Honest Advertising: Targeting your ad through copy

While the article reminds me a little of the movie 'Crazy People', which stars the late Dudley Moore, there are some interesting ideas that come out of Roy H. Williams' piece entitled 'Targeting Through Ad Copy' on 'Making Ads Work'.

Roy suggests that as advertising we might have the targeting around the wrong way. Instead of worrying so heavily on where to place the advertisement, we should focus more on the messages in our ad to produce results in term of who will want to buy our products.

Carefully crafting your message in your advertisement is no less important than choosing the right publication in which to put your advertisement. Each ad should have a great story. Too many ads look like the copy was just written and then sent out without a great deal of thought. Take time (where possible) to craft the story properly.

Journalist Richard Preston drafts the opening paragraph of a story 30 to 40 times. Is your product or service story any less important than the unpaid stories?