Video:
Write Now! Persuasive Writing Prompts:
Make Your Copy Better
Practice your copywriting skills with this prompt from The Professional Writers’ Alliance (PWA).
In this Write Now! exercise, you’ll discover a simple approach — a single question to ask yourself — that will help you improve your copy.
Watch this video by master web copywriter and teacher Nick Usborne to see what he does to strengthen every piece of copy before he sends it to his clients. (Or read the transcript below.)
Here’s something that I do as a copywriter all the time, and I learned this the hard way.
Before I send out any copy — I work really hard on my copy, and I keep writing draft after draft before I send it to the client — but when I’m ready to send it to the client (and I always give myself some leeway, some wiggle room for this), is I always step back and think, “Hang on – is there some way in which I can make this a bit stronger, a bit more powerful?”
And the reason is, when you get into copy, particularly when get started on headline or an opening paragraph to an email or something … you get kind of wedded to it. You begin to fall in love with your own work. You can get to a point where you say, “Oh that’s great,” and you send it off.
But if you’d paused, and you’d put it aside, maybe left it overnight and then come back with a really objective, critical eye … imagine if you’re the worst client in the world and you’ve looked at what you’ve written … and try and maintain that objective, critical eye and say, “Hey, where in this email, this sales letter, whatever it is, where perhaps could I increase the power: the power of the hook or the power of the offer, just the power of the opening paragraph … are the places where I could make this better?”
And I tell you — certainly for me, and I’ve been in this business for 35 years, copywriting, and even today, the answer is always YES. I pause before I send something, and I ask myself, “Have I missed an opportunity to make this stronger in some way?” I have always missed something. Every single time.
So that is a great trick as far as I’m concerned. Not really a trick, but just a process, a way of working, is that you don’t wait until the last minute of the deadline. Give yourself/get it done a day early. Maybe you only have two hours in advance, but make this a full part of the process.
Step back, put on your objective spectacles, and ask yourself, “Is there anything here, where I could actually make it stronger, more powerful. And I say, for me, one hundred percent of the time, the answer is yes. I always find something, and I probably miss one or two other things.
But try that. I think it will work for you.
View Our Full Library of Persuasive Writing Prompts
Write Now! persuasive writing prompts are presented by the Professional Writers’ Alliance (PWA) — a professional association just for direct-response industry writers. Learn about the many benefits of a PWA membership.
The Professional Writers’ Alliance
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I am Abali Success from Nigeria, I have always and still have this great zeal to write, however i still have not really know the true front to follow. I will be glad to find the right part or better still, can somebody send me a sample of any write up. While i love fitness training, fruit juice, fashion, novel writing etc. please help me out. Thanks
Abali Success –
Definitely rethinking and rewriting is so powerful as a must enhancing to any subject one writes on. Rereading, and editing help the writer to deliver a much better final product.
Thanks for sharing and reminding us of such a vital element of writing.
Rafik Labib –
Like Abali Success and Rafik Labib I'm also on the lookout for mentors and guide for my copyright niche. However, the above letters had been sent about 3/4 months back. Did they receive any reply? Was the problem solved? Three days after joining I'm still not clear what I'm supposed to do to improve my writing and I'm not talking about buying books - these will come later when I know I'm on the right track.
Guest (arlene) –
AWAI has some great free resouces available for those that are still feeling out the copywriting opportunity. I'd recommend taking a look at their free how-to videos here... https://www.awai.com/inside-awai/.
There are also hundreds of free articles covering just about any writing topic you can think of. Here are a few that might be helpful if you're looking for more information on niches.
https://www.awai.com/2018/08/3-ways-to-pick-a-niche-in-b2b-copywriting/ https://www.awai.com/2015/05/pick-a-niche-in-10-minutes-or-less/
Jeremy –