Writing is Design

Everyone I know writes words. They’ve got blogs like, ‘Cheryl’s Grocery Adventures!’ Where she’s like, “I bought a grape! For the price of grape!” Cheryl’s Grocery Adventure makes me wonder, do words matter? I’m a marketing designer, are words even relevant to design? To the business?

Nicole Fenton says it well in her article, “Writing is Design.” 1) To connect with people, you need a story. 2) Every business, site application, or candidate needs to connect with people.

Words affect the tone and mood of your audience. Words affect customer satisfaction, search, clicks, conversions, and customer loyalty.

Erika Hall outlines a guide to get the words right: Authentic, engaging, specific, appropriate, and polite.

Nicole wraps up her article with, “Good writing takes strategic research, focus, testing, and editing. We plan, pattern, create, and compose; all of these are part of the design process.”

Words do matter. But also, is Cheryl, a designer?

I’ve heard copy referred to as fluff. Copy should sell and not try to be cute. Good copy is hard to quantify. I like knowing that someone fought hard for space on a box and wrote something silly instead of product details. Product details have never made me smile, but copy has.

Thanks, Nicole!