The Drum Awards for Marketing - Extended Deadline

-d -h -min -sec

This Word Can – positivity in copywriting

By Andrew Boulton

February 23, 2015 | 3 min read

I’m generally a positive fellow. I cheer on habitually disappointing sports teams. I follow the same lasagne recipe again and again in the belief that this time it won’t come out looking like a man made entirely from sick has just been sick on some different sick. Even if I encountered a polar bear I would probably assume he was one of those jovial, Coca-Cola corporate ambassador bears rather than one of those other bite-off-your-skull bears.

But, despite my blithely hopeful bearing, I often find it hard to answer a copy brief that calls for a forcibly positive outlook. It’s a lot like being asked to write something funny, or sombre or (retch) quirky or any entirely subjective, elusive human characteristic.

When it’s done poorly, positive copy can seem shouty and aggressive, like a ferocious PE teacher bellowing flecks of poorly chewed pork pie into your face as he insists you must ‘do better’. Alternatively, it can come across as smug and exhausting, like an irritating friend who encourages you to take up their latest life-altering fad, knowing quite well that you’d rather extract your own teeth with a rusty soup tin.

But, when it is done well it can be buoyant, compelling and entirely inspiring. One particularly prominent example is Sport England’s ‘This Girl Can’ campaign, currently jabbing its boundless magnificence into horribly jealous eyeballs such as my own. Paddling around the fringes of the hyper-masculine sports brand language, it strikes a rare balance between being bold and motivational with a more charming sense of untidy individualism.

While the writers of this campaign were minutely familiar with their target audience, that is by no means a guarantee of reflecting or inspiring those women’s sense of positivity and achievement. Nor is it certain to properly reflect the reality that arriving at a goal is by no means glamorous nor pristine.

‘This Girl Can’ is a case study for measured language when the temptation is to go harder, stronger, faster, better. It’s an extraordinary recognition for the smallness of glory and pride, and chooses language that belongs on the hot, damp seats of a tired old spin bike rather than bursting through the tape at the Olympic Games.

‘Less is more’ is a crass and aimless phrase, but to capture real, accessible positivity in copywriting there is very much a case for inspiration with a little ‘i’. It’s a matter of carefully marshalling the point at which positive language can drift into something remote and overbearing. Fail in that and you and your readers will find yourselves chewing on a mouthful of sick lasagne my friend.

Follow @Boultini on Twitter for more delicious recipes.

Trending

Industry insights

View all
Add your own content +