Eric Staggs : Writer

Another excellent question. I’m glad you’re keeping up. Well, like most blogs, this one is about the author, Me (or a least one aspect of the I). In the site’s previous incarnation I used it to house some of my writing samples and film and video game reviews. The most traffic the site received was from people looking information about their failed Microsoft Xbox360 Wireless Antennas. That’s not to say we didn’t get traffic, but by far the bulk of it was from disgruntled Micro$oft customers.

Anyway, this blog is going to be about writing. All aspects of writing, in fact. Topics like the character, plot, scene, sense, backstory, villains, heroes, anti-heroes, monsters, to name just a few. In between highly focused blogs about writing, there may be a smattering of philosophy, and though I will attempt with all my might to avoid it, perhaps some social commentary as well.

Ugh! I know, another blogger who somehow believes that the world give s a damn about his opinion! When will it end? Well, hopefully never. Personally, I swing wildly from the idea that the internet is down fall of culture and invention (all art suffers from our cultures collective bad taste), and the idea that the interwebs will be the salvation of the next few generations, allowing a stymied mankind the ability to kick-start their intellectual evolution.

I’ve been working with the interwebs or some aspect of it for longer than I can remember (or care to admit), and for me, it’s become sort of blasé. I’ve seen ten-hundred websites, representing the ten-thousand forms of ingenuity and human determination: the start-ups, the unique service, the niche vendor, the public service, the crusader, the blatant opportunist, the pleasure seeker, et al, ad nauseum.

The one thing they all have in common is the need for words, the need for convincing copy, brief, tight text that tells their version of the capitalist dream. Anyone who’s ever written ad copy before has heard this:

“I’ve been selling lawnmowers longer than you’ve been alive. I know the business.”

And we bite our tongues, us writers, and try desperately not to retort “Yes, but I’m the one with the degree in writing/marketing/advertising.” Good copy is a hard sell, no doubt. Like a good logo, everyone needs it, but no one is willing to fork over the bacon for the time it takes for a creative to pull genius from thin air and make your brand complete.

Internet technology makes good copy even more vital. The world of Search Engines and SEO forces web site owners to develop good content and continuously produce relevant topical information. But if I’m a web site owner, hiring (firing these days), buying stock, making deals, worrying about being hacked, protecting my customers data and all the rest of the headaches that come with entrepreneurial spirit, do I have time to sit down and draft some SEO-strong but catchy copy? Obviously not.

It’s a matter of the right tool for the write job. You never tell the doctor which needle to use, you never sneak up behind the plumber and tell him which wrench to use. So, why do business owners insist on writing the copy themselves? That philosophical quandary simply cannot be addressed in a mere blog. It would take more starships with more firepower than I’ve … oh wait, that’s a different movie.

I digress.

My suggestion is that writers learn the ins and outs of SEO and internet search engine marketing. Back in the day, softcore erotica and Penthouse Letters were the last bastion of starving fantasy and science-fiction authors. In this post-cyberpunk paradise, it’s the wordsmiths with the world wide wiki that make the bank and pay the bills.