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Now we’re talking!

By Patrick Gant

Sending my WordPress-powered site into the garage for a much needed tune-up gave me an opportunity to think a bit more about where I could tweak the look-and-feel of the site.

So welcome to the revamped look for thinkit creative.

Navigation-wise our aim is make the site flat as possible—no needless clicking for things. Everything you need to know about what we do and what’s in it for you to choose us is all right where it should be. Consider what some of the leader in the field of usable design have to say about building websites and blogs that people want to read:

Keep your message simple and user-focused

“Text is interface”

Your audience scans more than they read

A URL should tell you something meaningful

Typography is woefully overlooked on the web

“Archives are superfluous”

Blog readers are always clicking, and they love lists

Customize your error (404) page to suit your readers

Blogrolls are generally a great, big, fat waste of time and space.

Break up those paragraphs

Never mind the hype

By Patrick Gant

Ultimate! Perfect! Unique!

When writing fresh copy, it can be tempting sometimes to hitch an idea to the hyperbole bandwagon. A product is just a product unless you say it’s the ultimate at what it does, right? The trouble with this approach is that it’s predicated on an empty promise and does very little to set you apart from the fray. As Seth Godin points out:

There are 345,000,000 Google matches for “ultimate”…

Want to make the best case you can to clients about what you do, or what you’re selling? Drop the self-congratulatory clichés and instead create copy that communicates benefits to your reader.

Remember rule #1 in communications. Your message is not about you. It’s always…always…about them.

Kickstart the creative

By Patrick Gant

Not everyone believes in writer’s block, but the underlying symptom—ideas and words that suddenly don’t play nicely together—is experienced by even the most prolific writers from time to time. And in my experience, how you deal with it is what makes the difference between being afflicted or just mildly bothered.

One of the better bits of advice I’ve seen about this comes courtesy of 43folders. I’ve been keeping it handy in my ideas folder on my desk, but blogging about it just makes so much more sense.

Let me add a few more tips and elaborate on at least one that they mention:

Cut and paste some text. Find something—anything—and drop it into the document you’re working on. It’s often easier to develop a thought when it’s couched in text rather than a couple of lonely sentences orphaned on an otherwise blank screen.

Write for an audience of six-year olds who had sugar for breakfast, because kids are among the most unforgiving when it comes to buzwords and wordiness. You’ll get to the point in a hurry.

Write something else. On a bad day, I find email is especially helpful because it gets me sitting down and typing. Sometimes all we need is a little push to get the momentum working again.

Go have a shower. I’m being serious, here. Not only will you feel better, but it’s where some of the best ideas can pop into your head. Maybe it’s the isolation and the white walls around you. Who knows? But it works. Heck, Holiday Inn is so convinced of this, they’ve turned this idea into a benefit of choosing them for accomodation for business travel.

Go somewhere else. Grab your notebook—be it one with a pencil or one with a keyboard attached—and get out of the office. Go to the backyard, to a park, or go to a place that offers free wifi. Grab yourself a large cup of something, and then take another kick at the can. Some of my best copywriting ideas have come knocking just by making a change to my thinking environment.

Have some of your own failsafe tips about what to do with the creative turns from warm honey to cold molasses? By all means share!