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Are You Writing for You or Writing for Them?

Image by Vanessa Pike-Russell via Flickr A Tip on How to Balance Good Writing with Good Customer Service I had spiders in my garage. Lots of them. Probably hundreds, to be honest. But they were just in my garage – they hadn’t infiltrated my home. Yet. In fact, I hadn’t seen a single spider in [...]

Positive vs. Negative Marketing . . . and Gamefly’s “Bad Game” TV Spot

So, Gamefly.com has been running this ad lately. Check it out: People buy bad video games. They freak out, realizing that they’ve purchased bad video games. They continue to freak out, ostensibly because they’re stuck with their bad video games (and out the 50 to 60 bucks they paid for them). The ad ends with [...]

And I Still Remember Worrying About Paper Quality . . .

Forget hard-copy resumes and cover letters. Forget job search sites. Check out how a guy named Hal Thomas landed a sweet new marketing job via Twitter. Just one more reason – if you needed one — to get on the social media bandwagon.

Stay in Focus: Remembering Your Audience and Message

When you’re in the middle of a copywriting job, there’s an age-old marketing maxim that can be hard to remember – and it can sometimes be hard to convey to clients: You can’t be all things to all people. Good copy does two things: It speaks to a specific, targeted audience AND it has a [...]

Starbucks’ New Instant Coffee Ad: Love it or Hate it?

In an earlier blog post, I cautioned against ad campaigns that were too trendy or topical, but Starbucks’ new “Via” TV ad is an edgy, hilarious example of why it’s sometimes okay to buck convention. In addition to promoting their new instant coffee, Starbucks takes on a touchy (and waaaay timely) subject: town hall meetings. [...]

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