing business that hit seven figures within five years, this book is your essential blueprint to learning what it takes to write great online copy, both as a freelancer and brand/business owner.In this book, Julia walks you step-by-step through the process of how to craft the seven forms of online content:1. Web Content2. Blogging3. Social Media4. Advertising/Sales Copy5. Industry Writing6. Journalism 7. Creative WritingJulia also takes you through the basics of SEO (search engine optimization) for the online writer and creator, without overloading you: you'll get a key list of the top tools on the web to research keywords, learn how to hone your best key phrases, and the tactics of how and where to place them in your content. Illustrated, easy-to-understand, and fun to read, this is a comprehensive yet digestible resource for writers and businesses alike on how to create successful online content.After you read this book, you'll be able to: Define your audience and the terms they use to search in Google Write great content that will get picked up by Google Know the basics of what it takes to write all seven forms of online copy Create blogs that are evergreen and engaging Know how to write the "secret" bits of copy that search engines love: meta descriptions, tags and more Know how to use Twitter chats, live streaming, and Facebook groups, and other platforms to find your people and confidently market yourself as a writer Access a comprehensive list of online writing tools and resources in the final Appendix Julia McCoy has built a successful freelance writing career and a multi-million dollar copywriting agency out of nothing but the amount of hard work, time, and self-teaching she put into it: and she believes any writer has what it takes to create great online content, provided they learn the essential tactics of adapting to all online copy forms. But she knows it's hard to find these fundamentals in one place: which is why she decided to write a book to offer everyone just that opportunity. A writer and internet marketer from an early age, Julia started three companies, enrolled in college, and wrote a book by 16.

The Brand Gap


Marty Neumeier - 2003
    - Quick, easy approach and a wealth of case studies give readers a crash course in the difference between good and bad branding. - Tons of tips and real-world advice plus a new branding dictionary help readers turn brand strategy into brand design and execution.