The Copywriting Sourcebook: How to Write Better Copy, Faster-For Everything from Ads to Websites

by Andy Maslen

It's OK knowing the theory, but when it's 9am and you have just been given until lunchtime to write some copy for a new sales email, landing page, press ad or brochure, what you really need is a shortcut.This book takes the grind out of planning and writing almost any type of copy by providing step-by-step advice on the best layouts, approaches and styles to suit everything from an email subject line to recruitment ad, direct mail letter or website. Prepared by one of the best copywriters in the B2B sector, this book also provides the reader with templates for 13 of the most common copywriting tasks for maximum effectiveness and speed.

Genres: Business, Writing, Nonfiction

214 pages, Paperback

First published January 31, 2010

About the author

MULTI-MILLION COPY BESTSELLER

Andy Maslen writes thrillers across a number of genres: police procedurals, vigilante, psychological, suspense and horror. He spent 30 years in business before turning to writing full time.

Readers praise Andy's novels for their relatable characters, realistic dialogue, sense of place and kinetic action sequences, and for his meticulous research into police procedure around the world.

He is the creator of best-selling series featuring Kat Ballantyne, Gabriel Wolfe, Stella Cole and Inspector Ford, plus standalone novels and short stories.

Andy was born in Nottingham, England. After leaving university with a degree in psychology, he worked in business for thirty years as a copywriter. In his spare time, he plays the guitar. He lives in Wiltshire.

Reviews

[Pink · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good tips for copywriters, easy to read. It feels like the author talks to you in person kind of.

[Andrew Lisi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good how-to book. It's a British style approach, but heavily influenced by the classics of Ogivly and Sugarman. A colleague suggested I read it several years ago, and when I finally decided to give it a go, it took me less than 2 hours from start to finish.

Its pros?
1) Maslen is a practitioner, with experience on the field and some examples of his own work to show
2) This is a true manual, not just a self-promotional leaflet like many of the books on the same subject
3) You can easily browse the task on which you need help with (e.g. sales letter, brochure, article)
4) It covers the main tasks a true copywriter will be paid for
5) It is brief, practical and to the point.

As for its cons, this is the only one I found:
- Its sections on internet copy are largely outdated. The book was published in 2010, and many things obviously changed since then. So the advice on Adword, E-zine, WebPage is very basic, and sometimes irrelevant or plain wrong. This also means many other media and copy styles (for instance, the various social media networks and their ad formats, modern landing pages, video scripts) are not covered.

Overall, any working or aspiring copywriter - and even the small entrepreneur who wants to save money on copywriting fees - has to read this book, while taking into account that in some points he/she will have to fill in with his own knowledge of current media outlets.

[Christine Bonheure · Rating 3 out of 5]

Helaas een beetje een tegenvaller deze, na het werkelijk fantastische ‘Persuasive copywriting’ van dezelfde auteur. De inleiding op dat boek leerde me meer dan de vele copywritingcursussen die ik ooit heb gevolgd. Andy Maslen schreef dit boek in 2010. Dat is al een eeuw geleden! Hij geeft tips hoe je overtuigende titels schrijft, commerciële brieven, persberichten, brochures, adwords, webteksten, mailings, … Hij bekijkt de sterktes en zwaktes van elk teksttype, geeft advies over de beste structuur zodat copywriters vlug iets deftigs op papier kunnen zetten als ze worden geconfronteerd met een zeer korte deadline. Zo van die rushjobs waar je amper drie uur voor krijgt – elke copywriter weet waar ik het over heb. Sommige inzichten neem ik mee, maar ik mis de Aha-Erlebnis die ‘Persuasive copywriting’ me gaf én de humor. Dit hier is zoveel objectiever verteld. Praktisch boek, maar ook niet meer.

[Christina Widmann · Rating 5 out of 5]

You'll find it quaint today: The book starts with sales letters, that is, snail-mail advertising. It has all but disappeared. But the points Andy Maslen makes about sales letters translate easily into website and email advertising. (And he has special chapters about those, too.)

If you've never written an ad, or an email newsletter, before, this book will give you a good start. And even for me, a professional copywriter with 10 years of experience, there was useful advice.

[Hossein Babaei · Rating 1 out of 5]

برخلاف عنوان کتاب که انتظار برای راهنمایی جامع ایجاد کرد، فقط توضیحات بدیهی برای انواع مدیوم‌ها و جاهایی که به کپی‌رایتیتینگ نیاز داریم نوشته بود. فصل اول نسبتا خوب بود اما در فصل‌های بعدی حرفی برای گفتن نداشت.

[Johanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Abandoned on page 29 pdf version, not because it was not good but because I quit copywriting.

[Putra Perdana]

The title should be "Copywriting for Dummies". Period!

[Margot Note]

"Read" in the ER waiting room waiting for the doctors to pop my lovey's shoulder back in place!