Ten Copywriting Lessons from the Donald Trump Campaign
Allow me to indulge in a little clickbait-esque article musing here. It’s Friday afternoon and I’ve been dealing with a difficult client all day.
Donald Trump is, as you’re all aware, on the news constantly. I log in to Twitter – there’s his name in the trending section. I go to eat my breakfast and the morning news is filled with discussions about Trump’s hair and why it isn’t discouraging people from voting for him. I go to my favourite viral sites to look at pictures of puppies doing stupid things, and there he is.
Hell, I log on to do my freelance work and people want me to write articles.
There’s no escape from The Trump.
That’s why today’s topic is about Donald Trump,and the copywriting lessons you can learn from his campaign so far.
(Please note: There’s going to be no political discussion in this article. I’m not American, don’t really know enough about politics to discuss any of it, and don’t have any stake in American Politics. And I don’t really care either.)
- You don’t sell on logic.
Trump makes the headlines every single day. The media cries about two things: 1) Trump makes stupid comments like he’ll “build a wall.” 2) Trump has no policies. (This one is rearing its head as the inevitability of Trump vs. Clinton appears.)
The fact is, in copywriting and life, you don’t sell anything to anyone based on logic. Nobody votes based on logic either. They might think they do sometimes. But the truth is Trump’s wall is an emotional device. So should your copywriting bullets be.
- You don’t have to prove your substance before the sale.
This is related to the first. (Arguably, all these points are related.)
Trump is not a political insider. In a line-up of political candidates, you tend to have Senator this, Senator that, Mayor this, Governor that. Trump is not an experienced or career politician, and he doesn’t have to be.
For as much as some people will cry about Trump “not stating his policies,” it doesn’t matter.
It’s the same with copywriting: There are plenty of people who’ve made a ton of money from copywriting for terrible products. The fact is, the product quality is absolutely irrelevant to the quality of the copy: good copy makes you buy, yet you’ll never know whether the product is good or not before you pay money for it.
Trump might be a fantastic president or a dire one. The thing is, nobody will know until after they’ve voted. That’s sales.
- You’re selling yourself at all times as much as you’re selling the product. This, in copywriting terms, is character, word choice and the like.
I hate politics. I can’t stand the stuff. But I was definitely entertained the other day where it turned out that, in a debate about who is going to lead the most powerful country on the planet, the subject of the conversation turned to penis size.
Is there an important point here? Definitely.
You’re always selling yourself.
For copywriters, who you are is an indefinable but important part of any sales copy. If a million people wrote about the same product or service, every one of them would be unique. I’m probably never going to be the best copywriter on the planet, but I can certainly write more like myself than anyone else can.
You have to embrace your flaws and strengths.
- People will label “sales” as absolutely anything, and anything as “sales.”
If there’s one thing I dislike about this article, it’s that I’m adding an article analysing Trump to the heaps that are already out there.
There are already a million articles that talk about what Donald Trump is doing as “sales.” They’ll also then suggest that Donald Trump looking in a particular direction at any one point is some magically hypnotic sales technique.
You should always take these sorts of things with a few grains of salt; I remember going to an NLP course once, and – for a course on how to tap into people’s psychology – it was filled to the brim with strange people trying to magically hypnotise people with what were basic rapport building techniques.
Don’t become an NLP-style weirdo. Copywriting is filled with sales techniques, but don’t fall into the trap of thinking that they’re magical.
- If you take the first step, you can make your competitors work against you.
I’ve written about how you should use your competitors’ weaknesses against them. I consider this moral providing those weaknesses exist. In copywriting, there’s no point in ignoring the elephant in the room. If your competitor can’t do X and your product can, then write that into your copy. Whenever people in the future have read your copy, when they hear about your competitor, they’ll have to think about the weaknesses you’ve made them aware of.
Trump does this in his campaign – you can see it live. He’ll jab with a little comment about his opponent’s weaknesses, and then the next ten minutes (or the rest of the interview) will be spent with the opponent trying to deflect the attack and redefine the conversation around the lines that Trump has set.
- Regular people’s opinions do matter.
Donald Trump is indicative of a general political trend to hate career politicians. We’ve had the same recently in the UK, where UKIP and the SNP have done well by appealing to the views of the “everyman” who feels neglected by the political class.
Whether any of those parties win or Trump disappears, a lasting legacy is formed whenever people realise that they’re not an oppressed minority – that they are in fact a silent majority of discontented individuals.
In copywriting, you have to find that reason that your audience feels they’re the oppressed minority, get them to realise they’re not alone and other people have their problems, and then give them a solution. I wrote about this yesterday.
- Petty tyrants / Non-buyers just don’t matter.
About seven billion people shout from the roof-tops “I’ll never vote for Trump!”
If you were to take that on face value, you’d think that this meant Trump would definitely not be voted for by anyone. After all, everyone is very incredulous about his existence!
The fact is though, absolutely none of the people that are so vocal in their opposition of Trump would have ever voted for him anyway.
In England during the last election cycle, we had various mud-slinging by all parties. Yet the fringe parties seemed to gain despite being branded as Scottish Nationalists, Hippies or Racists.
This perplexed people but it was simple: Nobody who’d vote for any of those parties (or Trump) was going to be swayed.
In the same way, when you’re writing your copy, remember that non-buyers do not matter. You aren’t writing for people who will never buy the product you’re selling anyway. You’re writing for the people that need and want your product. Don’t water down your message to appeal to people who are never going to like you anyway.
- You can throw out a hundred things, but all it takes is one hook.
If I polled everyone who watched any political debate, I’m sure that they won’t remember 99% of anything that was said. They won’t remember that candidate X said a boring thing about some matter they don’t care about, they won’t remember candidate Y at all because they’re boring.
All it takes is one hook to grab a buyer, listener or reader. It takes you presenting one problem, followed by one potential solution.
We’re all, as human beings, a mess of various problems that need fixing. Whenever you’re copywriting, you’re finding that problem and presenting a solution.
- There’s nothing wrong with going for people’s biggest fears.
“Donald Trump is a populist fear-monger!”
Trump talks about immigration. He talks about America’s overseas enemies and false friends. He talks about fixing big issues that other politicians won’t talk about. He argues that the answers are simple, they’d argue that the answers are more complex.
The fact is, Donald Trump talks about the fears of the everyman. He proposes to solve them. That’s what speaks to people.
Now, whether or not a huge wall would ever exist under his presidency or whether it’d even help doesn’t matter. The elephant in the room is immigration for a lot of people, and Trump is standing up to the perceived monster whenever he talks about his wall.
In copywriting, you will have to deal with people’s fears. After all, you’re a solution-seller. When you discover a fear, you’re only making your copy less effective should you shy away from talking about these things. For example, if you’re selling skin cream, you can’t avoid talking about vanity in some form or another. You might as well dive headfirst in because otherwise your message is compromised.
- Your copy needs to be an archetypal hero (or villain.) Even rationalists don’t care about the details.
Donald Trump is playing a role.
I’m not suggesting he’s either sincere or he’s insincere, just that his persona as larger-than-life character is consciously created.
The reason this works is because people swallow an archetype better than a shades-of-grey-human, and they can follow a character arc a lot better than they can follow the day-to-day life of an actual human being.
Copywriting is similar to fiction in that you build a story in multiple parts. You give people that “we’re on a quest” feeling and in return they buy into your theory.
In general, the closer you get to the archetypal heroes’ journey the better. One character. One challenge. One way to overcome.
(Not sure this is even a lesson about Trump anymore. Veering into a different subject so I’ll stop there. Feel free to drop your thoughts in – providing you don’t talk about actual politics!)