One piece of copy found on virtually every web page (or it should be, since your website should have an ezine sign-up form on every page except sales pages!) is the call-to-action aka “submit button.” But the last thing in the world it should say is “submit”!
Let’s look at the definition of submit from The [...]

Saying “yes” to the  TV producer who wanted the CEO to anonymously work on the company’s front lines was a risky marketing move for Waste Management (WM).
Especially since reality TV is all about drama…and the company was given no control and no say in what would air. So you can be sure they’ll choose the [...]

…
I saw the movie Up in the Air recently and thought it made a few interesting points about writing good copy
Plot Summary: The main storyline is about Ryan Bingham (George Clooney), a “career transition counselor” (aka hired hatchet man) who’s always jetting off to fire employees for companies who don’t want to do the dirty [...]

One way to make writing your own marketing materials easier to start creating a “swipe” file of things you like as you see them.
Often people talk about using a swipe file to save examples of copy they can “borrow” ideas or words from later. (Of course, there’s is an art to swiping copy effectively–especially for [...]

People often use dating analogies when they’re talking about getting clients and when you think about it, a ton of similarities exist.
So here are some marketing lessons from an online dating site…
1. Whether it’s an online profile or your website, visitors usually don’t know a single thing about you–and they’re pretty skeptical. After all, everyone’s [...]

I was reading Robert Plank’s Time Management on Crack 2.0 this past weekend and was thrilled to see a comment in the sales page section about remembering to include features in your bullet points.
Because features have apparently become the Chucky doll of copywriting.
It started out innocently enough. Well-meaning copywriters started spreading the word that you [...]

Your English teacher probably called them passive verbs but I think “victim” paints a clearer picture of what they’ll do to your copy. It also nicely sums up what you’re looking for—sentences where something is happening TO the subject, instead of the subject making something happen.
But whatever you call them, victim verbs make your copy blah, wordy [...]

First of all, “One” is supposed to be a number…as in:
“One love, one life, when there’s one need in the night…” as the U2 song goes.
“One” should NEVER be used as a pronoun. Especially when you’re writing something you actually want prospects and clients to read. (Or anyone to read, for that matter. Unless it’s [...]

As I’ve said before, the best testimonials are ones that cite specific results. Unfortunately, many clients I’ve written or done sales page critiques for either aren’t tracking response or have been shy about sharing their results.
Some copywriters resort to making up numbers or using ones that are more than a little misleading.
That’s just not my [...]

Last week Deidre Hughey of The Buzz Builder interviewed me about the 7 Deadly Sins of Web Copy for her Author Buzz radio show, and then we took a few questions from listener’s at the end.
Wanna listen? Here it is:

(I have to warn you though–I had bronchitis when we recorded it, so my voice is [...]