A. James Editing, Inc » B2B

Catvertising Video: Ask yourself, “What can cat videos do for my business?”

Amber — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 23:02:20 +0000

As a consumer of cat videos, I’m not entirely convinced that this idea would never work.

On a more serious note though, I think this video speaks to the dangers of following the trends of the moment that may not have much staying power.

It’s certainly a hilarious video though.

Trombone cat! Hah! Priceless. Enjoy.

(Thank you, Peter Bowerman, for sharing this!)

Ben Settle Says What About Professional Typos?

Amber — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 02:29:59 +0000

I do a bit of writing for email marketing campaigns and thusly, I follow the musings of Ben Settle, email marketing rockstar.

He sends a daily email to his list with information about all things marketing, but specifically as they relate to email. Some email subject lines from the past: “Who wins the fist fight: copywriters or marketers?,” “Best emotion to sell to in emails,” and “Shy bladder at the keyboard” to name a very few.

Today’s email was entitled: “How to profit from typos.”

Perfect timing considering yesterday’s post.

With Ben’s permission, I’ve copied his email below:

Amber,

A new reader slaps the spelling cuffs on me:

“Your site looks great, but you have put there, instead of their in
your first paragraph and it creates a poor impression. Just thought
you’d like to know ”

I must be losing my touch if you only saw one.

You see, not all typos are bad.

In some cases, they serve a valuable purpose.

Here’s what I mean:

First, if someone decided not to buy something from me or hire me
(actually, I’m not for hire, but still…) because of a misspelling
or whatever then I’m delighted — that person would almost certainly
be a big pain in the gluteus assimus to deal with.

(If I sold proof-reading services, that’d be the exception…)

Secondly:

I rarely care about spelling or grammar.

At least, in emails.

In fact, I often purposely leave misspelled words intact.

Why?

Because as Dan Kennedy and email Grand Puba Matt Furey say: “Money
is attracted to speed” — and spending time fixing little
grammer/spelling erros (hehe I misspelled those words on purpose)
is a waste of time when 99.9% of people simply won’t care or notice
anyway.

More:

This’ll REALLY freak ye olde spelling police out.

But in another market (weight loss) I send first drafts.

By that I mean…

I crank the email out (usually in about 4-5 minutes) and then let
‘er rip. No editing (unless the URL is wrong) or even thinking
about it.

Just sit, pound, send.

And it doesn’t hurt sales at all.

I’ve noticed it even HELPS sales sometimes.

That’s probably why old school copywriters used to purposely
misspell things in their ads

It made their letters look genuine.

Like personal letters.

And not “sales pitches.”

OK, enough.

For more contrarian email training, go to:

http://www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

Ben Settle
Marketing Specialist
Settle, LLC
www.BenSettle.com

Copyrighted & published by Settle, LLC.

All rights reserved.

Settle, LLC | P.O. Box 866 | Long Beach, WA 98631

A few posters to my previous post agree that spending too much time correcting errors is wasteful and unnecessary; keeping up with the speed of business being more important.

Really?

Typos actually helping sales?! (Gasp! Grammar Guardians, cover your eyes!)

I never thought so, but then again, maybe I’m missing out on millions when I refer to Grammar Girl and The Elements of Style for some of my copy.

Well, Ben Settle hath spoken.

What dost thou sayeth to that?

Professional Typos Sent From Mobile Devices

Amber — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 00:43:13 +0000

Doesn't it just break your heart?

When I was a senior in college, my Old English professor (Ok, so I took nerdy classes in college. Like you didn’t.) offered every student in the class the opportunity to get extra credit if they found any grammatical or syntactical errors in the language workbook he had created.

Within a minute of his saying that, I found a typo and raised my hand to collect my reward. Upon announcing my discovery, my professor said, “Typos in English don’t count.”

What?!

You’re a tenured English Literature professor and you think you should be exempted from the Laws of Spelling?

With that caveat, any subsequent typos that appeared in the workbook were pre-sanctioned.

Would you agree that this is not so in the business world?

While I wish it were so, I’m afraid it isn’t.

With the widespread usage of mobile devices to conduct business, I’ve noticed that messages sent from such sources, while not necessarily shorter in length, come with a pre-typed apology in the signature and thus, a sanction on typos. Here’s an example from a colleague of mine:

Please excuse my brevity or any spell-checked typos.

And here’s another one:

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry. Please excuse any typos.

So my question is this: Should we excuse them? Should we excuse ourselves? Should we care that much about sending messages that aren’t worthy of our so-called professionalism?

Or is it enough that we confess our potential for error up-front and without guile or puffery?

I know what my snooty copywriter answer would be.

And I also know what my “shit happens” answer would be.

What’s your answer?

To Join Or Not To Join? That’s A Hard Question.

Amber — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 22:27:25 +0000

Part of being a business professional is belonging.

Belonging to groups and organizations that will help you grow your business by providing you with exposure to heavyweights in your field, networking opportunities with potential business partners, educational/industry groundbreaking information, and exposure to prospective customers.

The killer question to consider though, is which groups should you join?

There could be dozens, even hundreds, of membership options for you. Most of these groups (and probably the better ones) will require something of you. If not your physical presence (a weekly networking group, for example) then certainly a monetary contribution.

How much money do you have in your yearly marketing budget for group/publication memberships?

If your answer is “A lot”, then you could probably join groups with wild, bacchanalian abandon.

If you’re like the rest of us though, you’re probably on a tight budget in this regard, and you have to be very selective in your choices.

Personal Story

Once upon a time I joined a networking group called LeTip. It’s a great organization, cool people, I made some good money the first year, and projected a significant net loss going into the second.

Right around the time when I was considering leaving the group, I stumbled onto an organization that I foresaw being even more in-line with my business direction: the American Marketing Association (AMA).

Short story shorter, I quit LeTip, signed-up with the AMA, and have no regrets whatsoever.

Membership with the AMA is hundreds of dollars cheaper per year than my membership with LeTip was, and the networking and business growth opportunities are exponentially higher.

It could easily be one of the best decisions of my professional career.

You’ll have to decide for yourself what group memberships work best for you and your business. Very likely you’ll spend some extra time and money exploring all your options before you get it “right”, but that’s all to the good.

What’s your group membership (or not) story?

Making the Plain Pretty Can Set Your Boring Business Documents Apart

Amber — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 19:14:52 +0000

I sent an email to my list of contacts about two weeks ago and got a very mixed response. Some responded with “OMG, that’s a great idea! Why have I never thought of that?” while others were like, “Yeah right, I bet you over-did it.”

(I’ll try not to take the latter personally.)

I’m referring to this email about how to get your “boring” business documents to stand out and get you the results you want.

The email was specifically about an RFP (Request For Proposal) I helped a financial advisor create.

He was bidding on a five million dollar 401(k) plan and, knowing he’d be up against some bigger, badder companies, he called me in to help him dress-up his RFP.

He wanted something that would set him apart and above all his competitors. His ideas were extremely innovative and he knew it.

He kept saying, “They’re not gonna see me coming.”

Now, this dressing-up doesn’t involve a lot of flashy crap that’s more distracting than eye-catching.

It involves simple, clean, value-added formatting and copy writing.

In my email, I originally offered to share a copy of the content I created with anyone who wanted to see it.

My client emailed me afterwards and told me he’d prefer if I didn’t do that because he didn’t want to be competing against his own RFP model.

Fair enough, I said.

So instead, I’ve created an outline for creating a successful, dressed-up RFP.

(Please note that I had nothing to do with the technical stuff about the actual 401(k) plan. All that information came from the 401(k) insurance providers. I just worked on the intro and the conclusion.)

Here is the RFP Outline as a PDF.

I would love to guarantee that all your previously boring documents will meet with wild success after implementing this strategy, but I cannot. Getting a good copywriter onboard will only be to the good though.

All I can guarantee is that you’ll be a peacock among geese.

(Note: I have nothing against geese. They’re just not as pretty as peacocks, okay? We may not be able to agree on how to spend taxpayer dollars, but I think we can all agree on that.)

BBC News: Spelling Mistakes Can Cost Millions in Lost Online Sales

Amber — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 20:47:05 +0000

BBC News reports that spelling mistakes in professional business communications (especially websites) can be extremely costly.

As a freelance copywriter, articles like this are near and dear to my heart. (Thank you, Mike, for sharing this.)

Read the amazing article here.

Why Copywriters Should Get Piggyback Rides from Graphic & Web Designers

Amber — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 20:01:46 +0000

In a previous post, I discussed the challenges freelance copywriters face in getting paid what their work is worth compared to graphic and web designers.

So, assuming it’s true that decision-makers think about the design of their website, for example, before they think about the writing (which, IMHO, is indeed the case), the designer will get to name their price with little to no negotiating required, while the copywriter, the second-born/afterthought, has to scramble for the bits of the budget that remain.

This does not have to be so.

I strongly recommend that freelance copywriters form partnerships with freelance graphic and web designers. This way, when they’re contacted to design a website, it’s easy for them to ask their client, “Who do you have working with you on the copy?”

And Voila! You’re in.

This also puts the designer in a unique, value-added position with the client. And very likely, the client will take their designers’ copywriter recommendation without shopping around for the best (read lowest) price because let’s face it: how many decision-makers/business owners know a good freelance copywriter or even where to find one?

Not many in my experience. (Except, of course, those who know me.)

By piggybacking on the success of your designer partners, you’re now able to get more work, in addition to receiving compensation that is closer to your work’s true worth.

(Hopefully you would have let your designer know what your preferred rates are so they can let their clients know what to expect, thus, paving the way for you to be paid what would be equivalent to at least a living wage.)

A freelance copywriter who is near and dear to my copywriting heart, Peter Bowerman, has written an e-book about this very subject: “Profitable – By Design!”

How to Make Difficult Conversations Easier

Amber — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 22:14:02 +0000

Piggy-backing on the last blog post about a good intention gone horribly awry, I’d like to share some conversational wisdom (that is, wisdom about conversations) as penned by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen in Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most

So, when we’re having a conversation with someone and we think we’re just discussing the facts of an event/process/document, the person we’re talking to might actually be hearing condescension or blame.

Very tricky.

According to the trio, what we say is only the surface of what’s going on for us while there are underlying, insidious feelings and intentions lurking in the depths that we are most likely unaware of. Knowing what these feelings are and how to address them in ourselves and others is key to having more success while navigating difficult conversations.

Here’s the highlights:

The 3 kinds of difficult conversations:

1) The “What Happened?” Conversation

These are the conversations where we try to figure out who’s right (and consequently, who’s wrong), who meant what, and who’s to blame–truth, intention, and blame.

2) The Feelings Conversation

You can’t just push your feelings about a person, a comment, or a situation aside. Sure, you want to keep it professional and not come off as a wuss, but feelings affect the way we interact with people and how we respond to every situation. It’s important to address them in order to avoid potential miscommunications or tension in future dealings.

3) The Identity Conversation

This conversation is all about who we are and how we see ourselves. Anytime a conversation feels difficult, it’s in part because we feel it’s somehow about us; that something personal is at stake. What does this conversation mean about your professionalism, your self-image, your abilities?

This is what my co-conversationalist had going on while I was having the “What Happened?” conversation I mentioned in my last post. She felt personally threatened by what I was saying whereas I felt I was just laying out the facts.

Now you know there are different levels of conversation that can be going on at any given time between you and the person you’re talking to.

How should you deal with this realization?

Should you rehearse everything you say to a co-worker or spouse prior to saying it just to make sure you don’t offend them?

Maybe.

Emotional intelligence is important in any kind of interaction–personal or professional. Being aware that the person you’re talking to may not be having the same conversation you are is the important first step in having better interactions with the people in your life.

Check out the book if you think you could benefit from what it has to say in much more depth than I went into here.

Happy chatting!

(No pressure.)

Getting the Most Out of Networking Events Even When You Don’t

Amber — Thu, 19 May 2011 23:03:03 +0000

I thought to blog about this because I go to a lot of networking events and not all of them are great. A large part of what makes an event great or not is how we use our time at those events. I confess I could have used my time more wisely at some of these events. Anyway, this isn’t a post about networking event dos and don’ts (this post is though), but I thought others might be experiencing the same feeling of dissatisfaction so I thought I would share my most recent experience. Thus, to blog.

I went to a networking event yesterday afternoon that was put on by the Portland Business Alliance called Lunch with Leaders. It’s an event series where members can attend a lunch talk with local city, regional and state leaders. The speaker this time was Tom Hughes, president of our regional governing body out here, Metro.

I arrived late to the event and there wasn’t a single person I knew in attendance. Sometimes I need to find shelter in a familiar face for a few minutes before moving on to new people and yesterday was one of those days. So I was immediately thrown off my game, I didn’t get to ask my very important question about how community gardens figured into the long-term regional development plan because some guy wouldn’t stop talking, and then everyone scattered as soon as the event was over. Extreme frustration. That’s what I felt.

You may be thinking to yourself, “Amber, you’re whining. The point?” Yes, yes, the point.

The point is that after I walked out of the air-conditioned conference room, I stood in the sun outside the building (a rarity in Portland. The sun, that is, not the building.) and thought about anything else I could do downtown while I was there. It turns out that two wayward clients had offices within a 10-minute walk of where I was standing. You see where this is going?

I stopped by the offices of these clients and when they gave me that, “Um, what are you doing here? Did we have a meeting?” look, I told them that I was in the area for an event that had just finished and I just wanted to stop by and say hi. Their confused forehead wrinkles turned into smooth smiles and I chatted with each of them for 5-10 minutes before wishing them a good day and leaving.

It was great. I felt immeasurably better afterwards and hey, maybe now those wayward clients will change their wayward ways.

So, the lesson to be learned from this story is that when unsatisfactory networking events give you lemons, make lemonade; when they give you eggs, make an omelet; when they give you oranges, just peel them and eat them on the spot.

Networking Events for Freelance Copywriters in Portland, OR

Amber — Thu, 12 May 2011 04:41:57 +0000

I’ve met quite a few freelance copywriters over the past few months, and the general trend I’ve discovered is that not many of us are attending networking events. This is at once wonderful and not so wonderful.

Why Wonderful?
Because it means I’m the only writer around and I have the run of the room!

Why Not So Wonderful?
Because the business owners and decision-makers I’m meeting have often never worked with a copywriter before, and have very little idea what our work is worth, thus, not budgeting for our professional involvement in their projects.

The more copywriters out there talking to people about what we do, and exposing them to the vast contributions we can make to their businesses and organizations, the more people who will understand our profession and what our work is worth. It’s about collaboration, not competition.

To encourage this mass ride of sorts, I would like to share all the networking events I know of around town. Below are the networking events coming up that I know about. As I learn about more, I’ll post them to my blog.

Here we go:

Thursday, May 12 (tomorrow/today depending on when you read this)
The University Club Grand Reception. It’s swanky so RSVP and gussy up. 3-7pm. Free to attend. Details.

Partners in Diversity Say Hey. Portland Business Alliance program. 6-8pm. Business casual. RSVP. Free to attend. Details. They also have a Facebook page.

Monday, May 16th
The Portland Business Alliance puts on one-a few events per week. Times and prices for attendance vary depending on the level of the event. I typically go to ShopTalk and Business Leads Exchange. As a member, I pay $5, non-members be prepared to pay $8. I would check their website here and add all their events to your calendar.

Wednesday, May 25th
Partners in Diversity Breakfast of Champions. 7:30-10am. Business casual. RSVP. Free to attend. Details. Looks like registration is closed, but it’s a quarterly event so keep your eyes open for it later.

That’s all I’ve got for you so far this month. Check back for updated info as the month goes on and as June rolls around. There were some events earlier this month that you’ve already missed. (I know this because I was the only writer there. Except that one event where I met fellow marketing writer, David Small.) I go to anywhere from four-eight networking events per month depending on my workload and the amount of sleep I get the night before (some of these events are early!).

What networking events do you know about around Portland that you’d like to share?