There’s a book, “Making Sense of Wine,” by author Matthew Kramer.

In it, Kramer writes: “What constitutes quality in wine?… The single greatest standard used in assessing a wine’s quality is its complexity. The more times you can return to a glass of wine and find something different in it — in the bouquet, in the taste — the more complex the wine.”

Could the same lesson apply to writing articles, ezines, or sales letters?

If it is, it’s one that flies in the face of conventional web wisdom. Usually, the writer’s mantra is “K.I.S.S.” (Keep It Simple Stupid). And most of the time, this rule works just fine. As does another you’ve seen me talk about here or in the weekly CR e-letter (sign up if you haven’t already), called the principle of “The Power of One.” The idea being that when you want to get a message across, the tither you can bundle it up for the reader, the better.

Yet, we also know that writing — especially the kind of writing we do in sales letters and even more so, editorially — is more and more about building relationships. And aren’t relationships built layer upon layer with complexities?

Here’s more from Kramer…

“It appears that we are, in fact, set up to respond favorable to complexity. Decades of work in experimental psychology have revealed that when people are free to choose between a simple visual image and a more complex one, they gravitate to the complex… Even our alleged neurological compatriot, the laboratory rat, has demonstrated a preference, over time, for more complex stimuli over simple.”

But if that’s true, doesn’t the idea of “keeping it simple” fall apart?

Kramer continues: ”One researcher in the field employs the notion of disorder or entropy. The more things are jumbled, the more ‘information’ can be conveyed at one time. The trick is our ability to sort it out and make it meaningful. In short, there must be both pattern and complexity for sustained interest… For something to be truly satisfying, especially after repeated exposure, it must continually surprise us and yet we must be able to grasp these surprises as part of a larger and pleasing pattern.”

Rich. Complex. Consistently surprising.

That’s the juice we seem to want to squeeze not just out of grapes, but life. At least according to what Kramer’s saying. If we accept this as true, maybe there’s still a way to reconcile this insight and the one about the power of simplicity.

First, I’d say that yes, the relationship one builds with readers, either from the first paragraph of a piece of copy to the last or over a series of articles or issues or blog posts does need to grow and evolve. And as anyone knows, evolution is never simple.

Still, this doesn’t mean you can just jumble your ideas together. Even rich and layered relationships are united by a few very simple goals. Maybe even one simple goal, depending on whom you talk to. Even in a sales letter that drills home on one distinct message, the copy does many things to build trust, nurture a sense of urgency, intensify desire, and so on.

Second, I’d say that you can never discount the power of passion behind written ideas. You can’t write well about something you don’t believe in. And you write better about things you believe in strongly. I say this because passion about ideas, it seems to me, is the glue between the “power of one” single idea insight… and the context of complexity in which it can still be couched.

Yes?

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I love a good analogy.

But, like the people who send marriage proposals to jailed serial killers, I sometimes fall in love with a bad one. A bad analogy, that is. Not serial killers. Point being, analogies can be a powerful tool when used well. But they can sabotage your message when they’re bad.

Below, you’ll find yet more of some of the most widely circulated and worst analogies proferred by our young American progeny. Read ‘em and weep…

On Experience: “He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience,like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.”

On The Power of Pavement: “McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty Bag filled with vegetable soup.”

On the Alternative Universe: “From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie,surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and “Jeopardy” comes on at 7 p.m. instead of 7:30.”

On Detail: “He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree.”

On Greater Detail: “Her eyes were like two brown circles with big black dots in the center.”

On Too Much Detail: “Her hair glistened in the rain like nose hair after a sneeze.”

On The Obscure: “The politician was gone but unnoticed, like the period after the Dr. on a Dr Pepper can.”

On Teeth: “They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.”

On Theater: “The thunder was ominous-sounding, much like the sound of a thin sheet of metal being shaken backstage during the storm scene in a play.”

On Confusion: “His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.”

On Imagination: “The red brick wall was the color of a brick-red Crayola crayon.”

Okay, that’s it. I’m now officially fresh out of analogies; like, you might say, a trayful of chocolate frosted doughnuts that didn’t survive the Policemen’s picnic.

(Oh boy, I think I need some aspirin.)

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There’s a guy named Jack (just a coincidence). He has a son. The son is in his early 20s and unmarried. One evening after dinner, the father and son have a conversation.

“Son, I want you to marry a girl of my choice.”

“C’mon Dad,” says the boy, “I want to choose my own bride.”

“Yes, but the girl is Bill Gates’ daughter,” says Jack.

Says the son, “Well, in that case…”

The next morning, Jack gets a call through to Bill Gates.

“I have a husband for your daughter,” says Jack.

“But my daughter is too young to marry,” says Bill, startled.

“Yes,” says Jack, “but this young man will soon be vice-president of the World Bank.”

“Ah, in that case…”

That afternoon, Jack goes to see the president of the World Bank.

Jack steps into his office and says, “I have a young man to be recommended as a vice-president.”

Says the World Bank president, “But I already have more vice-presidents than I need.”

“Perhaps,” says Jack, “but this young man is Bill Gates’s son-in-law.”

“Ah,” says the President, “in that case…”

And that, my friend, is how business is done. Okay, perhaps not really.

But what I do like about this joke — which was passed along by a friend of ours in France — is that it just goes to show you that the real story behind so many successful people  is that they’ve made opportunities happen rather than wait for them to come along.

So what are you waiting for?

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It’s brevity they say is the soul to wit. And If that’s true, I admit… sometimes, I can be a little soulless. I grew up loving what the nuns used to call “25 cent words.”

In high school, we called them “SAT Words.” These are the words, they told us, that make you sound smart. That win you respect, jobs, and the girl of your dreams. People who use these words, they said, can walk through walls.

Boy, did they get that wrong.

No sooner did I slip into the world of the written word, to discover that bigger, Latinate vocabulary doesn’t improve the accessibility of your cogitations, rather it obfuscates it. (That is, big words can make you sound dumber… simply because you’re tripping over yourself to get your message across.)

Which is why I was thankful when longtime copywriting buddy David Deutsch sent me a copy of “Short Words Are Words of Might” by Gelett Burgess.

It’s not a book, per se. In all it’s 16 pages. And SMALL pages at that. What’s really impressive, however, is that the entire essay is written with one syllable words. (Talk about practicing what you preach!)

Burgess’ essay originally appeared in “Your Life” magazine in 1938.

Here are a few juice quotes that reveal the core idea:

“Short words must have been our first words when the world was young. The minds of men were raw… Their first words were, no doubt, mere grunts or growls, barks, whines, squeals like those of beasts. These rough, strange sounds were made to show how they felt. They meant joy or pain or doubt or rage or fear…

“But these sounds came, in time, to grow more and more plain as real words. They were short words, strong and clear. And these first short words, used by our sires way back in the dark of time, still have strength and truth. They are bred in our flesh and bone. We may well call such words the life blood of our speech.”

“Short words, you see, come from down deep in us — from our heats or guts — not from the brain. For they deal for the most part with things that move and sway us, that make us act… That, I think, is why short words tend to make our thoughts more live and true.”

In other words, says Burgess, in a point that’s often ignored, short words have power. In poetry, sure. But also in sales copy too. “Never put a policeman in an automobile,” said someone much smarter than yours truly, “when a cop in a car will do.”

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Every great direct response copywriter can tell you what a valuable thing it is to have a “swipe file,” that burgeoning bin or desktop folder of winning promos crafted by other copywriters.

The idea, of course, isn’t to rip off the best of your colleagues… but rather to read, see what’s working, and use that to get your own creative juices flowing.

Not everybody gets that. Some people understand the concept, but go ahead and plagiarize anyway. Not good, folks.

And it looks like it’s not just a problem in direct mail or online advertising. For instance, Don Hauptman recently sent me a clip from the New York Times that Madison Avenue pros might be taking the, er, “borrowing” technique a bit too far.

Honda Motors and the Subway sandwich shop chain, both have ads out there centered on the old “Odd Couple” sitcom theme song. Coincidence? Maybe.

Maybe so, too, for Visa and the “Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium” movie trailer, who both featured the same instrumental piece of music in their commercials… borrowed from the 1985 movie, “Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure.”

Or the three ads from Dell, Sears, and Wal-Mart respectively — each with the “make holiday wishes come true” story line. And the movie trailer for the new “Beowulf” movie, which harkens back to the campaign advertising the blockbuster flick “300.”

Lots of ideas strike lots of people at the same time.

But it just goes to show you, you’ve got to work that much harder to be original with your message.

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I got a note from a reader who aspires to a copywriting career and wanted to know how best to get started. You can imagine, I get that question a lot. Here was my reply:

1) Keep on reading the Copywriter’s Roundtable!

2) Get some books on copywriting and study them. See the attached past issues.

3) Get on the mailing list of companies you think you could write for (your areas of interest and expertise).

4) Study those sales letters they send you too (the ones that make you want to buy, copy out by hand 3X).

5) Contact one of the companies (the marketing director or product manager, if you can find them).

6) Offer to write a sales letter “on spec” — which means they pay you if they like it.

7) Keep doing that until you have a portfolio of letters and some regular clients who hire you often.

Starting local is a good idea. Or can be. Businesses use sales letters and brochures to sell to other businesses (this is “B2B” copywriting) and then there’s the business to consumer market (”B2C”).

There’s also non-profit, but that can be a slow and less lucrative beginning. Better to get into that later, after honing your skills.

Look to the field you’re already working in, too. If you’ve been focusing on something in particular, you’re no doubt pretty knowledgeable about the products and the customers you service. Maybe enough that you could write marketing copy for that niche..

Of course, companies with information products, software companies, computer equipment companies, publishing companies… can all be good places to start.

You want to use each job as leverage to get your next assignment. And try to make each assignment that you get a little larger and more ambitious than the last.  

The more knowledge you get, start offering to give talks for companies and communities on how to use good copy to increase sales… and let people know, after the speech, that you’re a provider of those services.

 Find a good graphic designer (with direct mail experience, preferably) and form a “team” where you each try to bring in the other as part of new jobs. 

Again, you’re sure to have some hurdles in the beginning. And you need to expect to take at least six months to a year… maybe even just a little longer… to get good enough at this and established enough to make it a real career.

 Like anything worthwhile, you WILL need to put in the hours and be dedicated. But you can certainly learn how to do this, if you put in the time. 

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What’s more persuasive, email or face-to-face communication?

Per a UK psychology study published on this fascinating British psychology blog, gender roles make a difference. So does the level of familiarity. Friends can persuade us more easily, generally, than strangers.

But when familiarity levels are low, email is more persuasive for men than it is for women. And when familiarity levels are high? Women still react better to face-to-face interaction. At least, better than men.

But overall, you get your best results when ”oneness” levels are highest.

“Oneness” is simply the idea that the better you feel you know someone, the more doing something for them feels about as good as it does doing the same for yourself.

 The researchers tested this by giving two test groups a set of personality tests.

In one group, the results were faked so participants would believe they shared identical personalities to fellow test-takers. In the other, the faked results showed a vast difference in personality types.

 After the test, the participants were asked to try to convince one of their test-taking counterparts of different assigned arguments. In the “like” personality group, persuasion was a breeze. Between dissimilar types, not so much.

 If I had to tie this back to the email or face-to-face question, I’d say that — at the very least — this confirms what a lot of us have already suspected. Which is that, the more you build that personal connection, often the better your results.

Especially in business-to-consumer marketing.

From the same psychology blog, want to persuade a group that your opinion is actually the majority opinion?

Turns out that all you might have to do is repeat that opinion at least three times. Doing just that, it can have 90% of the same effect as three other people voicing the same stance. For marketers, this just underscores another accepted truism: there’s value in repetition.

If you’ve got a key message and you’re writing long copy, especially, look for more than one way to express that point. Not so the meaning changes, but so that it’s fresh and easy to absorb each time. Same goes for reinforcing your big benefit. Come back to it naturally in the copy, throughout, when you can.

Speaking of psychology tricks, here’s a set of some insights a little more for the “useless but interesting” file.

First, try this: do the following math quickly in your head… 2+2, 4+4, 8+8, 16+16. Done? Good.

Now QUICK pick a number between 12 and 5. Great. You picked the number 7.

Weird, isn’t it? No, I don’t know why it works.

Here’s another one: What is 1+5? 2+4? 3+3? 4+2? 5+1? Now say the number “6″ as many times as you can over the next 10 seconds. Done? Boy, you follow directions well. Now QUICK… name a vegetable. 

Was it a… carrot?

Only 2% of those tested this way ever say otherwise.

No, I can’t explain that one either.

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Here’s a quickie insight and useful tip:

The common wisdom is that everybody loves a pretty face, right? Not always so, says Bryan Eisenberg over at grokdotcom.

 Oh sure, the pretty face does attract attention. But that’s the problem. In ads, a real looker can pull a visitor’s eyes away from your message.

Heat maps showing viewer interest reveal that we impulsively go to the eyes first in a face.  This is especially true if it’s a head-on shot where the face in the ad is making eye-contact with the viewer. And that can detract attention from where you want the prospect’s attention to end up, which is with the content of your ad.

But when the model’s eyes look aside, the same heat maps show that viewers tend to follow the model’s gaze to where it lands. A good photographer knows this to be true, too. Portraits with someone looking directly at the camera have a very different feel from those where the subject looks off-frame or into an empty space.

For the marketer — even a copywriter — this matters when you choose stock photos or when you higher someone to take pictures for your promos? If you’re in that situation, ask the model to look in the direction of your product or headline instead.

(Or, in a pinch, use Photoshop to make it happen.)

©2009 Supreme copywriting secrets.... All Rights Reserved.

What is it that they know that we don’t? Not much, actually.

Since, after all, any good copywriter also knows that when you really… really… want to make for a powerful sales pitch, digging into the small details can be your most powerful technique. 

Here’s an example. Which of the following descriptions sounds better to you?

“I live on a big street in the city.”

Or…

“I live on a leafy, sun-dappled boulevard in Paris?”

For me, both are true. Because they’re one and the same.

But doesn’t the second “option” sound better?

Here’s another example…

Some years ago, I gave a copy seminar in Poland. I knew nothing about the country, honestly,
except what I’d seen on the news about labor strikes in the 1980s… and what I’d read in history books about World War II.

I came away, however, as travelers often do after seeing a totally new place up close. In fact, some of those images still stick with me today. It was, in short, a really nice place.

Oh… wait… just saying it was “nice” isn’t enough?

Okay, here’s more: Outside of Krakow, we saw an underground cathedral built deep inside a salt mine and decorated with a dozen crystal chandeliers and life-size religious statues made entirely of salt.

In the Royal Palace, the walls were covered with etched leather. On Sunday, we fed walnuts to the peacocks that wander Warsaw’s park. We dined on spinach-filled perogi and drank warm honey wine.

Now… which description wakes up your imagination?

“Nice” or the ones that actually painted a picture. No, I’m not writing a travel brochure here, but I’m sure you get the point. Those details that make the images more alluring, are what some writers call “actualities.” And they can make all the difference when you’re trying to persuade somebody to do anything in print.

See, many new copywriters get in the bad habit of painting their word pictures in only broad strokes. And sometimes, that’s enough. For instance, when you’re breezing past a point that’s already clearly imprinted on your prospect’s mind… and that’s been illustrated ad infinitum elsewhere.

But other times, you’ve got a lot of selling power locked in the “actualities” or fine details of the images you’re presenting or the product you’re selling.

Dig out the right ones and trot them past your prospect, and you could just unlock the selling opportunity that otherwise might have passed you by.

Here’s another example…

A LEAD THAT’S WORKED FOR 17 YEARS

For at least the last 17 years, the newsletter INTERNATIONAL LIVING has mailed a sales package that begins:

“You look out your window, past your gardener, who is busily pruning the lemon, cherry, and fig trees…amidst the splendor of gardenias, hibiscus, and hollyhocks.

“The sky is clear blue. The sea is a deeper blue, sparkling with sunlight.

“A gentle breeze comes drifting in from the ocean, clean and refreshing, as your maid brings you breakfast in bed.

“For a moment, you think you have died and gone to heaven. But this paradise is real. And affordable. In fact, it costs only half as much to live this dream lifestyle…as it would to stay in your own home!”

What makes that work, in your mind?

The newsletter is about retiring overseas… it’s about travel to exotic, undiscovered places… it’s about a life transformation that begins when you take a step out into the world.

Could a letter selling the product possibly start in any other way? As it happens, in this case, they’ve never really beaten it… except with other letters that were just as focused on those fine and enticing kinds of travel details.

And even then, only for a short while.

Too much detail, of course, is just as much of a hindrance as too little. But just the right touch, like a dash of paint in just the right spot on a canvas… or a splash of the right spice in a stew… can make your copy incredibly powerful.

Here’s a rundown of what a really well chosen “actuality” can do…

IT CAN MAKE YOUR MESSAGE “REAL”: The right “actuality” can give a story a much greater presence, a feel of truth.

IT CAN MAKE YOUR MESSAGE UNIQUE: Getting specific is often the fastest way to make average copy rise above the mean. Why?

Because the details prevent the reader from lumping your message in with other ones that would otherwise sound so similar. Simple enough.

IT CAN EXPRESS MORE IN A SMALL SPACE: Again, good description doesn’t mean writing longer. In fact, it often means the opposite.

A good word-picture example can make a message clear faster than a drawn-out explanation of a point.

IT CAN TRANSPORT THE READER: Like a good movie or book, where the audience gets lost in the story, careful use of detail can draw a prospect into getting “lost” in (wrapped up in) the excitement of your sales message.

How much detail is TOO much?

You need just enough detail to stir emotions and put images inside the reader’s head.

Some other tips…

* Try delivering the detailed image first, then follow up with a promise… either to deliver on a good image or to help a prospect avoid a bad one, depending on what you’ve presented.

* Focus on sensory details (touch, sight, sound, taste, smell) and numbers. The former appeal most to emotions, the latter to logic.

* Use details to show transition or improvement: “Jeff Johansen used to take a city bus to the unemployment office. Now he drives an S-class Mercedes to the gym…”

* Describe an emotional reaction you want your prospect to feel. “Dear Friend, When I read the latest report from the FDA, I just about dropped my coffee mug. Let me show you what it said…”

You get the point. The goal of the actuality is simple. It is to allow the reader to see your writing as more than just word patterns on a white page.

©2009 Supreme copywriting secrets.... All Rights Reserved.

Time magazine did a back-o’-the-napkin calculation.

 Suppose you estimate about five million of these “25 Random Things” messages in circulation in a single week.

 Given 25 details in each note, that’s 125 million random facts making the rounds. Even at just 10 minutes to come up with each list, that’s roughly 800,000 hours of time… probably at work… spent on Facebook.

 Okay, I’ll admit it… I don’t ‘get’ it.

 That is, I get the technology. It’s the appeal that escapes me. Not just Facebook, but MySpace, LinkedIn, Twitter, Reunion, and all the rest.

Yes, I know that makes me sound like a curmudgeon.

 Don’t get me wrong. I’m on it, if begrudgingly. Simply because so many friends invited me, it seemed rude to keep on ignoring the invitations.

 I’m now at around 140 or so friends… ranging from my hometown acquaintances to faraway college friends, an ex-girlfriend or two, old work colleagues, grad school friends, and so on.

 I haven’t invited any of them myself. I just accept the connections as they come. And sure, watching the network build… the status updates… the pictures of their kids… the details of their lives after we last saw each other… these really are good things.

 But I can’t help question the opportunity cost.

 For instance, where does everyone find the time to update a status or tap in all those notes? I can barely keep up with my email inbox. Now I’ve got to worry about forgetting to “Facebook” Mom too?

 Plus, the lost privacy. Not that I have anything to hide, but in all the time I’ve had a Facebook account, I’ve never entered a “status” update. Not once.

 Not that I have anything to hide… but some details just don’t feel important enough to share. (”John F. was just typing… and he’s still typing. There he goes again!” Welcome to the endless status loop.)

 Certainly, there’s a massive marketing benefit to this whole social network phenomenon (can you say ’self-expanding, self-selecting mailing lists?’).

 But… well… let’s just say that when they throw the Facebook friends and family reunion about a dozen years from now… you’ll find me over by the digital punchbowl.

©2009 Supreme copywriting secrets.... All Rights Reserved.