Web designers love to show off, and they love to share inspiring design. There are many sites that help designers share the good stuff, and I’m jealous!
When I want inspiration as a copywriter, where can I look? When I find fantastic copy, where can I share it?
Nowhere. Or so it seems.
So how about I set up a simple site, give you (as a copywriter) your own login details, and then we can fill the site with great copy!
Let’s spend more time complimenting great copy and less time criticising the bad stuff.
What do you think?
ADDENDENDENDUM: Following such a positive reaction to the idea, I set to work and created drivvel.com – a place to share and discover inspiring copy and content
Hell yeah.
Great idea.
Comment by Chris Harding — September 9, 2011 @ 1:37 pm
I’m onboard!
Comment by Mark Mauloni — September 9, 2011 @ 1:46 pm
Great! I’ll keep you both posted with progress. We need somewhere we can all submit great shit. And by shit I mean copy.
Comment by Leif Kendall — September 9, 2011 @ 2:00 pm
Count me and my shit in too. It’s an excellent idea – I don’t know why nobody’s done it before.
(By ‘shit’ I also mean great copy, obviously.)
Comment by John Mc — September 9, 2011 @ 2:24 pm
Bloody marvellous idea. Count me in. Now all I need is some great copy…
Comment by Martin Thomas — September 9, 2011 @ 2:49 pm
It’s a great idea: something like “The copy book”… online 🙂
Comment by marco — September 10, 2011 @ 3:35 pm
I think this is a really great idea. Then again, I always thought comparing todgers in the playground was a great idea because I always won. Not, of course, that I like to boast.
But anyway. From a client perspective, it’s a fantastic idea — ignoring the buzzword, it really is a “one stop shop” for them to compare different services and find a writer who really suits them. As copywriters, our lives would be made easier by getting more approaches from people we’d work well with.
The trouble is, unlike a Go Compare Todgers (I’m imagining the TV ad already) site, we’re not necessarily comparing like-for-like on finished projects. Some of my best work has appeared on truly awful looking websites, while other work I did I hated until I saw what the designer did with it.
So my question is, would we be comparing finished work in-situ or would we take a words-and-only-words approach? A portfolio of great copy on bad sites may look poor to a client beside a portfolio of mediocre copy that’s been polished by great designers. At the moment, I’d be tempted to display work I’ve done with good designers, rather than display my best work.
Thoughts?
Comment by Alastaire Allday — September 14, 2011 @ 3:32 pm
Alastaire – interesting points.
I was thinking of creating something that copywriters can use to find inspiration, as well as showing off their best work.
So while clients might use it to find copywriters, I think the audience will be mainly other copywriters and perhaps the people we work alongside, like web designers and other creatives.
Comment by Leif Kendall — September 14, 2011 @ 3:38 pm
I think this is a great idea. It might be nice if it were ‘pure copy’ – that is, just snippets of text with minimal formatting, but still looking nice.
A lot of copywriters’ portfolios show highly designed work. OK, they might have developed the concept behind it, and it’s understandable since it puts your work in the best possible light, but still – it’s showing more than just the writing.
I’d love to be able to pop over and quickly post something I’d written, with a description, to see what people thought. For example, last night I shoehorned a Smiths lyric into a cupcake site. The client might decide not to go with that, but I’d like to be able to post it somewhere so it doesn’t just get lost.
As for moaning about bad copy, I don’t know anyone who does that…
Comment by Tom Albrighton — September 14, 2011 @ 4:16 pm
Hi Leif. As a relatively new member of the crowd, I would certainly find a resource like this very useful – and I would hope to contribute quite a bit to it in the future.
Comment by Celia — September 14, 2011 @ 4:38 pm
Hmm. Clients will definitely find out – I was shocked when a client I’d thought to be totally clueless about the web told me “we’ve already found a designer on Cargo Collective…”
The problem for me is definitely separating the design of the finished work from the words. Maybe it’s just me, but I’d be uncomfortable putting work up if I felt the design was poor, even though it has no bearing on my skill as a writer.
Could we also do a separate, anonymous “clients from hell” page? I’ve got a few submissions… 😀
Comment by Alastaire Allday — September 14, 2011 @ 4:39 pm
Sounds good to me. I like the idea of having a place to share inspirations. Most advertising site lean towards the design, it’s be nice to have our own little space – count me in.
Comment by Ali Turner — September 14, 2011 @ 5:17 pm
nice idea! I allways had a dream about a “dribbble for copywriters” so I totally support you all. Maybe don´t forget about your colleagues form other (not English speaking) countries… 😉
Comment by Ivica Duricova — September 15, 2011 @ 4:35 pm
Sounds like a great idea, I’m in!
Comment by Dave Young — September 23, 2011 @ 11:02 pm
[…] This is a quick follow-up on my blog post, “Where do copywriters go for inspiration?“… […]
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[…] felt a need. A need to share copy and a find inspiration. And my blog post on that subject generated enough positive comments to spur me to action. An lo, Drivvel was […]
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