Soothing Critics

Considering that I am a student currently in Integrated Marketing Communications, this blog has lacked, so I have been told, anything to truly do with marketing.  I suppose I'll at least touch on marketing with this one then, just to try and soothe some critics.

Copywriting is vital in marketing; it is a skill that everyone needs to possess in the marketing world of today.  The problem is that many people don’t enjoy writing in any form, finding it laborious to write anything longer than a blog that is supposed to be three-hundred words in length—whoops—and often do I hear them complain that writing a report of two-thousand five-hundred words was nearly impossible.  We had weeks to complete the task that, while unenviable and relatively boring, actually covered quite a bit of useful information.   

Allow me to illustrate how very easy this task should have been.  Those 2,500 words equal out to about five pages of writing…this task gave us weeks to read a book that was two-hundred and eighty-one pages in length and then write five pages about it.  All that was required was for us to sit down and read the book at forty-six pages a day, taking short notes of vitally important revelations.  Once the book was completed, we then needed to only sit ourselves in front of a computer—I know, who has the time to be in front of a computer these days?—and write one page per day.  I doubt anybody actually did this.

Now, in terms of copywriting, those same people who complained bitterly are going to be faced with having to write a whole lot more in the future.  Will they be looking into becoming lead copywriters?  I seriously doubt it, but will there come a time when they need to be capable of writing intelligent pieces of written work?  Undoubtedly.  People can complain about the amount of time that it takes them to write, but would it not be easier to just withhold complaints until after they complete the work?  When somebody spends over five hours writing 2,500 words, I have to wonder how much of that is spent moaning to their friends over social media sites, taking various phone calls and just sitting back and staring at the ceiling.  Writing is difficult, that’s a fact many people have to face, but light planning of the points that your paper will revolve around before letting that brilliant piece of hardware in your body called a brain take control will certainly help.

Conveying Tone

One of the biggest difficulties that I have found with nearly any form of writing, including copywriting in marketing, is to properly convey tone.  By just altering a few short words it is possible to completely alter the reader’s inner voice, so that instead of making a beauty product sound as though it can used for light touch-ups, it seems like it needs to be caked on.  Which, considering some of the women who walk by me day by day, this advice might be taken quite literally.  Sarcasm seems to be the main problem for my writings, and has been mentioned to me repeatedly that some of what I write is quite rude because of this, and I have to admit that after reviewing some of the written work, there is a lot of sarcasm. 

I understand that professors might want their students to look at products objectively, to write a short report on why a topic is amazing or why it falls flat.  Although I cannot remember when last a teacher told me that it was alright for me to bash the reading.  I have to say that, just because one person thought that a book was amazing and world-defining, does not mean that another will.  Our likes and our dislikes are our own; I don’t need a professor to tell me that a blog written by a particular marketer is simply amazing.  Under my own volition I actually went to a certain blog to see if I could understand the near obsession that professors have with it.  I was more than disappointed, to say the least.  As I refuse to ‘name names’ as it were, I will content myself by simply saying that this particular blogger lacked everything I had been told they possessed.  Their written work was sub-par; their ideas hardly more than a baby bird struggling to attain altitude. 

While yes, my own work could certainly benefit from proof-reading to help eliminate various errors that forever creep into any lengthy works of writing, that does not excuse someone who is reputed to have nearly impeccable grammar and spelling.  Perhaps it is just a pet peeve of mine to think that words should not simply be created from thin air because someone with the mind of a gold-fish decides that they cannot find a word that properly describes what they are feeling and so invent a new one.  It’s called a dictionary; your computer even has one installed in case you have too much difficulty brushing the dust off the one on your bookshelf.

Sarcasm, for me at least, is something that I often try and put into my writing because without it, I feel as though the readers will miss out on how deeply I dislike something.  Could I write without it?  Certainly, but that would be akin to being told that you are no longer allowed to speak with any inflections.  A dry tone in writing is death, and I would prefer to be known as ‘that guy who uses sarcasm’ than ‘that guy who writes such boring nonsense in a tone that grates on your very nerves’.

As books crumble

Disturbing news has reached my ears, for not the first time, but this news has shaken me to my very core.  With the upcoming implementation—if it has not already happened—of iPads being introduced in a classroom setting, people are starting to take a long, hard look at books.  Since E-readers and the various tablets on the market allow for people on the go to forever have a wide variety of books on them at all times, without the bulky weight, more and more people are wondering why authors are not making use of the technology that is so important in this day and age.  I can assure those people that there are indeed books on the way that will be interactive and colourful and filled with all the vastness of the worlds, that offer in depth character creations and allow the reader a powerful control over the story…wait a minute…that sounds suspiciously like a video game, doesn’t it?

Of course it does, but it’s also what people are looking for in books these days.  What child, who has grown up with a healthy diet of Facebook and Skyrim, would ever want to sit down before the soft crackling warmth cast off by the flickering flames of a fire with a book in hand?  Few enough, as it turns out.  The startling statistic is that women 35+ are the most common readers, that’s not very good for us men, it means we spend too much either in front of the television with a beer, or in front of the television playing a video game with a beer.  To combat this, authors are struggling to find newer ways to write, ways that will engage audiences as never before imagined by a book…but imagined daily by Bethesda.

Do not mistake me, I hold a great reverence for video games, having played Everquest for…longer than I care to admit in public, and Oblivion for…yes, anyway.  However, my love for video games does not actually interfere with my obsession with books.  I often find myself sitting on the couch and reading, not for ten minutes for homework, not a one-hundred page book, but because I find it enjoyable and the books tend to revolve around a minimum of six-hundred pages.  Who would not want to read about a devious Assassin who is so cunning that he can stroll the city with only a single poisoned-tipped needle and manage to kill a King with nobody the wiser?  Or how about a Merchant-Prince cast into shame, and in order to survive he uses his knowledge of trade routes to become a pirate the likes of which have never before been seen?  Perhaps you would enjoy something a little more realistic?  How about when England, before it was called such, being invaded by the Danes and the struggles therein?  Mayhaps the American Civil War is more to the tastes?  Try Bernard Cornwells Starbuck series.

I remember when there were people in this world with imagination, when they could vividly picture every single word on a page as though it were an actual movie or video game.  Have we so lost these people that we are left with nothing more than children who stare slack-jawed at moving pictures, a line of drool spilling from their mouths as one eye is always pulled towards the tacky blue and white on their computer screens?  I, for one, weep for what will happen to books when, at last, the imagination of mankind finally fails and we take another step towards destroying something as beautiful as books.  Enjoy your pointless chats on social media pages that tell you that you’re important; I’m going to read how a King was used as a pincushion of arrows by Vikings because he thought God would protect him from harm.

Writing

I have often been asked about my writing, considering that it so often differs from not only the way that I speak in person, but also from the written work of my peers.  The questions are varied, but tend to circle around a central theme of how I manage to sit down and write approximately four-hundred pages of a book.  For most people, this seems to be a nearly impossible feat, considering so many struggle to simply write a short blog numbering at three-hundred words.  There is no one thing that I do in order to write 2,800 words every day.  Rather, I simply settle myself into my favourite chair, with a steaming cup of coffee—or a cold beer—and simply let the words flow.  There is no secret to writing, the same way that there is no real secret to any form of art.  If you care about it, then it becomes the easiest thing in the world.

I suppose my most common answer to those who wish to know how to sit before the screen of a computer and tap away at a keyboard for hours on end, is to lightly plan what it is you want to write.  I have never been good with organization, and over the last year I cannot remember a third of the books that I planned out in detail greater than some of the written works that have been published recently.  Cities were brought to life with a humming downtown core, filled with merchants and vendors of various foods.  Stores lining the simple cobble-stone streets, windows of glass sparkling in the rays of golden sunlight that lit upon them.  However, not a one of those stories were even put to paper.  Perhaps, in my own way, I am simply saving them for a time when I feel that they will be fully evolved, but more likely I became bored of all the detail as it left nothing for my imagination to do.

When sitting down to write, to do anything, the imagination is an exceptionally vital part of the process, it powers so much of the world around us that to leave it with naught to do but slumber is to steal the very breath of life from our written works.  Rather than planning an upcoming blog post or written material in full, I encourage those who so often complain that writing is hard, to just relax and allow their imaginations to take control of their fingers.  Instead of writing about a simple city and how the voices of the thousands of citizens create an ungodly cacophony of noise, perhaps something beautiful will take place.

The sun rose over the silent, still sea, stretching forth fingers of red-gold light to shimmer across the blue surface of the water.  In the distance, the calling of birds could be heard faintly, and a breeze drifted gently over the sea, stirring forth small waves and wrapping about the woman like a lovers caress as she stood, with feet warmed by the sand, at the edge of the water. 

The Written Word

Writing, no matter what your fourth grade teacher told you, is an art that speaks levels of difficulty beyond what any simple picture can hope to capture.  If a picture is worth a thousand words, is it not simpler, then, to turn from the difficult and seek solace in the easy?  Paintings, although beautifully mastered and rendered in the greatest of detail still fail in one vital aspect, they can be altered depending on how they are viewed.  What the artist has given, has painted, is all there is.  Although people search for the deeper meanings, the pain and the anguish that must be the signature of all great artists, debating about the gender of some, they miss the simple beauty that lies within.

With writing, however, one can create an entire world as unique as the individual themselves, bring light to a kingdom shrouded in darkness, give voices to those who fought and died bravely in wars long since faded to memories.  Yet I fear that the beauty that can be created by the written word is fading, authors becoming a dying breed as their words become mangled corpses, and simple wraiths as the younger generations begin to butcher the world around them.

Where once words could be used to twist and weave a type of magic that could leave the reader dazed and filled with a euphoric feeling, they are being mutilated into short-hand by applications, turning what could have been a beautiful symphony of words into simple trash.  A recent posting to a certain website, with both the poster and the website remaining anonymous, read thusly to his significant other; Sup bb, gud 2 see dat ur lukin so gud!  Wud h8 2 thnk u eva lukd bad.  It tears my soul, rending it from my body, to read such words, reduced to such a form.  People exclaim in wonder that the literacy rate in the world is fading fast, yet when such writings are becoming commonplace, how can they be surprised?

Taking it upon myself to aid this clearly failed post, I lent a helping hand to the man by rewriting it into what it should have read for one’s significant other.  The writing was simple, albeit a little flowery, but read; The golden-red light of dawns soft glow flickers across the ocean that is your beautiful cerulean-blue eyes, sending its golden waves through the tresses of woven wheat that frame a face as flawless as the marble carvings of ancient Rome.  To think, to but fathom, a day when the light of love fades from thine eyes is too much for my soul to bear, for the light would have left my very world, plunging me forth into the darkness of the abyss. 

Mistake me not, for I claim no mastery over writing, but I fear for what the world will become as the generations that write with the inability to complete, or fully form, thoughts comes into power.  Writing is a form of art, as surely as painting or acting, and yet it so often goes unnoticed in the daily lives of people.  Put down the controller of a video game, tear your eyes away from the glow of your computer screen and read a book, learn the language and delve into what the world once was or could one day be.

Thought Leadership

When being told to be a thought leader, I have found it interesting to observe the way in which people decide to decipher what is a rather cryptic comment.  Each individual who is assigned such a task must ask themselves three extremely important questions.  The first, and foremost, is what they truly believe a thought leader to be.  Secondly, one must decide for themselves just what being a thought leader entails.  Lastly, a thought itself must be decided upon.  Each thought must be carefully developed, ripened in the way a fruit does, growing until it weighs the mind down to the point where to not put it to paper should be considered a cardinal sin.

To the surprise of none, being a thought leader is an exceptionally difficult task, although many may make it appear as though they were born to it, even the greatest of us have poor judgements or thoughts now and again.  It is an inevitable truth in life that nobody and nothing is perfect, but there must always be those who are willing to step forward and forever push the line.  For some, they lead the fight as the greatest of generals have by using innovation and intelligence in their efforts.  Others still take the risks needed to push forth an idea that would be considered preposterous, all because they care about reaching out to the general public and allowing the world to see the ideas.

I have observed that many take a thought leader to be one who brings forth newer technologies each and every year.  Yet I find that there conviction in such matters could not be more questionable.  While technology is indisputably an important part of common civilization, it and of itself can hardly be considered anything more than what it is, a pretty screen that is a momentary novel.  By producing newer technologies each year, these so-called thought leaders show that they are not revolutionary, but are simply listening. 

Thought leaders, in truth, are the ones who step forward when others would fear to, unafraid of the possible repercussions.  Consider Galileo, a man insulted and persecuted simply because his views differed.  Many would argue that the world has changed, that thought leaders are praised not persecuted, and yet maybe this is because a true thought leader has not emerged into our midst in some time.  To those who would argue that thought leaders are fairly revered, was Sean Parker heralded for his work with Napster, or was it constantly being tried for piracy?  Consider, more recently, Facebook and its creator.  Forever will there be the challenges to the leaders of thought; the key is to remember that to falter is to forfeit.