Honor
The Copywriter Column #66
Every Friday, I offer weekly copywriting advice to anyone at the agency that will listen.
Oftentimes, my copy tips are inspired by conversations I observe on Twitter, egregious errors I see brands make, or sometimes by the struggles our own copy team encounters at any given time.
This week’s copywriting advice was about honor.
Here it is:
Honor your reader.
Notice I didn’t say respect you’re reader. That’s inherent to honor.
In many ways across our society, respect is a passive action. It’s something you maintain more than it is something you do.
However, there’s intention behind the act of honoring.
To honor someone means to actively hold them in high esteem — to lift them up, not tear them down.
What does this have to do with copy?
It means writing copy that is clear.
It means writing copy that tells the truth.
It means writing copy that actively seeks out the best for someone.
Sure, we help our clients make money and do whatever we can to make it happen. But we can still do that while also honoring their readers.
There are a lot of copywriters out there who have no moral compass and no problem with writing words that manipulate with the explicit purpose of pulling money from someone’s pocket.
You know who else does that?
Televangelists selling pieces of cloth they’ve prayed over.
It’s scammy and it makes my skin crawl.
But if you want to do someone a solid, honor them.
It’s a relational deposit that pays more long-term gains than petty, short-sighted gimmicks.
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