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Why every copywriter gets discipline slapped into them

By Andrew Boulton |

May 18, 2015 | 4 min read

What does it take to be a copywriter? Spelling sort of matters, in the same way it’s rather handy if the man hand-crafting your parachute has a decent working knowledge of knots. Also useful is a temperament that guides you gently away from the persistent and malicious jabbing of colleagues and clients in the neck with an inky finger. Previous experience with a pencil is preferable, but not essential.

But the attribute that cannot fairly be expected of any new copywriter – aside from being able to accurately, if not a little witheringly, decipher vague instructions – is, simply, discipline.

I have never met, and do not ever expect to meet, a new copywriter who understands and embodies the structural rigour expected from the role. It is the one piece of apparatus that is, without fail, slapped into all of us.

Speaking, perhaps a little presumptuously, for myself I remember many occasions when the presentation of my work and thinking was received on a sliding scale of politely concealed panic and frank (i.e. sweary) admonishment. Anywhere between the twelfth and fortieth of these dispiriting confrontations, you realise that copywriting is not about you or, heaven forbid, the stuff you like.

I’d go as far to say that, if you are at the very beginning your career as a copywriter, anything you write, and really actually rather like, will be painfully wrong. It’s a tender process and can, understandably, leave many wondering what the point of writing could possibly be if not to produce something we’d happily stick on our fridge, show to our mums or gleefully point out on the street to passing strangers.

And that is the brutal, hoof-to-the-groin lesson that turns us from untroubled alphabet enthusiast to stern, commercially ruthless copywriters.

It’s nothing more than a matter of making the often faint distinction between the most satisfying and most effective ways of delivering a message. Then, when the two eventually become one and the same, the process is complete.

The hawk-eyed amongst you may detect a flicker of pathos around this piece. You could be forgiven for arriving at the conclusion that developing as a copywriter is an unyielding Dickensian trudge through misery and oppression, destined only for the unhappy realisation that you have forever lost the joy of a deliciously empty phrase. And maybe it is for some.

But for many others, the satisfaction of a perfectly measured response quickly and substantially outweighs any residual sense of writing for, from and within the self. When the needs of the brief instantly and unquestioningly prevail over your need to write a funny line about dinosaurs or robot legs then you can tear those ‘L plates’ off your redolent vintage cardigan and replace them with a patchy beard and beige leather elbow patches.

It’s a transition that is happening at agencies all around the world on a daily basis – the almost immeasurable shift from writing nicely to writing well. I work with some exceptional young copywriters, and every day I see them more-and-more crossing out the option that sounds clever and substituting it for the one that sounds right.

Speaking from disgracefully personal experience, copywriters can get by without a great number of personal and professional skills – the capacity to chew quietly and not be haughtily disdainful of other people’s book choices to name but two. But without that sense of discipline we’re just tossing Scrabble tiles up in the air and hoping desperately that no one loses an eye.

Follow Andrew on Twitter and he will say nothing but supportive things about the book you’re reading.

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