A big part of being a successful copywriter is being able to get the information you need quickly and easily. Being able to search for the right data points allows you to create compelling copy that will truly stand out.
If you’re looking to improve your copywriting skills or looking for inspiration, how to get the data you need quickly and easily is a key skill to develop.
The Anatomy of a Research Project
A research project is a necessary evil in any form of copywriting. Whether you’re pitching a new product or service, creating a web page, or writing a press release, you’ll inevitably need to do some research to back up your ideas.
The challenge is that not all research is created equal. You’ll often need to sift through a lot of rubbish to find the facts and figures you need to create a solid foundation for your project.
The good news is that there’s a method to the madness and it’s something you can practice to become more efficient.
Create a Research Question
To begin with, give your research some purpose and make sure you’ve got a clear question in mind.
Your research question should be based on a real world problem – something that you, as a copywriter, are passionate about solving. This problem should be one that you’ve encountered and found difficult to overcome in your own life or in the lives of your clients.
For example, let’s say that you’re writing a case study for a law firm. You could research how legal professionals are managing their workloads; something all lawyers will find difficult to do. Or you could investigate the impact that the Covid-19 pandemic has had on business-to-consumer relations, as many businesses are now adjusting to a new normal.
Whatever the case study, you’ll need to find a way to answer the question:
How are busy lawyers managing their workloads?
How has the pandemic changed consumer behavior?
Or
What is the impact of the pandemic on business-to-consumer relations?
Having a clearly defined problem to solve makes your research much more manageable. It also means you’ll be solving a problem that is relevant to your audience.
Create a Research Hypothesis
Once you’ve got your question answered, you can move on to the next step: hypothesizing why your answer is relevant and how it will make your case study stand out.
Your hypothesis needs to be a well-thought-out, testable theory that you’re confident enough to present as fact. This theory should complement and explain your answer to the research question.
In our example above, our hypothesis is that a large number of lawyers are working remotely due to the pandemic, which has caused a drop in demand for in-person legal services. This brings us to the next point:
Determine The Desired Outcome
The desired outcome of your research is what you hope to achieve at the end of the project. You can see above where we’ve listed the various components of a research project – be sure to include what you hope to achieve at the end of the study.
In our example above, we hope to achieve three things:
- a better understanding of how lawyers are managing their workloads during the pandemic
- a clearer picture of how business-to-consumer relations have changed as a result of the pandemic
- useful evidence to support our claims
Your desired outcome should be based on what you hope to prove – the theory you’ve developed should be able to stand up to scrutiny and prove that your answer to the original problem question is indeed correct.
Conduct The Research
What does conducting research mean in practice? It means gathering the data you need to prove your theory. In our example above, we would need to pull together evidence to support our hypothesis that a large number of lawyers are working remotely due to the pandemic.
To do this, you’ll need to search for various pieces of information that could be relevant to your case study. You can use a number of tools to help you find the right data, including:
- News sites
- Research aggregators like Credole
- Databases like ProQuest
Once you’ve found the data you need, review it carefully and filter out any irrelevant information. Organize the rest into summary tables or charts that make your case study more accessible.
In our example above, we’ve collected a large amount of data and we’ve organized it into a number of tables and charts. These make it much easier for us to review our findings and present them in a clear and concise manner.
Create Different Research Options
In a research project, you’re always free to change your mind and reanalyze the data you’ve collected as new information becomes available.
However, doing this can be difficult if you haven’t collected all the available data yet. This is why you need to create different versions of your research – a master copy with all the relevant information and a working copy that you can refer back to for the latest updates as you gather more data.
In our example above, we’ve collected a large amount of data that supports our hypothesis. However, as more and more people want to work remotely due to the pandemic and we are unable to verify our hypothesis in practice, we’re starting to see counter evidence to it. To address this, we’ve created a second version of our research that includes information that proves our hypothesis is incorrect.
Doing this presents a few challenges – firstly, we need to make sure that our hypotheses and counter arguments are all clearly presented and, secondly, we need to decide how we’re going to reconcile the two versions of our research.
By creating different versions of our research, we’re able to address these challenges and ensure that our case study is as strong as possible.
Present Your Findings
Once you’ve compiled all the information you need into a draft, it’s time to move onto the next step: presenting your findings to your audience.
As mentioned above, your research should complement your case study. Therefore, your findings should expand on the evidence you’ve presented in your case study – bringing everything together into a cohesive whole that makes more sense than the disjointed pieces of information you started with.
In our example above, we’ve presented detailed findings on the extent of the coronavirus pandemic and how legal professionals are handling it. While this information is useful in its own right, we also took the time to explain how this relates to our case study and make the evidence we’ve collected easier for our audience to understand.
How to Get the Data You Need for Copywriting
Creating and presenting well-crafted research that you can use to solve a problem is only half the battle. The other half is being able to get the data you need quickly and easily. To do this, you’ll need to develop specific research skills that will allow you to find the information you require with ease.
For this reason, it’s important to learn how to get the data you need quickly and easily – this will make you a much more efficient copywriter. Practice collecting and organizing data until this becomes second nature to you – eventually, you’ll look back on your copywriting career and know just where you got the facts you needed to back up your ideas.