I told my cousin to be a copywriter, he laughed at me. This was how I convinced him.

Something interesting happened a few days ago.

Like every year during Eid Mubarak (traditional Muslim holiday), for a whole day my family and I went out to meet our relatives for silaturahmi — some kind of big family reunion, usually among Moslems.

I met up with Kiki, a cousin whom I’m very close to. He came up to me and asked for career advice. Now, I may not be the right person to talk to about this. It’s not like I’ve climbed on to my highest career level, or have the best job ever (oh wait, I do!), we’re just bros, and a bro always has his bro’s back — #BroCode.

Anyway, he asked me, “what job do you think I should take after graduation?”

To me that was a simple question. I told him to be a copywriter. He didn’t ask why or anything that a normal person would usually respond. He laughed at me — as if I gave the worst advice ever!

He told me there was nothing to be so proud of if he becomes a copywriter. Anyone can write, ergo anyone can become a copywriter.

Clearly, I did not see that coming! Well yes, at one point he was right. But I wasn’t going to leave it at that. So I said, “I suppose anyone can write, but not everyone can write creatively. Once you’re a copywriter, you do a lot more than just writing”.

Copywriters have the opportunity to shape ideas, tell stories and give people the reason they should pick A instead of B. In fact, copywriters can also change the world! It’s proven, I’m not kidding.

Related article: Talk about changing the world? Here are the 5 ingredients for writers to revolutionise the world!

I asked him, “how do you think Nike survived from its competitors, or Apple, or any other products you’re currently using that have existed for decades?”

Before he could even answer, I told him it was because of the great stories they conveyed to the world.

And to tell great stories, there’s more than just “writing”. It requires strategic and critical thinking, innovating people’s minds for the better. Doing so also requires you to excel in communications, getting into the habit of asking the right questions to the people whom you believe has more information for your story.

Since I knew that Kiki was the type of guy who was looking forward to work in a tech company, I told him to start practicing on his presentation skills. Because once a story is final, you would need to pitch it to your company for approval, before it goes publicly noticed.

I knew this was going to be a long talk, so I took a blank paper and drew him this instead:

Note that this could also help you guys who are in the same situation as Kiki, or have been wanting to become a copywriter but have no clue about the career.

I didn’t just drew this and said nothing. I told Kiki that each of this role was significantly important to a company.

Without having a copywriter, any company would fall apart. Why? Because copywriters have the abilities to translate and present concise and simple words that would make anyone’s lives much less burdened from being told about complicated, sophisticated data of a certain product.

Many people in Indonesia nowadays, including Kiki, consume a product because most of their friends use it.

The question now is, how did the first person among the friends know about the product and eventually decided to buy it? Luckily enough, Kiki was able to answer this. He said that they might’ve found out through TV commercials or other type of ads.

Now the next ‘rhetorical’ question is, who was involved in the story-making of those commercials and ads?

That was how our conversation went. Kiki told me that he will soon create his own blog (after I showed him mine).

That’s what bros are for :)

Check out my other stories: edwinmohammad.com