Simon Hopes undertakes freelance print copywriting for all forms of literature, acting as a short turnaround drafting resource for agencies and in-house marketing and HR teams.
Literature
I provide a print copywriting service for both short assignments and larger communications portfolios, with particular expertise in cross-media promotional campaigns.
I am able to offer short turnaround on smaller literature items such as marketing or recruitment advertisements, direct mail letters, leaflets or inserts. I also undertake brochures, annual reviews, reports and investor relations work – liaising with print firms as required.
Articles and Newsletters
My print copywriting portfolio includes extensive client periodical assignments covering print, online and e-newsletter format, as well as cross-platform.
I ghost-write articles and full newsletters on behalf of product and service providers, working from notes, telephone interviews or face to face meetings. Alternatively, I can prepare articles based on the assignment of topic only.
Awards, Directory and Proposal Submissions
I also offer an expertise in preparing submission information for awards and directories, particularly the editorial requirements of the two primary UK legal industry researchers, Chambers and Legal 500.
I also benefit from having worked in the pitch and tender departments of large professional services firms. I can implement labour-saving techniques to enhance the pitch and tender writing process, including the drafting of 'boilerplate' paragraphs covering products, services, experience, case studies and staff profiles.
Assignment Examples
Business Excellence Awards: Full communications portfolio print copywriting for the relaunch of a regional awards campaign, including entry brochure, ceremony programme and articles. Also prepared full website text content. (Agency: SPS Advertising Group/Well Studio)
Cantura: Print copywriting of a new primary brochure promoting a regional IT services firm. (Agency: Top Left Design)
CNN: Print copywriting of a brochure promoting the new prime time evening schedule. (Agency: Article 10 Group)
Institute of Directors: Print copywriting of a direct mail letter suite, covering membership services and marketing.
SA Law: Ongoing communications portfolio print copywriting (since June 2005) covering a range of advertisement, brochure, direct mail letter, case study and press release assignments. Also undertake ongoing online content generation for direct email, e-newsletters and the firm's website.
Vitality Healthcare: Print copywriting for the rebranding of former Simplyhealth Group subsidiary Vitality Healthcare, covering primary brochure, staff launch event materials, press releases and other literature. Also prepared full text content for the website relaunch. (Agency: Article 10 Group)
Copywriting Sample
Surviving the Online Publishing Evolution
Historically, a brochure represented an organisation’s primary call-to-action marketing tool. Websites subsequently claimed that role, quenching a growing consumer thirst for knowledge on which to base purchasing decisions. Organisations embraced this, seizing the opportunity to create instantly accessible information repositories that delivered cost-effective content control.
However, even the most intensive search engine optimisation strategy cannot guarantee distribution of a website to its target audience. Proactive promotional mechanisms are still required to draw potential customers to it. So instead of driving the brochure to extinction, online publishing actually expanded its remit.
Whilst still encouraging immediate purchase where possible, the brochure has become a highly effective preliminary persuasion tool. By enticing potential customers to seek further information from the relevant website, a psychological ‘step towards’ a supplier is taken, which greatly increases the chance that a positive personal connection will be made. And as we all know, a thinking audience is good, but only a feeling one buys.
Staying with the all-important emotion attached to purchasing decisions, brochures are also far better than online media at subconsciously communicating two organisational characteristics: tangibility and longevity. Holding an impressive physical document instils a feeling that an equally impressive physical organisation produced it. And the recognised inflexibility of print indicates the organisation is confident about its message and expects to be around for a while.
Therefore, the key to brochure copywriting is to focus on the aesthetic rather than the exhaustive. Restrict it to just the key messages and present them in a concise and tantalising format that begs immediate readership and that ‘step towards’ the website. Lengthy, comprehensive documents run the risk of being thought of as ‘something to look through later’. And we all know that can potentially end up as never.
