Copywriter, Copy-fighter – the bare-knuckle world of defending your words
Copywriters, generally speaking, are not fighters. Drop a copywriter into an even vaguely fighty situation and we’ll run squealing from the scene before the first Chinese burn has even been twisted. If there were a house in ‘Game of Thrones’ encumbered solely by copywriters then we would have been on the sticky end of a gruesome death long before Sean Bean popped his Northern clogs. Our house motto would be ‘Not The Face’.
But while you may be able to best us quite decisively in a bout of fisticuffs, you should still probably think twice about telling us what you think of our copy.
The defensiveness of copywriters is stuff of industry legend. Everyone in the business, however inky their fingers may be, has some tale or other about a copywriter who would sooner rupture an organ than remove a particularly cherished syllable.
Some of these tales are true, if not always fair. The very job of copywriting is a uniquely designed act of mental torture – allow someone to believe they are paid because they are good at writing and then tell them repeatedly that you don’t like how they write.
But much of it is a wilful misunderstanding of the copywriter’s role – or rather, where precisely the copywriter’s contribution ends. Some believe that the copywriter is there to write the words, present the words and then change the words. To this, I say ‘balls’.
Expecting a copywriter to give a deeply considered response to a brief and then swiftly and blithely abandon their own position is, as I said, balls. Of course a copywriter is going to make a forceful case for the work they’ve done, not out of some seeping prissiness, but because they can tell you the origins, purpose and logic for every single word. To do otherwise would be like a submarine engineer cheerily helping to drill holes in his vessel because the Captain fancies a spot of mackerelling.
No, the simple act of defending your copy is less of an annoyance and more a professional compulsion. Where the problems arise is when a copywriter forgets why they’re defending their copy.
Persuading anyone to appreciate and accept your copy is a little like litigation, only with cheaper shoes. It’s an opportunity to present all your reasoning and opinions, but it is equally your chance to anticipate and address any potential objections.
The smartest, most successful copywriters are the ones who have analysed their own efforts so rigorously and objectively that they can foresee the grandest and most trivial criticisms – and, more importantly, whack each of them down like an arcade game mole.
It’s the copywriters who arrive at a presentation without all the right assurances who find themselves bubbling steadily into a tantrum, struggling visibly with the realisation that they may not have been quite as right as they had thought. It’s in these scenarios that copywriters earn their reputation for sensitivity and inflexibility. It’s also at these times that insightful, external opinions – contributions that could unlock the perfect response to the brief – bounce feebly off the igloo of surliness in which the writer is now shivering and muttering.
The fact is that copywriters are hired for their expertise. But, as in every field of knowledge and skill, expertise should not be worn like a crown nor swung like a big stick. Expertise is the responsibility to prove that you are the expert, not to make others feel inadequate but to demonstrate that you have thought about this with care, precision and genuine self-examination.
Without this, you’re not an expert – you’re a slowly reddening person with some words on the page and a twitch in your eye.