Copywrite vs Copyright
I’d like to set the record straight. Copywriting is the art of writing copy and has nothing to do with copyrights. Copyrights fall under the law, therefore a lawyer who specializes in copyright law would be the person to contact but if you need an ad, a website or any other promotional related content written than a copywriter is the person to contact.
Most copywriters work in marketing or ad agencies, public relations firms or large corporations who have their own in-house agencies and then there is the freelance copywriter, a breed onto themselves. These freelance writers work independently from an agency; often from their homes or on their laptops at coffeshops or anywhere else that has free WiFi.
And if you are wondering where the word copywriter comes from, well it’s related to the word “copy”, which refers to the written word or text in an advertisement. Not to be confused with “make a copy” which refers to duplication. Open up any magazine ad and most of the time you will see a headline, images, subheads or call outs and the rest of the written text (usually as blocks of text) is known as body copy.
Some famous copywriters of distinction are David Ogilvy, William Bernbach, Dan Kennedy and Leo Burnett. Many other writers and creative people wrote copy for a living before they became famous like Salman Rushdie, Terry Gilliam, Don Delillo and Lawrence Kasdan.
So, the next time you ask someone what they do for a living and they say copywriting, ask them about the ads they have written and not about the rights and protection of intellectual property.
