The Copywriter Underground

This week’s Fifteen Minute Friday Pitch Post comes courtesy of a client who turned the tables and pitched an idea to me.
Sure, Fifteen Minute Fridays are supposed to work the other way.
I (and by extension, you) invest fifteen minutes thinking about projects I can pitch to an existing client, and then write the pitch e-mail.
It [...]

Michael Stelzner of Writing White Papers - never one to let a good concept go unused - has morphed his “Ten Best Writer’s blogs” idea into a “Top 10 Books for Writers” post.
I’m learning about a lot of titles I knew little about. But wonder why so few of the classics are seeing the light [...]

Matthew Stibbe of the Bad Language blog tackles the worthy subject of good copywriters producing bad copy. I loved the topic, and wanted to add a few thoughts. First, he listed ten reasons why bad copy happens to good people.
I won’t reproduce all ten reasons here, but will highlight a pair of his prime culprits:
4. [...]

Who says list posts are dead? Tech Digest’s Stuart Dredge posted a hilarious “Top 10 ways to diss someone in a Web 2.0 style” and while it won’t bring down the whole list post genre, it might make you shoot milk/tea/cola/beer out your nose.
Here are #2, #3 and #4:
2. Gather a group of friends [...]

I’ll say this right up front: it plumps the ego when a recruiter calls, even when the job isn’t for you.
Still, Coldwater Creek - a growing women’s clothing catalog operation - is looking for a senior-level copywriter at their Sandpoint, Idaho location.
Willing to relocate? Small-town life in northern Idaho sound attractive?
Check out their site. Then [...]

There’s a meme going around, and unlike a virus, this one’s OK to catch. It’s a list of “Z-list” blogs, and I’m supposed to post the list after adding a few more names to it.
 The idea, of course, is to create a tidal wave of links for the lesser-trafficked marketing blogs, and I admit that [...]

I just finished reading an intriguing blog post about article marketing using affiliate links. While I see the logic, it’s a wholly foreign concept to someone who’s written ads, direct mail and Web sites for better than two decades.
Have It Your Way.
If you’ve read the Copywriter Underground for long, you’ll realize I’m hot on the [...]

I spend hours every day in front of a 19″ flatscreen monitor. I play with new text editors and word processors like they’re toys.
And I know I couldn’t make a living from the base of a 14,162′ inactive volcano if it wasn’t for the Internet.
Yet I can’t quite escape the idea that pens and notebooks [...]