“Professional” is often just fear with better grammar. Fear of being specific. Fear of being odd. Fear of sounding like a real person instead of a safe one.
The line about writing for “no one can complain about this” vs writing for resonance is dead on. That ghost client voice sticks around long after the invoice stops.
Also: “corporate with contractions” is painfully accurate. I’ve met that guy. He runs every meeting.
Feral Mode isn’t chaos. It’s just honesty without the brand safety net. And it turns out people notice.
Good tips! I had to beat the grad school writing style out of myself (history/international relations) when I slid into the editor position at a print mag years ago. I've always had a loose writing style, so "only" took about a year. It helped reading all of the marketing industry crap at the time, which all sounded identical excepting the vendor/product names, and I quickly started thinking "I do NOT want to sound like that (and my audience doesn't want that either."
Marketing copy is the great equalizer. Everyone sounds identical because everyone's referencing the same five successful campaigns from the 60s. Swap the logos and nobody would notice.
I have purposely decided to include at least one very "Dallas" metaphor in every post. I don't think anyone will notice, but I spotted one yesterday that I was going to edit out and decided to leave instead. It's clunky and I love it 😂
What is this weird world where we want the texture, the oddities, the friction in what we read?! It goes against everything I have ever been taught 🫨
We gotta make this fun, right?! I'm half tempted to turn it into an actual game where people get points but not sure many will latch onto my sense of humour with this 😂
Excellent point. When writing is too “smooth” people think, AI. Real people don’t generally write perfectly. Even when writing is well written, as you say well here, it will have emotion, energy, and will necessarily exclude people.
Writing that tries to reach everyone will ultimately speak to no one.
“Professional” is often just fear with better grammar. Fear of being specific. Fear of being odd. Fear of sounding like a real person instead of a safe one.
The line about writing for “no one can complain about this” vs writing for resonance is dead on. That ghost client voice sticks around long after the invoice stops.
Also: “corporate with contractions” is painfully accurate. I’ve met that guy. He runs every meeting.
Feral Mode isn’t chaos. It’s just honesty without the brand safety net. And it turns out people notice.
The ghost client thing is the part people never expect.
You think firing the client ends the relationship.
Nope.
They're still in your drafts, adding qualifiers.
“Dad jokes in business casual” 😂🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 that’s so funny. Love how you infused the You into it and you 4Xed your result, that’s badass. 🙌
That line was one of my favorites I fatfingered out. Glad someone appreciated it! 😂
🤣
Good tips! I had to beat the grad school writing style out of myself (history/international relations) when I slid into the editor position at a print mag years ago. I've always had a loose writing style, so "only" took about a year. It helped reading all of the marketing industry crap at the time, which all sounded identical excepting the vendor/product names, and I quickly started thinking "I do NOT want to sound like that (and my audience doesn't want that either."
Marketing copy is the great equalizer. Everyone sounds identical because everyone's referencing the same five successful campaigns from the 60s. Swap the logos and nobody would notice.
LOL, it’s David Ogilvey’s world, we just live in it.
Read his book on marketing a few years ago and realized when he wasn’t talking about advertising-specific techniques; it was just content marketing.
Between him and Eugene Schwartz, you've got the entirety of ads masquerading as "content" we still see every day.
I need to take a shower 😂
Too much misleading crap out there for sure, but then that’s always been the case :)
I have purposely decided to include at least one very "Dallas" metaphor in every post. I don't think anyone will notice, but I spotted one yesterday that I was going to edit out and decided to leave instead. It's clunky and I love it 😂
What is this weird world where we want the texture, the oddities, the friction in what we read?! It goes against everything I have ever been taught 🫨
I love that you've turned it into a game. One Dallas metaphor per post. That's a constraint that forces personality.
Way better than "be authentic" (which is utterly meaningless by itself).
We gotta make this fun, right?! I'm half tempted to turn it into an actual game where people get points but not sure many will latch onto my sense of humour with this 😂
I'm Nick "Chief Instigator" Quick, and I approve this message.
Excellent point. When writing is too “smooth” people think, AI. Real people don’t generally write perfectly. Even when writing is well written, as you say well here, it will have emotion, energy, and will necessarily exclude people.
Writing that tries to reach everyone will ultimately speak to no one.
That last line should be tattooed on every content strategist's forehead. Backwards, so they see it in the mirror every morning.