How not to brief a copywriter

I’ve been working on (read: not getting around to) a post on ‘how to brief a copywriter.’ But that got me thinking about all the things that all too often go wrong in the briefing process. I thought I’d let off steam and dump it all here onto the blog. That’s what a blog is for, isn’t it? So, these are some of the ways NOT to brief a copywriter.

If you commission copywriting, this might give you some insight into how to make life easier for your writer.

If you’re a copywriter, you might recognise some of these. Please feel free to add more in the comments.

1. Email a bunch of PowerPoint slides in the firm conviction that they contain useful information.

2. Telephone out of the blue and, without introducing yourself, start gabbling about your bounce rate.

3. Call up and ask: “How much would it cost to write a website?” Give no indication what kind of website you want, or how large it will be.

4. Deflect that tricky question: “Why should customers buy this product?” Reply along the lines of: “Because I need to meet my sales targets.” We know sales folk are self-obsessed, but come on…

5. Send an email with the mobile phone numbers of various sales executives that the copywriter is to contact for information. Make sure these are people who never answer their phone because they are in ‘meetings’ and who are far too busy and important to reply to voicemail messages.

6. Send the copywriter contact details for a ’satisfied’ client who is to be the subject of a case study. Don’t bother to contact the client yourself to find out if everything is OK. And don’t waste the account manager’s time with such a tiresome and unprofitable after-sales task either. Leave it to the copywriter to discover that the software didn’t work, made life worse for them, and is no longer used. Let the poor writer take the flak for your appalling product and service. Then, when they can’t write a case study because all the feedback is so negative, you won’t have to pay them for the time they wasted.

7. Don’t bother putting a brief together. Let the copywriter figure it out themselves from all the ‘background information,’ you send. Email over lots of design work that is totally irrelevant, along with every conceivable document and case study you can find even if it’s barely related to the project in hand. Dump everything you can find on the copywriter to totally confuse them and waste as much of their time as possible.

8. When asked a relevant question by your copywriter, but you don’t know the answer, string a bunch of clichés together and finish with the phrase: “You’re the wordsmith, I’m sure you can do something with that.”

9. Contact your copywriter and ask them to confirm their availability for an exciting and ever-so important new project. Don’t tell them what the project is. Don’t tell them when it will start. Or what it entails. Or the deadline. Or what copy is needed. Or if any physical meetings are required. Or how much money you’re offering to pay. Just ask them to confirm their availability anyway.

10. Call your copywriter and tell them, in your most stressed out voice, that you have a crisis on your hands. You need copy right away. Can they drop everything and get it to you? There’s not much budget - but tell them it could be the start of something big. You’re sure there will be lots of work to put their way later if they get this one right. They’re sure to believe you, as they’ve never heard this one before. See if they’ll do the job for free, right now, for a very demanding client who expects perfection and more. Then moan about copywriters in general when they don’t return your calls….

All right, that’s out of my system. I’ll get back to working on the much more positive post: ‘How to brief your copywriter.’ Watch this space.

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