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Three Phase: Copywriting Project
Jun 14, 2022
I look at the three phases of a copywriting project.
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hey everyone this is todd from copy
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flight and today i want to do a quick
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video
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about
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um when you hire a copywriter
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there are certain things that they will
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do
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and it might help you understand a
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little bit about the value
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of what you're getting if you're a
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business and you want to hire a
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copywriter
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most copywriters will
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work on a project it really doesn't
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matter the kind of project it is it can
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be your website copy it can be a blog
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post a
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a well-researched authoritative article
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it could be um
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your funnel they could be writing your
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funnel they could be writing email
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sequences
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it really just doesn't matter the type
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of copywriting they will all
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usually go through one of three phrases
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phases excuse me
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now
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a copywriter may tell you
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that there are more they may label them
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differently
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and everybody does things differently
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but
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um
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in my opinion
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they will all come down to
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one of these three phrases this phases
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this is certainly true for me
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and i believe it's true for most degree
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of the copywriter again they may call
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the face something different and they
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may include more phases but they should
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fall
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uh pretty generally into one of these
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three phrases so today we're going to
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look at these phases
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i keep saying phrases sorry about that
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phases that
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we go through when doing a copywriting
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project
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and i'm going to look at them up front
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and then we're going to look at each one
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of them a little bit closer so the first
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phase is the research phase
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i'll talk a little bit more about that
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in just a minute the second phase
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is the strategy phase and the third
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phase is the writing phase which
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you see i also have editing there
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because editing is a big part of the
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writing phase as well so let's get
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started
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the first phase is the research phase
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and i have
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um
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divided these into two areas these are
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very general of course internal and
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external research
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um
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your copywriter may call them something
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different but essentially it's internal
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and external internal in the sense that
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they are looking internal to your
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business
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and researching that and getting the
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necessary information external in the
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sense that they are looking
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outward
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usually toward
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your customers but we'll talk about that
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shortly
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the internal research phase includes
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things like features and benefits of
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your product and service they want to
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know that
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if you have that already defined
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and done well they will probably take
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note of that and use that they're likely
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going to want to do this for each
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feature i'm sorry each product or
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service you have
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but depending on type of project you're
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doing they want to know things such as
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what those features and benefits are who
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your target audience is who it is you're
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reaching who it is you're reaching with
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this particular product or service um
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what are the pain points that they have
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um what is their customer journey those
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kinds of things and they want to know
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how you are different so if you combine
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these three it's basically what we call
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your unique value proposition
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they need to know each section of it
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they want to know what you think it is
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and they're likely going to do a little
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external research to talk about
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um
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or to learn what your customer says
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about it and do some comparison on that
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now i give you a little bit of a
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resource here this is the website copy
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framework it's something i created a few
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years back to help
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agencies and consultants work with their
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client and getting this internal
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information
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things like your unique value
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proposition
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so there are a series of worksheets and
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frameworks in there
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that will help you with that um
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doing that process
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um so
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if you need a resource for
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doing that internal research this is a
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something that you can take advantage of
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the second type of research that we talk
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about is external research
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again as i said earlier this is really
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looking to toward the customer to see
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what they have to say about you
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so we're going to look at things like
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the voice of customer research so
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that may include things like
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testimonials what do people say about
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your product or service and testimonials
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do you have case studies and in these
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case studies is there a story there are
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the quotes from clients about
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the process they're going to look at
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that
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and then they may need to do some
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interviews um with your customers
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all this is to get what your customer is
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saying about
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um your product or service that is
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huge because then you're going to take
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that information and curate it and
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that kind of thing
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curate it and put all the pieces
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together that you need to write your
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copy
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um
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here are a couple resources for your
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external research phase
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get a copy of the book finding the right
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message by jennifer havis she basically
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breaks down this process of voice of
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customer research
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uh that kind of thing
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if you want help with your
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personas i highly recommend
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learning from adrienne barnes she does
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the personas she does it in a way that
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takes
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stock of things that the customer says
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the voice of customer research those
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kinds of things i used to not like
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personas but she is allowing she's
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causing me to change my mind
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so she's got a number of free resources
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that you can take advantage of to learn
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a little bit more there are a number of
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people out there who do interviews and
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voice customer research adrienne's one
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of them
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um highly recommend you checking some of
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those folks out
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the next phase is called the strategy
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phase you're gonna take all that data
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from phase one and curate it you're
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gonna put it you're gonna you're gonna
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categorize it you're going to
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look at the words people are saying
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about your product your service you're
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going to think deeply about it many
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copywriters it's a brainstorming thing
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and as you know that doesn't always
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happen by sitting there staring at stuff
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sometimes you got to go away and
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do something else for a while and
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you come back and it begins to formulate
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for you it's it's
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not as scientific as maybe we would like
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for it to be
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another thing you can do that strategy
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you may take a risk
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you may try being bold with your copy um
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those are all strategy points
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but it's a phase that the copywriter
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goes through
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obviously they'll be spending their time
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working with you
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giving you the information that they're
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curating so
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so that you're part of the process
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the third phase is the writing phase and
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i add and editing so
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by you need to edit and i'm not just
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talking about making sure grammar is
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correct that is a huge part of it but
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i'm talking about what we call copy
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editing
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it's making your copy compelling concise
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and convincing those are three things
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that a copy editor will be looking to do
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they will clean up they will tighten up
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uh the things that need to be tightened
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up and help it do those three things
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so the rubber beats the road in this
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phase you're taking everything the the
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copywriter's taking everything
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that he or she has learned and worked on
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the first two phases to start to put it
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in place it's like
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building a building with lego blocks you
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know you've got you start to put your
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lego blocks
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together and you start to build your
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building
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they're going to take advantage of
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proven frameworks
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there are a number of proven frameworks
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out there
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um probably no framework is better than
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the other per se
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um even people who do funnels and
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sequence
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email sequence writing will use a
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certain kind of framework
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i am partial to the pas framework for
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website copy problem agitate solution i
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like things in threes it helps me
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remember them better
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but most of the other frameworks are a
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variation of the pas
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um so that is something you know they
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take advantage they will take advantage
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of proven frameworks not just with
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uh the website page but even with
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headlines and things like that so um and
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and so they'll use what they like what's
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what it is proven you're putting all
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those blocks together one of the things
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they'll do they may do is create
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variations of the copy
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so
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um either for your approval and or
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testing so if you're going to do testing
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they may provide you with multiple
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variations of a particular page or
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headline or whatever to do testing to
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see which one's better
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but when i do
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a project i typically do some variations
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anyway that i like to leave with the
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client
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and then you're going to have what is
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usually called a key message copy
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platform
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i like to call it a copy flight plan and
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play on words for copy flight
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but that's essentially what it is you're
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basically pouring all that into one
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document that is reusable as like a
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library of copy
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points that
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maybe even some micro copy that you can
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use repeatedly and in different areas of
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your business
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so
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this is what i call the three phases
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of a copywriting project again like i
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said it does not matter if you're
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writing website copy if you're writing a
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blog post uh authoritative blog post uh
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a full funnel
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email sequences
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there the process is largely the same
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um again they may your copywriter may
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call it something different they may
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arrange it differently it may not be so
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sequential but in general there's a a um
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a research a strategy phase and then the
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writing pages phase
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so um
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just so you'll know when somebody uh
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does a project with you for copywriting
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that is what you can expect
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even
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when i do about pages
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i use this process
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i am the about page guy toddy jones
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again you can take advantage of the
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website copy framework and go to
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copyflat.com
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wcf pick up a copy of either the
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the regular or the white label
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and has a series of frameworks and
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worksheets you can use to
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help your client or yourself um
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write your copy
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i will say that it does lean more on the
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internal research size side so
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uh if you're going to do some external
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research you'll probably have to do that
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outside of the website copy framework
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but i think it's worth your time if you
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choose to do so
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and my website is copyflight.com so
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check that out uh if i can help you
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anyway let me know uh
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again i am the the about page guy toddy
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jones
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thank you
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