Do you rely on an accountant to produce your business’ annual accounts? If your business suffered a catastrophic IT failure, would you get out your screwdriver to fix it yourself? And if you had a legal problem, would you try to resolve it yourself or contact a solicitor?
In all these cases, I’m guessing you’d call in a professional.
It should be the same with copywriting. Because what you put out there matters.
Five reasons you should use a professional copywriter:
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The impression you’re creating
If your blog post, mailing or brochure is littered with spelling mistakes and hard-to-understand sentences, what does that say about your business? What impression does it give of your professionalism and the attention to detail you devote to client work? Sadly, I’ve seen many stunning websites that undoubtedly cost thousands undone by poor copy. -
The opportunity cost
It’s easy to see why you might be tempted to delegate a piece of writing to an employee. You may initially think it’s a low-cost option. But the hours that employee spends staring at a blank screen waiting for inspiration to strike or struggling with repeated rewrites is time they could be spending more profitably doing the job you actually hired them to do. -
Getting the job done
Your employees have to juggle many balls in the air. They will typically be working on multiple projects involving different departments. Of course, each department believes its project should be prioritised over everyone else’s. Sometimes, logic flies out the window and less important, less urgent jobs take precedence simply because of internal politics. But professional copywriters don’t get sucked into any of this. We can simply focus on writing excellent copy, day in and day out. There are no endless departmental meetings that swallow time or egos to consider. This means we can single-mindedly focus on writing persuasive copy that gets your messages across by the deadline we’ve been set.
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You know too much
Seriously? How can that be a bad thing? Well, when you’re very close to the subject you’re talking about it can be difficult to see the wood for the trees. This means it’s hard to filter out all the detail and home in on the important points you need to get across. You quite literally know too much. But an external copywriter, coming to the topic with fresh eyes, is skilled at identifying your key messages and expressing them in a way that people can understand. -
A better end result
The best writing often appears effortless, with the result that everyone thinks they can write (until they have to do it). However, will the mailing or landing page written by an untrained member of your marketing team get the results you need? An experienced copywriter has years, if not decades, of experience. And experience really does matter. It makes all the difference when it comes to striking the right tone of voice, creating an impact and stirring the reader into action.
As the American firefighter ‘Red’ Adair famously said, “If you think it’s expensive to hire a professional, wait until you hire an amateur”.
If you’d like me to quote for your next marketing project, please get in touch!
(Full disclosure: The picture above is not my actual desk – it’s far too tidy)
