Studying This Gives You Writing Superpowers

When it comes to improving copywriting - and getting better results out of the words we write - it’s more than the words. Writers don’t need to be the next Shakespeare to see good results. There are other factors at play that help increase the efficacy and power of words beyond pure wordsmithing.

In fact, once you’ve mastered the basics of good writing, your time is best spent mastering these other skill sets, since what you say is just as important as how you say it. And one of these skill sets stands out above all others. If you spend time learning about this superpower each day for the rest of your life, you’ll become a more powerful writer, and become more effective in all other areas of life.

Here’s a story to illustrate this superpower…

In Fall 2014 I quit my teaching job in China and started tutoring math online. I’d taught math in person for close to a decade before this, but tutoring was hard because students were demanding and expected quick results during sessions.

So I tried a few different things. I asked which topic they wanted to cover, then taught it. I asked which problems they wanted help with, then showed how to solve similar problems. I started out each session by teaching what they needed to know, then asked them to try it on their own.

None of these worked. The sessions dragged on. The students complained that I’d wasted their time. They left in the middle of the session and demanded refunds.

So I tried something counterintuitive. Instead of starting the session by teaching, I asked what they’re stuck on. I asked what they already know. I asked them what parts were giving them trouble. I sought to understand the student’s thought processes, to see how they were thinking as they solved problems.

It sounds simple, but it worked like magic. In a few short sessions, we could quickly get to the student’s exact point of confusion, and I’d help them get proficient enough to pass their class, or get whatever grade they needed to graduate.

In a way, I became a good math tutor because I quit teaching and started to understand the student’s psychology, what was going on inside the student’s mind. Psychology is likewise a superpower for writers, since understanding your reader’s mind is key to knowing how to communicate with them in words. And here are three key psychology concepts to understand:

1- Attention is key, so know what matters to your audience

We constantly have thousands of different sensory signals coming in our various sensory organs. Our brain has to sort through those to determine the few that actually matter. To do this, our brains have a system called the reticular activating system (RAS). The RAS sorts through all that information coming in our eyes, ears, mouths, noses, and nerves, and determines which ones are important enough to bring to our conscious awareness.

You’ll need to trigger your reader’s RAS in your writing in order to get their attention to begin with. To do that, learn what matters to your reader, what’s important to them, then make sure to address that at each point in your writing.

2- People generally make decisions based on emotions

We like to think we’re rational creatures, that we make decisions based on logic. But the reality is people use irrational methods to make decisions, then justify them with logic. One example of this is the know-like-trust (KLT) formula. People like to do business with people they know, like, and trust. Having a quality solution is critical, but people can overlook defects if they know, like, and trust you. 

3- We have a few core psychological needs

Our minds have systems that function like thermostats to check our core needs are satisfied. These include:

i) the need to feel safe, to know we’re physically safe in a situation

ii) the need to grow, to know we’re not staying in the same place in each area of our life

iii) the need to belong to something larger than ourselves

Find a way to emphasize how your solution satisfies these needs. For example, you can show you’re ‘safe’ using proof elements like testimonials, or by pre-suading your reader to trust you by delivering value up front. 

So learn about these psychology concepts. Learn about other psychology concepts, like how to influence people, and cognitive biases. Your psychological knowledge will become a superpower when combined with other writing skills. 

About Scott McKinney: I’m a freelance copywriter specializing in B2B software. I write funnel-friendly copy that helps my clients attract wonderful long-term customers. Unlike other writers, I come from a mathematics background, so I can tackle technical topics and translate them to what the audience needs to know. Need a writer? Email me at [email protected]. I’m currently booking new clients for 2021.