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Writing copy is always a fun, creative and sometimes challenging endeavour. Every now and then, however, a particular client, or campaign, comes along that is just a dream to write for.

This has certainly been the case for a recent marketing and social media campaign for our client, Vocation.

We developed a campaign that capitalised on the high availability of their core range, particularly their flagship IPA, Life & Death.

For this campaign, we created a number of impressive design features. Including really cool animations and an attention-grabbing Instagram grid that reinforced the branding and presented the product in a radical, visually-engaging way.

Jonathan Amos, our Senior Designer at Brilliant, took the themes of heaven and hell from the branding on the can and created an other-worldly design concept for Instagram.

You can find out about the way he did this in more detail in his awesome blog {link to Jonathan’s blog} about the same campaign.

After discussing these ideas with Jonathan in a creative meeting, it was my turn to get creative and have a little fun with the copy.

Before getting stuck into the writing there were a few things to consider:

The theme

Jonathan’s exemplary design and creative direction in telling the narrative of the book of genesis was the ideal starting point to develop the writing that was to accompany the campaign.

A change in objective

The content was planned to coincide with new listings in major supermarket. As such, the objectives of the campaign were different. Rather than trying to encourage as much engagement as possible, the aim was to reach as many people as possible, to raise awareness of the brand, and increase the mental availability of the product – as the physical availability of the beer was set to increase.

 

With these in mind, the copywriting style change manifested itself in three main ways:

1. Biblical references.

With the story of genesis, and theme of heaven and hell, there was much scope for the copy. However, we still needed to keep the product at the core and be able to talk about other new beers and supermarket listings. As a result, I played around with snippets of biblical text, repurposing them to spread the gospel of top-quality IPA. Then peppering these throughout the posts.

 

“Try the golden liquid, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall know the taste of great IPA.”
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Genesis 3, verses 4-5, The Beer Bible.

“Then I saw another angel flying in mid-air, and he had the eternal gospel to proclaim to those who live on the earth—to drink world-class IPA and nothing less.”

– The Gospel of the IPA 15:19, The Beer Bible.

Life and Death IPA – discover beer that’s better.


Then could be heard the voice of many angels, numbering thousands upon thousands. In a loud voice, they were saying: “Worthy is the IPA, hoppy and aromatic, brewed with glory and grace!”

– The Gospel of the IPA 19:21, The Beer Bible.

  1. Punchier, sharper copy.To compliment the lengthier biblical references, it was necessary to keep any surrounding copy to a minimum, whilst keeping it consistent with the theme.Full of flavour, hoppy as hell, our IPA will knock your socks off.Temptation, thy name is Life & Death.

    Get around IPA that’s worthy of the Gods.

  1. Fresh calls to action.With the Life and Death cans going into supermarkets up and down the country clear calls to action that referenced this were necessary. With the success of brands like Brewdog craft beer is becoming much more mainstream and IPA’s like Life & Death are taking up more and more shelf space. These CTAs (as they’re known in the business) needed to be punchy, convey the higher quality of the craft beer and encourage customers to locate the Vocation cans on the shelves.Get into the craft – discover beer that’s better.Discover quality craft beer – look for the black can.

    Life & Death IPA, available in major supermarkets.

    Writing CTAs that can be chopped and changed as these can is a great way to keep the wording front of mind without them getting overly repetitive.

 

Keep an eye out for the campaign and what else we’ve got in store for Vocation in the future. If you’re looking for a creative campaign for your brand  – get in touch.