Copywriting
The Power of Text and Sub-Text
© 2009 Ugur Akinci We are all swimming in an seamless and boundless ocean of stories, narratives, texts, and sub-texts. Like the oxygen we breath, 99% of the time we are not even aware that that is the case. We are not even aware of it and that’s why it is so powerful. Here is…
Read MoreDon't Quote an Hourly Rate or Fixed Fee for Your Writing Services
© Ugur Akinci Here is something I’ve learned the hard way: if you publish or quote a fixed hourly rate or a fixed fee for different types of writing services, you’ll end up attracting the cheapest and hardest clients and you’ll never make money in this freelance writing business. We writers are generally very nice…
Read MoreWrite for Niche Markets to Earn More
© 2009-2010 Ugur Akinci We live in a world of specialization and specialists always earn more. There are neighborhood car mechanics who fix any old car and those who repair only Jaguars, BMWs and Porches. Guess who charges more? Your family doctor may know a lot about a number of different diseases. There’s also your…
Read MorePerseverance vs. Perseveration and the Role of Stress in Writing Life
© Ugur Akinci I have always wondered about the relative merits of hanging in there and keep pushing up against life’s obstacles (perseverance), on the one hand, and continuing to do what clearly does not work and suffering the inevitable consequences of uncontrollable repetition (perseveration), on the other. The dominant market mentality encourages us to…
Read MoreThe Importance of Using the Right Words
© 2009 Ugur Akinci Using the right words is so critical in communications in general and technical writing in particular. The wrong word can take the conversation to a totally unintended direction, sometimes with humorous and other times with not-so-humorous results. Here is an example… As I was jogging the other day I was listening…
Read MoreDo Your Verbs Agree with Your Subjects?
© 2009-2010 Ugur Akinci It’s a fundamental rule of English grammar: your VERB must agree with the SUBJECT of your sentence. Why I’m addressing this very basic rule? The reason is, when violated, it can have disastrous consequences in technical writing. First the RULE: The garage [Main SUBJECT] where he kept [auxiliary VERB] his antique…
Read MoreLearning How to Write Well with John Steinbeck
One of the best ways to learn how to write well is to read a master and pay attention to the way he or she is doing it. I still read a lot of books with that kind of awareness since even after 20 years of writing for a living I’m still learning how to…
Read MoreHow to estimate a copy writing job
© 2009-2010 Ugur Akinci It’s not easy to estimate how long a copy writing job will take due to the many factors involved in the estimation. Writing commercial copy does not only involve sitting in front of your keyboard and starting to pound away. You need to make research, read all the relevant materials on…
Read MoreWhich Way Your Sentences Branch – Right or Left?
Ugur Akinci Try right-branching sentences in your technical documents for higher comprehension. Right-branching sentences start with the SUBJECT, follow it with PRIMARY VERB (or sometimes the other way around if the verb is in imperative/order mode), and then end with modifiers and other relevant information. What branches off to the right of the subject and…
Read MoreGive Speeches to Supplement Your Income as a Writer
by Gary Karbon Guest Writer Have you considered giving talks as a natural way to supplement your income as a writer? If you haven’t, you should. It’s a powerful shortcut to become known as an “instant guru” in your field without receiving a Ph.D. degree. Writers are natural speakers since they know how to organize…
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