Advertising Information

The Power of...


You certainly must know that Many Big Marketers consider COPYWRITING to be the most important skill you need to be earning online.

There's a lot of good copywriting around. But even in good copywriting there are some manerism that in my opinion don't help to achieve the desired result. No doubt the most over-used in copywriting is the Exclamation Mark. As a result of this over-use it's become a very ineffective means of expression. But nevertheless, it still appears everywhere, often in pairs or big flocks. Conveying practically no longer any real emotions. I don't mean that the feelings that the copywriter expresses are not true - whether it is or not is no the point here. The important thing is that the READER, seeing those expression marks, doesn't feel anything "extra". Nothing over what he/she would feel if there was no exclamation marks.

While exclamation marks in a book or a newspaper may be needed for stressing something you are saying, making it more violent, "louder", on the Web you have other options. On a webpage or in HTML email you can for example stress a word using bolder, bigger characters in a different color. And it will generally work much better.

Yes, in a plain text emails you can't use colors and bold characters. But there is another unpleasant aspect of too much exclamations: they tend to trigger those bitchy "spam-filters". While failing to arise much excitement in the reader.

I'm not saying that exclamation marks are not to be used at all. I simply see much to many of them, and they usually don't achieve the result they were intended for. Not with me in any case, and I doubt if they do with you.

OK, that was mostly "against". But I also have got a positive suggestion for you. In fact it will be the main topic of this article...

Relatively little used today, which makes it very noticable and powerful. What it is? It's the ellipsis. Three little dots ending a sentence. Or rather - suspending it only, leaving the reader aware that something is to follow, and that something for some reason is letting the reader wait. Arousing that readers curiosity, waking his/hers impatience... Isn't that what most copywriters want most of the time?

OK, it's not quite as loved by sentimental shool-girls of the old as the exclamation mark. But let's make a small experiment. What's the title of the present article? It's "The Power of...". Power of what? you say. Somebody who has just seen that title can't possibly know that... Perhaps that title is just awful and could be easily made much better.. How? By using exclamation marks of course! ;-)

Seriously - please take a look at each of these suggested versions of the title, one after another:

1. The Power of...

2. The Power of SuperWidget

3. The Power of SuperWidget!!!

Sincerely, which of those titles best incites you to read on in order to see what's it all about? I'm sure you will agree that no number of exclamation marks can compete with the psychological trick of the number 1.

Let's take a look at another example. This time we want to convey the feeling of suddeness and shock. Which version does this the best?

1. And then KABOOM! It happened!

2. And then... KABOOM! It happened!

3. And then - KABOOM! It happened!

My bet is on number 2: softly, slowly... and THEN! (By the way, you can notice here that this is NOT a crusade against exclamation marks.)

Elipisis is all suspence, uncertainty, hesitation... Yes, but here I hope to have shown how it can for example enhance the exact opposite - the violent feeling of a sudden KABOOM!

An rather interesting thing about elipsis, in realation with the Internet and marketing, is that it can't easily "transcribed" into visual elements, such as: colors, size and shape of the characters etc. In any case, much less easily than exlamation marks. Which is one more reason why you should consider using it more in your copywriting.

========================================
Piotr Obminski is an Internet marketer living in Poland. He's open for interesting JV proposals. His sites include: http://net-profits-udder.com http://e-liber.pl
========================================


MORE RESOURCES:
Google

The New York Times Company Reports 2008 Second-Quarter Results
MarketWatch - 8 hours ago
"Print advertising continued to soften during the quarter, particularly in the classified areas. At the same time, circulation revenues rose 2.5 percent to ...
Boston Globe hit hard by ad revenue slide Bizjournals.com
NY Times misses Wall Street revenue forecast Forbes
NY Times misses Wall Street revenue forecast The Associated Press
Wall Street Journal - MarketWatch
all 271 news articles


3 Advertising, ABQ The Mag become roommates
Bizjournals.com, NC - 53 minutes ago
Albuquerque The Magazine and 3 Advertising have joined forces to turn the second floor of the Albuquerque building that houses the outdoor recreation store ...


The World of 'Green Advertising'
Adweek, NY - 6 hours ago
As a result, companies -- and more specifically their advertising -- are touting the environmental value of their business and products more than ever ...
It's not easy being green CNN International
all 3 news articles


E Canada Now

Saving TV advertising the TiVo way
BBC News, UK - 11 hours ago
And of course it gladdens the hearts of all those companies who had been paying out top dollar for TV advertising only to have viewers completely ignore ...
TiVo's Radical Shift in Strategy: Advertising eFluxMedia
TiVo and Amazon kick advertising and purchase power up a notch TECH.BLORGE.com
TiVo Embraces Ads for Amazon InternetNews.com
TMCnet - New York Times
all 138 news articles


RTT News

Publisher reports 5% rise in revenues despite weak advertising ...
Scotsman, United Kingdom - 11 hours ago
Daily Mail & General Trust (DMGT) said year-on-year advertising revenues at Associated Newspapers, which includes the Daily Mail and the Evening Standard, ...
Daily Mail owner says online helps offset fall in print advertising Telegraph.co.uk
Daily Mail Sales Rise 5%; Economy Hurts Advertising (Update2) Bloomberg
Daily Mail advertising revenues plunge 5% Times Online
Trading Markets (press release) - Reuters
all 36 news articles


Earnings: Hi-Media Sees Online Advertising Market Slowdown; Could ...
Washington Post, United States - 7 hours ago
Could the impending advertising recession actually spread to online? Though many in web ads and publishing confidently predict a continuing "big flood of ...


Adknowledge Social Advertising Reaches 10 Billion Monthly Ad ...
MarketWatch - 19 hours ago
Adknowledge recently announced a program for MySpace application developers that provides them with free advertising to promote their applications within ...
Cubics Serves 10B Ad Impressions Across Social Networks Marketing Vox News
all 8 news articles


RussiaToday

Russian internet advertising market hots up with Google's Begun buy
RussiaToday, Russia - 2 hours ago
Global Internet search engine Google is buying one of Russia's leading Internet advertising service - Begun - from portal Rambler for $140 million dollars. ...
Rambler Media H1 sales soar on ad market growth Reuters India
Rambler figures boosted by Russian advertising market SmallCapNews.co.uk
Rambler Signs Advertising Agreement With Google Hit Search
ITProPortal - The Moscow Times
all 114 news articles


CNET News

You can't talk online advertising without the 'G word'
CNET News, CA - 2 hours ago
What if you organized a conference panel about digital advertising and nobody mentioned Google? Well, Fortune magazine almost accomplished that feat. ...


CNET News

Yahoo profits fall amid company turmoil
San Francisco Chronicle,  USA - 14 hours ago
The results highlight the slowdown in the US online advertising industry and keep the pressure on the Sunnyvale Web portal's leadership to push though an ...
Yahoo's profit, revenue fall shy of targets MarketWatch
Microsoft Holders Say Web Spending Masks Idea Drought (Update2) Bloomberg
So when do we get over with it and declare Google a monopoly? CNET News
PC Magazine - Investor's Business Daily (subscription)
all 23 news articles

Advertising - Google News

home | site map
© 2007