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    - Concept Creation
    - Copywriting
    - Graphic Design
    

Web Development

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     Advertising Design

     If anything, creativity must be tightly controlled and harnessed during copywriting and design. This is why an Advertising Plan, as part of your overall Marketing Plan, is so important. It keeps your creative people on message and on purpose.

Writers and designers, by their very nature, want to produce "creative" marketing materials. But true marketers want to "sell something." Whether that sale is a business product or service, or a non-profit membership or member benefit, marketers are less interested in entertaining anyone than they are in getting them to take the "desired action," which is the purpose of the marketing effort.

With that foundation, let's look at the three principal steps in creating good marketing materials, whether for your Web site or for offline:

Concept Creation

Like a blueprint, from which all your marketing messages will be built, your advertising concept must come first. This concept should be a component of your Advertising Plan. And, of course, your Advertising Plan flows directly from your overall Marketing Plan's purpose.

See how these plans are connected sequentially, so the whole process is homogenous? The purpose of marketing planning is to deliver consistency in all your marketing messages, so no matter where a prospect sees or hears a message...it says the same thing as all other exposures to your marketing. That way each exposure reinforces and builds on previous ones...inexorably moving the prospect or customer toward the next desired action!

The focus of advertising, with that kind of influence, is never on you or your company. It's always on your prospects, customers, or members...and their wants, needs, and hot buttons.  So, how do you focus on their wants, needs, and hot buttons? 

First of all you have to get their attention. Consider using one of the great human motivators:

• Fear
• Exclusivity
• Guilt
• Greed
• Ego gratification

Human beings, unfortunately, respond to these emotions. So, even if your Web site is for a ministry or some other altruistic purpose, you need to consider these motivators, towards which you can focus the benefits of what your organization offers.

People want to be free from fear, they want to feel like they're part of the "in crowd," they want to be guilt-free, they want to be prosperous enough that they don't have to worry about money, and they want to feel important. Focus on helping them achieve one of these desires and you're on your way to a successful advertising concept.

Brainstorm several concepts, without critical examination. Then, when you've run out of ideas, eliminate them one-by-one until only the fittest survives. If more than one seem fit, market testing will determine the winner.

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Copywriting

Good copywriting is so subtle it's like a fresh pastry that melts in your mouth. By the time you realize you've been eating it...it's deep inside you.

Good copywriting is also something that doesn't come in a software box. That's one of the principal reasons it's not really a good idea to have one of your Information Technology (IT) people do your Web site. Because, even if they can master the technology, they're likely unarmed when it comes to the marketplace battleground. 

And, even experienced print or broadcast copywriters can be out of their depth on the Web, because - while the psychology may be the same - the implementation is different. A Web site is not a linear document, where you can easily lead a reader sequentially through a thinking process. Web readers can jump anywhere inside our outside your site with one mouse click, so copywriting has to take that randomness into account.

Web writing also must consider the reading realities of the computer monitor. Web reading is slower and more fatiguing, so Web writing must be more compact.

One commonality with all copywriting is that Web site copy takes precedence over Web site design. It's the verbal presentation that makes the selling case, not usually the visuals. Of course, if you're selling art or something else where the visual component is the primary value expression, then a picture may well be worth a thousand words. But, in most cases... especially on the Web, where pictures dramatically slow the download...a well-crafted word is worth a thousand pictures.

So...can we at Content and Design write copy?

It should be pretty obvious to you, one way or the other by now. You've read our copy to this point. What d' ya' think?

If you're not sure you're a qualified critic, then how about taking the word of the Direct Marketing Association? They don't give out their coveted DMA ECHO Awards for nothing. They gave us one for both the design and copywriting of a successful national direct marketing campaign.

Not only did we win the award...but the campaign was a big success. That's the award that really matters.

Some tips for successful copywriting...

• Start with a logical outline of your sales argument.
• Make sure the outline is focused on the reader and their wants and needs, not on you or your organization.
• Convert the major points of your outline to a headline and subheads.
• Convert the outline points under each subhead into paragraphs.
• Interject real stories, or better yet, testimonials to reinforce major benefit claims.
• Use active verbs.
• Minimize the use of prepositional phrases.
• Be sure everything is leading logically to the desired action you want the reader to take.
• ASK them to take that action, several times, especially at the end.
• Set the copy aside for a few days.
• Go back and ruthlessly edit, carving out every unnecessary word. For example, look for unnecessary uses of the word "that." Every word you eliminate improves your copy...lean copy is effective copy.
• Have a typical target market person read the copy, without coaching, and see if they're motivated towards the desired action.
• If not...go back to the outline stage and rework it until they are.

Just to prove we take our own advice, we ask you to consider letting us write your marketing copy for you. Whether it's for Web direct marketing, or traditional direct marketing, we know how to put the words together to make your case to your marketplace.

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Graphic Design

Graphic design for the Web takes a special skill set, beyond that of a traditional graphic designer. Why? Because the Web is not a graphics- friendly medium.

So the Web-experienced graphic designer knows how to produce visual effects that enhance a page's message, without adding bloated files to the page's download. Designing for print involves few if any such file size restrictions. 

Another fact understood by Web-savvy designers is that there are only three graphic file types that work on the Web:

• GIF
• JPEG
• PNG

More than that, they know which type works best for each image situation. For example, GIFs can be made transparent, so the page's background shows through the image's background areas, while JPEGs cannot. JPEGs compress better for images with smooth or frequent color variations, like photographs, while GIFs compress better when the image has substantial areas of consistent color or grayscale. GIFs can be animated, JPEGs cannot. Meanwhile, PNGs, although very capable, are not yet widely supported, especially by older browsers.

At Content and Design, design is our last name. We offer award-winning graphics design capabilities, with Web-smart instincts. So, when we apply our design know-how to your Web project, it will be for the express purpose of calling attention to your site's compelling message... not to our compelling graphics.

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There's a lot more to advertising

Of course, there's a lot more to advertising than just concept, copy, and graphics. 

There's knowing where, both on and off the web, to place advertising. There's being able to focus the messages, in multiple media, towards a common desired result. More than that, there's knowing how to create synergy, so the various media reinforce and enhance each other, magnifying the outcome.

And there's knowing how to continually evaluate response and adjust the campaign accordingly.

In other words...don't try this at home. Call (or click) Content and Design.

 

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