Nicole Bianchi

Writing, Copywriting, & Marketing Strategies

F. Scott Fitzgerald on How to Write Vivid Character Descriptions (Video)

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If you’re celebrating Christmas next week, I hope you have a lovely, joy-filled holiday. If you don’t celebrate or if this is a difficult time for you, I wish you peace and happiness this December.

And I have a writing gift for you — I’ve just uploaded a new YouTube video:

In this video, I look at how F. Scott Fitzgerald writes vivid physical character descriptions in The Great Gatsby. I share four strategies that will help you describe people in both fiction and nonfiction so they come alive for readers.

I hope you enjoy this last writing resource of 2021! Be sure to give it a like, leave a comment (comments are awesome), and subscribe to my channel for more videos like this one in the new year.

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5 Essential Marketing Strategies From Legendary Copywriter Claude C. Hopkins

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When you think of the word “copywriter”, you might picture advertising executives like those from the show Mad Men. Copy generally refers to the text in an advertisement: those words that persuade the customer to buy a product or service.

But in today’s Internet age we’re all writing copy even if we’re not selling a product for a company. We might be trying to persuade someone to click a link to read an article or leave a comment on a social media post or sign up to our email list or buy our book and write a review.

No matter whether you write fiction or nonfiction, you can learn invaluable marketing and writing strategies from copywriting books. These strategies will help you write more persuasively and market more effectively so you get your message out to the world.

One of the copywriting classics is a book called My Life in Advertising by legendary copywriter Claude C. Hopkins. It was published way back in 1927 but still contains many copywriting lessons that we can learn from in 2021. 

In today’s post, I’ve written up my top five takeaways. Let’s dive in.

(Please note that links to books are affiliate links which means I’ll earn a small commission if you buy through the link with no extra cost to you. Thank you!)

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4 Copywriting Templates That Will Help You Beat Writer’s Block

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You’ve poured your heart and soul into creating something new to share with your audience. Maybe it’s a helpful blog post or an entertaining short story or even a product like an online course.

At last, you’re ready to send an email, publish a social media post, or write up a sales page to promote what you’ve created.

But your fingers hover over your keyboard as you struggle to figure out what to write. How can you grab your audience’s attention? How can you communicate the value of what you’ve created and make them eager to check it out?

You don’t want all of your time and effort to go to waste. You don’t want to lose this chance to impact your audience’s lives just because your promotional post wasn’t as compelling as it could be.

Not to worry.

In today’s article, I’m sharing four powerful copywriting templates that will help you structure a piece of writing that captivates your audience.

Whenever I face writer’s block when typing up an email, a social media post, a sales page, or even a blog post introduction, I love turning to these fantastic templates for guidance.

Let’s dive in.

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How To Use “The Hero’s Journey” in Fiction and Nonfiction Writing (video)

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I’m excited to share a new video with you today! 

It’s all about the fantastic story template called the Hero’s Journey. In this video, I look at how you can use this template for both fiction and nonfiction to make your writing more compelling and captivate your readers.

I hope you enjoy the video! It would be awesome if you could give it a thumbs up and leave a comment. Have you used the hero’s journey before or will you use it in a future piece of writing? Also make sure to subscribe to my channel if you haven’t already!

I’ve just started making YouTube videos and really appreciate your support. I hope the video inspires you with your writing. Thanks for watching! 

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3 Powerful Writing Exercises from Ursula K. Le Guin’s “Steering the Craft”

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Last year, I compiled two articles sharing writing exercises from famous authors. Writing exercises give you a fantastic way to strengthen specific skills through deliberate practice. They can also help you spark new ideas for stories or memoir essays or blog posts (very helpful if you’re struggling with writer’s block!).

In response to the articles, a reader asked if I had ever read Ursula K. Le Guin’s book Steering the Craft, saying it was filled with a powerful set of writing exercises too.

Well, of course, I immediately put it on my to-read list. This past month I found a copy at my local library, and I dove in.

Le Guin was a sci-fi and fantasy author, but her book Steering the Craft is a useful guide for both fiction and nonfiction writers.

It deals with the nuts and bolts of the craft of writing and the subtle stylistic choices that will help you take your writing to the next level. For example, there’s a chapter on how to select the best point of view for your piece. Each chapter ends with several writing exercises so you can put into practice what you learned.

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