Why I recommend poetry for aspiring copywriters.

When I began writing copy in 2005, I didn't consider myself much of a copywriter. I would tell people "I'm trying to be a writer". Rather than actually being a writer.

There seems to be a high failure rate, initially, with a lot of graduates from advertising schools who drop out of copywriting in the first three months of their aborted careers.

Writing copy is hard at the beginning.

It does depend on where you land up. Some agencies are more about nurturing talent than others.

But some just don't have the time or resources. Or the creative directors are too busy to fully take young writers under their wings.

However, young writers can literally take things into their own hands and decrease the time it takes to improve their skills. And that's by becoming poets.

Now, there's a definite connection between writing copy and poetry. Both involve concise usage of language as well as excellent language fluency in order to achieve their aims.

Many in advertising will tell you that "people don't have time to read". I disagree. People read all the time. More so in the social media era than ever before. What they don't have time for is reading garbage.

Good copy pulls a reader along rather then makes them strain their eyes to keep going.

Where poetry comes in is its playfulness with language. It's about assonance, alliteration, rhythm, rhyme, and connecting various elements of the piece together.

As mentioned, in concise a way as possible.

So it's good for a copywriter to challenge themselves by writing lyrical, poetic pieces.

One of the early tricks I used to establish a meter (a beat) in the writing was by listening to hip-hop beats without vocals.

(A beat, like a drum beat for music, in writing is what gives it its rhythm.)

This acted as a metronome for my writings. The other trick was what I'd call the poetry challenge. I would basically ask a friend to give me a fair, but interesting, title for a poem.

I'd then give myself two hours to write the poem around that title. Sometimes, it was dreary.

Sometimes, I managed poems that excited me. And best of all, it fulfilled its purpose: helping me write powerfully within a tight deadline.

This led to my copywriting improving and, consequently, my poetry writing would improve as well. It happened drastically, and my creative director at the time noticed the rapid improvement - leading him to want me to handle all his copy needs.

He barely ever changed anything in the copydeck. And my output was extremely high.

Poetry is a hobby I continue to pursue as it has become a passion of mine now. And it continues to hone my copywriting abilities.

Of course, no blog piece on poetry is complete without an example by the author, so I've included a recent work for you!

Hopefully, it will inspire you to start writing poetry of your own.

The Sirens of the Seafront

A.Friedman

The song of sirens

Sound across the seashore

Where many a shipwreck bares scores of scars

Its sailors melted away beneath the waves

Though their bleached bones wash ashore as it cascades

The gulls swoop through flotsam

As fish nibble flesh rotting in salty stench

A skull floats partly fleshed

Open sockets staring at a sunny sky

High above, among the cliffs

Sing the very things that bring death

Melodic in music

Muses that make men mad

Ramming their ship’s figurehead headlong into craven rock

Smashing into bits all that stocks a ship’s soul

And so goes down and drowns an essence

A death sentence

While eels weave and leave not a man

Left to return to his beloved on land

Scuppered

By sea-song caressingly

But, oh so heavenly!