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The takeaway of this post is that writers have to reposition themselves as marketers because nobody needs just writing anymore. You've got AI for that.
So let’s talk about marketing.
Specifically: how it works vs. how people think it works.
I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard “I could do marketing if I had time.” Especially from technical founders and software developers.
The assumption is that marketing is... beneath them.
Some think they can “pick it up over a weekend.”
But unfortunately, scrolling through a few marketing tips on LinkedIn doesn’t make you the next Seth Godin. And yet, many people are convinced they’ve “cracked the code.”
Meanwhile, the people who actually make marketing work?
They often second-guess their strategies and struggle with imposter syndrome.
Why?
Coined by psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger in 1999, it describes a phenomenon: people with low competence in a subject often overestimate their abilities.
This cognitive bias explains why your neighbor thinks he could run a Fortune 500 company and why an SEO expert believes he can instantly leap into positioning and messaging.
The marketing world is particularly vulnerable because success stories are loud and visible, and failures are something nobody talks about.
We see the viral ads, soaring analytics graphs, clever campaigns, brand makeovers that work.
What we don’t see: countless flops, wasted ad budgets, stagnant organic reach, rebrands that never gained traction.
This creates an illusion that marketing is easier than it actually is.
How people who don't get marketing think marketing works:
“I want to write a landing page. I’ll just Google ‘top-performing landing pages’ and copy what those do.”
How marketing actually works:
“I want to write a landing page. Hmm… Basecamp! It had that brutally honest image with "but no one told me that” quote. I’ll go re-read that for inspiration.”
How people who don't get marketing think marketing works:
“I need a catchy tagline. Let’s ask ChatGPT to brainstorm something clever.”
How marketing actually works:
“I can’t stop thinking about that ad in Harvard Business Review: ‘from a billion points of data to a point of view.’ It's not the “insights for decision-making” cliché you hear everywhere. It stuck with me. What if I brought it to life visually? Maybe I could pull some specific numbers, then design a hero image that shows the shift from overwhelming data to a singular point of view? My line could be: You don't need more data. You need a perspective.”
How people who don't get marketing think marketing works:
“Our traffic is down. Let's optimize our content with more keywords and make it longer.”
How marketing actually works:
“I still remember that email from Animalz. It announced updates to two of their top-performing articles, structured like a product release, with a ‘What’s New’ section. I even shared it on LinkedIn. That’s optimization: treating content like a product. You evolve it, make it more useful, and worthy of sharing, not just add fluff to make it longer.”
How people who don't get marketing think marketing works:
“I’ll win leads by making a free ebook and gating it behind a form.”
How marketing actually works:
“Someone dropped an example of a super-effective lead magnet. It's basically a mini product – a full-functional introboard with a list of dream customers for making intros. I still have it bookmarked. THAT made me look up their company.”
How people who don’t get marketing think marketing works: “Let’s hire a content writer to pump out five blog posts a week.”
How marketing actually works:
“I remember that case study Zmist & Copy published about Preply, how they built a scalable content system from only two in-house writers, reaching 150 articles per quarter, 2M views per month, every blog tracked for revenue. That was truly impressive.”
Every one of these examples comes from companies that earned their place in my head.
They didn't do it with an AI-generated LinkedIn post or a single SEO blog. They did it by showing up consistently and getting it right, again and again.
Most companies don’t do that, so most “marketing” barely moves the needle.
So no, marketing is definitely not something you “pick up over a weekend.”
But when it’s done right, you remember it.
Kate
P.S. If we aren't connected already, follow me on LinkedIn and Instagram. If you like this newsletter, please refer your friends.
P.P.S. Need a hand with content? Fix your mediocrity problem with Zmist & Copy
Wonder what copywriting is? What do copywriters do? How do they get paid? How do you become a copywriter? Is it a good career? Get all the answers about copywriting in this article.
If you want to generate leads, your content needs to correspond to the right stage of the customer's journey. Learn how you can build your content strategy using 5 Stages of Awareness. I break down the whole process into 5 easy steps.
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