Copywriting is verrry different than academic and creative writing.
After spending a lot of my free time as a kid writing poems and essays and stories, along with graduating with a BA in English, I felt pretty good coming in as a writer at an advertising agency. While I still knew I had much to learn (and was eager to do so), I thought my writing experience would be pretty similar as a copywriter.
The truth is, I basically had to relearn how to write.
No ten-paged essays. No perfect grammar. No using your own voice when writing. As a “classically trained” writer you could say, I basically had to throw aside almost all of what I had spent years perfecting. I felt very vulnerable at this time. I was starting anew, and I felt like my copywriting just wasn’t there. I had to be extremely concise when I was a flowery writer. I had to abandon most grammar rules to make the copy feel more human. And I could not let my own voice shine through because I had to learn how to reflect the voices of my clients instead.
It took time to adjust, and I was hard on myself, but I also worked diligently to improve. And overtime, things began to click. The best advice I can give if you find yourself in this situation is to give yourself grace. Give yourself time to learn. Not getting it right away doesn’t mean you’re bad at what you do. I mean, even the masters had to start somewhere.
Work ebbs and flows.
This isn’t your consistent 9-5. Some days, you’ll be crammed with assignment after assignment. And others, you’ll have very little to do. It’s on those days when I don’t have much that I find the hardest to stay motivated, so here are a few things I do to stay in the zone when I find I have nothing to do:
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Write posts for my blog
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Read up on copywriting and advertising news
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Take LinkedIn Learning courses
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Update my portfolio
You need to be an expert in everything.
In order to truly find the voice of a brand, you need to become an expert on not just the brand, but the entire industry it’s in. That means if I have to write a video script for a roofing company, I need to know as much as possible about roofs. You gotta do your research, and that is something I learned very quickly when starting out as a copywriter. Research will helped me understand the kind of customer mindset that will be attracted to the ad. Once I created that understanding, it became a lot easier to successfully write copy for a brand.
Most of your day is spent staring at a wall.
I think of copywriters as the mad hatters of the ad world. They produce impressive, creative work, but their process seems completely nonsensical to the outside world. The reality is, you’ll go through a wide range of emotions when trying to come up with a brilliant idea. And that means you’ll spend a good number of days just staring at a wall, thinking, pondering your existence, and questioning what you’re doing with your life.
It’s all a part of the process of coming up with a great idea. The best ideas take time, so don’t beat yourself up over having a seemingly unproductive day of staring at a wall while others appear insanely busy typing away, making phone calls, or attending meetings. Those days of just pondering are actually the most important in helping you get to where you need to be.
When I become frustrated in these kinds of moments, I try to change my surroundings, move myself to a different space, and talk to my coworkers. The best way to get out of these moments and make them useful is by surrounding yourself with new environments, people, and things. Inspiration comes from everywhere, and I can truly say that most of my ideas come to me after having a long chat with my neighboring coworkers about something completely random. Whether that discussion helps to reset my mind or I find a tidbit of inspiration from it, it brings me to a place of clarity and re-energization.
Pay attention to the ads around you.
Like I said before, inspiration comes from everywhere. So get your head up in the clouds. Take a look at all the ads that surround you on your walk to work or your commute home. Once I began tuning into the advertisements around me, I felt much more inspired and passionate about my work. I was able to create my own perspective on the advertising world, what I liked about the ads I saw, along with what I didn’t like. Basically, keeping myself in the ad zone whenever possible helps me stay in tune with improving my own work.
Take the stairs.
My office is on the sixth floor of an old factory-looking building right at the entrance of the North End. Every morning, no matter how tired I am, I take the stairs.
I make the six-floor trudge up massive flights to get the blood pumping, to get my brain going. On the days I work in-person, I usually don’t get a chance to work out, so this three-minute climb is my time to do just that.
Exercise has always been a prominent part of my life. As a dancer, I always need to stay in practice, and that means consistently working out to maintain my strength and flexibility. It’s my way of refreshing and restarting my brain and body, no matter what other craziness is going on in my life. And when I climb those six flights of stairs in the morning, I arrive at work feeling ready to take on whatever’s thrown at me.
I mean, if I can climb six floors, I can write a few words, right?