Copywriting: Perform Brain Surgery

2. Get to know your customers really well. Go where they go, listen to what they listen to, read a few of their magazines and watch a few of their TV shows. Have conversations with them. Listen in on customer service lines and read notes they’ve sent to the company.

Doing so can make a huge difference in how a catalog works. For example, a few years ago when we began working on the Highlander catalog, we realized that when the copy touched on the customers, it ridiculed the over-the-top passion fans had for the “Highlander” TV show, films and stories. When we began working on it, both my writing partner, Otis Maxwell, and I got the first four seasons of the TV show on video, and over the next three to four weeks, we watched the shows and got into the culture. And as we watched, we opened up our imaginations and became fans.