Copywriting v. Journalism and Ethical Considerations

A question about ethics came up recently on a Yahoo list for copywriters. Heather thought my answer might be helpful to others with similar questions, so here it is.

The situation: A business hires a freelance writer to write a profile of their company, and asks the writer to submit it to a magazine.

The question: Is it ethical?

It depends. There's copywriting, and there's journalism. Writers who do both are ethically and morally obligated to know which hat they're wearing.

1. If you're writing a company profile for the company, you do the best job possible for that client. Writing a promotional piece *as if* it is objective reporting is doing a service to your client (the company, not a magazine publisher). The whole point of an advertorial is to get people to read it, so it shouldn't look like an ad.

2. If you are a journalist working for a publication, you will never take payment from the subject(s) of the articles. That would be a conflict of interest and a HUGE ethical no-no. Now, if the editor wanted to run that company profile, knowing what it is and who you're working for, that's up to her. (They do it with press releases all the time.) As long as you don't misrepresent it as objective reporting. And if you REALLY want it to be nice and clear, the client should submit the profile to the magazine. Then there's no question.

Writers have the ethical obligation to clearly be working for either the client or the publication - NEVER both. There may be more to it than that (i.e., should you ever write a reported piece that includes a company you once wrote advertorials for?), but in the context of what we've been discussing, that's the basic difference.

Questions? Comments? Objections? Let me know. We should all strive to maintain a spotless reputation, in my opinion, not only for the good of our careers but just because we're great people.

Rejection versus perfectionism

Image by tanakawho via Flickr

I got an interesting email this morning - normally, after posting (like I did the other morning), I'd wait a couple of days, but this one just couldn't wait.
I was talking about rejections yesterday, and I wasn't entirely clear or accurate. Most of the pieces I'm currently having rejected are later accepted by magazines further down my submission chain.
But there are just some places I CANNOT get into - the elusive areas of fiction writing that would really make a huge difference to my morale, my goals and possibly my writing career.
Where does the email fit into this?
Well, yesterday I got a rather sniping email asking if I realised I was making 'smelling mistakes' (I'm assuming they meant spelling ;)) and that no American author should make the mistakes I do.
Well, for a start, I'm British, not American. We use the Queen's English instead of American English. Both are perfectly valid language variations in my opinion - and there's no reason to say American English is derivative, because both languages, in my opinion have evolved since splitting paths. I'd probably have etymological students up in arms right about now, but to be honest, for me, it’s splitting hairs. And if you prefer the look of color without the U, that's great! I can't write that though without my brain screaming 'WRONG!'
Secondly, I'm mildly dyslexic. I also rush when I'm writing blogs, because, to me they are very 'immediate'. I have spelling and punctuation problems, but I don't rely on Word to check them, and that's something I'm trying to teach myself to get over. Most of my favourite bloggers make the same mistakes as me ;). Its not an excuse though, so I'm trying to fix that.
Blog posts, for me though, aren't the same as the writing I'm sending to my editors. Both are equally important to me, for different reasons, but I *really* don't view what I'm saying on blogs as the same as what I'm sending to editors. The immediacy issue aside, I also feel that no matter how you cut it, blogs are less formal - they don't require nearly as much editing, and while that can lead to sloppy writing, it's more likely that the poster is just in a hurry. Again though, that's not an excuse for making spelling and grammar mistakes (my most common one is 'it's' and forgetting the apostrophe ;))
I am however making a few changes.
I'm going to 'slow down' - I'm going to write posts in Word and hopefully, I'll see a pattern in what mistakes I make - which will tighten up my writing, and feed my perfectionist streak.
And yes, I know, it sounds odd saying I'm a professional writer that makes all these mistakes – so I’m going to start removing them, just to make sure that I’m presenting exactly that. Though my blog posts and my fiction writing are two completely separate things, there’s absolutely no reason for me to handle them differently.

What do you think?

Teleclass from Marcia Yudkin - How to get those first clients

I thought some readers of MNABC might be interested in this. Reposted with permission from Marcia Yudkin:

How do you get your commercial freelance writing practice off the ground?

I would like to invite members of this group to a FREE one-hour teleclass in which I share the six methods of getting first clients that have been successfully used by copywriters, marketing consultants and publicity specialists whom I have worked with.

Three of the six methods I'll be discussing cost nothing at all, and the other three methods cost a modest amount to implement.

Here are the details:

Monday, February 18 at 4 p.m. Eastern time(3 p.m. Central, 2 p.m. Mountain, 1 p.m. Pacific time)

To join the call, go to the following link and look for the yellow-border box, which contains the signup form:

http://www.yudkin.com/become.htm

You'll then receive the call-in information by return email.

My previous call for Wellfed Writers produced testimonials like these:

"Marcia Yudkin is a great teacher and mentor. I have
learned more from her than from anyone else in the
marketing business." - Charles Brown, Dallas, TX

"Very informative. Great call!" - Carolyn Erickson,
Wichita, KS

"This session has value for anyone trying to market their
services to other businesses in the B2B arena." - Mark
Bohrer, Saratoga, CA

Can't make the call? I'll be recording it, and you can pre-order the CD for just $10, with free shipping anywhere in the world.

There will be ample time for questions and answers during the call.

With all best wishes,
Marcia Yudkin
Copywriting Mentor
http://www.yudkin.com/become.htm