Blog - Pete Hugh

First off, it has nothing to do with copyrights, patents, or trademarks. If you’re looking for any of those things, I’m afraid I really can’t help you.

The standard definition of copywriting is that it’s “like a salesman in print”, but I’ve never gotten along with that analogy.

It seems somehow too restrictive.

Where traditional copywritten pieces (direct mail, advertisements, billboards, and the like) are designed to sell a specific product, these days a subtler message is often needed.

The Internet opens up so much choice that a single letter or advert will generally be insufficient to convince a prospect to part with more than a few hours’ worth of pay.

And if you’ve spent any time looking around my site, you’ll notice I don’t work with small-time products. My clients are almost exclusively large tech companies, who sell predominantly to other businesses (B2B).

But all this is not to say that “sales writing” is a waste of time. In fact quite the opposite is true.

It’s just not all that’s needed.

And that’s why I prefer a wider definition, which includes all the facets of quality, modern copywriting:

“Persuasive, Engaging, Educational”

Persuade – Even when you’re not selling, you must bring the reader round to your way of thinking.

Engage – If it’s boring, nobody will read it. Nobody.

Educate – Perhaps the most important word in the tech industry. You can’t sell a product if nobody understands it.

Consider a white paper, or a case study.

Clearly these are not “sales” pieces, but they must still convince your reader. In essence, you’re selling your expertise, your trustworthiness, and your ability to help them.

The same goes for blog posts, research articles, emails and autoresponders, website content… even tender documents.

If you like, copywriting is the ability to sell… even when you aren’t selling.

The real secret is to persuade, engage, and educate your prospects… and then help them to buy.

But we’ll talk about that more in my next post: What is Content Marketing?

A fair question, and one I’d like to take a few moments to answer.

My name is Pete, and I have two major interests: Writing, and Tech.

I’ve written about pretty much everything in my lifetime. As a child I enjoyed creative writing more than anything else at school.

In my teenage years I wrote more journal entries than was probably healthy.

As a young man I started writing non-fiction on a variety of largely unlinked subjects that were interesting only to me.

At college I studied Business, Economics and Politics, which involved – you guessed it – lots of writing. Nothing changed significantly in the three years I spent gaining my business management B.Sc. from the University of Surrey. They loved essays too.

In the following years I worked variously as a data analyst and project manager in the fields of Adult Social Care, Procurement, Finance, and IT. My combined love of writing and tech led me to write all sorts of things, including:

Project Documentation
Tender Documents – Invitations to Tender (ITTs) & Tender Responses. (I also designed the tender evaluation model used throughout Hampshire County Council, and evaluated more tender submissions than I care to remember)
Social Media Campaigns
Bids and Proposals
Copy for over a dozen websites, including Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

And all manner of reports, business cases, newsletters and whatever else needed writing.

Scintillating stuff, I know.

Technology was something I came to from an altogether different angle.

One day, when I was young and minding my own business, my father came home with the most amazing thing I’d ever seen: Our first computer.

Now I feel I should give the whole story, so here it is. This computer had actually belonged to his employer, but one night when he was working late he accidentally spilled beer over the keyboard. Unperturbed, he found someone to do the necessary repair job, and paid for it himself.

It looked something like this:

Oh yes, it was a laptop.

It ran Windows 3.1, and was good for little more than playing Minesweeper or Tetris. It also looked a bit like a Fisher Price kiddies toy.

Nonetheless, it was my portal into the magical world of technology.

I won’t bore you further with the details, but as my life went on I’d continue to be fascinated by tech – Everything from mobile phones and e-readers to servers, programming languages, and office software.

Over the past 5 years I’ve spent well over a full day (yes, 24 hours) discussing Microsoft Excel, and its various competitors, with my Father.

Dad spent most of his career working as an Accountant, and was lucky enough to be one of the first users of Visicalc – The very first electronic spreadsheet.

You can imagine how quickly everyone else leaves the room when we get started.

In my spare time I like to write about my interests – usually technology, but also including personal development, diet, exercise, sleep, and learning. At one point, well before I’d had any formal writing training, I created a whole website devoted to the selection and use of office software.

Although not in my hands, the site is still going, and if you’re as much of a geek as I am you can still find an old article I wrote about using the VLOOKUP function in Microsoft Excel.

So.. Copywriting?

Some time ago I realised that, though I enjoyed the work I was doing, I’d much rather be working for myself.

Not only would that mean I could spend more of my time doing what I really enjoyed – Writing, learning about tech, and working directly with business clients – it would also give me the freedom to do things my own way.

Oh, and cut out 2-3 hours of commuting each day.

So I quit my job. I undertook every copywriting course I could find, studied every piece of direct mail that came through my letterbox, and pored over every assignment I could get my hands on.

After years of education and increasingly responsible jobs, I’d finally found what I wanted to do. And I was good at it.

So without further ado…

My name is Pete Hugh, and I help tech companies attract more clients and grow their business.

For more info on how I do that, check out my About Me page, or keep reading my blog.

What is Copywriting?

“Persuasive, Engaging, Educational”

Who The Hell Are You?

So.. Copywriting?