My Biggest Copywriting Bugbear!

A client recently pointed out that as we’re in the latter part of the year, we’re perilously close to “Bah Humbug” season…

“Don’t worry,” I replied, “It’s always Bah Humbug season in my office!!”

Let me share my biggest copywriting bugbear…

Every once in a while, a well-intentioned friend will recommend some email copywriter to me. “You need to go and subscribe to Billy Bigshot!” they say. I roll my eyes internally.

“OK, I’ll check him out,” I reply.

So, I go and subscribe to Billy Bigshot’s email list. The opt-in page contains a 17-minute, non-skippable video (which I don’t watch). The thank you page contains two upsell offers, promising instant unlimited leads from the right magic formulation of words.

I follow Billy’s emails for a few days. Each one begins with some outrageous hook, such as “Bill Gates ate my cat, here’s how…”

Billy goes on to make a crowbarred connection to his real message, bragging in the process about how he ‘grabbed’ your attention with his contrived hook. Worse, Billy’s writing style makes the email practically unreadable.

Each paragraph begins like this…

Using only a handful of words…

Why?

Because he’s ‘grabbed’ your attention!

And now he’s not letting go…

Every line finishes with a horizontal ellipsis…

You know, the three dots?

Of course, Billy doesn’t talk like this in real life…

Because nobody does…

Unless they’re manipulating you…

And so on.

By paragraph three I’m frantically trying to find the unsubscribe button, which is worded ‘update your preferences’ and coloured grey to be practically invisible.

Maybe I’m being a little hard on Billy. At least to external appearances, he appears to have a successful business. Successful enough for at least one person to tell me about it! Everyone on his list then tries to copy what he’s doing, including his funnel pages, tech stack and writing style.

But here’s the thing: it might work for Billy. But will it work for you?

Some of the highest-converting emails I’ve ever seen have been poorly but authentically written. They were written from the heart about a specific problem. They replicated the exact experience of being in a room with the sender. In fact, you could hear the sender’s voice as you read the words!

First and foremost, your audience wants to hear from you, at the deepest, most authentic level. They want the unmasked, unfiltered version of you. They don’t want the marketing version of you. They want to hear your perspective; your take on things. They value the clarity you provide much more than your exact choice of words. They love your stories, even when you lack confidence in them.

So don’t feel like you have to show up like Billy Bigshot. Show up as you, consistently and authentically. That’s the real work here.

P.S. For more articles like this you can also subscribe free to the Story Selling Lab email list.

P.P.S. Some more things I’ve been saying “bah humbug” about recently:

• LinkedIn budget recommendations
• LinkedIn audience size recommendations
• LinkedIn ad length recommendations (bah!)

More on this next week!