Unlike other animals, humans are driven by rational thought (well… some of us are). However, as much as we like to believe in our powers of higher thinking, we’re still led by our emotions and instincts more often than we care to admit. Good copywriters know that a great headline grabs audiences’ attentions and taps into their emotions – leaving them with little choice but to keep reading. Want to learn how to sharpen your headlines’ hooks? Read on to find out more…

Unilever’s Dove was just your everyday personal care brand, but this changed in 2004 when they launched their “Real Beauty” campaign. Abandoning their usual rail-thin models for curvier (and more relatable) female figures, the brand generated a 700% increase in sales in the first six months and their publicity skyrocketed. Social values in marketing became the new norm. However, brands inexperienced in the nuances of social value marketing should be wary of potential pitfalls. Eager to tie your brand into social values? Read on…

One of the great pitfalls of copywriting is becoming too accustomed to our own writing. After all, it’s far too easy to adopt an “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” mentality. However, this attitude can lead to copy that ends up stale, trite and worst of all, lazy. If you’re eager whip your writing into shape, join Wordsmith to discover how the great English writer George Orwell (author of Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four) kept his prose in line.

With the number of bloggers expected to reach 3.12 billion in 2020, thefact of the matter remains that all websites, big or small, can benefit from offering interesting and engaging content in 2019.

Regardless of the fact that we’re now living in the age of what Social Media Strategist and award-winning author, Mark Schaefer calls the “content shock”, where over 4 million blog posts are published on the internet every day, smart businesses continue to break the mould and heavily invest in content curators, SEO copywriters and blogging influencers. Why? Because successful blog content leads to increased website visibility and brand awareness, builds higher levels of trust with consumers and results in 67% more leads than those who don’t integrate blogs into their content marketing mix.  

However, this doesn’t mean you should create a blog, just for the sake of it. In today’s content-saturated, increasingly tech-savvy world, marketers have to overcome audiences’ shrinking attention spans to create blog content that not only generates qualified leads, but also keeps consumers coming back, further promoting brand loyalty. Intrigued? Read on for Wordsmith’s 5 top reasons why blogs are one of the most valuable tools in your content marketing strategy tool kit.

A company’s reputation is determined by the quality of its products and services. In today’s always-connected world, it only takes seconds for bad news to travel around the globe – which, unchecked, can lead to a full blown PR disaster. 

What should companies do if they fail to live up to consumer expectations? And how can you prevent a minor PR hiccup from spiralling out of control? Read on to find out more…

As adults, it’s safe to say that most of us have developed a kneejerk reaction and wince whenever we hear Barney’s “I Love You” theme, or when a child asks us to read Dr. Seuss’ Green Eggs and Ham for the millionth time. 

Although we may write these works off as kids’ stuff, what if there’s more to these colourful characters than meets the eye? Join Wordsmith to explore the world of children’s marketing.

Adored and adorned across the globe, high-end fashion is an industry that has made impressive strides in cross-cultural marketing. From celebrating classic cultural designs to highlighting eccentric innovation, haute couture brands like Dolce & Gabbana are able to traverse borders and oceans to appeal to an increasingly international consumer-base. 

However with any global business, blunders become an inevitability when cross-cultural sensitivities are not respected – exactly what the Italian luxury brand did towards the end of 2018, and it left their sales figures reeling and their Chinese fans infuriated. What sort of precautions do marketers need to heed when considering cross-cultural marketing? Join Wordsmith to take a closer look… 

“Empathy” and “marketing” aren’t usually two words you would use in the same sentence, let alone together in a corporate buzzword. Yet, over the past couple of decades, it has become increasingly apparent that empathetic marketingworks. Real empathy-driven brand experiences focus on content that addresses customers’ needs and pain points, so they can relate with the brand on a humanistic level.

According to MarketsandMarkets, empathetic marketing is estimated to grow 40% annually to a US$36 billion market by 2021. With artificial intelligence already beginning to detect visual, semantic and sonic cues, it won’t be long before we will be able to test how well content resonates with customers, and measure users’ readiness to purchase in real time.

But for the time being, how do brands take customers from “considering to conversion”, by simply being more considerate? Join Wordsmith to see how the biggest brands in the business effectively win hearts and minds through empathetic content.

With the winter holidays fast approaching, ‘tis the season of uncertainty… “Will I finally get that date I’ve been yearning for?” and “Will Aunt Martha show up sober to our Christmas brunch this year?” Personal holiday woes aside, the festive season also brings several certainties – overbearingly cheerful music everywhere we go and a mixed bag of seasonal adverts from money-hungry businesses. 

If you’re tired of horrifying festive adverts like this and are eager to learn the secrets behind heart-warming and engaging holiday campaigns like the ones produced by UK retailer John Lewis, read on to find out more…

If you’re a fan of stand-up comedy, then you’re probably no stranger to the magic of improv. Short for improvisation, what sets form of live comedy aside from regular stand up is the dynamic acting environment that requires comics to devise punchlines on the go – usually with the help of supporting partners or audience suggestions. 

In improv, the comics walk on stage with neither plan nor conception about what’s going to happen next. Not a trivial task by any means, and yet, the crew from the television series Whose Line is it Anyways? or Key & Peele seemingly mastered the art of churning out sketch after sketch of unique and ludicrously amusing content. If you’ve ever wished that your creativity could flow as freely as it does for these improv veterans, then read on… 

Since you first learned to read, do you know how many words that you’ve come across? Millions? Maybe even hundreds of millions? Even if you aren’t an avid reader, The Guardian estimates we’re exposed to approximately 490,000 words a day – a number that only continues to grow as we come across increasing amounts of content online.

From the dullest PowerPoint presentations to the greatest scientific discoveries, humanity has relied on the written word to convey and preserve information, opinions and ideals. While ancient monks spent lifetimes painstakingly hand-copying books, the printing press eliminated this arduous process (and arguably gave people with poor penmanship a much needed break) – leading to the creation of typefaces, fonts and a standardised presentation of words. Curious about the world of typography? Read on to find out more…

Today’s customers are a whole new breed. In a world where smart, mobile technology has become the norm, tech-savvy customers have come to expect highly personalised experiences from brands, and see no shame in selling their loyalty to the highest bidder. 

Technology may have upped the ante when it comes to competing for customer loyalty, but neuromarketing research shows that some of the best techniques to make customers' brains click may be simpler than we think. Read on to discover how you too can create that lightbulb moment between brand and customer.

Do you remember the first time you read a gripping story and just couldn’t put the book down? 

Be it a lengthy tale with carefully drawn out narratives or a series of comic strips with short and humorous quips – there’s just something incredibly compelling about reading a well-written plot filled with the unexpected. If you’re tired of tired clichés, read on to find out more…

With today’s marketing industry focused on a sales-driven approach, it’s easy for brands and marketers to get disconnected from their customers. Consider the recent 2018 Blizzcon (a large-scale gaming convention hosted by game developer Blizzard Entertainment) fiasco where they announced the game Diablo Immortal for mobile devices. 

The game was a sequel to the cult classic computer roleplaying game Diablo I & II and prequel to Diablo III. With many of Blizzcon’s attendees being die-hard computer fans who had been waiting for a new Diablo game since 2014, they were furious with this “big reveal”. Some critics even called Blizzard out for their perceived “cash grab” in catering to casual mobile gamers instead of creating games for their die-hard fans.

This is a classic case of a brand failing to empathise with their customer-base. Blizzard automatically assumed that they had a clear understanding of their consumers’ wants, but sadly missed the mark. If you’re eager learn more about how to develop customer empathy and avoiding a potential PR disaster, join Wordsmith to find out more…

Have you ever had a fantastic idea for an article, only to have everything crumble apart like wet cardboard as you tried to write? Riddled with technical garb and dry content, nothing seems to come together at all! 

Before you tear up your notebook (or punch a hole through your computer), have you considered that your troubles may not be caused by your points – but instead by the way that you’re presenting them? Read on as writing guru Roy Peter Clark (author of Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer and lecturer at the Poynter Institute for Media Studies) shares some ideas on how to construct sentences that pop.

Odds are that you’ve already read at least one article that was completely generated by an algorithm. When content marketers read headlines like, “The Washington Post’s Robot Reporter Has Published 850 Articles in the Past Year,” it’s hard not to feel anxious. However, what advanced artificial intelligence systems lack is critical thought, predictive judgement and intuitive feel for consumers’ wants and needs, and that isn’t going to change anytime soon.

In recent years, people and businesses have felt an increasing need to be PC – and we’re not talking about computers. In these touchy times, the slightest deviation from “Politically Correct” terminology and themes can lead to a huge public backlash. 

Remember that infamous Pepsi short film with Kendall Jenner from April 2017? The video generated so much negative feedback that Pepsi took down the video and issued a public apology. Was it social insensitivity or just political correctness running unchecked? Read on to find out more…

You’ve got a major writing assignment to submit tomorrow and you’ve dedicated all day and night to getting it done. Although you promised yourself you’d get started once you found the right motivational video, somehow you find yourself falling down another YouTube wormhole – forcing you to pull yet another all-nighter lest you feel the wrath of your boss. 

Prolonged procrastination (also known as the plight of copywriters and college students) becomes even more serious when confusion about your task arises as you try to race against the clock. Imagine the embarrassment of being reprimanded by your supervisor for not bringing it up earlier! What if we told you that procrastination and writing uncertainties can be avoided with the right prep work? Let Wordsmith help you get the lead out…

Dating apps offer undeniable convenience coupled with a shroud of anonymity for many users. If you’ve ever dabbled in them before, do you remember spotting that one profile that just outshined the rest? Not just a profile with an impossibly hot picture, but one that stood out because it made you laugh or conveyed a sense of personality… 

Copywriters – did you know you can apply similar tactics to your ads, web copy and content to leave an unforgettable impression on consumers’ minds? Read on to find out more…

Uncovering key insights from your data is one skill, but communicating them is quite another. Storytelling has long since been used as a dynamic tool to break through consumers’ anti-marketing defences, but in recent years, the concept of “data storytelling” has taken flight.