How to create an effective ad copy?

You can’t escape advertisements in modern world. They are all pervasive. Watching TV, reading a magazine, waiting for bus at a bus stop or if you are in contemplative mood and just looking out of your window or balcony, you can’t ignore ad world.
What it takes to make a successful ad copy? How much effort and hard work goes what we see in few seconds?

An ad copy is not a work of literature. A copywriter can’t be creative like M.F.Hussain. He doesn’t have seamless boundaries. Still he can be creative.

Creative Visualization:

At this stage, everything is inside the head of the copywriter. He can see layout and different elements from his mind’s eye. The person should be uninhibited, have fluency of ideas and no ego hassles, when the need arises to reframe, modify or polish the idea to provide it a practical look.

From Visualization to layout

Advertising creativity is a disciplined art, and the copywriter has to think within certain set parameters. He has to keep in mind, the customer, product/service, and its usability and the ultimate objective of increasing the sales. Layout means giving an abstract idea a concrete shape. For this the copywriter has to check various aspects such as who will be the target audience, their age group, their general outlook, their income group. Knowing all this, a copywriter will have an idea about the kind of people he is talking to.

A great deal of study into the psyche of target audience will help in deciding the USP of the product or service.

Opening and closing of the ad

Both are equally important. One catches the attention of the target customer and another compels him into action. Knowing your market segment helps in deciding whether to use emotion or facts or technology, or how your product is better than competitors or an ideal mix of important issues.

Here is a fine example of how to write a successful ad copy. I have got it from Beautiful Life.