Have you ever wondered whether it’s okay (or appropriate) to pepper your web copy with humour? How do you decide when it’s a good time to be funny?
Humour can please your audience, but it can easily offend, confuse and disappoint.
I’ve been writing copy for a few different social networks and they often need something light-hearted. After puzzling over when, where and how to inject humour into the web copy, I decided to write a sort of ‘humour style guide’ that dictates when it’s okay to use humour.
This is my own guide (use it if you like):
Good Funny
It’s good to be funny:
- When things go wrong
- When people don’t follow instructions
- When you’re giving people a longer explanation of a feature (humour helps break up the educational journey)
- When it’s appropriate (ha! Whatever that means…)
Bad Funny
It’s bad to be funny:
- All the time (relentless attempts at humour are very tiring)
- When people just want to get something done
- When space doesn’t really allow
- When it obscures meaning
- When it complicates something that should be simple
- When it’s forced
- When it alienates a section of your audience
Note: this was something I mainly cooked up for MyMotor, a social network for people who love cars. And some of it arose from thinking about how to write for ArtBuzz, a micro-blogging site for art lovers.
Posted in copywriting, websites |
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I wrote a blog post recently for Freelance Advisor, which was all about motivation, and what I do when fear or inertia slows me down.
One of things I wrote about was the tendency for momentum to build as soon as you take action, how the first push is the hardest, and how life takes over once you put your back into it. I was just browsing through one of my partner’s psychology books (Motivational Interviewing) when I found a quote that resonates with what I wrote:
Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness, concerning all acts of initiative and creation. There is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream events issues from the decision.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Posted in freelancing, ideas |
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Just a quick post – I was called this morning at 7:45 and asked if I would go on BBC local radio (I think the DJ was Neil Pringle) to talk about Twitter.
Now the interesting thing is that the producer or researcher who called me found me by Googling ‘Brighton Twitter’. One of the results for that search is a blog post I wrote ages ago, ‘Why Twitter? – Method in the Mayhem‘. So I’m writing this post mainly to remind my future self of the benefits of blogging.
Back to the radio interview – so within minutes of answering the call, I was on the radio talking about Twitter. The DJ asked me whether he, as a Luddite, should try Twitter. I said something like, “that depends on you. Twitter isn’t for everybody…”
I briefly discussed how Twitter differs from Facebook (it’s much more open – you follow who you want, you don’t just befriend friends or the people you never liked at school) and then the interview was over.
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What follows is a short rumination on a common choice: the choice between what you can afford today and what you can afford tomorrow.
Okay, so I agree that cheap is bad. “Buy it cheap, buy it twice,” we say. Andy Budd wrote an excellent blog post on the merits of buying quality (Why I can’t afford cheap.) which I really like and very much agree with.
The Fast Side of Cheap
But I’ve experienced the other side. I’ve personally felt the benefits of just doing. Cheap might be quick and dirty, but often the alternative is waiting until you can afford something better.
I frequently encounter people who delay significant life changes or big steps forward because they’re waiting for some other criteria to be met… “I can’t do this until I’ve got that,” … “I can’t start my business because I can’t afford Z,” … “I can’t do X because I’m waiting for Y to happen.”
Sure, it makes sense to invest in quality, but sometimes it’s better to just get going.
Quality can wait; life will not.
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I’ve just been wrestling with copy that’s so thickly coated with toxic jargon that I’ve had to wear a haz-chem suit just to get near it.
I’ve been working through it slowly, battering sludgy phrasing into sleek, efficient copy that everyone can understand. And then I happened to Tweet about it.
Clive Andrews asked me how I go about de-jargoning my clients’ copy. After I explained that I just use a mixture of judicious deletions and sensible replacements, Clive asked how I remove jargon without offending my clients. After all, jargon is often industry-specific lingo that helps to exclude outsiders by mystifying simple concepts unite groups by giving them a shared vocabulary, and people get quite attached to their ’special words’.
Persuading clients to ditch jargon
When I’m trying to encourage clients to accept my pruned and de-jargoned copy, I simply insist that clear copy sells, while jargon confuses. I never suggest that jargon is bad because I don’t like it.
Jargon is bad because it puts a thick blanket of stupid between your words and your reader. Using jargon is like hanging curtains over road signs.
My other trick for getting clients on the anti-jargon bandwagon is to get other people to do the arguing for me. So if I’m working with a few people in an organisation, I’ll suggest that jargon is probably hampering our goals and then ask the group for their thoughts.
This strategy is a gamble, because I’m just hoping that my colleagues will argue against the jargon. Luckily, they usually do.
An earlier blog post about jargon.
Thanks to Clive Andrews for his questions.
Posted in copywriting |
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Thanks to Dave Stone for blogging about Déformation professionnelle – the expression that brilliantly describes:
a tendency to look at things from the point of view of one’s own profession and forget a broader perspective. It is a pun on the expression “formation professionnelle,” meaning “professional training.” The implication is that all (or most) professional training results to some extent in a distortion of the way the professional views the world.
I’m very conscious of this effect, so I seek out conflicting points of view and the opinions of people from other industries.
My awareness of déformation professionnelle encourages me to blog negative views of SEO (twice) and social media.
I love this quote from Wikipedia’s déformation professionnelle article:
When the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.
Thanks Dave!
Posted in ideas |
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I read this post yesterday: Spammers, Evildoers and Opportunists by Derek Powazek with much interest.
Derek discusses SEO, and suggests that anyone offering SEO services is a conman and that SEO practices are damaging the web. While I think the first assertion is false (because many websites need a dose of SEO before they get significant traffic from search engines) I do agree that SEO practices are filling the web with trash.
The way Google works is damaging the web.
I’ve thought this before, and have blogged about the pointlessness of web directories (web directories are a large subsection of the web that seem to exist purely to provide links to other websites, while adding no real value to anyone).
But how do we fix the system so that people aren’t encouraged to ‘game’ the system, and add junk to the web in their quest for more links?
I always encourage clients to look for ways to add value to the web. If you want to be found, try being useful. Rather than adding junk for the sake of links or fresh content, try adding useful information.
Posted in SEO |
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The first WriteClub went swimmingly, so there will be more.
15 (or so) copywriters, journalists, proofreaders, authors, travel writers, novelists and bloggers chatted over coffee in Cafe Delice (who very kindly opened 30 minutes early just for us).
Given that the plan for WriteClub was to form an open group for all kinds of writers (and non-writers) to meet and mingle, it’s fair to say that the first meeting was a success.
To help organise the group and to help people find it, there is now:
write-club.net (where members can feature their blog posts)
WriteClub – the Google Group (so members can chat to each other and find out about new meetings)
The next WriteClub
Is an evening meeting: Tuesday 13 October, 20:00. Location: TBA (a pub in central Brighton)
The next morning WriteClub
Is Tuesday 27 October, 08:30. Location: Cafe Delice (upstairs)
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A couple of questions that I can’t answer:
How much does the average company spend on the copy for their website?
How does the cost of copy compare to the cost of design and development?
The web business is peculiar. Websites exist to present information, but it seems that in many cases the carrier (the website) is treated as the important thing, not the information.
To what extent is copy important?
Do the majority of web designers and web developers have their priorities all wrong? Should we flip the web development process around and focus more attention on the content?
Should more money be spent on great content, perhaps at the expense of design or features?
Tags: copywriting, web copy
Posted in copywriting |
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I enjoyed this blog post: Calling Bullshit on Social Media, by Scott Berkun. I enjoyed it, not because I agree with him on every point, but because Scott does a great job of removing some of the hot air from ’social media’.
It seems that in any business it’s easy to get wrapped up in your own enthusiasm (some would call it hype) and it’s easy to find confirmation for your beliefs and to cherry-pick evidence that suits your agenda. And whenever that happens, it’s important for people like Scott to burst the balloon.
Of course, I still feel that there’s loads of potential for organisations to adopt social media and to do something meaningful with it.
Tags: so
Posted in social media |
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