Copywriters: Guilty as Charged?

The whole ball of wax is simple for the copywriter. I only take on projects I believe in, and can get excited about. Then it is my duty to sell it the best I can, in its honest, but “best looking” light. I fact-check it the best I can against my creative brief, but in the end, it's up to the product owner to make sure the facts are in compliance.

I think an acceptable analogy is the gun shop owner.

Does the gun shop owner take responsibility if one of their guns was used in the commission of a crime? No. But there are limits, and there are steps to take that, if neglected, can make the copywriter somewhat responsible.

For example, let's take the scenarios you indicated:

#1: Clients who defraud:

Just as the gun owner doesn't know how their guns will be used, we don't know how clients will use our copy. We're copywriters, not psychics. Gun shop owners do background checks, just as copywriters use questionnaires. Which is why I think copywriters who don't do any due diligence are partly responsible. It makes them, to some degree, complicit. (Complicity through negligence, in this case.)

#2: Clients who lie:

As I said earlier, gun shop owners do background checks. But with identity theft and fraud being as rampant as it is, how can we prove the information we're given is legit? And if the gun was purchased using fraudulent information, the gun shop owner is not liable. (Of course, provided the gun shop owner proved he carried out proper due diligence.)

#3: Shenanigans:

What if the gun buyer provides legit documentation and information, but has current personal issues we don't know of? Issues not found during a standard background check? Such as recent psychological problems? Or recently fired from their jobs? Or anger management issues? Well, it's ditto as #2. We're copywriters, not psychics — much less lawyers carrying out discoveries. However, as you suggested, we might want to start asking for references or even do credit checks. I know of some copywriters who do this.

#4: Willful Complicity:

That's a non-issue. It's no different than a gun shop owner who willingly sells to a known criminal (or to someone who's clear about what the gun is intended for). However, I think there's a difference between moral, unethical, and illegal.

Illegal: the gun is going to be used to commit a crime.

Unethical: the gun is used for self-defense, but is stored in a poorly locked location in a house filled with kids.

Immoral: the gun is used to hunt. (This might be considered immoral by vegetarians, for example.)

All three are different. The third is pretty black and white. The second a little less. But the third is definitely a gray area. The mroe black and white it is, the more complicit the copywriter is or should be.

But that brings me to the point:

A gun shop owner who skips a background check, or sells guns on the black market, or ignores tell-tale signs (i.e., the buyer appears drunk or high on drugs, for example) are definitely in the wrong.

Or more loosely, bad gun shop owners will attract bad clientele, for we attract who we are. So while any one of the above scenarios, which may happen once or twice in a copywriter's career, is forgivable, if it happens more often than the norm, then I think the copywriter is just as complicit.

Because he is attracting who he is.

Ryan, I think you summed it up best when you said “write copy that sells without being deceptive”. Positioning something so it appeals to its best customer is actually doing that customer a favor, if the product has a high perceived value to him.

Meanwhile, it's up to the client to give you all the info you need to work with, when asking you to write a sales letter. It's not up to you to check out that information and their background and business practices, piece by piece – that *would* be over-reaching your responsibilities! But if something doesn't feel right (and I think all copywriters do experience those vibes sometimes, when talking to potential customers), it's only common sense to check it out more thoroughly… and/or pass.

That being said, your Situation # 1 as we all know nailed the late great Gary Halbert and netted him jail time – writing a letter for a product that never got delivered. The words “due diligence” come to mind; and copywriters, of course, have to practice that.

The bottom line, though? Copywriting is not so much about ethics as about law. What is a copywriter's legal responsibility? After that, your ethics are your own; just make darned sure you live up to them. That's my take.

And now, 'scuse me… I gotta get back to work. Thanks for the mind-break.

Hunting immoral? You've got to be kidding me. I'd be more accurate to say that hunting to feed your family is not immoral, but hunting for the pleasure of seeing how many you can get of something without regard to those that also want to hunt, that's immoral. In other words, over hunting, and you can include over fishing in this, is the immorality, not the act itself.

That's what happens when you touch-type and respond very quickly, without editing, lol!

You're right about the obligations to the “employer,” but you also have obligations to the reader (target). People take the copywriter “at their word” about the product/service. You say it's the greatest thing since the Microwave, and we tend to believe you. So, if you have any notion that it's really a piece of c–p, you shouldn't do the ad. The same way if the product or service is below average, don't try to make us think that it's better.
People have a cynical attitude towards advertising and marketing, because for too long that's exactly what copywriters did. It caused the prevalent idea that “Advertising makes us by things we don't want.” The truth is that Advertising does no such thing. It can do only one of two things. 1) Make us aware of a solution to a class of problems we didn't know existed. 2) Make people believe a solution exists, where it doesn't really. The first is both legal and ethical (usually), while the second is neither (always).
I say the first is unethical, when it draws a group's attention to a solution to a problem that they are unable to solve properly. For example, selling stock picking programs to the general public. Most people don't have money to lose, and little inclination to actually determine the truth of the offered program. The truth being that few if any can deliver on their promises, for any length of time.

Depending on their personal and professional ethics, copywriters can choose how they deal with situational ethics. Except when an outright fraud becomes well publicized, copywriters remain behind the curtain. The question is how you want to conduct business and sleep at night. Because of anonymity, I am sure more than one copywriter has been tempted to take on a questionable situation.

In professional sales, my situation has been very different. You are the face for the company you represent. I have commented that when I make a sales call, all I really have when I walk in is my reputation and creditability. Just like in copywriting, it is reputation and creditability that you are trying to establish and build on to make the sale. If the sale goes sour regardless of the reason, it is the sales person that they will remember. And believe me, they will remember. I did a large six figure deal and the company was almost 6 months late delivery the software to the client. Years later, I bumped into the project manager and he remembered me.

John Deck

Your scenario #4 reminds me that as a copywriter it sometimes seems like I'm selling feelings instead of products and this has weighed on me at times, even though the product isn't crappy.

Does the world really need another product about X? Or is it just part of the never-ending festival of hype where we point people to the newest shiny thing rather than encouraging them to use their own resources (i.e. encouraging Ralph Wolves instead of Sam Sheepdogs :-)?

The upside is that it's possible for a copywriter to have a positive impact in a marketing campaign, even if the product isn't all that necessary or is even borderline crappy.

Also, I've taken encouragement from what Brian Eno said last year in an interview about how he works with U2 in the studio: “'They feed on their own excitement… the point is to keep offering ladders that people can climb up to another place and then you can throw the ladder away afterwards, it doesn't matter.”

So even if it seems like we're selling feelings or it's not the greatest product in the world, as long as it's a ladder, then that's OK.

I have turned down work because of what I feel are ethical reasons. I also have signed the “Business Ethics Pledge” located at http://site.business-ethics-pledge.org/read-the... after reading and reviewing “Guerrilla Marketing Goes Green.”