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Your words are doing more harm than good

Today’s Living Social deal for Providence reads like this (with my added commentary):

In a city that’s dripping with design (Cranston, Rhode Island?), it’s sometimes difficult to define your own personal (font) style (Font? Is that supposed to be a play on words? The world’s first and hopefully last attempt at a font joke?). Walk away from the Wingdings (Another bad font joke? Seriously? And how many people will actually understand this unfunny joke and how many will be left wondering what the hell a Wingding is?) and into the salon with today’s deal from Wil.O Design Studio in Cranston.

For $100, get a Brazilian blowout (What the hell is a Brazilian blowout? Do I even want to know?). Or sit for a women’s haircut and eyebrow shaping for $27. Spend just $20 to mix that perfect shade of bronze without touching Photoshop (Seriously? A Photoshop joke, too? “I’ve got the perfect shade of spray-on tan for you and I didn’t have to use Photoshop to find it! Ha!”) with a full-body spray tan (Who does this anyway?). Armed with eco-friendly products and a fierce sense of what you need (Someone please explain what the hell a ‘fierce’ sense of what I need is), the artists at Wil.O know what it takes to stay unique in a copycat world (Spray-on-tan will keep me looking unique? Are you kidding me?). And, after getting confident with today’s deal, crafting the next design standard needn’t take more than a single mouse-click or pen-stroke (Could they have constructed a more convoluted and confusing sentence is they had tried?).

After reading the copy twice, I was compelled to send the following email to Wil.O Design Studios this morning:

To Whom It May Concern:

Your Living Social deal arrived in my inbox today. Though I do not currently require a full body spray tan or a Brazilian blowout, I would like to humbly offer my services in the future when it comes to writing ad copy for your business.  While I am certain that you are highly effective in your area of expertise, the copy for your Living Social deal leaves a great deal to be desired. For a small fee, I would be more than happy to put my expertise with the written word to work for you, crafting a clear, cohesive ad that will appeal to discernible readers everywhere or editing ad copy that you produce.

I’d be more than happy to send you a list of my credentials if you are interested.

Best of luck with your Living Social deal and with all future endeavors.

I’ll let you know if someone responds.