We all have to write from time to time, but very few of us enjoy the process. Technical marketing communication, where getting the message right often involves blending science, engineering, copywriting and design, can be particularly challenging.
This, as it happens, is the area in which Copper’s Content and Creative team specialises. We thrive on the challenge of marketing technical products and services, and our copywriters have pulled together some top tips for more effective writing.
This may seem pretty obvious, but there are plenty of technical marketing publications out there that neglect this fundamental rule. Good writing is supposed to explain and illuminate. The writer should be trying to make things clearer and to help the reader make a little more sense of our world. And that is the case whether you are writing a novel or a product description.
Good writing serves the reader. It anticipates the questions readers may have as they read a piece and answers them as they arise in readers’ mind. Explanation is never wasted. Producing writing that answers customers’ questions is where marketing communication specialists add the most value. An outside agency can frame those questions and have you answer them before committing text to screen or page. The aim is to make it as easy as possible for customers to understand what they are being offered and why they should be interested in buying it.
If you are in the business of making claims about products or services, data will give your writing context and lend credibility. Content rooted in something true – not just your opinion – is more credible. Use data, fact checking, research findings and other published sources to make your content solid, factual and defensible.
It can be very important to present opposing viewpoints. By incorporating different perspectives, you show that you have given careful consideration to the subject you are writing about. Even if you cannot dismiss all the potential negatives, you should acknowledge that they exist. Keeping such information back is a sure way to lose the trust of your readers.
Science and technology, and the businesses built upon them, can be complicated. The products or services you want to promote might involve difficult concepts that seem impenetrable to that non-specialist reader who has the final say on purchasing. Simple does not mean simplistic or dumbed-down. You can assume that your readers know next to nothing about a subject, but never assume that they are stupid. Clear writing flows from clarity of thought. Think of what you want to say, then write it as simply as you can without distorting or misrepresenting it. The first step is to lose the jargon and corporate blah words, and then to convey the message in the most accessible terms you can.
One of the most important things in written communication is finding the right words. Unfortunately, the right words are not likely to be the ones that came hot off your keyboard in a feverish, late-night splurge of textual creativity. Reviewing and reworking drafts will, ultimately, pay huge dividends.
The best writing is the result of a collaborative process. Writers get the glory, but behind every good writer there is a good editor. Find a professional whose views you value, a person who will be honest with you and who has a good grasp of grammar. An editor like that brings a lot to the writing and communication process.
If you are facing a tricky copywriting challenge, Copper can help. Please get in touch to find out more info@copperconsultancy.com
Over the past year and a half as a junior graphic designer, I’ve learnt a lot about design (which goes without saying). Also learning about working in a professional environment, and, more importantly, about myself.
However, starting a job in this industry fresh out of university with only a few freelance jobs and an internship under your belt can be an extremely daunting experience. But the design team at Copper helped to guide me through this transition.
We have all been there. Undeniably, starting a brand-new job and realising that you have no idea what you are doing. Luckily, my manager and the wider team were there patiently answering my queries whenever I needed them. Not only has this helped me to gain confidence and knowledge, but also to completely understand what is required of me.
I became a sponge. Soaking up knowledge through experience, exposure, and guidance from the other designers. Evidently, this is something that I will continue to do.
In fact, being a junior has never stopped my team from asking for my ideas. They treat me as an equal and emphasise the fact that just because I don’t have a few years of industry experience, this doesn’t mean I can’t express my opinion. Ultimately this really helped to build my confidence and voicing your opinion will also build your communication skills. Pitching new ideas, concepts, and having a fresh perspective to tasks, whilst also having them taken seriously helps to make me feel like I am a valued member of the team.
Copper has continuously supported my thirst for learning new skills, and from that, I have learnt to speed up my workflow on multiple programmes as well as experiment with new ideas. Most notably, I have been given the chance to apply these skills to client work. Trying new things has shown me that the magic happens outside of your comfort zone.
The friendly nature of Copper has helped me to feel confident when talking about both positive and negative experiences of working at an agency. After all, there is no doubt, that if I need help, someone will be able to offer assistance.
Click here to find out more about the creative services we offer at Copper
HyNet North West is an innovative low carbon and hydrogen energy project that will unlock a low carbon economy for the North West and North Wales and put the region at the forefront of the UK’s drive to net zero.
As the project moves towards a more public-facing stage, we were tasked with evolving the HyNet North West brand and creating a series of assets to explain the project.
We developed the UI designs and redeveloped the HyNet webite, simplifying the navigation and streamlining information. We created a series of graphics and assets that could be utilised across multiple channels, as well as on the website.
Sitting alongside the website, we developed a consultation microsite to support the first consultation on the HyNet North West project. The look and feel reflected the overarching HyNet brand.
We develop social graphics to support HyNet’s key messages, encourage engagement and explain complex concepts to stakeholders and the public.
HyNet North West is made up of several different projects, the first of which is a carbon capture pipeline. We designed and delivered an animation to help explain key elements of the project in an accessible way, enabling people to easily respond to the project’s public consultation.
Powering up a ‘green’ design for RSK’s new electric vehicle fleet.
RSK Group approached our design team requesting a fresh and appropriately ‘green’ design for the livery of a new electric vehicle (EV) fleet. The aim was to develop a slightly modified version of the existing RSK design to make the new EVs stand out. This would help raise public awareness of RSK switching to EVs and reflect the company’s commitment to sustainability, caring for the planet and tackling climate change.
The main challenge was creating and adjusting a design that would suit various vehicles in the fleet, given the differences in vehicle size and shape. This involved manipulating and rearranging the various elements of the design to fit accordingly. As part of the process, our designer visited the company that applies livery designs to vehicles. Seeing the designs brought to life at full size was very different from the challenges of creating them on a small screen in the design studio.
Content and Creative has designed and delivered a range of marketing support material, including exhibition stands, digital publications and product information sheets, for a new client in the aquaculture industry. Innovasea provides end-to-end solutions for fish farming and aquatic species research, including equipment, consulting services and innovative platforms and products.
One of our tasks was to improve an existing e-book design and create a more sophisticated look and feel for a new digital publication. The e-book described the pros and cons of recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS), examined the costs of building and operating these facilities, and detailed the typical return on investment for two typical farms: one raising freshwater Atlantic salmon and the other raising saltwater red snapper. Promoting the e-book would enable Innovasea to showcase its expertise in this area and underline its credentials as a knowledgeable and trusted source of information.
The Content and Creative design team focused on creating a design that presented the content in a clear and simple way, and developed a set of thematic icons that represented each section in the book. One of the main challenges was finding accurate imagery for this fairly specialised subject area. Searches of commercial image libraries did not yield suitable images, so the job had to be put on hold while the right images were sourced. As the e-book would be available from the Innovasea website, our designers chose a simple landscape format for the layout that would be ideal for online viewing.
Providing clear, non-technical explanations of complex concepts is a crucial part of what we do. But just as important is ensuring that when we make the message more accessible, we do not compromise on technical accuracy. In this example, the client asked us to describe the challenge of rising energy demand for server cooling operations and to illustrate how a radical new solution could transform this requirement. A complex story that needed a light-touch visual style.
We sit between marketers, who need to make strong claims, and scientists and engineers, who tend to be cautious and rightly insist on technical integrity. There are also legal teams to keep happy.
All our writers have science or engineering degrees. This helps us to work with our creative colleagues to make a splash while respecting technical accuracy.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is now a mainstream topic for public debate. Much of this interest has been prompted by fears for job security or the perception that powerful AI systems might one day pose an existential threat to humanity. After more than a decade of explaining how our corporate clients use AI-based systems to enhance energy production or optimise manufacturing processes, the writers and designers at Copper now find similar technologies knocking at the studio door.
Should we be concerned for our futures, or excited by the possibilities? What does AI mean for content creation?
Generative AI applications such as ChatGPT or Midjourney are set to revolutionise the work done by human “creatives” and re-shape the business communication sector. These sophisticated AI systems can quickly produce new text, images and audio on demand, which brings them right to the heart of content creation.
In the short term, we can expect a surge in AI-assisted content, with digital systems performing basic writing and design tasks more quickly and efficiently than flesh-and-blood creatives. Generative AI can deliver and modify content very quickly, which presents an opportunity to explore a wider range of potential content solutions. Humans will still take responsibility for the conceptual/briefing stage of a creative task where the direction is set and for selecting, correcting and editing AI-generated materials but, overall, creative projects should progress more quickly. There is early evidence that generative AI can lead to increased productivity.
Machine power is already displacing human effort on simple tasks such as drafting emails or blogs. In terms of volume or speed of production, human creators cannot compete. However, applying generative AI without human support might be problematic in other areas. For example, writing a detailed strategy paper that aligns fully with a client’s marketing plan and is tailored to meet the needs of a specific audience in a specific part of the world is a much more nuanced challenge than churning out standard emails.
A further complication is the question of originality surrounding AI-generated content. This has been brought into focus by recent legal actions against prominent generative AI platforms. The claim is that AI art tools are violating copyright law by scraping the work of artists from the web without their consent. Intellectual-property law, as you might expect, has not kept pace with technological advances in AI, and there are fundamental debates to be had about the balance between technical innovation and the rights of human content creators.
It is possible, of course, that clients and audiences will tire of algorithmically generated content. There could be a backlash against AI that creates a two-tier system where ‘human-made’ content commands a premium. Today’s generative models demonstrate remarkable capabilities, but their output is far from perfect and not generally tailored to actual client needs. For example, AI systems can produce text that sounds plausible and polished but contains numerous errors of fact or logic. Customers might well demand greater accuracy from their content providers and prefer to rely on trusted human sources.
If that were the case, humans would maintain a competitive advantage against algorithmic competition. The uniqueness of human creativity, including awareness of social and cultural context, could become an important differentiator. Cultural values can change in very short timeframes, perhaps faster than generative algorithms can be re-trained, so humans maintain a reactive edge that algorithms may be unable to match.
Increasing volumes of AI-generated content will necessitate a growth in content moderation. Without appropriate checks, information platforms could easily be overwhelmed with automatically generated content that is false or misleading. Countering this will require human oversight and effective governance.
Ultimately, it is businesses and society that will decide how much of the creative work is done by AI and how much by humans. Finding the balance is an important challenge and one that will affect everyone who cares about communication or earns a living from copywriting, design or coding. At Copper we have been experimenting with the use of AI systems as part of our creative processes. Our experiences have been positive, but we definitely see generative AI as a tool for writing and design support, not as a way to replace writers and designers.
To find out more about what we offer, with or without AI assistance, please visit our webpage here, or view some of our case studies.
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Catalyst company Albemarle, headquartered in Baton Rouge, USA, asked us to help write and redesign its customer magazine, Catalyst Courier. We helped to transform it from a dry-looking technical journal into a contemporary, colourful and engaging read.
Catalyst Courier is produced regularly in print and electronically. Our team writes some sections of each issue, manages the publication schedule, edits and proofreads the text, creates the layout and graphics, and liaising with the printers.
Moving from a ‘house of brands’ to ‘hybrid branding under a parent brand’
Acteon’s strategy was to move from a collection of individual brands operating under an umbrella name to a more formal hybrid-branding approach. The branded services, product lines and expertise were to be structured into eight strategic business segments that aligned with customer needs. These segments would combine the overall Acteon brand with the strongest existing brand in each segment. We helped define how these would be presented and described.
Times change and company activities change with them. Familiar product and service brands are re-named, retired, merged or moved to new homes. And the effects of these changes are felt most keenly at the client interface. Those who manage brands want to ensure that any new structure brings clarity and attracts new business, without alienating existing customers. This was exactly the challenge that we took on when we helped a major engineering group modify its service structure branding.
