It is a truth universally acknowledged that marketing folk are so busy with buzz words that they forget to tell us WHAT they actually do.
This actually makes it hard to buy what they sell. Not a good thing.
Why? Well…it seems we often don’t know what it is we are trying to sell.
We’ve all heard about features v benefits. People don’t actually want to buy a drill. They want a hole in a wall.
I had a good think about this the other day and came to a similar conclusion about PR. Marketers are not actually desperate to sign up a PR consultant or agency. They want the result of that purchase. They want coverage and awareness.
All too often when I come in for a brief with a potential client and ask them what they do and for whom, they really don’t seem to know.
They talk about “best practice”, “robust strategies”, “whole of market offerings” and “holistic approaches”.
Waffle
WHAT do you do? What actually changes once you are hired or your product is sold? What is the tangible ROI?
My colleague, Martin Rockley, will head up our new copywriting service, ‘Press For Copy’, from September. Martin lives by the mantra “sell the sizzle, not the sausage”.
Benefits. Results.
So I asked Martin (or in current marketing phraseology I “reached out” to him) and asked him what he does.Here’s his reply worked through to the end:
“Does a copywriter write copy? No. A copywriter sells stuff by using written words. We are the print or digital equivalent of the door-to-door salesmen we have replaced – we reveal how we can improve lives rather than describing the product features.
“Nobody employs me because I’m an advertising Dostoevsky. They employ me because I can help them sell their products or services. I’m a problem solver. Someone who knows what buttons to press and how to press them.
“So I’m a problem solver, salesperson and button presser – or copywriter for short.”
Before anyone begins a marketing or PR campaign, they need to know their audience (their who) and their message (their what). So, can you tell me yours?
What do you actually do? What changes once I make a decision to buy from you?
Nail that and then we can talk about how I can help you tell other people that.
I’d love some free PR tips and tricks please