How To…
Writing for social media:
our theory to add to the theories.
‘How should our brand write for Facebook, Twitter and [insert the next big thing here]?’ That’s a question nervous brand managers ask us a lot at the moment. To their slight dismay, we don’t hand over a template, a guideline or a guaranteed-to-get-you-more-retweets-than-that-photo-of-Barack-and-Michelle trade secret. Because social media is different to other writing. You’re talking [...]
No, it won’t do. Ten signs a copywriter is on autopilot.
It’s easy to blame bad writing on cautious clients or the scars of two-thousand-and-one track changes. But much of the blame has to lie with copywriters themselves. Too many of them have knocked out sloppy words for far too long. We want it to stop. So we’ve written, not rules exactly, but provocations. What if [...]
Buy-in? No we don’t.
When we hear the words ‘stakeholders’, ‘engagement’ or ‘buy-in’ at the start of a project our hearts sink. On paper it makes perfect sense to make sure the people who should be involved have their say. But in practice, the process often takes over at the expense of any good ideas.
How to sum up your brand in a line
How to describe your brand in a few words. How to make it really, properly, actually different. How to sell it in.
Writing for websites: the thing most websites get wrong
There’s already lots of advice on the web about writing for search engine optimisation (SEO). How the right keywords in the right places will help your website get further up search engine results, that sort of thing. But that’s only half the story – because sometimes words get in the way. It can be better [...]
How to do brand naming
How to work out what kind of name you want (and why that’s the most important bit). How to come up with the right name. How to get it through the trademark checks. Naming should be really simple. It hardly ever is.
How to say what’s different about you
How to find what makes you different. How to explain it so that everyone gets it. And remembers it. How to do this without all the usual branding bluff. This is what brand consultancies call your ‘brand essence’ or ‘big idea’. Whatever you call it, we’ve explained the steps to writing down why you’re different [...]
How to write a strategy
How to get to the point. How to structure your ideas clearly. How to involve the right people (without letting any of them mess it up). This isn’t a guide to doing a SWOT analysis or the McKinsey way. This is the bit they forgot to cover on the MBA course. How to write a [...]
How to find your tone of voice
How to make your words work just as hard as your identity.
How to come up with a tone that doesn’t sound like everyone else.
How to make sure everyone can use it.