Q. Hi Adrian, I find myself being asked by my coaching clients to handle all of their copywriting, advertising and marketing. I’m an OK copywriter, but my stuff just isn’t very compelling. Any advice on how to make my writing more compelling and attention-grabbing?

– Diane Stevens

Hi Diane,

It’s easy to write about certain topics like celebrities, technology or social media. Everybody wants to know about these topics. But what if your passion is botany, supply chain logistics or cognitive psychology? How can you make these topics compelling when your subject is… boring?

Here’s the bottom line

People love “dot connectors.” Have you ever read something that was a true “aha” moment for you? Could you stop reading at that point, or were you excited and compelled to continue reading?

Our world is getting more complicated by the second. If you connect the dots for them, you can get popular in a hurry. For example, human nature demands that almost every choice we make is connected to incentives. However, did you know that incentives can sometimes backfire on you? Consider this example of a daycare.

When parents began to show up late to pick up little Susie or Johnnie, the daycare center implemented a policy of charging a $3 fine to incentivize parents to show up on time. Unfortunately, the fine wound up incentivizing parents to pay $3 for an hour of babysitting and not feel guilty for showing up late!

When you give your prospect’s these “aha” moments, you keep them reading what may otherwise be a so-called boring topic… and have them asking for more.

However, that’s not to imply that headlines don’t matter. Even with all of our shiny social media tools, writing great headlines is still important. You can be a masterful storyteller and write killer content, but none of that matters if no one reads it.

Titles are the closest thing marketers have to a “silver bullet.” So whatever you do, don’t waste them. The quickest way to give your boring marketing a facelift is to put some eye-hijacking power into your headlines. In fact, write your headline first before you even start the rest of the ad. It really is that important.

Numbers are a marketer’s best friend. One common complaint of marketing collateral is that no one takes them seriously. How many of us really believe it when we hear… Better Ingredients, Better Pizza… Papa John’s? Do they REALLY have better ingredients? Doubtful.

Let’s face the facts

Most marketing plays fast and loose with the facts… and often lacks any type of substantive proof. It’s easy to avoid hard numbers and focus on writing the soft stuff, but that’s a big mistake.

Many marketers are afraid that statistics, equations and hard facts will scare away prospects, but that’s not giving them enough credit. The problem isn’t the numbers — it’s that we stick numbers out there without connecting them to a story.

 Use numbers to reveal a hidden story. Consider the example of the school administrator that looked up the numbers on standardized tests for Baltimore students. On the face of it, the data was BORING… until those numbers revealed that teachers were cheating.

Why in the world would teachers cheat??? Well, it turned out that the teachers received salary boosts when their students performed better on standardized tests — motivating them to fill in a few additional correct answers on behalf of their students. See how the story makes the numbers interesting? The numbers make the story credible. Seriously, you have to try this yourself.

Another good tip to remember is that everyone loves a good mystery. Any mystery begs for detective work. We can’t leave well enough alone and we want to know why — especially if someone else is going to do the legwork of figuring out the answer for us. Look at the box office success of most mystery movies or TV series like CSI.

You can use this quirk of human nature to make your topic enticing. Look closely at your content and uncover some old-fashioned mysteries. Now write an ad that presents the mystery and leads your reader through the investigation to its incredibly satisfying conclusion.

Another way to present compelling copy is to provide a better way to solve a common problem. Have you seen the My Pillow ads? They only run every 3 minutes on every network on the planet. That commercial makes me think that every problem imaginable can be solved with the right incentive, data analysis or storytelling because it incorporates all three of those components into the ad.

This is what “added value” means. Simply restating a problem is boring. Offering new tools and perspectives to solve problems helps your prospect get closer to their goals — and that makes you someone whose content they’ll want to read every time you come out with something new.

For example, does your business have a website? Look at it right now. Do you have the name of your business at the top of the site? I’ll bet you do. Do you have a “menu” of the products or services you provide listed in the body copy? I’ll bet you do. Do you have your name or picture somewhere on the site? I’ll bet you do. What about your phone number? It’s on there too, isn’t it? Well, of course, it is.

EVERY one of these is wrong, wrong, wrong! Your prospects could care less what you have named your business, what you look like, what your name is or what you sell. Why in the world do I need a window cleaner to tell me on their website that they “clean windows?” Why do moving companies tell me on their website that they can move both local or long distance… or that they move both residential and commercial? And yet… they ALL say that in their marketing.

Your prospects ONLY care about themselves… period. What the moving company SHOULD be telling me as a prospect is that ALL movers claim to be “fully insured.” And legally, they all are. It’s required by law. What no one knows, however, is what that “legally” means.

Ahhh… are you now interested in what I have to say next? Are you now hanging on my every word because I have just introduced a “mystery?” What… pray to tell… is this “secret” information? Can’t wait to find out, can you? See why all of this works?

Well, wonder no more. ALL movers are “fully insured”… PER POUND OF DAMAGE! What does that actually mean? It means that if you have a $5000 HDTV, and your moving company destroys it in the move, they MUST replace it based on 40 cents per pound of damage. That TV typically weighs around 100 pounds, so the moving company is obligated to reimburse you $40 for your $5000 TV. Read the fine print (which of course, no one does).

But since I told you about this startling information in my moving ad, and then went on to tell you that I avoid “ripping off” my moving clients by providing “full replacement value” insurance that reimburses you for the full market value of anything I break and go on to give you my insurance policy number, name of my insurance agent and that agents phone number for verification, well… who are you going to have handled your next move? Big difference huh?

To get devoted prospects who will anticipate your every email, ad, brochure, etc. with rabid enthusiasm, give them solutions… NOT features.