Second Article
Quality Copywriting, Woodworking, and Songwriting.
In the computer programming industry, there's a saying:
garbage in equals garbage out. The inverse is also true:
quality in equals quality out.
The other day I was reading an article by a master
copywriter outlining the sequence of steps he goes through
when writing copy for a client. As I was reading his
article, I started thinking about quality, craftsmanship,
and professionalism vs. mass-production. As an example, my
brother-in-law is a cabinet maker. He makes beautiful, high
quality cabinetry and furniture. Watching him make
something and work with wood is like taking a trip in a
time machine back to a time when everyone made the effort
to do their best at whatever they did. Yes he has modern
tools, but what I'm talking about is that he cares about
what he's building and making the best cabinet or piece of
furniture that can be made is important to him. Is it easy?
No. It requires a lot of work.
How does that relate to the article? Because most people
are not going to go through all the steps, trouble, and
work that either of these two people put into their craft.
Most people will take the mass production route and just
slap something together. And therefore, most people will
not get the results in terms of conversion ratio and sales
as the master copywriter does or heirloom quality furniture
as the cabinet maker does.
I'm a songwriter, programmer, and Internet Business
entrepreneur. I've read a great quote, I don't remember who
said it, that songwriting can be divided between songs the
songwriter should play on his guitar in his bedroom, and
songs that should be played on the stereo in the bedroom.
What that means is that some songs may be therapeutic to
the songwriter, or have special meaning to their loved
ones, but they don't have the commercial appeal that's
required to be released as a recording. They've not been
polished enough. Consistent and quality songwriting
requires a lot of the steps that quality copywriting does.
Songwriting is usually sparked by some emotional feeling or
event and when it happens, you rush to get those first
thoughts down on paper before they fizzle away. Then the
work begins... editing, rewriting, recording and listening,
more editing, etc. But if you love it, it's not work, it's
who you are and a part of you goes into and is shared in
each song.
The moral to this story is that if what you're doing is
important to you and you love it, you'll put more into it
and get more out of it.
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Fred Black is an experienced programmer, web site developer, Internet business operator, systems integrator, father, husband, musician, and songwriter. Visit his Internet Business web site, www.pqInternet.com for Information and Tools to help build a successful Internet Business.
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ou almost didn't receive Web Sm@rts today. Can you believe this; I almost forgot to mail it!
normally mail this out around midnight, one of the last things I do before going to bed. Now here it is, 8 in the morning and I'm still working on my first cup of coffee.
