Why copy is written differently depending on where it lands up

Marketing and promotion can take place on a variety of mediums or platforms. The traditional mediums include print, radio, television, direct mail and telephone while the online mediums include email marketing, social media, pay per click marketing, search engine marketing in addition to mobile marketing. There are benefits and costs to each type of marketing which means that it is critical to understand the objectives of each marketing campaign and utilise the medium that best facilitates them.

Good copywriting depends on the medium for which you’re writing

This means that you should adapt your copywriting to take advantage of specific opportunities available in different mediums.

Advertising copy that is written for the same product or service may have different content and styles depending on the medium through which the advertisement will be broadcast.

Diverse types of copywriting are needed for different purposes, different audiences and different media. Getting it correct means being getting heard by the right people in the correct media, in the right way. This is why one piece of copywriting won’t cut it across a number of different media.

Copywriting for different media

Keep the following in mind regardless of what medium you are writing for.

Visuals are usually as important than words

If you don’t have good visuals in your advertising copy, go back to square one as without these images your copy won’t matter.

Condense, condense, condense!

This doesn’t mean a switch to a font size which is smaller.

Beware of jargon and acronyms

Unless you are aiming your writing at an audience which knows the jargon and acronyms intimately, avoid them. If you cannot do this, explain them.

Utilise bullets to make your copy easy to scan

Bullets need to be parallel (that is, every bullet in a series should be a sentence or a non-sentence and punctuated accordingly). In a lot of ways, bullets are much easier to write than a full narrative.

Think about your purpose

What would you like the person reading this information to do? Call, visit a website, order, or what? Include a call to action which makes it clear what the following step is.

Consider your audience

• Do they know your product or service, or are they not familiar with this?
• Are they technically competent in your field of expertise, or do you need to explain what the complex technical terms mean?
• Are they old or young?
• Does your text address what they care about (which may not be exactly the same thing you care about)?

Think about your tone

A lot of times, you’re will be going for an effortless sales tone of writing. However, your business may be more formal or casual, depending on what your business does and what your brand is like.

Consider a tagline

A tagline is your slogan, the thing which you want to explain above all else which your company does. Your goal is to be short as well as snappy, but not too cute.

Get in touch with the Digital School of Marketing

Want to learn more about adapting your copy to different media? If you do, then you really need to have a look at our National Diploma in Copywriting and Digital Marketing. For more information, please follow this link.