A client recently said to me, “good copy is like fine wine – it’s ready when it’s ready.”

He wasn’t in a rush for me to finish his project. This gave me such a sense of relief that I was able to write the copy very quickly.

Like most writers, however, I don’t usually have the luxury of time. No matter what type of writing you do, it requires a significant amount of mental energy and sometimes you just aren’t in the “zone.”

Salon has an interesting article called A cure for writer’s block.

An excerpt:

First proposed by two psychologists in 1908, this principle holds that the more “aroused” (i.e., engaged and challenged) a person is by a task, the better he or she performs, up to the point that the arousal becomes anxiety or worry, at which point performance declines.

In other words, beyond a certain point, the more difficult a writing task, and the more you think it matters, the more likely you are to become blocked. This may explain why journalists with, say, two deadlines per week almost never get blocked: no individual story ever has to carry that much weight. (The paycheck helps a lot, too. Not long ago, a woman sitting next to me on a plane asked if I had a trick for getting past writer’s block, and I replied, “Yes. It’s called a mortgage.”)

I can relate to that to an extent because I have deadlines every week and juggle more than one client project at any given time.  Although I’m certainly familiar with when “engaged and challenged” morphs into “anxiety or worry.”

Here’s the cure according to the article:

That’s what every blocked writer really needs: something more significant they should be doing instead, an earth-shaking, life-changing project you’re stealing time from to work on this little novel. Or the great novel you ought to be drafting while you knock off your memoir just for fun. Granted, inventing such a decoy project and convincing yourself that you may actually get around to it someday requires a bold and sustained act of imagination.

So true. Whenever I’m in procrastination mode due to feeling overwhelmed, I will often write a blog post on my personal blog. I don’t get paid for this writing and it steals time away from my client work. Yet doing this usually refuels me and I’m able to focus on my client projects with more energy afterwards. It sounds absurd to say that I often take a break from writing by doing other writing but it works somehow.

Also, if I just step away from the computer and stop thinking about the writing project, then the ideas start flowing, of course. Ideas often have to incubate far away from the computer before they sprout.

I’ve read several books about running lately, including Born to Run, which mentions a tribe in Mexico whose members often run 50-100 miles at a time, and a couple of Dean Karnazes’s books. He’s an ultramarathon runner.

As you may know, an ultramarathon is a race of 50 miles or more.

At first glance it would seem that an ultramarathon is a near-impossible feat.

Yet if these books are any indication, the human body was originally designed for running. With the proper motivation and techniques that work with, not against, your body, an ultramarathon is doable.

I’ve always been afraid of running but, using the free 8 week Couch to 5K program, I can actually run in 5 minute intervals now without stopping (a miracle for me). My goal is to be able to run 30 minutes (a 5K).

Although I have zero intention of running in an ultramarathon, I can’t help but notice some parallels to email copywriting.

An email message can be like an ultramarathon runner. With the right approach, an email to prospects can be sent again and again to prospects for several years, without wearing out.

Emails to current customers sent out as broadcast messages at regular intervals are also like ultramarathon runners. This is the type of email most marketers neglect to send (like those of us runners who can’t imagine ever running in an ultramarathon). The tendency is to send a set number of emails to prospects and maybe crank out an email to customers at holidays or when there’s a sale and leave it at that.

But those that do go the distance and send emails to current customers week after week, month after month, year after year, are building an ultramarathon business with true endurance.

Just like an ultramarathon runner can’t do it alone and needs outside support, it’s hard to put together an ongoing email campaign without help.

To that end, I have two options for you.

One is my pre-written emails. If you sign up for the list on this website you’ll get access to all 67 pre-written email series I have available.

Or you can hire me to write custom emails.

My favorite quote from Born to Run is: “You don’t stop running because you get old. You get old because you stop running.”

On the same note, your business slows down because you stop sending email. If you don’t send email you don’t have a business at all.

A screenwriter and film professor put together some guidelines about about communication/messaging and I think it applies to copywriting and every other type of writing too.

Some salient bits from her post:

What follows here is an outline for a communications strategy based on a few oft-repeated Hollywood principles.

I. The “Big Idea” of Entertainment/Messaging

There is a fail-proof ancient Greek formula for getting and holding an audience’s attention. Every communication should have what Aristotle called: Logos, pathos, and ethos. That is, there needs to be something for the mind, something for the emotions, and finally, something for the imagination.

a) Something for the mind – some facts to learn; half of holding people’s attention is in feeding their instinctive desire to know; Every message needs to teach something that the audience can take away and integrate into their framework and conversations. A message is meant to be carried on the winds. Hence, the speaker needs to be focused on helping the hearers become teachers. Give them examples, power ideals and metaphors to share.

b) Something for the heart/emotions – a reason to care; Aristotle says that every effective drama either leads the audience to weep or to feel fear of evil. A message needs to be clear in its emotional tone – either sadness, or wonder, or fear or joy or terror. Then, the emotion can be heightened until the audience responds physically – with tears, or frowns or goose-bumps or laughter. The audience that is feeling these things will be attentive and fully engaged.

c) Something for the imagination – something to dream about; A good message ends by causing a beginning in the hearer. A good message is a launch in the hearer. The speaker does their work and then sends the hearer off to do theirs – to brood over the full implications of the message – to apply it to their own world – to begin to foment a plan as a response.

A few other helpful principles of communication are:

1) Production value matters. Things like working microphones, a well-lit and attractive set, good hair and make-up, costuming, etc. all matter. Attention must be given to these so that they complement the message as opposed from distracting from it.

2) Rehearse. No matter how well a speaker or writer knows a topic, every message opportunity should be thoroughly strategized, structured and rehearsed so that it looks effortless. This is a service to the audience, but also will allow the same basic message to be reframed according to the needs and situation of the hearers.

3) There is a definite hierarchy of elements in any piece of entertainment. Aristotle lists the hierarchy as: Plot first, then characters, then theme, then dialogue, then music and lastly, spectacle. When applying this to messaging, we can say that the story is the main thing. What is the story that this message needs to tell? Then, immediately move to characters – who will be affected by this? How? Then, give attention to theme – what is the overall ideological principle underlying this communication? Then, give attention to specific wording. Then, ask yourself, what is the icing on the cake of this message? What is the entertainment value for the hearers?

I especially like this:

II. The Two Key Rules of Hollywood/Messaging

The two biggest rules of Hollywood meetings, and also movies, are:

A) Don’t bore me.

B) Don’t waste my time

It is possible to construct the foundation of a whole communication strategy from these two rules.

I couldn’t agree more.

You can read the whole thing here.

As you may know, I live in Wisconsin and there has been significant political turmoil here the past few weeks.

I’m not going to go into the politics of it in this email, but I want to point out a couple of principles that are also pertinent to marketing and copywriting (from Neighbor Against Neighbor in Wisconsin in Books & Culture):

In 21st-century America, 70,000 people do not hit the streets in sub-freezing temperatures for political strategy. Policy does not motivate like that anymore. What does motivate is emotion: anger, joy, fear, loathing, celebration, and so on.

I’ve been a copywriter for almost four years and find I have to regularly remind myself and my clients that what matters most is how you make your clients and prospects feel.  It might seem shallow, but providing how-to content and information, although important, isn’t fully motivating unless the emotions are also engaged.

From the article again:

…this conflict remains at heart a local story. It is about the culture of public spaces and public works in a quirky state. It is about who we are, and who we are becoming.

Most of us in Wisconsin feel part of this larger narrative and have felt compelled to spend some time at the capitol building or other venues to participate in the expression of this story. We sense this is history in the making and being part of it in some tangible way like that is important.

Your business has a story, too, and the more your clients and prospects can be a tangible part of it, even in small ways, such as through Facebook fan pages and writing a customer review of your product, the more they will trust you and become a repeat customer.

Emotions. Story. No good protest or marketing campaign can do without them.