writing and blogging
Back in 1998, when the Internet was all shiny and new (and referred to with awe as “the information superhighway”), I was hired by a search engine company to write web copy. Our department of brave new online writers was known as “Editorial,” based on the newspaper model. The word “content” hadn’t crept into our…
Wordsmithing is both an art and a craft. Copy that engages audiences is built on the nuts ‘n’ bolts basics of good writing: correct grammar, spelling and punctuation; proper word usage; and consistent style. In our digital age of LOL text-speak and 140-character microblogging, precise writing still matters. Most seasoned writers have at least a…
I’ve been looking back over various lists of copywriting tips published online over the past several years. They provide lots of good advice. Write a great headline Gail Goodwin advised in Entrepreneur Focus on “you,” not “we” Susan Gunelius wrote in 2009, also for Entrepreneur Pick one message and one message only Kimberly McCall recommended…
We do quite a bit of cross-cultural work here at Wordsmithie, especially with the UK. As George Bernard Shaw rightly observed, “England and America are two countries separated by a common language.” The same is true—perhaps even more so—for Australia, New Zealand and English-speaking Canada and India. It’s always wise to keep our many linguistic…
You might remember President Ronald Reagan’s maxim, “Trust, but verify.” It comes from a Russian proverb, “Doveryai, no proveryai,” which is why he quoted it to Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev during the signing of a nuclear treaty in 1987. “You repeat that every meeting,” Gorbachev said, winning laugher. “I like it,” Reagan replied, drawing even…
Writing for a living may sound romantic to those who’ve chosen a different career path. Non-writers think we spend our days drinking coffee (true), banging out quirky prose (maybe), contemplating brilliant ideas (…), all while working in bunny slippers and waiting for magic writing fairies to flitter down and kiss the page (we wish!). But…
Working a great deal of the time with startups and tech giants alike as we do at Wordsmithie, it’s exciting to be in on the ground floor of new ideas. Creating buzz around a new product or service and crafting the words and phrases that will connect it to people is one of the most…
Say that you’re launching a new product and need your agency to create sales and marketing materials. Or say that you’ve signed with a new agency and need to bring them up to speed on your company. How much information do you provide? At Wordsmithie, we generally say, “Send us whatever you have.” There’s no…
If you’re old enough to remember writing on a heavy, anvil-shaped thing called a “typewriter” — well here’s to you, my fellow editorial veteran. Back in the ’80s, at my first newspaper job, we banged out stories on thin yellow typing paper, using Liquid Paper and correction tape to fix our mistakes. “Cut ‘n’ paste”…
Once upon a time, in what seems like the Internet Stone Age, content marketing was just taking off. It was “rumored” that, by writing excellent content, one could reach audiences far and wide, but very little was done to analyze the success (or otherwise) of that content. Back then, setting up a blog was a…
