I always tell people (or at least ones I hope won’t tell another soul!) that you don’t have to be a professional or full-time copywriter to write good copy.

And it’s true: With more and more marketers, entrepreneurs, business owners, consultants and others doing a little bit of everything when it comes to their marketing, a little knowledge and advice can go a long way.

(Most copywriters wouldn’t want you to know this….but with the right tools and techniques, anyone can write copy well enough to be, well, dangerous.)

If you fail to plan, you plan to fail. Here’s the thing: all of the great instruction and skills in the world don’t take care of the most important part of the process…planning.

Here are some failing-to-plan mistakes I see all the time:

1. The Dive-In-Head-First Approach: This is the same as the “Everyone Is Doing It, So I Should Be, Too” one. You know, the one where you learn at 9am that others in your industry (or in the world for that matter) are using this site or on that social  media network and by 3pm you have spent half the day creating a profile and reaching out to new friends for some reason that you’re not quite sure of.

Lesson Learned: Go according to a plan that, while flexible and nimble, is based on consistency, suitability and the end result.

2. The Speaking-A-Foreign-Language Approach: Has someone ever spoken to you in a language that was not your own? Did you understand a word said? This isn’t much different than marketing to a market that simply does not want, does not need and/or is not interested in what you are marketing.

You may be writing great copy and conducting a fabulous campaign, but how successful will you be if you’re preaching to the unconverted?

Lesson Learned: Don’t write even one word before you have learned, lived and breathed your target market.

3. The Bring-Me-Potatoes-But-Hold-The-Meat Approach: This is the one where you have a gorgeous website, a stunning blog, a fancy e-newsletter sign-up and tons of profiles on every imaginable social media, press release and article syndication site but you are missing one crucial piece of the puzzle:

YOU FORGOT THE COPY!

Lesson Learned: Don’t build it, bolster or promote it if “it” has no words, message or meaning. A marketing vehicle with no copy is WORSE than no marketing vehicle at all.

Yes, filling the world with copy is an endless task and blogs, websites and marketing in general are beasts with endless appetites for content. But you have to play by the rules and feed the beast or get lost in the shuffle…very quickly.