What Toddlers Can Teach You About Copywriting
Who loves listening to a good story?
And who loves telling a good story?
Who loves reading a good story?
Me, me, me…Let me explain…
All brilliant stories start like this:
“Do you remember when…”
“Once upon a time…”
Now, have you ever heard someone explain a story like this…
Every particle attracts every other particle in the universe with a force that is directly proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between their centers…that’s why I decided to go for a walk
Exciting story right?
It should be, it explains how gravity works, and yet it’s not.
How about this one…
I woke up suddenly…It was freezing cold, there was a thick layer of fog all around me.
Why was I so cold? Where am I?
I could smell wet pine cones in the air, was I in a forest? But how? Why?…
Do you want to find out what happens next?
What if I told you that this was a true story…
Your Story Must Have One Purpose
As I said before, people love stories and people love to listen to stories. Stories can be told in many different ways…
A musician composes a song
An artist paints a picture
And a copywriter…writes compelling copy.
However, a copywriter doesn’t just write any type of story…
A copywriter’s story only has one purpose…and that’s to sell.
A quick scholar.google search will give you in-depth articles on how to use storytelling in advertising but, for this blog post, all you need to remember is…
You need to show your customer how their lives will improve after they’ve used your product or service,
And one powerful way to do this is through storytelling.
Facts Tell…But Stories Sell
Stories that evoke strong emotions…usually compel the reader to buy what you are selling.
I don’t know why I have to mention this, it should be obvious, but I’ll mention it anyway…all your stories have to be truthful…don’t lie to make a sale, it will only hurt your business.
Anyway
There’s a saying in advertising that goes something like this,
”Facts tell…Stories sell”
So what do stories have to do with toddlers improving your advertising copy? Everything!
Toddlers love stories and toddlers love telling stories.
We were all toddlers at some point,
what this means is that we’ve been conditioned to listen and tell stories from an early age.
Actually, go back in history and you’ll discover that storytelling is one of our oldest forms of communication (if not the oldest)
Add These Parts To Your Story
Let’s go back to our early examples of storytelling, which story would interest even a toddler?
Yup…the second story
(btw, make sure to continue the story with…oh yes, I was camping).
But what makes this story compelling?
Yes, you guessed it…
It’s easy to read and understand
It asks lots of questions that need answers
It provokes emotions
And it has a subliminal instruction…to read on (remember the waterslide?)
It’s missing an ending though (more on this in another blog)
But for now, just remember that this can be a powerful technique used in your ads to persuade your reader to buy what you’re selling.
So keep your sales story simple that even a toddler can understand.
Bye for now
