Copy writing is an art – and if you do not get it right, your product will surely look ugly. If not ugly, be assured that it won’t help you achieve what you aspired for.

Here are two examples that I have noticed in the last few days where the message simply failed to create any impact.

AOL Spam Folder

If your AOL spam folder is empty, this is what you will see:

This folder is empty. Get the latest from ‘Today on AOL’

aol spam mail

You mean get the latest spam from ‘Today on AOL’? What does the ‘latest’ mean? News? Movie information? And will it be delivered in spam folder?

The chances are that user is not going to click on that link, because it is not clear as to what it is. It’s as good as not having the link itself. Essentially, no impact.

Friendfeed’s Self Promotion

Sometimes, Friendfeed inserts self promo messages that asks you to import your friends from Google/Yahoo/ other networks onto Friendfeed.

This is what message reads:

Find the people you know on Friendfeed

friendfeed find friends

Why would I find (the) people who I already know on Friendfeed? Given the clutter of information/tweets/feeds that one goes through, does this message stands out? Chances are that I won’t be going through the remaining text to understand what the message is all about.

It surely is confusing and fails to attract attention in the first eye contact.

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There are tons of such examples where copy just doesn’t get the impact right.
One needs to realize that your user/visitor does not have all time in the world to understand/use your product – there are pockets of usages and great copy is the one that gets the message across.

Signs of Great Copywriting

Great copywriting does only one thing and gets that right – it has a strong call to action element with a clear benefit proposition to the user.

Also, what’s important to note is that not every message needs to have a call to action. Sometimes, you should just make it sweet. For instace, Google’s empty spam folder reads:

Hooray, no spam here!

Well, isn’t that a reason to cheer about?

What’s your opinion? Have more of such examples?

friendfeed find friends

Tags: aol spam, copy writing strategy, friendfeed, Product Management, product strategy