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San Diego freelance copywriter Anne McColl shares tips and insights on copywriting, running a small business, marketing trends, writing websites, and design.
How to have a brilliant year. (With a nod to James Altucher who I had the honor to sketchnote at TEDx San Diego.)
You can also download this infographic in a handy dandy 1-page book!
Happy writing!
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I had the great honor and pleasure of sketchnoting the TEDx San Diego conference. Previously I had attended the 2010 and 2011 TEDx events. (But when the event was moved to the Saturday during the holiday season I couldn't make it!) With 700 attendees, this event was much larger than the first event of 150 attendees but was able to reach a much wider audience.
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A fun sketch inspired by a great post by Jay Baer that talks about the relationship between content and social media.
Happy writing!
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Is there anything more intimidating than an 8/1/2 x 11 piece of paper or a blank screen?
Yes there is. Writing about yourself or your company.
It. Can. Take. Forever. To complete the first paragraph. You’ll edit. And edit. And edit—and never make any progress.
So what do I do when I have an assignment and don't know how to begin? Start with the middle first. Or even the end. I fill in the easy parts. Maybe it's the contact page information. Or the disclaimer part of a coupon (because everything has an expiration date.) But the important thing is to get the momentum started.
You might discover by the time you've flushed out most of your article or blog post, the beginning will become more obvious.
Happy writing!
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The National Retail Federation hired me to sketch their Shop.org Merchandising Workshop at the lovely Terranea Resort. It was a fast two days. Big takeaways: share data with your whole team. And video, video, video!
I use the Brushes app on the iPad to create all of my sketchnotes. It took a while to master the app to be able to move fast. I work without a stylus for greater accuracy and control. (Probably because I am always losing them—great holiday gift idea for me.)
You can see more sketchnotes here.
So I am a design-challenged copywriter who wants to create a video quickly and easily. My audience: the San Diego designers of AIGA San Diego.So design matters.
Adobe Voice to the rescue. It's simple and easy to use. It's limitations is what makes it easy. (There are only a few layout options. This is to keep non-designers from making too many mistakes!)
But my wishes for Adobe Voice:
How to Sell on eBay.I wrote scripts and suggested some animation. emota produced.
The Whys of Social Media Social media made easy. I wrote the script and storyboard.Voiceover recorded in a bathroom after a glass or two of wine. With Fandom Marketing.
A New City The center of San Diego is shifting.
What does next look like? from Anne McColl on Vimeo.
The Science of Scheduling Nurse staffing made easy. I wrote the script and sketched rough storyboard. The folks at Jacob Tyler produced this.
Who's the Most Photographed Woman in the World? Shameless self-promotion. Started as a blog post but more fun as a video.
It’s summer time. And that means more time at the beach and the pool. After surfing or swimming, if I don’t feel like reading my paperback, I pick up my iPhone and catch up on emails from some of my favorite writers. These emails are like postcards from friends, insights on what they're writing or what they find interesting.
Every week he shares his favorite things around the web which may include a few of his drawings or black art poems.
If there is one person to follow on the Internet, it's Maria Popova's Brain Pickings. (I would never get anything done if I read everything Maria wrote.) This is weekly recap of the best of Maria’s amazing Brain Pickings. A catalogue of interestingness.
(Austin suggested her.) Ann is a journalist who loves the Internet and writes for a bunch of places like The New Republic, NewYorker.com, ELLE, The Guardian and Los Angeles magazine.Ann shares her writings and her favorite articles from around the web. And pie charts. And animated gifs.
Nicole is a content strategist (And a surfer.) Her once-in-a-while missives talk about the writing life and her experiences in authoring her first book.
So. I love my iPhone.
At a seminar earlier this year, Interactive pioneer Todd Purgason said there’s never been a great creative tool for self-expression. It’s true. You can take photos. Film videos and create art.
The iPhone is also addicting. It’s like a window into another reality where you can leave your current existence.
Yesterday my history-obsessed daughter and I were discussing the origins of the term alpha and omega. Quickly at a stop light I googled omega to see what latin letter it stood for. Thank you iPhone, instant knowledge. Instant gratification.
Yet, when my husband is driving it’s too easy for me to get on my iPhone and miss the opportunity to talk to him.
Why do I keep feeling a need to go back to my iPhone?
It's all about dopamine. Dopamine controls the pleasure systems of the brain and motivates you to seek out pleasures food, sex and drugs. So when you get a response to a text, it's a shot of dopamine. When you find an answer you Googled, it's a shot of dopamine. And our body always wants more. More. More.
Up next:
A 12-step program for iPhone addicition.
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Happy creating!
It's funny. As a writer, I am often the biggest proponent of visuals in web content. Clients ususally pay attention to the homepage but then after that, sometimes visuals get forgotten. But when text and visuals are paired together, they create a stronger message.
And if you have a lot to say, nothing is more intimidating than an entire page of text. Visuals help break up text into chunckable pieces that are easier to retain.
You bet.
Writing is design.
You really can't do one without the other.
Update: Original source for stats for infographic. But the 60,000 stat has been proven bogus. Apparently my sketchnote has travelled around the Internet.
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Happy creating!
Adobe released a new story telling app for the iPad called Adobe Voice. It’s a simple and really fun way to make voice-driven explainer videos.
You begin by recording a short audio recording. (Don’t worry, there’s a magic automatic make your voice sound better element included.) You can then add royalty free icons, photos or text—or you can upload photos from your iPad. You have a choice of 30 or so themes with set fonts and transitions and a limited selection of background music.
Here's a short video I created with Adobe Voice:
Simplicity = success. You’re only limited to a choice of 5 different layout per slide. While it would be nice to be able to tinker a bit more, the strength of Adobe Voice is in its simplicity. The average person will be able to create a nice looking video without knowledge of typography or design. There are even prompts that ask you about your story if you don’t know how to proceed. Yes, you can do a lot more with programs like iMovie, but Adobe Voice lets you create a beautiful piece in minutes.
Sharing is caring. To share your Adobe Voice video you have to upload it to Adobe’s servers requiring you to create an Adobe Cloud account. From there you can share on Facebook, Twitter or use an embed code. While the player page is beautiful, it gives you no indication of how many views. or where the video has been shared. I would really like to be able to save the videos onto a device (useful for kid’s homework) or to be able to upload to YouTube, to be able to leverage the searchability of the Internet’s second largest search engine.
Rating: Creative: Excellent Social: Fail
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Happy creating!
Receiving all the 1090s in the mail every year is like receiving postcards from good friends. And then I had a sudden realization.
In life. Design. Writing.
So I attended the big social media fest once again—Social Media Marketing World 2014 #smmw14. It's held here in San Diego so it is silly not to go. Some interesting takeaways
I had great success with visuals standing out in Twitter feeds building on success from last year. Next year that strategy will be flooded. And when it came to sketchnoting, using a much fatter brush for font emphasis is a quicker way to go rather than block letters.
Here is the entire collection:
So Social Media Marketing World is blowing into town this week! Beginning with an opening event at the USS Midway Museum. Did you know that the movie Top Gun, that 80s tribute to naval aviation starring Mr. Cruise, was filmed right here in San Diego.
As a matter of fact, you should get in the mood by having lunch at the Kansas City BBQ, the scene where Maverick and Goose are out with their family and hot naval instructor PHd girl friend. The Kansas City BBQ is located within a short walk of the Midway.
So I'll see you there tonight.
But anyway, on to the Top Gun Guide for Social Media Mavericks.
It was another two days of creativity and community at the Y Design Conference. My two favorite speakers were our local heroes. Architect Rob Quigley spoke ever so eloquently about keeping true to original intent whille designing the new Central Library. And Ron Miriello shared his take on life/design/life with the enthusiasm of a beginner tempered with the wisdom that only comes with experience. There is always the reacurring theme of become your own client and create your own projects.
Copy + Cocktails was a roaring success with quite a few freelance San Diego copywriters coming out. Some people I had met online before and not in person. We had a great time comparing notes, sharing comma trauma stories and swapping strategies. After putting in a long day, it's hard to get out and meet new people. But it is SO worth it. It really wasn't until I started freelancing and didn't have the built in consistancy of a creative department that I understood the value of building community. It's about meeting new people, encouraging serendipity and promoting the collision of new ideas.
There will definitely be a Vol. 2 in the not too distant future.
I was talking to a fellow copywriter on Twitter and we missed each other at the San Diego Ad Club's Mingle Bells for the the second year in a row. So I decided to organize a copywriter meetup and invite every writer I know that I've never met. Sometimes it gets lonely hanging with art directors and designers all the time as a freelance copywriter.
I presented to copywriting class at The Art Institute-San Diego and shared this slide (a creative way to emphasize the importance of planning and the creative brief.)
Then I realized I was only focusing on the creative process. There is a lot else I do, I spend so little time actually writing. When you perform a craft for a living, there is a whole lot of business around the craft.
So basically, the NFL will come after advertisers if they use the copyrighted name "Super Bowl." Here's a few creative alternatives for marketers.
And thanks to the Internet, I can catch all the ads the day before.