By Sheeva Azma
As scientists, we never get any marketing training. That makes for an interesting crossover! What a marketer might call a “swipe file” I might call an assortment of ads I randomly adore.
This article originally appeared in the Fancy Comma newsletter.
When I first got into freelance science writing, I had no idea of any of the terminology in the marketing world. I learned that “copy” meant text because that’s how my marketing agency clients talked about the words I wrote. I actually ended up learning the terminology because the more professional (read: higher paying) gigs had people who knew this lingo, and I decided that if I wanted to get more clients, I had to learn it myself, too.
I probably still don’t know all the marketing and communications terminology. It’s sad, in a way, since I do all of the stuff that other communicators do, yet I probably don’t call it by the same names that they do. I do a lot of “researching” and “writing” – whatever comes my way, sometimes – and I have a lot of skills, but am not sure of the exact words and phrases. My work can be called “ghostwriting,” “corporate communications,” “executive thought leadership,” “content marketing,” “content strategy,” “social media content creation,” … and on and on. Not all of it is communications – some of it is legislative analysis, research reports, and stuff like that. People often assign me challenging work because they know I can handle it, even if it’s not in my wheelhouse. They are impressed by my credentials and like that I’m a scientist that has worked in Congress. So, that’s how I’ve gotten to work on so many different types of projects over the years.
Could I be getting paid more if I knew all of the terminology? Maybe, but the thing that makes me happiest about freelancing is that I get to carve my own unique path, outside of the words that we try to use to describe the work that we do. Something that is “thought leadership” can also be referred to as “public-facing research writing.” So, how descriptive and useful are these names, exactly?
So, yeah, I have never taken a marketing, communications, or journalism course as a scientist – I learned all of these things over the past 10 years as a freelance science writer. These days, I inhabit many worlds outside of science, whether it’s policy, marketing, journalism, or something else. I love to think about the many ways science interacts with our everyday lives, and how much we take that for granted or don’t even realize it.
One thing I was surprised to learn had a name was the concept of a “swipe file.” Basically, a swipe file is a collection of projects or ideas or copy or whatever that you really like and seek to emulate.
I did get some SciComm training in my science courses at MIT, and that’s when my professor, a biologist turned science writer, told us: find someone whose writing you admire and emulate them. That’s what a swipe file does. I didn’t know what a swipe file is, but I’ve always had one in mind.
Marketers and ad professionals use “swipe files” as scrapbooks of copy, images, and other information that they found interesting. Think of a swipe file as inspiration for your work.
Science communicators can also have a swipe file. Surely, there are some people that we all try to be like, such as Carl Sagan or Neil deGrasse Tyson. We can also draw inspiration from highway billboards, tv commercials, radio jingles, even the marketing text on the back of your box of cereal. I definitely get inspiration from everywhere. One of my favorite hobbies is to evaluate advertising and marketing materials that I see around me. Some are brilliant. Others…not so much.
Some ads/marketing in my swipe file: the Pfizer COVID-19 commercial that features NFL football player Travis Kelce. I also like the Progressive commercial with the marching band kittens. The GEICO Gecko poster ad I see everywhere I go that changes according to where I am: he has a cowboy hat in Texas and a shopping bag at the mall. That State Farm TV ad about the girl who grows up and gets a car after asking her dad if she can drive his car as a kid.
I love to get ideas from anywhere, especially TV ads and billboards that are meant for everyone to see. These ads in my swipe file inform my SciComm, and they help me communicate better. Sometimes, they are just brilliant and I wonder who came up with the brilliant ideas. I try not to limit my SciComm inspiration to just science, but get it from everywhere, because as scientists we’re allowed to have fun and communicate science in novel ways.
So, reader, my question for you is: do you have a swipe file, and if so, what’s in it?
Fancy Comma, LLC 