UCO, Y U No Copywrite?

The Mass Communications department at the University of Central Oklahoma offers a Strategic Communications major where students can utilize this degree in a variety of fields within the workforce.

I just so happened to land myself in an E-commerce position at a plastics company here in the city and was immediately familiar with the terms SEO and content marketing, but I did not know how to copywrite. It is one of the tasks that they have me doing due to the marketing department itself being small. In all honesty, this position is so important it should be designated to one person specifically. Also, there are no classes offered at UCO on copywriting. The intro to advertising class does not even mention this.

Copywriting is defined as the written persuasive content through online media and print materials used for the purpose of marketing and advertising to raise brand awareness. It's pretty much the make and break for a product and let's be honest, it's not easy to make plastic sound sexy.

I've had to use descriptive words out of my usual vocabulary such as "Superior", "Maximum", and "Rigidity". These terms are important because let's say you are promoting a certain product. Say your competition is trying to sell the same product, but they happened to market it differently and the copy is way better. Consumers are going to go for the competitors brand because they SOLD it to them in terms that they can understand and they could easily find what they were specifically looking for.




For example, on one of the projects I am currently working on I have to beef up the content on a glass washer. (Yes, exciting.)

Which product sounds better?

"Sturdy polyester bristles for dependable cleaning in a busy foodservice environment"

"Commercial grade bristles that meet sanitary needs in both residential or foodservice environments"

The second one, duh.

It's minor changes in verbage, but it gets straight to the key points with more of an impact. Copy can be outdated and wordy, so it's important to keep the consumer's interest at hand. I mean, what makes sense to you? Personally, I don't care what the bristles are made of, I want to know what it can do for me.

Anyways, that's what I've been struggling with at work and I hope one day UCO does open a class for it. Copywriting can be quite difficult and it goes to show content is important in EVERYTHING. It's a powerful tool to use because it shows you can sell something.