Dear Business Builder,
My 12-year-old son has designated himself the “crack cop” of our house.
The moment someone lets his pants slide down a bit and then ducks down, the boy gleefully yells, “Say no to crack!” —and then he collapses helplessly in spasms of laughter.
It happened to me just last night. In front of the babysitter. fucking humiliating.
Now, as your friend and mentor, I would hate for something like this to happen to you, especially when you pitch your copy to a client.
Showing off your keester, showing that you played hooky the day they taught grammar and punctuation rules in third grade, is no way to put your career on the fast track!
No, I’m not messing with you. In fact, this issue is more about my health than your career.
Look, I get tons of spec assignments and samples from writers who want to work with me. Plus, I edit tons of sales copy for “A” and “B” level writers who work for my agency, Response Ink.
And if I have to correct another stupid and/or careless mistake in grammar or punctuation, my head is going to explode.
And so, in what I’m sure is a futile attempt to stave off the heart attack or stroke I’m sure will happen the next time you see the same brain-dead mistakes in sales copy: Here are 17 simple guidelines I found on an educational website that may help…
1. Verbs have to agree with their subjects.
2. Also, never, ever use repetitive redundancies.
3. Be more or less specific.
4. Comments in parentheses (however relevant) are (usually) unnecessary.
5. There are no sentence fragments.
6. Foreign words and phrases are not appropriate.
7. Don’t be redundant; do not use more words than necessary; it is very superfluous.
8. You should never generalize.
9. Never use double negatives.
10. Avoid ampersands, abbreviations, etc.
11. The passive voice should be avoided.
12. Delete comments, which are not necessary. However, words in parentheses must be enclosed in commas.
13. Never use a big word when a diminutive or diminutive will suffice.
14. Use words correctly, regardless of how others use them.
15. Understatement is always the absolute best way to present transcendental ideas.
16. Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.
17. Check carefully to see if any words come out.
Now, I heard that in addition to the above rules, those of you with a sheepskin on the wall also learned some things about how to communicate effectively in English that just aren’t true, like…
1. One word sentences? Eliminate. No way! I’ve found that when used sparingly, one-word sentences and even one-word paragraphs in sales copy add emphasis and make the page look more engaging.
2. Who needs rhetorical questions? I do, that’s who! Rhetorical questions are a great way to stop prospects in their tracks and get them thinking. My rhetorical headline, “What’s wrong with getting richer faster?” mailed for years.
3. Contractions are not necessary and should not be used. Baloney! Contractions should always be used when writing sales copy, unless NOT using them adds proper emphasis: “Don’t buy any stock today” is much less emphatic than “DO NOT buy any stock today.”
4. Prepositions are not words to end sentences. Not necessarily true. Remember: Our goal is to write colloquially, and most of our prospects break this rule with complete abandon.
5. And don’t start a sentence with a conjunction. MISTAKEN! Conjunctions are words that connect… when used at the beginning of a paragraph, they can be very helpful in promoting reading.
6. It is wrong to ever divide an infinitive. Again, if you speak to your prospect in a colloquial way, it can sometimes be helpful.
7. Avoid clichés like the plague. (They are old hat.) That’s as dumb as a bag of hammers. Clichés, metaphors and other figures of speech are more than colloquial and comfortable; they tend to paint vivid mental pictures. And as we both know, a picture is worth a thousand words.
8. Also, always avoid annoying alliterations. Some of the most effective headlines ever used alliteration to make them memorable. Bencivenga’s legendary “Lies, Lies, Lies”, “12 Smiling Scammers”, etc.
9. Comparisons are just as bad as clichés. WHO wrote these rules anyway? Comparisons are essential in sales copy. To make my case, I often compare something that is happening in the economy or the stock market today to something that happened in the past.
And to keep things simple, I often compare something that happens inside your body to something that happens outside of it: “This supplement is like a root rotor for your arteries.”
And of course, comparing the high value of benefits my product offers with its low cost is a proven winner.
10. Analogies in writing are like the feathers of a snake. Again, analogies are word pictures…they are used in colloquial conversation…and are a quick way to drive your point home.
11. Kill all the exclamation points! Not always! Judicious use of exclamation points when writing sales copy is helpful in emphasizing important points! However, excessive use can kill!
12. Remove the quotes. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “I hate dating. Tell me what you know.” You can quote me on this: Waldo was a drooling jerk. Citing implicit or explicit endorsement from a top expert for your rationale, topic, or product is a powerful way to establish credibility.
13. If you’ve heard it once, you’ve heard it a thousand times: Resist hyperbole; not one writer in a million can use it effectively. Hyperbole is like art: no one can define it, but everyone thinks they know it when they see it. As a writer, only you should judge whether your tone and choice of words are appropriate or over the top.
14. Word games are for children, not for strong readers. Tell that to Arthur Johnson: He knows that light humor, including puns, can be a powerful booster for readers and responses, especially in headings and subheadings!
15. Go around the barn at noon to avoid colloquialisms. Nonsense. Colloquialisms communicate. See above.
However, there is one more set of rules that I DO try to follow carefully, and that I see broken more than any other…
Use the apostrophe where it belongs and omit it when not necessary.
Oh, apostrophes. Those little demons seem to be all demons I know. The problem is that the misuse of apostrophes is a concern for me.
I can’t explain why, but when they’re used incorrectly in a copy I’m reviewing, critiquing, or editing, they make me see red.
My blood pressure “spikes”, those little “veins” on my forehead bulge, a gallon of adrenaline “pours” into my bloodstream and I have to resist the urge to strangle the poor person “who” offended me.
In my humble opinion, nothing, NOTHING, makes your sales copy look more ignorant than misusing or abusing the humble apostrophe.
And wouldn’t you know? Just about everyone in my office…every copier I work with…every vendor that sells stuff to my companies…every client I have…and even the top copywriters I boss copy with every day.. .couldn’t. Don’t correctly use an apostrophe if you put a gun to your “head”.
look. This is not brain science or rocket surgery: there are three times, and ONLY three times, when an apostrophe is required…
Tense #1 — To make a possessive word:
RULE A: If the root of the word is NOT possessive and does not already end in “s”, adding an apostrophe followed by an “s” makes that word possessive.
Example:
“This is Clayton’s article.”
NO “This is the Claytons article.”
RULE B: If the word already ends in “s”, no additional “s” is needed. An apostrophe at the end of the word is sufficient.
Example:
“That’s Martin Weiss’s newsletter”
NO “That’s Martin Weiss’s newsletter”
RULE C: Words that are already possessive do not need an apostrophe, regardless of whether they end in “s” or not.
Examples:
“This is yours?”
NO “This is yours”
“This is yours?”
NO “This is yours?”
“Is this hers?”
NO “Is this hers?”
“This is theirs?”
NO “This is theirs?”
“He said his product”
NO “He said it’s a product.”
AND DEFINITELY NOT “He said it’s a product.”
Time #2 — To combine two words into one using a contraction:
The apostrophe is used to replace a missing letter in the combined word.
Examples:
is = is
no = no
won’t = won’t
could not = could not
she is = she is
he is = he is
are = are
Clayton’s = Clayton’s
Tense #3 – Colloquially, to indicate that a letter or part of a word or number is missing.
Examples:
Clayton has been called “The Sultan of ‘Persuasion’.”
In ’87, the stock market crashed…
—————————
There.
I feel better.
I’ll never have to correct these things again, right?
