How to make money writing short paragraphs (in the days before Twitter)

This unprovenanced ad for piecework copywriters was posted on BoingBoing. I'd love to repurpose it the next time we're hiring word people. "No tedious study."

What he's actually doing is selling you a series of books on writing for things like greeting cards and (I assume) tiny classified ads. If you're interested, there's a box of them on Ebay right now.

Ironically, there is also a long copy advertorial version I found here.

A Google search also turned up this one in an early-70s issue of Ebony:

Note that the Ebony insertion lacks Barrett's creepy mug, unlike this one in a 1973 Bangor Daily.

F'd Ad Fridays: Kopywriting Kourse teaches you to rite good

Saw this on my Facebook:

But today it's only 75% off. But even if it reaches 100% off, it's probably a bad deal. It takes you to an obvious spam site.

Dabitch from Adland also tells me that the image is stolen from here:

Copywriting: Getting lame dudes laid since the invention of language

While my wedding photos can't deny that a way with words can allow a man to date way out of his league, I'm not sure I'm convinced by this copywriter's self promo:



Erika, however, sounds well-qualified as a social marketer. Tell her to get dressed and send me a CV.

(Tip via Ads of The World)

Nice homemade bar ad

Spotted on Buzzfeed:

Everyone's a Copywriter these days.

F'd Ad Fridays: Winababy

Not much to see here. It's just the latest publicity stunt by Ottawa radio station HOT 89.9.

It's still in the teaser stage (I spotted this yesterday) but the copy on their web site already has me groaning:

Be listening to The Morning Hot Tub with Mauler, Rush, Jenni and Josie at 7:15am to find out what we've CONCEIVED!

It may RATTLE the city!

We're still in the INFANT stages of planning...

Ok, just listen Monday Morning.

This is going to be SPECIAL!

Any guesses on the contest theme? A free sample of DJ semen? An all-expenses-paid trip to a secret cloning lab? Human trafficking?

Ambiguous copywriting kills God

Well, that's unfortunate.

This real church billboard was placed in Mansfield, Ohio, as a response to the Freedom From Religion Foundation's "Good without God" campaign.

It caused Hemant Mehta of The Friendly Atheist to comment:

"Not only are they telling us that god doesn’t exist (in a large font, no less), they’re also telling us to be skeptical of what we hear! I couldn’t have said it better myself :)"