This is a thankless and scolding article.
Although Brother Chan has plucked up the courage and decided to write it out countless times, once he actually enters the writing stage, he still inevitably feels apprehensive and feels that he is taking on the risk of "risking the world's disapproval". However, no matter how scared you are, you must tell the truth, take a clear stance, and state your views straight to the point:In corporate and brand promotion, most soft articles written by construction and ceramics companies are self-promoting soft articles.
It must be noted that soft articles are a kind of soft "text advertisement" written by copywriters and planners of enterprises or advertising companies compared to rigid advertisements, and press releases also belong to one of these categories; the soft articles mentioned in this article are actually more Focus on press releases.
Although the specific circumstances of Jiantao Enterprise’s soft articles for self-promotion may vary greatly, there are still some common points, some of which are very common. Below, Brother Chan summarizes them one by one.
01
Be secretive about the leader’s name
Everyone should have the impression that in the press releases of the People’s Daily, Xinhua News Agency, CCTV and other major media, whether it is the title of local party and government leaders or party and state leaders, except for the first time they appear, Use "position + surname + first name" (such as × Li ××, Governor of × Province, said that he should always be called by his first name. In most cases, it is written directly as "surname + first name" (such as Li ××), rather than "surname + position" (such as Li Province) Chief), not even "last name + first name + position" (such as Governor Li XX).
Looking at our ceramic construction companies, the authors of press releases and soft articles seem to value the names of the leaders of their units more than anything else, or they think that calling the leaders by their names in the article is disrespectful to the leaders (actually It is a huge mistake to think this way, and it would be truly disrespectful to hide his name), so much so that I would never write it out easily. For example, a press release from a ceramics company reads like this (the case is real, the company name and the person's name are fictitious):
On a certain day of a certain year, the "Inheritance·Transformation·Take-off" brand upgrade conference of Universe Ceramics Co., Ltd. was held grandly. Chairman Niu Dong, General Manager Mr. Ma, Assistant Chairman Zhu Mr. Zhu and other leaders of Universe Ceramics and more than 250 dealers from all over the country attended the conference.
The event started with an important speech by Niu Dong, Chairman of Universe Ceramics...
……
Of course there are many problems with soft articles like this, but here we only talk about the issue of naming leaders.
Firstly, when the leader first appears in the soft article, it should be written as "Niu Zhentian, Chairman of Universe Ceramics" (assuming that Director Niu is called Niu Zhentian, Mr. Ma is called Ma Shitu, and Mr. Zhu is called Zhu Everything goes smoothly), and should not be written as "Cosmic Ceramics Niu Dong" that makes people confused (because it is the first time, how can unfamiliar readers know what Niu Dong is?), and it should not be written as superfluous and nondescript " cosmic pottery"Chairman Niu Zhentian Niu Dong" (this is not the case in this case, but in reality some ceramic construction companies do).
Second When a leader appears two or more times, he should directly write "Niu Zhentian". Generally, there is no need to repeat and cumbersomely write "Niu Zhentian, Chairman of Universe Ceramics".
Why should leaders be called according to this rule in press releases?
The first is to maintain an objective stance to make the press release more credible. If the leader’s title cannot be written in a standardized manner or the name simply does not appear, such soft articles will appear to be written by insiders and lack the objective stance that a third party should hold. Writing soft articles from the perspective of a third party such as the media is easier to gain the trust of readers such as dealers, especially consumers.
The second is to shorten the distance with readers and make the press release more approachable. This point can be illustrated by other examples: If a person who has not done well in society for many years goes to a class reunion, you say that he feels that the classmates call each other "× Bureau" or "× President" "" is more cordial, or is it more cordial to call each other by first names or even call each other by nicknames or nicknames? Obviously the latter is more approachable. Similar to this example, calling leaders "Director ×", "General Manager ×", etc. in a press release will make readers feel that the leaders are superior, and will naturally build a link between them and the press release and the companies and brands promoted in it. Invisible walls.
The third is to distinguish leaders with the same surname and make the press release more accurate. This is better understood. If a company has two or more leaders named Niu, how should they be called "Mr. Niu" in the press release? Do we need to number them and call them "Mr. Niu No. 1" and "Mr. Niu No. 2"...?
In today's Internet era, with consumption upgrading and channel fission, brand marketing is more difficult than ever. Building the personal brand IP of corporate leaders has become an effective means of brand marketing. Isn’t it one of the ways to build their personal brand IP by using correct titles in press releases to make corporate leaders more specific, vivid, approachable and credible?
02
Exclamation marks abound
In the soft articles of some construction and ceramics companies, especially press releases, there is a serious abuse of exclamation marks.
This type of soft article often starts with an exclamation mark in the first sentence or the last sentence of the first paragraph, then the last sentence of the second paragraph is an exclamation mark, and the last sentence of the third paragraph is still an exclamation mark... The last sentence of the article or the last sentence of the last paragraph Still an exclamation point. After writing an article, at a glance, it is full of "!", which is very spectacular.
Soft articles, especially press releases, are different from literary writing. In order to maintain objectivity and calmness, generally speaking, exclamation points that express strong emotions should be used as little as possible. When emotions become stronger, it often means that subjectivity becomes stronger; when subjectivity becomes stronger, objectivity and calmness tend to weaken.
Soft articles that are too emotional and lose objectivity and calmness are usually objectionable and difficult to believe.
Even if you have to use exclamation points sometimes, you should pay attention to moderation, otherwise it will be overflowing with emotions but lacking a climax. Every sentence in the article is full of strong emotions, which is equivalent to no emotion in every sentence. Just like highlighting the key points before an exam, all the key points equal no key points.
The so-called overflow of exclamation marks, to put it nicely, means overflowing with emotions, but to put it ugly, it means lack of skill and exclamation marks are used to make up for it.
03
There is no standardization of proper nouns
When proper nouns such as company names appear repeatedly in a soft article, if these proper nouns are troublesome to write and difficult to read due to the large number of words, they can be solved by using abbreviations.
However, the use of abbreviations must comply with regulations: Firstly, use standard, normative, and agreed-upon abbreviations, and avoid making up abbreviations; secondly, follow the logical common sense of first full name, then abbreviation, and avoid order. Reverse; third, keep all abbreviations consistent and avoid doing whatever you want.
For example, a certain construction and ceramics company called itself this way in a soft article (as above, the case is real and the company name is fictitious): sometimes it is the universe, sometimes it is the universe ceramics, sometimes it is the universe brand. , one moment it is a cosmic enterprise, another moment it is a cosmic enterprise.Universe Company, for a while it will be Universe Ceramics Co., Ltd.
Unstandardized expressions of proper nouns can only give readers a bad impression that this company has chaotic thinking and is not like an excellent company.
04
Bad errors abound
The last thing I want to summarize is low-level errors, including grammatical errors (improper collocation, incomplete components, mixed sentence structure, etc. are the most common), wrong use of punctuation marks ( It is most common for nouns such as event names to be misused in book titles, etc.), illogical and inconsistent with objective facts (the soft article is written without verifying the content that is not certain).
The soft articles of construction and ceramics companies often make these low-level mistakes for two reasons: on the one handthe copywriting planners themselves are not strong enough and lack strong comprehensive literacy in writing; on the other hand, the leaders do not understand soft articles In other words, we don’t pay enough attention to soft articles, focusing on the overall situation but not on perspective, emphasizing creativity but not on implementation, emphasizing direction but not on details. In layman’s terms, we have the skills to select a topic and write a certain paragraph well but not the ability to write the entire article well.
Okay, this article is almost over. There may be readers who are still confused after reading this: Why?So soft articles that exist in the above four situations are self-promotional soft articles?
This is a good question.
Soft articles with the above four conditions will make readers feel low, unable to read, and even feel that the companies, brands and products carried by the soft articles are unreliable. Such soft articles lose their due positive role and even hinder brand marketing; such soft articles have no real readers (intended dealers and potential consumers) and can only entertain insiders and should not Is it called a self-promotional soft article?
As for the higher level of brand communication and marketing, the situation is more complicated and has less common ground. Brother Chan will not discuss it in detail in this article. Let’s talk about it later when we have a chance.
