In-focus-remembering-your-audience-and-message - The Writers For Hire

STAY IN FOCUS: REMEMBERING YOUR AUDIENCE AND MESSAGE When you’re in the middle of a copywriting job, there’s an age-old marketing maxim that can be hard to remember – and it can sometimes be hard to convey to clients: You can’t be all things to all people. Good copy does two things: It speaks to a specific, targeted audience AND it has a specific, focused message. The two go hand in hand. If you try to talk to several target audiences at once, or if your message is too broad, you’ll end up with copy that’s the equivalent of lukewarm, watery coffee. No one wants that. How to Find Your Target Audience: A target audience can still be fairly broad, but it needs to be identified. Sometimes it’s just a matter of asking your client. Sometimes, they might not know. A few ways to sort and identify target audiences is by: 1. Gender 2. Age 3. Profession 4. Interest/Hobby 5. Income You may find that, more often than not, your target audience falls in between several of those categories. For instance, I would guess that video game companies traditionally target young men under 30 with time and cash to spare. Another way to identify your target audience is to ask questions such as Who is buying your product or service? and Who do you want to pay attention to you? When you don’t have a defined audience, you can’t have defined copy. You can’t, for instance, write a marketing piece that’s aimed at national advertisers, local businesses, customers, and teenagers. That’s because these group have no common links – they each have their own needs, their own perspective. You’d be better off creating marketing materials for each group, because trying to write a single piece directed to all of them is going to be a jumbled, generic disaster. How to Choose a Specific Message: Your message always comes AFTER you identify your target audience. That’s because you can’t start crafting a message until you know who you’re talking to, who’s going to be interested in this product or service, or why they need it. Now, all copy needs to be persuasive, well-written, and focused on identifying differentiators and benefits. Once again, you can’t be all things to all people. Your message should do two things: 1. It should identify a problem that your target market faces. 2. It should offer a solution to that problem. Once you’ve identified both the problem and the solution, start crafting single sentence theses. This won’t necessarily be your company’s slogan or new campaign, but it will help keep your thoughts organized as you develop your marketing materials. And it will help you identify different angles and avenues for your marketing campaign. For example, a new energy drink could take many different routes with an email advertising campaign. Here are some examples of marketing messages (not slogans) that the company could take: DrinkX gives you the energy you need without the jitters you get from caffeine or the crash you get from sugary drinks. Five great flavors means you won’t only get the energy you need from DrinkX – you’ll actually enjoy drinking it. The first message focuses on the fact that DrinkX doesn’t contain caffeine or sugar. The second message is all about taste (literally). Either message may work, as long as it correctly addresses a problem that the target audience perceives concerning energy drinks (either, a problem with energy drinks causing jitters, or a problem with energy drinks tasting terrible). Now, if the message you use is the wrong one, you may end up wasting a lot of cash. But, if you can’t decide between the messages, you’ll have the same problem: spending a lot of money going back and forth, trying to target different audiences. Applying the Message: Where do you go from there? Well, there are a couple of options. For small campaigns, keep things simple: try two targeted landing pages on your website. Draw traffic with pay-per-click ads and measure the results. Which one does better? That’s the correct message; stick with it. If you’re launching a massive marketing campaign with print, radio, web, and TV ads, you have a few options. You can run complete campaigns in different regions and see which one does better (lots of cash required for this option). A more affordable route is to do some basic surveys on your own – via email or phone – to find out what your target audience really cares about. In Review: There’s a process to it all, a method to the copywriting madness. And it goes like this: 1. Identify your target audience 2. Identify your message 3. THEN start writing †¦

How to Write a Science Fair Project Report

How to Write a Science Fair Project Report Writing a science fair project report may seem like a challenging task, but it is not as difficult as it first appears. This is a format that you may use to write a science project report. If your project included animals, humans, hazardous materials, or regulated substances, you can attach an appendix that describes any special activities your project required. Also, some reports may benefit from additional sections, such as abstracts and bibliographies. You may find it helpful to fill out the science fair lab report template to prepare your report. Important: Some science fairs have guidelines put forth by the science fair committee or an instructor. If your science fair has these guidelines, be sure to follow them. Title:  For a science fair, you probably want a catchy, clever title. Otherwise, try to make it an accurate description of the project. For example, I could entitle a project, Determining Minimum NaCl Concentration That Can Be Tasted in Water.  Avoid unnecessary words, while covering the essential purpose of the project. Whatever title you come up with, get it critiqued by friends, family, or teachers.Introduction and Purpose:  Sometimes this section is called background. Whatever its name, this section introduces the topic of the project, notes any information already available, explains why you are interested in the project, and states the purpose of the project. If you are going to state references in your report, this is where most of the citations are likely to be, with the actual references listed at the end of the entire report in the form of a bibliography or reference section.The Hypothesis or Question:  Explicitly state your hypothesis or question.Materials and Meth ods:  List the materials you used in your project and describe the procedure that you used to perform the project. If you have a photo or diagram of your project, this is a good place to include it. Data and Results:  Data and results are not the same things. Some reports will require that they be in separate sections, so make sure you understand the difference between the concepts. Data refers to the actual numbers or other information you obtained in your project. Data can be presented in tables or charts, if appropriate. The results section is where the data is manipulated or the hypothesis is tested. Sometimes this analysis will yield tables, graphs, or charts, too. For example, a table listing the minimum concentration of salt that I can taste in water, with each line in the table being a separate test or trial, would be data. If I average the data or perform a statistical test of a null hypothesis, the information would be the results of the project.Conclusion:  The conclusion focuses on the hypothesis or  question as it compares to the data and results. What was the answer to the question? Was the hypothesis supported (keep in mind a hypothesis cannot be proved, onl y disproved)? What did you find out from the experiment? Answer these questions first. Then, depending on your answers, you may wish to explain the ways in which the project might be improved or introduce new questions that have come up as a result of the project. This section is judged not only by what you were able to conclude  but also by your recognition of areas where you could not draw valid conclusions based on your data. Appearances Matter Neatness counts, spelling counts, grammar counts. Take the time to make the report look nice. Pay attention to margins, avoid fonts that are difficult to read or are too small or too large, use clean paper, and make print the report cleanly on as good a printer or copier as you can.

3 Examples of Misplaced Modifiers

3 Examples of Misplaced Modifiers 3 Examples of Misplaced Modifiers 3 Examples of Misplaced Modifiers By Mark Nichol n each of the following examples, placement of a phrase obfuscates the sentence’s narrative flow. Discussion and a revision follow each sentence. 1. Ultimately, it isn’t the strongest or the smartest companies that survive and prosper, but those that successfully adapt to change. Because â€Å"survive and prosper† applies to both the point and the counterpoint, it is best located at the end of the sentence; otherwise, the phrases ending in â€Å"that survive and prosper† and â€Å"that successfully adapt to change† appear to be distinct, whereas the second phrase, as part of the larger phrase beginning with but, is subordinate to the main clause: â€Å"Ultimately, it isn’t the strongest or the smartest companies, but those that successfully adapt to change, that survive and prosper.† 2. Anthony Ervin made history in the men’s 50-meter freestyle by becoming the oldest swimmer to win an individual Olympic gold medal at age thirty-five. This sentence states that of all the individual Olympic gold medalists in swimming who were thirty-five, Ervin was the oldest, but to correctly associate the age with Ervin alone, rather than with all thirty-five-year-old swimmers, the phrase â€Å"at age thirty-five† must be adjacent to Ervin’s name, preferably as an introductory phrase: â€Å"At age thirty-five, Anthony Ervin made history in the men’s 50-meter freestyle by becoming the oldest swimmer to win an individual Olympic gold medal.’ 3. Nevertheless, Neo-Nazis and white supremacists have been perpetuating the myth that the movie has an anti-Semitic message since at least 2008. The sentence could be misread to suggest that the myth is that the movie acquired a particular message in a specific year. To clarify that the year refers simply to the advent of the notion itself and is not integral to the notion, it should be placed near the head of the sentence: â€Å"Nevertheless, since 2008, Neo-Nazis and white supremacists have been perpetuating the myth that the movie has an anti-Semitic message.† Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Grammar category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:50 Synonyms for â€Å"Leader†10 Types of Transitions10 Writing Exercises to Tighten Your Writing

The nature of democracy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

The nature of democracy - Essay Example Democracy as defined by Margaret Thatcher was through her policies known as Thatcherism. A simple definition of Thatcherism involves three main themes, which are; it was the peak suitable shorthand portrayal of what Conformist administrations practiced between 1979 and 1990. This ideology shows that every step these governments took had a heavy doctrinal base, and it infers that all the Conservative governments in this era were subject to their leader, Mrs. Thatcher. Gorbachev, on the other hand, was determined on restoring Soviet socialism through peaceful and democratic means. The hitch, of course, was that the Soviet economy was a deranged system that directed people and resources through state commands, threats, and the force of the Gulag (McFaul, 2002). Nonetheless, Gorbachev relentlessly strained to reform the organization, not through orders but using influence and pleas to truth and teamwork. Ronald Reagan, in support of United Kingdom, dared Gorbachev who at the time was the secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, a major participant in the cold war. Reagan believed that communist democratic system was going to split down as a symbol of Gorbachev desire to increase unrestrained freedom in the Eastern bloc of Germany restructuring and transparency processes. Thatcherism asserts to promote low inflation, the slight state and free markets through strong control of the money supply, privatization and constraints on the labor movement (Blundell, 2008). It is frequently associated with Reaganomics, which implemented policies founded on supply-side finances and encouraged a traditional liberal and laissez-faire viewpoint, in search of stimulating the economy with large, across-the-board tax cuts. Gorbachev also initiated capitalism through the laissez faire ideology. This was a major reason for the fall of communism in Russia. The inflexibilities and deceits of the Soviet economic and political organization demonstrated to be fundamentally resis tant to change, ending in the comprehensive fall of the Soviet government and economy in 1991. Capitalism backs democracy in that it takes very slight upkeep from the government for a capitalist economy to work. Capitalism undermines democracy since wealth in a capitalistic culture ultimately converts to be much lop-sided, and this culminates to a vast gap among the proletariat and the bourgeoisies. This result to the entire democratic developments being tainted by money added in the political course and the effect that money has on the politicians. Democracy and socials, on the other hand, have a curious relationship. Both of these traditions are rooted in the philosophical concept of equality (Duberstein, 2006). However, different characteristics of equality are emphasized. Democracy relates to political equality and socialism relates to material equality. From all these relationships, a deep analysis of Vaclav and Gorbachev depict the latter in their type of ideologies. Equity as a nature of democracy and capitalism was portrayed in Thatcher’s government, and she introduced various political as well as economic initiatives intended to reverse high unemployment rates and the Britain’s fights in the rise of winter of dissatisfaction and on-going downturn. Margret Thatcher’s political view and economic policies emphasized the deregulation specifically on the financial

Data design Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Data design - Essay Example sequences that are to be integrated into the system should be turned into separate sequences in order to ease the procedure of processing information (Terry Halpin, Tony Morgan, Morgan Kaufmann Information Modeling and Relational Databases, Second Edition, March 2008. page 134). c. Feedback: The system should have the capability to provide feedback which is articulate, informative and semantically correct. This will ensure that the information displayed on the user and the client side is reliable and correctly understood (Terry Halpin, Tony Morgan, Morgan Kaufmann Information Modeling and Relational Databases, Second Edition, March 2008 page. 136). d. System messages: The system should be able to provide user centered messages like error messages. (Terry Halpin, Tony Morgan, Morgan Kaufmann Information Modeling and Relational Databases, Second Edition, March 2008 page 139). The system should also avoid using threatening messages or alarming messages. e. Display: The display between screens should be consistent and must show some degree of inertia. Unnecessary information should be avoided since they will be of no use and the interface should use easily recognizable icons. (Ramez Elmasri, Shamkant Navathe, Addison-Wesley Fundamentals of Database Systems (6th Edition), April 2010. Page

Hurricane Katrina Essay Example for Free

Hurricane Katrina Essay Mike Mulally 10-11-19 In 2005 Hurricane Katrina swept through the city of New Orleans and destroyed the lives of thousands. Katrina was one of the largest hurricanes and natural disasters in the history of the United States (Wikipedia, 2009). While most of the casualties’ occurred during the actual storm, still a many took place days after, and were do to the fact that the local, state, and national government were slow to respond. This slow response was due to the nature of federalism. I believe Americans got a glimpse at how federalism and bureaucracy have flaws. These imperfections will be discussed in the pages below. The PBS documentary â€Å"The Storm,† depicts the destruction Hurricane Katrina caused, as well as what went wrong with the evacuation and rescue of New Orleans residents. Local, state, and national government officials were interviewed, such as New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, New Orleans governor Kathleen Blanco, and FEMA Director Michael Brown. Each official gave his or her version of why events happened the way they did. Some of the their accounts contradicted each other. I believe everyone was just looking out for him or herself, trying to save face. This seems to be a common problem in American politics. I will next explore how federalisms can be a inconvenience in a situation such as a natural disaster. Federalism by definition â€Å"is a system in which governmental powers are divided between a central government and smaller units, like states†(Greenberg Page, 2009, Ch. 3). The officials at all levels of the government were somehow confused during Katrina on who exactly was in charge. Was it New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, FEMA Director Michael Brown, was it President Bush? † (Marcela, 2005). There was also a lack of communication between the different levels of government, which, as was talked about in class, is an obvious downside or barrier to federalism (Oxendine, 2009). In a situation like a natural disaster, communication is key. If one cannot communicate with another, how is anything supposed to be accomplished? Having several le vels of government involved just makes everything in a disaster situation more complicated. I believe the U. S. needs a more centralized form of a disaster agency. If a natural disaster is to happen there ought to be one plan of action carried out by one agency. Having this central organization would have alleviated much of the confusion and frustration that we witnessed with Katrina. According to Director Brown, after Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans’ local government did not communicate very well with FEMA officials. Brown says he was never told what sorts of manpower or supplies were needed (Marcela 2009). However Louisiana National Guard Adjutant General Bennett Landreneau stated in his interview that he specifically sent requests to FEMA for what help was required. A few days after he was interviewed he sent in the documentation that proves he did indeed ask specific needs from FEMA (Marcela 2009). FEMA Director Brown lied on television. So often politicians lie about issues, why can’t they ever own up to their mistakes and just tell the truth. I believe the American public deserves to know the truth on issues, especially when dealing with something like Hurricane Katrina. In a natural disaster it is at first the state that has control. If the state becomes overwhelmed and can no longer control the situation, the state then needs to clearly articulate what services they are in need of, and that is when FEMA will then intervene. Several days after the storm, Director Brown apparently believed the state of Louisiana had the situation under control (Marcela, 2005). While the Mayor and Governor thought FEMA was going to step in and help. There was a period of time where nobody knew who was in command. Consequently there was a period of time where the many of the people of New Orleans had no food, water or shelter, and that is when many lives were lost. It bewilders one to think that this sort of miscommunication and misunderstanding could happen to a country like the United States. One would assume that our country would have one of the best disaster protocols in the world, considering our global supremacy. I will now touch on another part of U. S. government that I consider to have flaws, and that is bureaucracy. A bureaucracy as defined by Greenberg Page (2009) is â€Å" A large, complex organization characterized by a hierarchical set of offices, each with a specific task, controlled through a clear chain of command, and where appointment and advancement of personnel is based on merit† (Ch. 13). Individuals are appointed not elected and therein lies a problem. Anyone that the president chooses can be in a position of power. Many believe Michael Brown was absolutely not qualified for the position of FEMA Director (Greenberg Page, 2009, Ch. 13). After all he had no formal training in disaster relief or anything of that sort in his resume. Positions like FEMA director should have to have some sort of qualifications. One cannot just be put into that situation like Director Brown was. I believe that positions such as director should be an elected one. When someone who is not qualified is put in charge of one of biggest natural disasters in U. S. history, nothing good can come from it. And indeed that is exactly what happened, total chaos and confusion took place due to Director Michael Brown’s incompetence. After the attacks of 9/11 President Bush reorganized FEMA into a Bureaucracy. FEMA was downgraded and became a sub department of homeland security. Many believe this reorganization really hurt FEMA. Personnel, IT systems and other resources were dramatically reduced due to President Bush’s budget cutting agenda. The President also cut project impact, a program started by FEMA to help communities become disaster resistant, due to tax cuts (Marcella 2009). In addition 80 million dollars was taken from FEMA and distributed to other sectors in homeland security. This is just another problem of FEMA becoming a part of the U. S. bureaucracy. How would anyone expect an organization to do their job when they have had significant funds and resources cut? Clearly part of FEMA’s inadequacies can be linked to President Bush’s choice to make tax cuts and cut parts of their program. Again, the reorganization of FEMA was really detrimental. Hopefully in the future leaders will make more conscientious choices about which agencies should be cut back. Most would believe a disaster relief program such as FEMA should have some of the most funding and personnel available. Apparently former President Bush thought otherwise. Although President Bush does deserves a little bit of a break considering â€Å"the sheer size and complexity of the executive branch. There is so much going on, in so many agencies, involving the activity of tens of thousands of people, that simply keeping abreast of it all is no easy task† (Greenberg Page, 2009, Ch. 13). He is in charge of so much in the U. S. there is no way he could keep an eye on everything. So while the President may have indirectly affected FEMA by inducing budget cuts, he cannot be held directly responsible for the government’s lack of involvement in Katrina at the national level. The president relies on his appointees to do their jobs, which Director Brown did not fulfill. However, President Bush choose Michael Brown, so maybe Bush is in fact responsible for FEMA’s inadequacies. Obviously having a large federal bureaucracy is an inconvenience to say the least. I believe Hurricane Katrina has taught our country a few lessons. First of all that while having a federal bureaucracy has its pluses, it also brings with it it’s many flaws, and the main one being communication. Our government should be striving for interoperability. The ability for several groups at all levels of the government to communicate what resources are needed during a natural disaster will prove to be the single most important tool during a relief operation. I hope that in the future, Presidents will choose more wisely when filling high-level positions such as FEMA Director, and not just appoint those who helped with their campaign. I also hope more cities around the country have better evacuation plans than those of New Orleans. I hope National Guard buildings are better equipped with resources and manpower in the future, especially along costal areas that are known to have hurricanes.

Issues in Teaching the English Language Essay -- English Writing Teach

Struggle as I may, I cannot avoid James Berlin’s statement: â€Å"To teach writing is to argue for a version of reality† (234). If I’m going to be successful in any academic field, in any language, there are certain conventions that I must follow, but what I say and how I think is inexorably linked to the available resources of any particular convention. For my part, I just can’t escape the confines of the English language. I see this most poignantly when I try to teach a Chinese writer how to cite sources or when I attempt to read a text in translation. To teach writing is to argue for a version of reality, and the best way of knowing and communicating it. . . . All composition teachers are ineluctably operating in this realm, whether or not they consciously choose to do so. (Berlin, 234) The language in which we think, speak and write effects the meanings we are able to construct; it molds our versions of reality. One of the more famous instances of this dynamic at work can be observed in translating Sophocles’ Antigone. There is a word in the first and second lines of the Second Stasimon, popularly referred to as â€Å"The Ode to Man,† which brings this issue to the foreground. The word is deinoj [1] (deinos). It is conventionally translated as â€Å"wondrous.† Its meaning, however, is far more complex than â€Å"wondrous.† If any one word in the English language comes closest to approximating its meaning in the given context, the word is awesome. In Greek, its meaning runs the gamut of terrible, fearful, awful, danger, implying force or power for good or ill, mighty, wondrous, marvelous, strange, passed into that of able, clever, skilful [2]. It is utterly impossible to translate this Greek idea into English without somehow tempe... ...uns on the French word differer, which means both "to differ" and "to defer." The result is differance, which is a misspelling of 'difference.' Since words are only signifiers and have no inherent meaning, there is a distance between the signifier and the signified. The meaning is deferred. And since words are identified by what they are not, their meaning is defined by difference. Hence, differance. When spoken in French, differance sounds no different than difference, a clever subtlety that, again, is lost in the translation. Derrida is no doubt aware that the two words sound the same, a fact which exhibits a weakness in spoken language† (http:65.107.211.207/theory/maslin/Difference_750.htm). Please note that the author didn’t define this term in his paper because the author has taken a decidedly anti-academic-jargon stance in so far as he can never actually stand. Issues in Teaching the English Language Essay -- English Writing Teach Struggle as I may, I cannot avoid James Berlin’s statement: â€Å"To teach writing is to argue for a version of reality† (234). If I’m going to be successful in any academic field, in any language, there are certain conventions that I must follow, but what I say and how I think is inexorably linked to the available resources of any particular convention. For my part, I just can’t escape the confines of the English language. I see this most poignantly when I try to teach a Chinese writer how to cite sources or when I attempt to read a text in translation. To teach writing is to argue for a version of reality, and the best way of knowing and communicating it. . . . All composition teachers are ineluctably operating in this realm, whether or not they consciously choose to do so. (Berlin, 234) The language in which we think, speak and write effects the meanings we are able to construct; it molds our versions of reality. One of the more famous instances of this dynamic at work can be observed in translating Sophocles’ Antigone. There is a word in the first and second lines of the Second Stasimon, popularly referred to as â€Å"The Ode to Man,† which brings this issue to the foreground. The word is deinoj [1] (deinos). It is conventionally translated as â€Å"wondrous.† Its meaning, however, is far more complex than â€Å"wondrous.† If any one word in the English language comes closest to approximating its meaning in the given context, the word is awesome. In Greek, its meaning runs the gamut of terrible, fearful, awful, danger, implying force or power for good or ill, mighty, wondrous, marvelous, strange, passed into that of able, clever, skilful [2]. It is utterly impossible to translate this Greek idea into English without somehow tempe... ...uns on the French word differer, which means both "to differ" and "to defer." The result is differance, which is a misspelling of 'difference.' Since words are only signifiers and have no inherent meaning, there is a distance between the signifier and the signified. The meaning is deferred. And since words are identified by what they are not, their meaning is defined by difference. Hence, differance. When spoken in French, differance sounds no different than difference, a clever subtlety that, again, is lost in the translation. Derrida is no doubt aware that the two words sound the same, a fact which exhibits a weakness in spoken language† (http:65.107.211.207/theory/maslin/Difference_750.htm). Please note that the author didn’t define this term in his paper because the author has taken a decidedly anti-academic-jargon stance in so far as he can never actually stand.