why writers need copywriters

twitter tip from ariel who is often at the other end of the phone

wanted: copywriter in uniform

I'm doubled over laughing at Copyranter's Craigslist ad of the week:

A dynamic, entrepreneurial for-profit college in Northwest DC is looking for an experienced copy writer.

The twist: while you are writing copy you will also fill the role of security guard, working 6:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday. We will buy your uniform. You won’t carry a gun. Applicants must be able to pass a drug screen as well as a criminal background check. The security guard spends most of the shift seated at the reception desk, and there will be very minimal security duties. Practically the entire shift you will be able to focus on writing copy – you’ll just happen to be wearing a uniform.

The pay: a whopping $18/hour. Interested? Click here. On second thought--if you're interested, click here.

copywriters can be suckers, too

A middle-aged woman with luminous skin sold me a plate of wheatgrass at a farmer's market today. I was seduced by her sales pitch. And, of course, her luminous skin.

It was a dinner plate of soil from which grass was growing. How do you eat it, I wanted to know. She pulled out a scissors and took some off the top. Snip, snip, snip, like she was cutting hair. She gave me a wad of grass that I chewed, like cud. At first it tasted bitter, then very sweet and left an aftertaste that was not unpleasant.

As I chewed, I read a laminated laser-printed sign elucidating the benefits of wheatgrass ingestion:
--improves the digestive system!
--prevents cancer, diabetes and heart disease!
--cures constipation!
--detoxitfys heavy metals from blood!
-- makes menopause manageable!

I'll take some, I said. It was $9 a plate. Which seemed a bit steep for a plate of grass. But her skin was luminous.

"Bring the dish back next week, would you?" the woman said sweetly, as if she were handing me a neighborly plate of homecooking instead of selling me soil-- $392,040 an acre.

if u cn rd ths, u cn b a copywriter

Yea, there's Portfolio Center. There's VCU Brandcenter. There's W+K 12. Or, you can sign up for a correspondence course which lets you master the craft of copywriting without leaving home. (The solicitation email itself is a compendium of every trick of the trade.) Who knew it could be this easy? Why do I always do things the hard way?

Everyday people like yourself are earning as much money as most doctors, lawyers, or engineers... and without the long years of schooling. All you need is a basic feel for the English language and a desire to communicate.

The business I’m talking about... is writing. But it’s not the type of writing you think it is. School only prepares you for “traditional” writing. You know, magazines or newspaper articles (or even novels or screenplays, for that matter.)

If you can write a letter, learn a few simple rules, and put forth the effort, you too could be on your way to enjoying a lifestyle that many doctors, engineers, lawyers — even stressed-out CEO’s — would envy. And… without the aggravation and heartache they get on a daily basis.

People who do it are able to spend more time with their family. These folks decide when they want to work, and where they want to work: On a sailboat... on a beach... at home... or even on vacation.

These people are called: Freelance copywriters.

And get this:

You Don’t Even Have to Know How to Write!
(Not the Way Most People Think of Writing, Anyway)

So long as you can write conversationally, you don’t really have to know the “rules” of grammar. You don’t have to know a preposition from a noun.

There are plenty of proofreaders and computer spell check programs that can do it for you.

Now picture yourself in this life: You’re a freelance copywriter and you live wherever you want to and still earn a six-figure income. North America, South America, Canada... I have colleagues that live in beautiful seaside resort in Europe. They tell me there’s nothing like living in an exotic location to get the “creative juices” flowing. That and getting a five-figure paycheck couriered to them from overseas.

I now invite you to join the ranks of an elite circle
of people who enjoy working in this lucrative business.

It’s an Easy Skill, Once You Know How

I can honestly say that I’ve made some mistakes over the years — but the single best decision I ever made was getting into copywriting.

A while back when I realized that there is so much work in the market place — I decided to put a course together. One so special that it would teach the “Average Joe” not only how to write powerful, compelling copy — but how to succeed in the exciting and lucrative advertising industry.

If you were to go to school for this course it would cost you thousands of dollars. But I make it available to you for only $507...(to sign up, sucker, go to The #1 Reason to Become a Copywriter)

why the bloody hell don't we move to australia

I have no time to blog—I'm on two pitches, remember?

But I did have time to troll the web just now and stumbled across a site that you may already know--The Advertising Agency. It's in Australia, but with the same tsuris-producing clients & clueless management we deal with over here. I almost blew my cover (that I was googling some questions re. our target market) by laughing out loud at a post from last March, titled Being a Writer is Like Being a Cleaner:

You sweep the dirt into one corner and someone says, 'No, I wanted it in THAT corner.'

So you sweep it into the other corner and then someone else - some loser account guy playing devil's advocate for some loser client - comes in and wants it in another corner so you do that and then someone else wants it under the carpet instead of in a corner and then the art director says, 'I'm not having any carpet in my office,' and then the CD comes in and says you're using the wrong broom anyway.

So you get another broom and sweep around for another few hours and then the client comes in and says you should have vacuumed it.

By that stage you've been sweeping so much there is hardly anything left to sweep and now it's five-thirty and all you want is a drink and you think to yourself, 'If I really was the cleaner, I'd be going home right about now.'

I'm thinking of swapping jobs. Do cleaners earn $250,000 a year?

Is that what staff copywriters pull down over there? No wonder Australian tourism ads were banned for a while--lesser paid creatives on holiday there might never come back.