{"id":8696,"date":"2017-05-04T11:25:08","date_gmt":"2017-05-04T10:25:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/marvel7077.wpengine.com\/?p=8696"},"modified":"2020-09-03T15:13:14","modified_gmt":"2020-09-03T14:13:14","slug":"rise-ux-writer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marvelapp.com\/blog\/rise-ux-writer\/","title":{"rendered":"Rise of the UX Writer"},"content":{"rendered":"

Right now is a very interesting time to be a copywriter in the UK. <\/strong>As an industry, copywriting seems to be going through something of an identity crisis.<\/p>\n

On the one hand, you have the copywriting old guard: extremely skilled and experienced craftspeople who cut their teeth in the Golden Age of Advertising or have followed in the footsteps of those who did.<\/p>\n

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Joy for these venerable wordsmiths is in delivering a piece of long form copy powerful enough to change a person\u2019s entire worldview while they\u2019re sitting at a bus stop. Or crafting a one-line zinger so taut and on-the-money it can cause a giggle-fit in a library.<\/p>\n

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\"As an industry, copywriting seems to be going through something of an identity crisis.\"<\/p><\/span><\/blockquote>\n

On the other hand, you have the new generation of copywriters. Weaned on tales of the Golden Age, but presented with a drastically changed landscape, they\u2019ve had to adapt to a completely different way of working: more platforms, more knowledge, less trust and less time.<\/p>\n

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Joy for these multimedia multitaskers is in hits, dwell time, shares, trends, virality and any other measure of effectiveness.<\/p>\n

One side bemoans the other\u2019s lack of craft and creativity, the other side can\u2019t believe the first ever had it so easy.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s just the view from the inside.<\/p>\n

A 2015 DMA poll<\/a> found that copywriters on the whole aren\u2019t happy. 54% cited a lack of respect in the industry for the value of copywriting, while 28% believed that if a project\u2019s budget were to be cut, copywriting would be the first role to go. Veteran copywriter Tony Brignull (pictured above) even went so far as to say that \u2018Copywriting is dead<\/a>\u2019.<\/p>\n

But why? There\u2019s never been a greater need for copywriters. With the rise of voice user interfaces like Amazon\u2019s Alexa, conversational UI and chat bots, AI and machine learning, and automated phone services, the whole industry is looking for ways to have better quality, more cost-effective dialogues with users.<\/p>\n

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\"The whole industry is looking for ways to have better quality, more cost-effective dialogues with users.\"<\/p><\/span><\/blockquote>\n

These kind of information exchanges need skilled narrative and conversational designers \u2014 specialists in language and communication.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an open goal for copywriting talent.<\/p>\n

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How did we end up\u00a0here?<\/h1>\n

How is it that copywriters now feel pushed out of the conversation and relegated to the kiddies\u2019 table? To understand, I think it\u2019s useful to compare how the disciplines of copywriting and design have evolved quite differently over the last few decades.<\/p>\n

As we touched on above, \u2018copywriting\u2019 today is such a broad term neither those within it nor those on the banks of it know quite where its edges are. A single role can include:<\/p>\n