Copywriting breakthrough: imagination or insight

This article mainly discusses the relationship between imagination and insight in copywriting, and advocates that copywriting should break through, reimagine products, and give brands more value through insight. It is recommended for friends who have brand copywriting needs.

When you work hard all night to write a piece of copy and send it to the work group:

CD said, your writing is too empty, it's completely floating in the air; ART said, you don't have any sense of picture, I don't know how to do it; AE said, although I don't understand it, I feel that the client will not buy in; Sure enough, the client said, what the hell is written, it has nothing to do with my product...

We often see big but meaningless copywriting in advertisements, especially car and real estate advertisements, which are the hardest hit areas. For example, "the glory of a class". You say it has no imagination, but it is good at creating castles in the air, and can think of a class from a house; you say it has no insight... Well, it really has no insight, which class, how can it be glorious, why does this class need this glory. Isn't Honor a mobile phone...

Copywriting based on imagination alone cannot impress people because it lacks the foundation of life insight. So, what is the relationship between imagination and insight, and how can we write copywriting that impresses people?

1. Imagination is possibility, insight is sense of proportion

Yu Hua said in My Literary Path:

Nowadays, many people emphasize how important imagination is, but we must understand that imagination must be followed by insight. Because it is insight that helps imagination grasp the measure of narration, otherwise it is just fantasy, which is fabrication without any basis in reality. This is very important.

Imagination is the writer's creation that comes from life and transcends life. Otherwise, what you write will be no different from the daily account of ordinary people; and insight is the writer's narration of details, writing about those things that already exist but are ignored by ordinary people, the most ordinary but most touching things.

In his early years, Yu Hua admired Kawabata Yasunari very much. The latter wrote about the glass on the long table of the hotel in "The Existence and Discovery of Beauty":

Although the pile of glass cups was neatly arranged like a marching team, they were all upside down. Some were stacked in two layers, large and small, crowded together. Not all of these cups could reflect the morning sun, but the arc of the bottom of the upside-down cups emitted a glittering white light, shining like a gem. I don't know how many cups there are, probably two or three hundred. These cups don't all emit the same light in the same place on the bottom arc. However, quite a few cups have a bright spot on the bottom arc, like a star. These rows of cups scatter rows of light, which looks really moving.

This paragraph is very imaginative. A bunch of ordinary cups look like a team going to war, like gems, and like stars. It is also very insightful. The bright spots are not in the same place on the arc of the bottom of the cup. The ultimate beauty of light and shadow is so real and the insight is so detailed! But if you just write that the cups are like a team, gems, and stars, without those minute and vivid descriptions, it will not be convincing and will not attract people.

So imagination is responsible for opening up more possibilities, and insight is about finding focus points based on reality within the possibilities.

We have to admit that the products that most copywriters deal with are as ordinary as this glass, with ordinary design and ordinary performance, but wonderful copywriting and art can give products personality and vitality. The author's extraordinary imagination and meticulous insight make this glass no longer a cold industrial assembly line product, but a work of art with high-level aesthetics.

It clearly comes alive in the sun, shining, blinking, full of vitality, calling friends. Don't you want to buy a few and put them on your bar at home? Not to mention that it is very comfortable to look at in the sun, if you pour a glass of water and add some ice, the transparent glass body, together with the water and ice inside, shakes with subtle light. If you change it to whiskey, shake it slightly, the amber liquid ripples gently in the bright light, can you already smell the intoxicating warm oak barrel scent?

2. Which is more powerful, the mighty force of the sun or the gentle blow of the moon?

Teacher Liu Shenleilei mentioned who is the best Tang poetry writer in the book "Tang Poetry: A War between the Sun and the Moon". He listed all the popular Tang poems, most of which were related to the sun or the moon. The one who entered the finals was Wang Zhihuan.

The sun sets over the mountains, and the Yellow River flows into the sea. If you want to see a thousand miles, you must climb to a higher level. - "Climbing the Stork Tower"

This poem is a masterpiece that will be remembered throughout the ages and is the most perfect representation of the spirit of the prosperous Tang Dynasty. It deserves to win the first prize.

But unfortunately, Li Bai took action.

The moonlight shines brightly in front of my bed, I wonder if it is frost on the ground. I look up at the moon and think of my hometown. - "Quiet Night Thoughts"

Teacher Liu Shenleilei believes that in terms of realm, ingenuity and ingenuity, "The sun sets behind the mountain" is not inferior to "The moon shines brightly before the bed". It loses to the human heart - the former is a grand rhetoric, while the latter is a collision of the soul. After all, the majestic atmosphere during the day is not as moving as the longing under the moon.

I think that "wanting to see as far as a thousand miles away" is indeed heroic, but it is too far away for ordinary people. Only a very small number of people who are born with talent can "want to see as far as a thousand miles away" and "reach a higher level". Most people are ordinary people like you and me, who care about food and vegetables. No matter how far they go, they always miss their hometown and family the most. That is why "Quiet Night Thoughts" has become a common memory of Chinese people around the world. Wherever there are Chinese people, every reunion festival, there must be "looking up at the bright moon and looking down at my hometown".

It is certainly difficult for a copywriter to write such a great work that will be passed down through the ages, but this also brings us some inspiration. In terms of imagination, Wang Shi seems to be better; but in terms of insight, Li Bai, a bold and unrestrained person, is rare in his subtlety and touches the heart.

In advertising, we often talk about big idea, which actually refers to the big strategy of a brand or project, such as the meaning of travel for LV and the devaluation of happiness by Coca-Cola. The big idea requires "looking far into the distance" and looking at the long term to find a story theme that can keep the brand communication going. It has strong vitality, scalability, and universal values; but when it comes to specific execution, we need "the moonlight before the bed", and the execution creativity must be small, because we are just "a mayfly in the world, a grain of sand in the vast ocean", and things that are too big are difficult to resonate with people.

For example, when we recall our youth, what moves us is not such irrelevant things as the beautiful memories spanning twenty years, but the white shirt you wore when we first met, the clear laughter you heard while riding a bike through the shade of trees on campus, and the naughty ponytail of the girl in the front row who turned her head and swept your pencil off the table.

Keeping creativity small does not mean that we should bury ourselves in the insight of details, but that details will make people feel real and tangible, and that the big can be seen in the small. When we talk about family and country feelings and the vicissitudes of history, the wonderful details in the grand narrative will make the copy like a magnificent palace, but the brick and stone texture of the palace is extremely clear, as if it is right in front of you.

For example, CCTV documentary "If National Treasures Could Talk":

The rhino urn sent away the rhino. A river older than blood vessels flows through a land older than the country. Passers-by come and go, smile at each other, and all things have a spiritual connection. - "Bronze Rhino Urn with Inlaid Gold and Silver Cloud Pattern"

What passes through the holes of the bone flute is the breath of human beings nine thousand years ago, which is the forerunner of civilization. The wind moved then, and the heart moves now. - "Jiahu Bone Flute"

3. There is nothing new in the world; all new things are just forgotten.

Solomon said: There is nothing new under heaven. Just as Plato explained that all knowledge is recollection; Solomon also has a famous saying: All new things are just forgetfulness.

This is a quote from Bacon in his essay, and was used by Borges at the beginning of his novel collection Aleph. This quote inadvertently reveals the secret of creativity and is applicable to all industries related to creation, including advertising.

For advertising copy to break through, it is not enough to have grand imagination and details, but also creativity. The so-called creativity is to find the unknown in the known and the strange in the familiar.

Seeking creativity with imagination and insight is actually seeking the intersection of the known and the unknown, and the connection between the familiar and the unfamiliar.

Borges has a very amazing metaphor in "Another Death":

Later he "died", and his faint image disappeared, just like water disappearing in water.

Death is common, water is familiar, and death is like water. There is nothing new in the expression. However, water disappears into water, and the subject and the metaphor are consistent. This is an innovation in form; life is like a drop of water falling into water, splashing ripples, and then gradually disappearing, returning to calm, as if it had never been there, disappearing so thoroughly and cleanly, this is an innovation in artistic conception. Familiarity and strangeness are perfectly connected in the creative expression of "water disappearing into water".

Advertising is ultimately the follower of business, helping sales, with the goal of getting people to choose and buy products. Advertising gives products reasons to be worth having, and gives many not-so-novel products novel meanings. This is the original sin of copywriting, but also the magic of copywriting.

For example, a watch is a product that can never have any breakthrough innovations, and it will definitely talk about time, which is something that everyone is familiar with. How can you bring out the unfamiliarity and the newness in the known? This is a great test for the copywriter.

I don’t care about how long it lasts, I only care about having it once. ——Solvil et Titus You can easily own time, but you can’t easily own Vacheron Constantin. ——Vacheron Constantin No one can own Patek Philippe, they just keep it for the next generation. ——PATEK PHILIPPE

All three slogans are powerful. They all talk about time and "possession", but the insights behind them are different. Solvil et Titus talks about the happy moments in life, and once you have them, you will have no regrets; Vacheron Constantin talks about the symbolic meaning of the brand to a successful life, and precious time is just an ordinary thing in comparison; and PATEK PHILIPPE redefines "possession" as a king, making a watch transcend the "possession" in the sense of an object, and connecting it with the ultimate pursuit of mankind - life reproduction and family inheritance.

They have all achieved a breakthrough in copywriting between the limitations of the product and the shackles of content, allowing the product to be reimagined and giving the brand richer value through insights.

To sum up, imagination is a wild horse running wild, insight puts the reins on the horse, and wonderful creativity or copywriting is like riding the horse on a tightrope, with wild imagination but also careful and steady "horse steps", which makes people feel bright and there is no worry of "falling off the horse".

Author: Chen Wuyong

Source: WeChat public account "Chen Wuyong (ID: wuyongzhiyong2022)"