Inkwell copywriting, ghost writing, media relations

Lancashire copywriter thankfully does not suffer from addiction, anxiety or depression

 ... but many people do. And if they are based in the North West they could call Steve Pope Associates.

Here is their website for which I wrote the copy. Steve was too busy to write the copy himself and valued the objective eye a Lancashire copywriter could bring to the task.

As a recovering addict himself, Steve has the experience and training to set his clients on the right path - the path to sobriety and a happy and healthy life.

Steve also helps sports people 'get into the zone' and works with corperates to motivate their people.

African Brew Ha Ha - The FREE Show

Looking forward to the publication of my travel book African Brew Ha Ha in April 2010, I will be available to give after dinner talks, club guest speaker slots or group presentations. 

The talk is about the 14,000-mile solo motorcycle trip through Africa - Blackburn to Cape Town - in search of the ultimate cup of tea, and is suitable for:

• Travel clubs
• Motorcycle clubs
• Rotary Clubs
• Probus Clubs
• Business networking clubs
• Tea Dances!!
• Any clubs that enjoy a good story well told

I would like as many people as possible to read the book (now that it's taken me 2 years, and all), so I will be available from April 2010 to speak at your club or one that you know.

The talk is FREE but I will expect some expenses if I have to travel.

It's a great story and I've got some terrific pictures to show. You won't be disappointed.

 
 

African Brew Ha Ha - Lancashire copywriter goes on the road to SA

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The African Brew Ha Ha was a project dear to my heart that I undertook over 15 months during 2007-2008. I set out on a quest for the ultimate cuppa that took me through Britain and then on a 15,000-mile journey to Cape Town - that's right, looking for the ultimate cup of tea.

I got a bit carried away.

Publication of the book (cover above featuring the bike on the road to Timbuktu) about my motorcycle tea tour is due in all good book stores - and a maybe few rubbish ones - in April 2010 in the UK.

I've already had a great endorsement from travel writer Peter Moore who read an early draft of the book. Always thought he was a man of good taste.

UK Copywriter gets emotional

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A copywriter's life can be a varied one. Here's a UK company that makes 'intimate massagers' - O, alright then, vibrators - who came to me to write some sensitive copy for their marketing.

I approached the job as I might any other: checked out the competition, researched the market, decided on their point of difference until I managed to put my finger on the G-spot.

The copy for the website and brochure had to be helpful but not clinical, arousing but not tacky. I think I hit the spot.

Press releases that get read

 
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A large US company launching their UK operations through a number of franchisees came looking for some press coverage. This is one of a number of cuttings I achieved for them.

The key to writing press releases that get read is to study the style and format of the magazine or newspaper you're sending to. The closer you get to their style, the more of your story they are going to publish. A good photo helps, too.

Copywriter is a real asset

Johnson Reed is a busy firm of asset finance specialists in Manchester who needed a copywriter to write some tight copy for their website, sales leaflets, folders and inserts, a newsletter, and other marketing materials for resellers throughout the UK.

The copywriting job was quite detailed as we had to tease out the fine differences between them and their competitors in a crowded marketplace. I liaised with a marketing consultancy and a group of designers to get the job done on time and on budget.

Netherland - subtle & mesmerising

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The world will never be the same for millions of New Yorkers following the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center. The population was left hurting, scared and bereft. Just walking down sixth avenue without the guiding monoliths is a disorientating experience.

Joseph O'Neill's Netherland deals with these insecurities in an original story concerning a man's relationship to cricket and with the compelling but flawed character of Chuck Ramkissoon who dreams of building a stadium for the first New York Cricket Club. More curiously, our narrator is Hans van den Broek, a Dutchman with an outsider's eye for both the ridiculous and the fantastic in New York.

O'Neill creates a mythic place of conditional relationships unable to depend on the world as it was, and a human condition that appears always out of time. I don't understand cricket but I love New York and you will love this book if you want to understand the effects of a world made disorderly through the eyes of a man who depends on cricket. It also contains some acute descriptions of the differences between NYC and London. Subtle and mesmerising.

Gold!

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Rose Tremain's novel The Colour takes the reader to a time, place and culture not much exploited by literature - the 19th Century gold rush in New Zealand.

Tremain creates superbly the harsh environment and the hopes of those with gold fever, who survive on little other than dreams of the big strike. The insularity of the immigrant English family is tightly drawn and the portrait of the heroine, Harriet Blackstone, is intimate and compelling. The characters must come to deal with decisions they have all made in the past, some of which come to devastate their lives.

Some of the descriptions of Maori life are not as tautly realised as they could have been but taken as a whole Tremain's assured novel is never less than engrossing. The book has opened a whole new genre of historical fiction for me - and I've discovered another novelist I didn't know I liked.

The White Tiger has claws

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The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga is an epistolary tale told as a series of letters from our protagonist -  a humble chauffeur - to the Premier of China. It seems an odd way to tell a riveting story of one man's climb from poverty - 'the darkness' - to riches - 'the light' - in modern day India. On the journey the novel uses the deep divides within the society to underline how difficult it is for many to move up from their caste, or social class.

While the reader's initial sympathies are with our hero, we come to realise that he has lost his own morals and clawed his way to the top by committing a terrible act in his bid to become an 'entrepreneur' in the new India.

The sense of place created by Adiga is compelling and while the reader gets a broad brush picture of the society, it is the incidental details that stay with you long after the last page is turned. Highly recommended.

Copywriter stops for Lancashire lunch

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Ashberry Sandwiches make and deliver sarnies throughout the North West of England. Based in Blackpool, Lancashire they have grown from a single Spar shop to a purpose-built unit employing over 100 people filling, spreading and slicing for Spar shops and forecourts throughout the region.

They asked me to write newsletters for both customers and their staff and media relations for both the general regional press and the trade magazines. We had great success with seasonal stories, which emphasised the company's quirkiness. For instance, we launched a strawberry and cream cheese sandwich for Valentine's Day and linked it to a factory romance that was blossoming among the sliced Hovis!