A recording engineer who worked with Frank Zappa and Barbra Streisand told me a story about a well-known 80s rock group.
They had a big problem. Their drummer, a founding member, was notoriously bad at keeping steady time. They couldn’t get rid of him, but studio costs were piling up because it was such a struggle to get him through a song without losing the beat. The record company was also applying pressure. Something had to be done.
When the drummer took a day off, they recorded a drum machine playing his parts instead. He came in and they played him the drum machine powered version of the song. They held their breathe and waited for the inevitable blow up. Instead, he nodded and said “sounds good!” and walked off.
They couldn’t simply say:
“You can’t keep time, so we replaced you with a machine.”
Copywriters make the same mistake when they force prospects to confront something humiliating before they can buy:
You’ve been doing everything wrong…
You don’t understand money…
Your marketing sucks…
Now buying requires an ego injury.
Copywriting lesson: Give people a route to the conclusion that lets them keep their dignity.
RW
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