BackWednesday 17th August, 2011
Why don’t copywriters use dialogue?
Copywriters don’t like talking about dialogue – and it’s because they rarely use it.
That’s the conclusion I’ve come to after doing a few Google searches.
Type in ‘Copywriting Sentences’, ‘Copywriting Paragraphs’, ‘Copywriting Titles’ or ‘Copywriting Punctuation’ and you’ll find reams of helpful advice from copywriters across the globe.
Hammer in ‘Copywriting Dialogue’ and you’ll get a rather moth-eaten blog post I wrote in 2009 and little else in the way of advice.
Unless you count a job that suggests the successful applicant should ‘Maintain a proactive dialogue with business teams on 5ttgvydjyyyyyyyyyyyyik8,jxy5eesy7r8tesz78g
(Sorry. Jargon always makes me pass out from boredom.)
Do you use dialogue?
I put my hands up. I don’t use dialogue much when I write professionally.
I’ve racked my brain to think of the times I have. This is what I’ve come up with:
- A magazine-style newsletter, when I incorporated dialogue into some features
- Advertorial, which used interview dialogue
- An advert, which I gave a short Q&A dialogue format
- A website, also following a Q&A structure
- FAQs.
That’s it.
Of course, copywriters use quotes all the time – in case studies, testimonials, press releases and elsewhere.
But these are one sided – monologue, not dialogue.
Where’s the dialogue gone?
The stupid thing is that I love writing dialogue more than anything else.
When I used to blog about the everyday lunacy in my then home borough of Hackney, there was nothing I prized more than spontaneous dialogue. It said a lot more about life in my area than any pen portrait could ever do.
I was reaching for a fag when a woman came up to me. She was wearing a black bikini-top, a fluorescent-pink pencil skirt, black boots and a white baseball cap. Her left eye was half gummed up.
“You got a light?”
“Yes, somewhere, here you go.”A few steps on. Tapping on my arm.
“I’m not a beggar. But…”
“No, sorry.”
“… I’ve got 50p, and…”
“No.”
“… I only need…”
“N..”
“Oh, Jesus Christ, you people make me fucking sick.”
Sure, it’s not the most amazing dialogue in the world – but it strikes a chord in a way an essay on the borough’s drug, violence and poverty problems almost certainly wouldn’t.
Copywriters are good at dialogue
I don’t think I’m the only copywriter out there who likes writing dialogue.
Dozens of copywriters write novels and short stories in their spare time – and I’ll bet there’s not one without plenty of dialogue.
So…
Why not use more dialogue in professional copywriting?
The more I think about it, the more opportunities I can see for using dialogue in marketing copy.
I posted about the phenomenon of Ulysses contracts a couple of days ago – they’re pacts we make with ourselves to keep our warring impulses under control.
We make them because of a kind of internal dialogue:
“Mmmm. Chocolate.”
“Put that chocolate down and walk backwards with your hands in the air.”
“Oh, c’mon. I’m only going to have a nibble.”
“Oh no you’re not you fat scumbag. You’re on a diet.”
“Says who?”
“Says me”
“But I am you?”
“You are?”
“Does that mean you’re me?”
“I don’t know. My head hurts. Shall we have some cake?”
“Mmm. Chocolate.”
Okay – that contract failed before it was agreed, but you get the idea. Why not use dialogue to reflect consumers’ own internal conversations?
But while I can see that dialogue can be used in lots of marketing copy, would it actually work? Would it sell anything?
Does dialogue sell?
I suppose the answer to this is ‘test, test, test’. Use dialogue in your copy and see whether it increases sales. If it does, test it against copy that doesn’t use dialogue.
I’ve a vague memory David Ogilvy came a cropper with some dialogue he used in a series of adverts. It was inspired by the Pickwick Papers, and it was a total failure.
But I suspect that’s because people find Dickens boring – not because they don’t respond to dialogue.
Do you agree?
The inner dialogue is a monologue too, is it not? I suppose people are more accustomed to sales-type dialogue in video format (e.g. TV ads) rather than in the written word. But using dialogue in copy would be an interesting experiment, although it would suit some products/services better than others, I’d imagine. And it would need to be funny.
Comment left by Averill Buchanan on Thursday 18th August, 2011 at 9:38 am
Good question. Why not indeed? There is a more common variation of this, the type of copy that says things like, “If you’re like me…” or “You’re probably asking yourself…” It implies a dialogue which is not actually taking place.
The Ogilvy campaign you’re referring to was a charming series of ads for rum featuring a dialogue between a man and a dog.
Joe: Happy returns. Many.
Best friend: Thanks. Hate birthdays. Getting on.
etc.
Great stuff, but it didn’t apparently convince enough drinkers.
Comment left by Micheal Leahy on Thursday 18th August, 2011 at 1:40 pm
Great post.
It’s funny that it’s never occurred to me to use dialogue in marketing copy: before I was a copywriter, I was a playwright and soap opera writer.
Now that you’ve made me think about it, however, I’m intrigued and eager to try it out.
By the way, David Ogilvy used dialogue brilliantly in his Paco Rabanne ad: http://www.aef.com/on_campus/classroom/book_excerpts/data/2476
Comment left by Lorraine on Thursday 18th August, 2011 at 1:56 pm
Thanks for the comments.
@Averill – Yes, it’s a sort of monologue/ dialogue. Makes me think of the cliché of the warring devil and angel on opposite shoulders, convincing some poor sap to take a virtuous/ naughty course of action.
Funny dialogue could work well. So could using it to create empathy/ sympathy – like in a charity campaign, using the voices of the people they’re trying to help. Now I think of it, that’s done reasonably often.
@Michael – Yes, I do that in direct mail fairly frequently. But it’s not the kind of pure dialogue I’d like to use a bit more.
And – thanks. I remember the Ogilvy ads now. My copy of Ogilvy on Advertising was in the office when I blogged this – and I have a shocking memory.
Comment left by Ben Locker on Thursday 18th August, 2011 at 6:05 pm
@Lorraine – sorry not to see your comment until now. I think it could be a lot of fun for copywriters to give dialogue another try – I suspect that it tends to result in longer copy (which everyone seems to be allergic to these days).
I’d forgotten about the Paco Rabanne ad. I wonder whether Ogilvy was onto something we’ve all forgotten about – or whether testing has shown dialogue doesn’t perform as well as other styles.
Comment left by Ben Locker on Thursday 18th August, 2011 at 6:10 pm
I love writing dialogue and I think I have a good ear for it. My favourite briefs are for radio because I think I might be able to get a good 2CK script out of it.OK, so not all good radio has to feature dialogue but it’s a good place to start from.
I’ve also managed to base a few DM packs around dialogue, where one participant is, as you say, intended to represent the consumer. No idea what the response was – freelancers rarely find out – but one of the packs was good enough to put in my book for a while. (Until the typeface became interesting from a nostalgic perspective.)
Comment left by Kevin Mills on Friday 19th August, 2011 at 10:46 am
Hey Ben, I edited a series of eight or nine blog posts on smart technology that featured a running dialogue between the hapless resident, and his increasingly computerised house. This was the brainchild of the low-carbon expert who wrote the pieces, & I stayed with it & just sharpened them up a bit. Because there was so much complicated technical information in the posts, the bits of dialogue – placed at the beginning and end of the posts – really worked. They topped-&-tailed, with a concise intro question and a concise and humorous summing-up. Star stuff.
I think the key with copy – where people are after info, after all – is to keep it short, use it for leavening, and make sure it moves the action along.
Comment left by KEB on Friday 19th August, 2011 at 11:12 am
“Dialogue? In marketing copy?”
“Well, why not actually? It uses the same words and sends the same message, only in a form more natural for the brain to absorb.”
“Longer though, I think.”
“So?
I once did an ad for Brinks Diamonds that went like this.
“How long have your people been waiting?”
“Almost two thousand years.”
“Two thousand years?!!
Why didn’t they use Brinks?”
Comment left by tulli on Friday 19th August, 2011 at 5:38 pm
@Lorraine. Wow, I remember that ad! Excellent. And a resounding endorsement of Ben’s point.
Comment left by Micheal Leahy on Monday 22nd August, 2011 at 2:42 pm