The KISS Principal Applies to Not Only What You Write – But Also How!   

This is especially true when trying to write ads.  I don’t know how many times over my tenure as a copywriter I’ve actually said “your ad should be about one thing – and one thing only”.  In fact, there are times I’m convinced that if I had a nickel (maybe a quarter with inflation) for every time that I’ve said those words, that I would not need to be an ad writer anymore. 

However, as I recently discovered and will explain further, it’s not only advice that I should be giving to others, but it’s something I should remind myself of as well when I’m trying to construct an ad.

See, just like I would like to tell most advertisers and business owners, that they really know too much about their product to be objective when it comes time to decide what to write – I should also remind myself that I know a lot about the craft of writing radio ads, and that I need to keep it simple too!

As you may or may not know, I am a graduate of the Wizard of Ads – which simply means that I spent about 4 mind-blowing days in Austin Texas learning a lot about advertising, human nature, physics, and how to deconstruct the creativity of art, music, photography and poetry and use those techniques to write more effectively from Roy Williams.  And if you know about Roy, then you likely know about his weekly blog post called the Monday Morning Memo. 

Like many others, those who’ve been to Texas, and many who have not – I read his Memo every Monday.  In a recent Memo I was reminded about the basic lesson of the KISS principle as it relates to writing an ad.  If you go to the website (www.mondaymorningmemo.com) and look through the archives you’ll find the whole Memo called “Japanese Summer”.  I suggest you read it.

He does an extremely good job of explaining how important it is to keep it simple and how valuable hiring or having a good ad copywriter is to creating effective ads.  But here is the nugget that I dug out of the ground, dusted off and am trying desperately to put to use.

It’s nice to have a fancy ad – well crafted and filled with information.  But the average person just doesn’t care.  They don’t care how knowledgeable you are about your product.  All they really want to know is what will your product or service do to make my life better.  And when you tell me about it – keep it simple, cause I don’t have a lot of time and I don’t want to be challenged trying to figure out just what it is you’re trying to tell me. 

I realized when I read this Memo that I have often been guilty of being too cute, or too complicated – when all I needed to do was say it simply – say it plainly.  Then get the hell out of the way. See after more than 20 years, I’m still learning too.