Where do you find inspiration?
It's funny but so many people ask me this. Where do you find inspiration for the articles/copy you write? It's simple, it's in the world around you.
Okay, I'm not particularly trying to do the 'good girl, at-one-with-the-universe' personification of the year, I'm just saying that I look around and things make me feel either good or bad. Then I work with these things. Is that too spiritual for you?
Every single minute of every day I'm interested in the world. I"m interested during the morning news programs, I"m interested in the traffic jams on the way to work and I sure was interested when meeting some business women for the first time at lunch today. What a fantastic group of people and what a lot of information to share!
To be honest, when writing copy or journalistic articles you have to find the topic you are researching interesting and I do! I love anything, anything new. I'm fascinated by your product, really interested to find out who you are and I really, really want to know what you want to achieve. Really.
So, that's it. Inspiration? Look around, it's there anytime you take a moment. All you have to invest is time.
Where do you find the right words?
When you're trying to write that perfect marketing piece, or maybe web content, it's all about the words, the right words! So, where do we find them?
For me, I like to get a feeling for what I'm trying to sell or the information my client wants to disseminate to their public.
Sometimes, like now, I gaze away from my laptop out my window and watch the trees swaying slightly in the breeze. If I space out for long enough, with not too many thoughts in my mind (that bit's easy!), then when I snap back to reality I often find that the words are there. A quiet, mindless meditation to achieve my writing goal. Who would've thought?!
Today I'm thinking about autism. I'm thinking about an event that a client wants me to organise and promote. I've done a search on google for relevant information and found the most fantastic story about a group of surfers in the US who take autistic kids on surf camps. Apparently, the feel of the sea and the movement of the surfboard soothes the jangled nerves of an autistic child. I find my heart uplifted.
It doesn't take much to get my heart involved and this project has already done just that. Slight pause for brief gaze out of window... The words are already there because this campaign appeals to that better part of society, the part where people care.
Looking for words? Peer closely at the project you are working on, look inside the information your client has given you and imagine being on the receiving end of the words you write. What is it that you would want to hear? That's what you write.