Beginner’s guide to copywriting: What’s the difference between a copywriter with a monthly salary of 3,000 and one with a monthly salary of 30,000?

It is said that the chain of contempt of advertising companies is like this:

People who do planning despise people who write copywriting , people who work for clients despise people who write copywriting, people who do design despise people who write copywriting, people who do front-end work despise people who write copywriting, people who work in media despise people who write copywriting, people who do finance despise people who write copywriting, people who work at the front desk despise people who write copywriting, people who do cleaning despise people who write copywriting…

Why?

Because copywriting is a skill that has no threshold. As long as you can recognize a few words, you can write copywriting.

Anyone can write copy, and there doesn’t seem to be much of an introduction. All you need is a piece of paper and a pen to start working. But it is easy to pick up a pen and write a few lines of copy, but it is difficult to write good copy. Often, the simpler something seems, the harder it is to do well.

It is easy to be a copywriter with a monthly salary of 3,000 yuan, but it is difficult to be a copywriter with a monthly salary of 30,000 yuan.

A copywriter with a monthly salary of 30,000 is one in the crowd, while a copywriter with a monthly salary of 3,000 is just like everyone else.

They are just a few words, what’s the difference?

The key is two points: insight and concept

A copywriter who earns 30,000 yuan a month is one who can find consumer insights and refine creative concepts when creating works.

1. Insight

For advertisers, people are the basis of creation, and the secret of advertising is to discover it by going deep into the lives and hearts of consumers.

The so-called insight means to experience life more, understand people's hearts, and understand human nature.

To find insights, there are two things to do.

First, discover the details of life.

This requires the ability to observe life in great detail and to be able to discover the user's special psychological phenomena and small movements.

Many advertisers complain that they cannot write copy. When it comes to writing copy, their brains go blank. They rack their brains to find words and look up dictionaries, but they still can't write easily. This way of writing copy is actually not creation, but coding, a trick of choosing words and making sentences, and playing word games .

True creation should be like what Ang Lee said:

"A director is just a conductor. He senses something and conveys it to the public through his own understanding. A director is a container. He first feels something and then shares his feelings with the audience. I speak from my heart."

Copywriting is about feeling life and expressing it. The real writing does not come from the dictionary, but from life.

So don’t say that the target audience of your copywriting is those born in the 1990s, female white-collar workers, successful people... such vague and abstract groups. Instead, imagine yourself as one of them and put yourself in their life role.

What tone do you want advertisers to use when speaking to you, and what do they say to impress you?

Imagine that you are a female white-collar worker in the workplace. Your daily life, the kind of friends you have, and your thoughts are the origins of the copywriting.

We know that girls feel uncomfortable during those few days of the month, they don’t want to go to work and just want to stay in bed, they just want to wear comfortable clothes, they are emotionally sensitive and explosive...

When Hushubao saw these details of the girl, she chose to look at life from a different perspective and told the girl that some changes in life would bring different gains and fun, so she wrote this "Happiness Declaration":

“During those days, I have a date with my bed, don’t call a meeting with me;

“During those days, I cried whenever I wanted and used my tears to wash away the bad emotions;

“During those days, I wore sneakers instead of high heels and went shopping in the sun.

Happy Woman's Month, Always.

This kind of copywriting can definitely not be written by a straight man who doesn't care about girls' feelings.

As a precious metal mineral used for engagement and wedding, gold has always been at a disadvantage in the competition with diamonds and platinum. Gold seems traditional and conservative.

Therefore, the World Gold Council hopes to give gold the symbolic meaning of unswerving loyalty and carry the true moments of the emotional journey. And tell men and women that when they fall in love with someone, they should choose to give gold jewelry as a gift. When love is about time, only gold matters.

Its text is as follows -

Tolerating a little temper and meeting best friends, these small details in love are insights into life.

In August 2011, when Typhoon Meihua hit China, BBH spontaneously filmed a short video for the World Gold Council, telling the story of a date that would be met despite wind and rain and even on typhoon days. The copy says: "When love is stronger than a typhoon, love is established." This is a creative idea that is lifelike and can make people empathize.

For someone who likes running, it is common to go out for a run in the early morning. At the beginning, everything was quiet, with few pedestrians and vehicles, and the whole city was still asleep. It is pitch black everywhere, you can't see the road in the distance clearly, and the occasional figure that appears or the barking of a dog makes you nervous, but you just have to keep running forward, relying on the listless street lights and the little light of morning light.

Slowly, you see the sky getting brighter and more pedestrians and vehicles appearing. By the time you finish running, the sky is already bright and the golden morning light is shining. Others are still sleepy, yawning and walking in a hurry, but you are already sweating quietly, enjoying the relaxation and comfort coming from all your limbs. When the day breaks, my heart becomes bright too. That feeling cannot be experienced by those who don't run.

So New Balance said: Keep running, and the day will dawn. A sentence full of double meanings, which comes from the feelings of runners. You will understand it if you run.

His slogans, such as “Every time the second cup is half price, I think of you” of McDonald 's, “Every day I use a six-digit password to protect my two-digit savings” of Ant Fortune, and “The most important car in the world is Dad’s shoulder” of China Auto , all contain meticulous observations of life.

Write out the details and bring life to the text, and it will become lively and full of life.

Second, explore consumption motivations.

Insight is not only about finding the details in life, but also about discovering the hidden motivations of consumers.

Sometimes, consumers will say one thing and mean another. Their true thoughts and real motivations for consumption are often hidden beneath overt behaviors and appearances, and disguised as high-sounding reasons. They don't say it out loud.

For example, for a middle-aged greasy uncle who plans to buy a luxury car, his real thought is probably "the high configuration and high performance of the luxury car can increase my masculine charm, save the disaster caused by my hairline and belly, and increase the chance of the opposite sex looking at me sideways."

Remember this picture?

For example, for a woman who buys YSL lipstick, the hidden consumption signal is probably "it can make you look younger and more fertile, much better than those 17 or 18-year-old girls who are just starting out."

Of course, these hidden narratives do not need to be spoken out loud. You only need to associate driving pleasure with enterprising spirit and social status in the copy, and interpret the colorful and plump lip color as an independent and confident attitude of women.

Regardless of whether the copy is explicit or implicit, you must know the consumer's true intentions so that the copy you write can hit the mark.

For marathon runners, what matters is not beating others on the track, but beating others in the circle of friends .

The reason why we wear a safety helmet is not because our lives are threatened, but because our social status and image are threatened.

These two pieces of copywriting are exploring hidden motives, as is the copywriting for Taobao women's clothing:

The little lace girl with a Lolita style desires not your protection, but your possession;
The fresh white dress is not looking forward to the hawthorn tree, but the reckless gangsters;
The black silk commuter outfit in the workplace is not shouting for independence, but for shoulders;
The black mini dress is not a popular way of dressing, but a vanity that can not win but definitely cannot lose;
A woman's true feelings are never spoken, but only worn on her body.

Clothes are the most moving language

Only by deeply understanding user psychology can you write copy that touches people's hearts. Another example is the Hunter and Prey series of NIKE WOMEN:

Hunter

I like being a hunter

Because the hunter is beautiful

Especially when the thought of attacking and the ruthless actions of his men merge into one...

Beautiful inside and out

I recently saw two very beautiful hunters

One is a pitcher who is tense but holds his breath

He faced the batter and prepared to pitch.

But just by his momentum, he has turned the opponent from an opponent into a prey.

The other hunter is me.

That's what I saw in the other party's eyes during the negotiation meeting.

This non-decorative, practical, siege-type aesthetic

I call it "functional aesthetics"

Prey

I like being the prey

The conditions for becoming prey are: to be seen, to be needed, to be admired, to be...

The act of "becoming prey" is actually an active "passed" verb.

Therefore the prey must always present itself to the hunter.

Just like a small clerk who expresses his unique views in an important meeting attended by the big boss

And when your performance is seen, you are the focus

You are the most beautiful thing in people's eyes

But sometimes the hunter disguises himself as the prey

For example

When in love

Between hunter and prey, only by understanding consumer psychology can one capture the hearts of consumers.

In an early Chivas advertisement, several men were fishing in the snow with a bottle of Chivas at their feet. The advertising copy said, "This is the Chivas life."

What is Chivas Life? Rich and good at spending money. This is the implication of this copy.

Taiwan's PX Mart is the most widely distributed supermarket in Taiwan. Its advantage is that it is cheap, but its disadvantage is that it is too cheap. As a result, many young people who go to PX Mart feel embarrassed holding PX Mart shopping bags.

Everyone wants to save money, but they don’t want others to see them saving money and make them feel poor. This is the consumer mentality.

Therefore, in its advertising copy, PX Mart portrayed saving money as a personality, an attitude, and a consumption aesthetic for young people. A huge success.

Therefore, copywriting is like an inner drama, and you must know how to arouse consumers. A good copywriter must be a psychologist, a preacher, a shaman, a pick-up artist, a wizard who chants blessings...

2. Concept

If insight is the inner skill that a copywriter practices, then concept is the copywriter's magic weapon.

The difference between a good idea and a great idea is whether there is a strong concept behind the idea. What distinguishes an ordinary copywriter from an excellent copywriter is whether he has the ability to abstract concepts.

Concept is the key from strategy to creativity.

The job of an advertising agency is to find key insights and develop communication strategies through comprehensive analysis of consumers, competition, and products.

Then, refine the strategy into a core concept that communicates with consumers, which can be either the product USP or the brand concept.

Then, develop creative expression around the concept. As long as you have a good concept, good copywriting and good creativity can be easily achieved.

From a strategic perspective, the concept is a dragon-slaying sword that condenses the core selling points of the product and the core values ​​of the brand, expresses the core competitiveness and market position of the enterprise, and commands the world to obey.

From a creative perspective, the concept is the sword of the sky, the source of text that can most touch the hearts of consumers, and the word or sentence that can most impress and capture consumers. It is so sharp that no one can compete with it.

Creative concepts can be divided into two types:

One is the core selling point of the product.

To be more precise, it is a logical deduction based on the product selling point, what benefits will be brought by having the product selling point (result method), and what disadvantages will occur if the product does not exist (problem method).

For example, the benefits brought by BMW driving technology are driving pleasure and enjoyable experience, so the copy of BMW advertisements revolves around the core concept of "JOY".

For example, the core selling point of Evian is that natural mineral water can bring physical and mental health and vitality, so the core concept of Evian is youth, and its slogan is live young.

The above is the result method, let’s look at the problem method.

The question method is to explore the pain points that consumers had before the product appeared, or what troubles consumers would encounter in their lives if the product did not appear, and then refine them.

For example, Xiaoping Island, a real estate project in the southwest of Dalian, is a coastline community of one million square meters. Xiaoping Island is surrounded by the sea on three sides and backed by mountains on the north. It is close to Laohutan and Xinghai Bay. Since the 16th century, it has been famous for its delicious seafood and island tourism. The biggest selling point of the project is naturally the sea view.

Therefore, the advertisement sets such a concept: if there is no sea in Dalian, to describe the importance of the sea to Dalian and highlight the value of the sea view. All creative ideas and copywriting revolve around the concept of "What if Dalian had no sea?"

If Dalian had no sea, then...

Dating is so boring, seafood prices have increased more than eight times, I can only travel to Qingdao, I don’t like Dalian anymore.

Other examples include the national public welfare campaign "got milk?" initiated by the Body By Milk Association in the United States and the early "hungry?" campaign of Nissin Cup Noodles.

The other is the brand’s core values.

It is to abstract a point of view, a concept from product attributes, functional benefits, and brand history, so that it can resonate with the group, become a socially recognized value concept, and sublimate into the core values ​​of the brand.

Creative copywriting is expressed around this viewpoint/concept.

For example, Vita Lemon Tea, its product selling point is real tea + real lemon, the quality is genuine and the price is reasonable. Vita's creativity is to elevate real tea and real lemon to a concept: "If you want it, just do it for real."

To be serious goes beyond the product level. It is not about the "truth" of the product, but the "truth" of the consumers, thereby expressing the young people's courage to act, their straightforward personality, and their uncompromising self-persistence. This attitude towards life can easily win the resonance of users.

“If you want to do it, do it for real” is actually a creative interpretation of the product value of “Real Tea Real Lemon”. It moves from value to values, and thus becomes a life concept shared with users, giving the brand attitude and personality.

One of the TVCs was shot like this, centered around the idea of ​​“if you want it, do it for real”.

A couple was walking on the road, and the girl said, "If I fall into the river, will you save me?" The boy said, "Of course."

So the girl jumped into the river immediately.

If you want to do it, do it for real! Real tea + real lemon, Vita lemon tea.

Another example is Sanquan Private Chef Dumplings. The flavors of Private Chef Dumplings include black pepper beef, chopped pepper fish head, shrimp dumplings, etc. Compared with the traditional pork and cabbage, pork and corn dumplings, its product selling point is that it tastes better and represents consumption upgrading. So, the concept it communicates to consumers is: life is not easy, living is difficult, and "it is necessary to eat well."

"It is necessary to eat something good" does not just mean that the product is good, but more importantly, it expresses an attitude towards life and requires you to know how to please yourself and reward yourself.

The copywriting it put on buses reads: Look, life is so hard! Come eat something good!

Sino-Ocean Wanhe City, a real estate project in Tianjin, is far away from the city and has inconvenient transportation and lack of supporting facilities. This is an obvious disadvantage, but fortunately it will be improved in the near future, so Wanhe City would like to say to consumers: It is very far now, but it will be very close in the future. This is about selling the project's block potential and future plans.

In terms of communication, Range Rover advertising designed the following concept for Wanhe City: Must be optimistic. We must believe that Wanhe City will get better soon, and we must be blindly optimistic and confident in life.

Its text is as follows -

From "the present is very far away and the future is very close" to "we must be optimistic", this is a creative transformation from products to consumers.

But there is a logical connection between the two. Precisely because "the present is so far away and the future is so close", we "must be optimistic". The two are related.

Without the support of product selling points, creative concepts will become castles in the air. It is impossible to make consumers ultimately switch from identifying with the concept to identifying with the product.

Wanhe City and the Xiaoping Island in front are both produced by Range Rover advertisements. From these two cases, we can see the importance of concepts.

With a concept, creativity and copywriting will have a soul. All creative ideas will revolve around the concept, which is simple, sharp and has a better communication effect.

At the same time, the concept is a bridge connecting products and consumers, strategies and creativity. It establishes a connection between products and consumers, makes product functions closely related to consumers' vital interests and lifestyles, and makes consumers more easily influenced and impressed by products.

In addition to life concepts and attitudes towards life, brand core values-style creative concepts can also be the philosophy that the brand upholds, such as Apple's think different and Johnnie Walker's keep walking.

LV, a well-known luxury brand, has a rich product line, ranging from bags to shoes, ready-to-wear, watches, and jewelry. But when it comes to a product that can represent LV, it has to be the suitcase. In 1835, the founder of LV, 14-year-old Louis Vuitton, left Switzerland and walked 250 kilometers to Paris to make a living. He started as a suitcase apprentice and gradually became Queen Eugenie's exclusive leather designer and suitcase expert.

We know that most magazine advertisements for luxury goods are centered around supermodels and celebrities, with a brand logo as the only feature. There are no claims or text.

All luxury brands are associated with high-end, extravagance and celebrity, and are symbols of wealth and status. But in terms of brand value and personality, there is insufficient differentiation among luxury brands.

When LV was seen as a display of wealth and both genuine and fake products were everywhere on the street, in 2008, LV began to add a series of core value advertisements based on its original simple fashion advertisements, centering on "travel" to output its brand image and concept. LV reminds us that travel culture is its core value and its historical origin.

LV suitcases not only symbolize wealth and status, but also accompany and witness your life journey. Traveling makes each of us what we are.

Guided by the concept of "travel", LV created a series of excellent advertising copy.

Agassi-Love is the most beautiful journey

Is there any greater journey than love?

Catherine Deneuve - Sometimes, home is just a feeling

Sometimes, home is just a feeling

Gorbachev-Travel makes us face ourselves

A journey brings us face to face with ourselves

Coppola - In every story, there is a beautiful journey

Inside every story, there is a beautiful journey

40th anniversary of the moon landing - some journeys changed humanity forever

Some journeys change mankind forever. first step. june 3rd

During the 2010 World Cup , LV invited Zidane, Pele and Maradona to shoot a travel core value advertisement.

This series of advertisements made people re-acquainted with LV and established a connection between the brand and consumers through people and travel. It is not an ICON that is everywhere, but a humanistic aesthetic that focuses on people and thinks about life.

This is the creative concept. It is not just a piece of copywriting, but also a brand’s belief and the core value of a brand.

As we have repeatedly emphasized, people are the starting point of advertising.

Through consumer insights, we capture life details and consumption motivations, find and extract powerful creative concepts from them, and lead the entire communication. Single concept, integrated output to impress consumers.

That’s the whole core of ad creation.

By constantly improving your copywriting skills through insight and making good use of concepts as a strategic weapon in copywriting, you can become the best.

Although the title says a monthly salary of 30,000, in fact, it is not common for copywriters to earn 30,000 a month. This is not because copywriters are worthless, but because good copywriters are promoted to creative directors.

According to the Peter Principle, the conclusion drawn by American management expert Lawrence Peter from his research on the phenomenon of personnel promotion in organizations:

Various organizations are accustomed to promoting competent and outstanding personnel at a certain level to higher positions. If he continues to be competent, he will be promoted further until he reaches a position that he is no longer competent for.

Ultimately, in a hierarchy, each employee tends to rise to a position for which he is not qualified.

This phenomenon is ubiquitous in real life: a competent university professor is promoted to president but becomes incompetent; an outstanding athlete is promoted to sports official but becomes incompetent.

The same is true in advertising companies. Excellent copywriters will be promoted before their monthly salary reaches 30,000 yuan. The greater the ability, the greater the responsibility and the more work. So there are only directors with a monthly salary of 30,000 yuan, but no copywriters with a monthly salary of 30,000 yuan.

But an excellent copywriter may not necessarily be a qualified director. Because in addition to being responsible for professional creation, the creative director is also responsible for coordinating the creative communication management of the entire project, leading people, and selling proposals.

However, in terms of professional creation alone, a copywriter who does not understand consumer insights and concept refinement will definitely not be able to become a director. Because insight and concept are the core of creation, and also the basis for a copywriter to move from being responsible only for words to being responsible for overall creativity and understanding strategy.

The author of this article @空手同学was compiled and published by (Qinggua Media). Please indicate the author information and source when reprinting!

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