A few days ago, I came across a list of 36 rules for writing well. The list was put together by Italian novelist Umberto Eco, best known for a book that became a 1986 movie starring Sean Connery.
(Roger Ebert: “If the story had been able to really involve us, there would have been quite a movie here.”)
If I sound a little bitter, it’s because Umberto Eco is directly attacking me and my writing with his stupid rules. Here are a few of them:
1. Avoid alliterations, even if they’re manna for morons.
13. Don’t be repetitious; don’t repeat the same thing twice; repeating is superfluous (redundancy means the useless explanation of something the reader has already understood).
17. Don’t write one-word sentences. Ever.
22. Do you really need rhetorical questions?
30. Do not change paragraph when unneeded.
Not too often.
Anyway.
I’ve covered many of Eco’s rules in this newsletter. Except my advice was to do the things Eco warns against.
I guess the difference is that Umberto Eco has snobbish taste on his side, while I have numbers. Because things like alliteration work to get people’s attention, and even to make sales.
If you don’t believe me, look at the curious case of The Big Black Book.
This was a book of consumer tips that sold like crazy, through a sales letter, to a list of infomercial buyers of an audio cassette program on reprogramming your subconscious.
What?
Why did people who bought a bunch of tapes… by watching TV… about reprogramming your subconscious… want to buy a book, on an entirely unrelated topic, sold through a different format?
Easy.
Because that audio tape program was called Passion, Power, and Profit. Get it?
Passion, Power, Profit… Big Black Book.
Crazy as it seems, these buyers bought mostly on the strength of alliteration in the product name.
Same thing with words.
Umberto Eco’s rules don’t mention amazing, secret, or magic, when used as an adjective. But based on his other rules, I bet he would think those words are cheap, overused, and ineffective.
Wrong again. Those words have been used in direct response marketing for a hundred years plus. And they show no sign of wearing out.
In fact, words like amazing and secret are used so often, and with so much power, that I put them in a list of 20 such magic words.
It’s part of round 14 of Copy Riddles. That’s my program about bullets and copywriting. The promise is that in just 8 weeks, Copy Riddles gets A-list copywriting skills into your head, through a combination of exercises and demonstration.
The deadline to join this run of Copy Riddles is this Sunday at 12 midnight PST. 2 days from now. Coming up soon.
So if you want skills that pay the bills… or complete command of copywriting… this might be worth a look: