[Re: Loose Cannon: Constipated Mommies and Plush Upholstery, Direct Newsline, July 18, 2005]:
Oh joy – a column especially for copywriters! All too often, direct marketers focus on the offer and the mailing strategy, and forget that compelling creative (hey, that means good writing!) is an equal partner in the success formula.
It’s quite true that language standards have plummeted. Even the NY Times, once the infallible Miss Manners of grammar, has fallen frequent prey to run-on sentences, awkward usages and just plan bad English. But who among us can dare to throw the first brick? I remember years ago when, as a just-graduated English major, I put together my resume and included the fact that I was Phi Beta Kappa — which a friend to pointed out to me I had misspelled (as Betta). That sorta undercut the claim to intelligence I was striving to make.
Oh well, for betta or worse, I made it as a writing professional … and remain very diplomatic when correcting my clients’ mistakes!
Lauretta Harris
Write Communications Inc.
Scarsdale, NY
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I have been a copywriter for 30 years. The task has always been to relate to audiences… to move hearts and minds. Message always trumps language. Why else would Dodge write, “Yea, it’s got a hemi”.
Now, with the proliferation of text messaging and the emergence of a new, phonetic short-form language… i.e., “good2cu”, spelling and grammar that used to just be hard is becoming all but useless.
Speak English in a wireless world at your own peril.
Robert Lusk
Marketing Consultant
Ontario
Network
