If you’re anything like people in our office, you’d rather set fire to your own hair than read boring ads, emails, and Websites.

They’re a chore.

You’d be right to say many are indifferent; they’re often just time-expired ideas, leaving you with the feeling you’re on a hopeless journey.

Why bother.

What’s worse is content without a strong headline. You’re left with a wodge of words that do little to stir curiosity.

Content without an intriguing headline is like handing someone a newspaper with the front page torn off and expecting them to get interested.

It’s not going to happen, is it?

If you’re writing a Tweet, a landing page or say, a social media post about a brand of raspberry jam, why not say something unexpected?

Something that’s not the usual bollocks.

Remember that old rule about not being allowed to watch TV on a school night?

That could well apply to buckling down after hours to learn how to write better headlines.

A place for marketers and agency people to start is The Copywriter’s Bible.

It shows you how 32 of the world’s best advertising writers write their copy.

It’s where you’ll find an escape from all that’s dull and inert.

It’s applicable to the Digital Age or any age as it’s about triggering human motivation.

Dare we say it, that includes sales.

Remember selling?

Here you’ll learn how to communicate with wit, charm and reasoned thinking.

An example is an ad that ran in the UK for The Solicitors’ Regional Directory.

On the face of it that sounds like a book that’s dead boring. A yawn.

The visual for the ad is three conservative looking men in suits carrying briefcases. Three straight arrows.

The headline is ‘Which one of these men do you think would be best at rape?’

It turns out that the men are all solicitors. One is better at bankruptcy, one at property and one at crime.

The Solicitors’ Regional Directory helps you choose the best legal representative for the job when you’re in dire need.

As when you or someone close to you has been raped.

Suddenly The Solicitors’ Regional Directory becomes valuable. Essential, really.

Of course, headlines and content should always be good enough to raise the value of a product.

They should add to its worth and help to polish the brand.

Anything less and your customers are left to do one thing.

Set fire to their own hair.

Share with us. Leave your comment below. Thanks for reading Whybetonto.com. Regards, Steve Ulin LinkedIn: http://linkd.in/1Bey3Jl

‘We’re Passionate about what we do’

How many times have you heard that self-serving guff?

Website content is often like a broken record with that claim.

You’re expected to take it at face value and be impressed.

Fat chance as the ‘passionate’ statement seems to be dotted all across the Internet.

With over-use, it sounds like the symptom of a mental breakdown from those too lazy think of anything better than talking about themselves.

It makes you wonder … wouldn’t it be more profitable to crow less and talk more about why customers should do business with you.

How about addressing the what’s-in-it-for-me question?

Here’s a travel site that does just that, smallworldtraveler.com.

We’re betting those who run the site are every bit as passionate, innovative and committed as anyone else.

Probably more so.

But you won’t see that vague and inadequate word, passionate, in their branding.

Adventure is their reason for being; they elaborate brilliantly on it to stop you and lengthen your attention span.

They’re promoting global journeys of discovery for families.

Small World Travel is where you go to arrange expeditions with your kids to 7 continents.

To frozen oceans, volcanic archipelagos, lost cities and places like say, Botswana.

There you can do things like live in the bush and experience something of a lion’s eye view of the world.

At times you’d have to call that an underwater world.

Because lions in Botswana’s swampy Okavango Delta have learned to swim to pursue their prey.

Imagine it, lions as part of marine life.

Some bright spark said the best advertising is an example of the product experience.

That’s what you get with Small World Travel.

The prospect of adventure is expressed as a story that’s original, charming, perceptive and multi-layered.

You get the whole box and dice so you read and read.

It convinces you that you couldn’t do better by going elsewhere.

You’re the one who becomes passionate.

Passionate about heading off to places like Botswana, Egypt, India, Thailand, Australia and Antarctica.

Isn’t that better than the soppy and weak ‘We’re passionate about what we do’?

Share with us. Leave your comment below. Thanks for reading Whybetonto.com. Regards, Steve Ulin LinkedIn: http://linkd.in/1Bey3Jl