Stella Orange, WORDSMITH Uncommon copywriting & strategy to make your cash register sing

Why Killer Copy Must Get Away With Murder

“…And you must murder your darlings.”

The most chilling words I’ve ever heard. Not uttered by a psychopath. But by one of my writing teachers*.

And when it comes to writing copy that sizzles like a shrimp kabob on a hot summer grill, there’s no better piece of advice I can give.

Why Your Darlings Need To Go

Because you really love what you do…

…But the rest of us just don’t get it.

Say, for example, you sell cardboard boxes. And because you’re a person committed to doing what you love, you can’t get enough of the stiff corrugated stuff.

In this example, you know all sorts of tidbits about where the pulp comes from. The weight each box can hold. The name of the guy who had the original patent, and used the stuff for wrapping thingmabobs.

So when the time comes to create a website, article, or brochure, these sorts of things are top mind.

Know what I say to that?

Off with their heads!

The cold-blooded truth is that your audience – be they clients, customers, fans, or people who have yet to join your tribe – aren’t thinking about that stuff. So you’ve got to kill off your perspective in order to connect with the perspective of your people.

(The salespeople at big box computer and audio stores are notorious for not doing this. Instead of telling you how a certain tech doodad will help you get your X, Y, and Z done in half the time it takes you now, most seem hard-wired to tell you about the number of gigahertz, megapixels, and bits. This is what happens when your darlings live to breed. You leave with a printer that takes a small foreign army to install.)

After Your Darlings are Dead

Many businesses have copy that doesn’t work because it’s focused on the wrong thing. It talks about “all the things we do” instead of “how this will help you solve your itchiest, burning-est problem.”

What we’re actually talking about here is “features” versus “benefits.”

Features are all the different aspects of your product or service. These are your darlings. Benefits, on the other hand, answer your reader’s question: “What’s in it for me?”

In other words, how does your cardboard box make my life easier?

Find and speak to their darlings, and they’ll want to speak to you.

Here’s How

Think through the specific problems you solve for your people—clients, customers, fans, readers, whatever. Put some good ole elbow grease into translating the your service or product into the value it adds and the way it enriches the lives of those who use it…

…and you are bound to be successful.

It’s the difference between a business that describes itself as “a mechanic” and one that says: “When you call us with a flat tire, a live human being picks up the phone, and dispatches a tow truck within the half hour. Along with a chocolate chip cookie that’s on the house.”

So go ahead, and kill off those darlings. Let me know how it goes.

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*(Hugo House. Seattle. Lovely organization, by the way. If you even happen to find yourself on Capitol Hill, I recommend checking it out. It’s the sort of living, breathing cultural hub that I have such a soft spot for. One that works with high school students, readers of the New Yorker, emerging writers, big name writer-types, prisoners, and punk rockers. Another entry for the Orange Guide.)