Walt Kania   :Writer
Populate the copy
Put some people in there.  And sell more.
 
The mystery writer Raymond Chandler used to say, “When the story starts to get dull, I just bring in some guy with a gun.”
 
It works for copy, too.  And you can even leave out the gun.
 
Get some live human beings into the text and things get interesting right away.  Your prose is clearer, more relevant, and easier to read.  And easier to write.
 
That’s especially true when you’re selling technical or complicated products.
 
I know, it sounds too simplistic.  Or maybe even impossible.  ("I have to write about network attached storage, marine insurance, workflow automation, claims management software.  There are no people in it.")
 
Sure there are.  Here's some typical copy about an enterprise network service.
 
  1. XCompany remote access solutions allow companies to provide a virtual workforce with the same connectivity and access to resources available at key company locations.
 
Decent enough.  But look what happens when you let people walk around in the copy:
 
  1. With an XCompany remote access solution, you can allow a sales manager working from home — or from a hotel room — to use the same data resources available to the teams back at headquarters.
 
This de-fogs the windshield a bit.  Now, instead of a "virtual workforce", we can see a manager working out of her house.  We see staffers at work at headquarters.  Instead of a "company" we have a "you", which counts as a person.  We have a clearer picture of how this would actually look.
 
Another example.  Here is a high-tech company setting the stage for selling its network equipment.
 
  1. Remember when the promise and efficiency of Frame Relay eclipsed the value of X.25 and began to supplant it as the WAN transport of choice? After the technology's value was proven, a massive migration took place to the better transport.
 
Grammatically correct, but a lifeless abstraction.  There's no one here.
 
What if we began this way . . .
 
  1. Remember when the more adventurous IT managers began to abandon X.25 in favor of the promising efficiency of Frame Relay?  As soon as other IT teams saw the pioneers were right, they began migrating en masses to the better transport.
 
Now you're talking about people.  People with guts.
 
Or, how about marketing medical imaging equipment.
 
  1. The simple graphical user interface allows for greater productivity in the MRI unit, as well as faster archiving and transmission of the images.
 
Put a live person in the story, and the exact same information sounds like this:
 
  1. With the new graphical interface, your imaging technician can program a typical diagnostic series in less than 60 seconds, and automatically have the images archived and transmitted to your radiologist for review.
 
Ah.  Now we have an imaging tech doing her work faster, and sending things to a radiologist.  It's a picture that means something to the director of an MRI unit.
 
Individuals are better than groups.  It’s easy to picture a technician installing server software, or an HR manager interviewing a college kid.  Much harder to see an implementation team being more productive, or a company meeting quarterly targets.
 
What if you have to describe the innermost machinery, software architecture, or molecular structure of your offer, where no human being can even fit?
 
Try this.  Somewhere, somehow, this machinery or protocol stack will come in contact with a human being.  Somewhere, a live person will see, feel, hear, or do something different because of your technology.  Describe that.  Put the bloke in there.
 
An example of machine-only copy:
 
  1. The highly flexible design allows for user-selectable parameters for reporting frequency, alarm thresholds, and consolidation of feeds from multiple production monitoring devices.
 
Too parched and bloodless.  Instead, let a few users sit down and start selecting parameters. . .
 
  1. Depending on the needs of your facility, your production supervisors can specify which systems to monitor, how often they receives reports, and the thresholds for any alarms generated on the line.
 
Okay, but what if the real value of the technology doesn't really touch a human?   What if the value really is all down in the gears and hydraulics?
 
Tell them who designed it, and for whom.
 
  1. Our engineers designed both 6-slot and 9-slot configurations, which both offer you up to 224 auto sensing 2/1-Gbps Fiber Channel ports in a single chassis and up to 768 Fiber Channel ports per rack.
 
 
Smart folks, our engineers.
 
 
 
“The more technical the product, the more humans you need walking around in the copy.”
“ Somewhere, a live person will see, feel, hear, or do something different because of your technology.  Write about that.”
“Products aren’t nearly as interesting as people doing cool things with a product.”
 
Before:  Faceless
 
Remember when the promise and efficiency of Frame Relay eclipsed the value of X.25 and began to supplant it as the WAN transport of choice? After the technology's value was proven, a massive migration took place to the better transport.
 
 
 
After:  With people
 
Remember when the more adventurous IT managers began to abandon X.25 in favor of the promising efficiency of Frame Relay?  As soon as other IT teams saw that the pioneers were right, they began migrating en masse to the better transport.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Walt Kania is a freelance writer specializing in marketing communications for B2B and technology companies.  He works out of New Jersey.  You can contact him here.