As a copywriter you are paid for what you do.
Therefore, your livelihood rests on mastering these 6 essentials skills to:
Differentiate yourself, and
Succeed.
1. Excellent Writing
Good grammar, punctuation and spelling is a must.
But you don’t need to be a master with easy access to spell-checkers and copy editors.
Not to mention proofreading your work and reading your writing out loud to capture errors and determine how good your writing is.
To become an excellent writer, you need to master these skills:
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And when you master these skills, you develop your:
– Creative thinking, and
– Problem solving skills.
Also, important skills to become an excellent writer.
2. Powerful Headlines
Nothing is more important than writing attention grabbing headlines.
It gives the target audience the chance to:
- Connect with the copy, and
- Decide.
Therefore, great content must be complemented with a great headline or else:
Nobody will read it.
Because as John Caples once said:
“If the headline is poor, the copy will not be read. And copy that is not read does not sell goods.”
Caples crafted one of the most famous advertising headlines in 1926:
“They Laughed When I Sat Down at the Piano but When I Started to Play!”
Check out these useful links for practical help in crafting powerful headlines:
- Copyblogger’s Magnetic Headlines training
- 4 U’s of web copywriting for writing great headlines
- Neil Patel’s step-by-step guide to writing powerful headlines.
3. Familiarity with WordPress
WordPress is the most popular content management system (CMS) in the world.
Therefore, you should learn how to upload content with it.
A basic understanding of HTML is a bonus (not essential) as it allows easy customisation of content.
Familiarity of other popular platforms is not essential as you learn while you do.
And that means ‘hands on’ use of the CMS to understand how to fulfill all your content needs.
Tip: an online tutorial could fast track your success with a CMS you’re not familiar with.
4. SEO Knowledge
A high-level SEO knowledge is what you need.
Because writing great content is the first page of the game.
The second is ensuring that content is found.
And user experience should be at the heart of your SEO knowledge because when you focus on creating the best content for the user:
You will solve most SEO problems.
And you do this by:
– Writing for humans first, and
– Optimising for Google second.
Neil Patel in this awesome post states you need to consider that a ‘best practice’ and:
- Target your customers, and
- Solve their specific problems with well-crafted content.
Tip: check out the most comprehensive guide to SEO copywriting online by Brian Dean.
Ultimately: SEO knowledge gives you a competitive advantage by making you more employable. And of course, you can build your own brand better with this knowledge.
5. Image Software Know-How
A picture is worth a thousand words.
Therefore, having the skills to customise images will:
– Give you greater control and
– Create better content.
And at the very least this should be the ability to:
– Crop images, and
– Resize them.
Adobe Photoshop is your baseline but various free tools can also help you make picture perfect creative content.
Overall: Image software skills means you are less reliant on others who (despite their best efforts) may not have the same content vision as yours.
6. Marketing Awareness
A copywriter must always ‘think’ and ‘act’ like a marketer.
You are in the marketing industry after all.
‘Marketing awareness’ is about knowing:
- Your role, and
- Where your role fits within marketing.
Because such awareness allows creation of better marketing-focused content that will maximise return on investment for any client.
Such content must sell the benefits not the features and this is outlined in this great post from Starttech Ventures.
You should also be aware of the 3 Golden Keys to Success in Copywriting to be the foundation of success in copywriting.
Bonus Skills
Communication – At the core of everything you do from:
- Winning clients to
- Working with clients to
- Ensuring client satisfaction.
Communication in Copywriting is Everything.
Listening – And active listening is the skill you need to master.
This is listening with the intent to understand.
Because if you don’t understand, your copy will suck.
Probing in Copywriting: 12 Ultimate Tips is a useful post that tells you how to:
- Assess all problems
- Provide the best solutions, and ultimately
- Succeed in copywriting.
Self-Promotion – Website or not you will constantly need to sell yourself to:
- Win new clients, and
- Build relationships.
It’s just part of the game and the key is to stay organised because as you gain experience self-promotion becomes easier with:
- A larger work portfolio
- Stronger client base, and
- Better exposure.
But just remember in copywriting: self-promotion never stops!
Conclusion
As quoted by Tony Buzan:
“Learning how to learn is life’s most important skill.”
So, if you are copywriter right now with a skills gap and want to become successful:
Embrace learning by turning your weaknesses into strengths to master the essential skills that will give you a competitive edge in a crowded industry.
Over to You…
Do you agree or disagree with The 6 Essential Skills for a Copywriter? Or is there something missing or you would like to add?? Would love to hear from you in the comments – any feedback is greatly appreciated.
Want to Talk Copywriting or SEO?
Please contact me and let’s have a chat!
