Copywriting Defined In A Single Tweet

It seems business owners who understand the power of sales copy are most interested in learning all the “advanced” copywriting tips. Unfortunately, the advanced stuff doesn’t do you much good if you don’t understand the essence of copywriting.

That’s the bad news.

The good news is that the essence of copywriting may be a whole lot simpler than you think. I’ll get to that in a minute. First, let me tell you a little story…

I’m fairly active on Twitter. It’s a good place to share thoughts, spread ideas, and connect with like-minded people.

Well, a few days ago, well-known Internet marketing trainer Ken McCarthy challenged his Twitter followers to define…

Copywriting in a Single Tweet!

Just 140 characters to work with. That’s it.

A few people responded, and I was one of them. I suggested that:

Copywriting is: Getting attention and keeping it long enough that the reader takes your desired action.

On the surface, this may seem too simple. So let’s break it down.

First, for any sales message to be effective, you must get your prospect’s attention. If you don’t get attention, you don’t get a sale. Period.

Second, once you have a prospect’s attention, you must keep it long enough. It’s critical that you understand this point.

Sometimes, you may only need to keep somebody’s attention for a few minutes before he buys (think “impulse purchases”). Other times, you may need to keep his attention for months.

Seriously.

Hardly anybody buys a new car or new house or new appliance on a whim. All of these products (and many more) have longer-than-average buying cycles.

And that’s why it’s so important to keep a prospect’s attention long enough.

Third, you must get your prospect to take your desired action.

In most cases, you’ll want the prospect to buy. But in other cases, you may want your prospect to opt-in to an email list, retweet a blog post, forward a link to his friends, or perhaps make a donation.

Copywriting has many purposes besides getting sales, so a “desired action” can take many different forms.

See How Simple Copywriting Is?

Copywriting doesn’t need to be complicated. Not at all.

So next time you sit down to write some copy, keep in mind that copywriting is nothing more than getting attention and keeping it long enough that the reader takes your desired action.

–Ryan

P.S. Want ideas, strategies, and techniques for growing your business? Then check out these free business growth articles.