Today in our Principles of Copywriting 101 class, we’ll examine the case of the Philips HTS3440 DVD/5.1 Surround Home Theater w/USB Direct. This full-function home theater system includes a progressive-scan DVD player with DivX Ultra playback, five 250W satellite speakers, a 250W subwoofer, and a front-mounted USB port for music playback from portable MP3 players or Flash drives. In short, it offers a wealth of potential features and benefits for the copywriter to epmhasize.

So what does Philips’ copywriter lead with? Take a look: “The Philips HTS3440 has high-resolution JPEG playback to display up to 2-megapixel resolution, so you can view your digital pictures in their true resolution without loss of quality or details.”

That’s right – of the many entertainment functions this system boasts, this writer leads with its capacity to display still photos. Do you look at a lot of still photos on your TV? Do you know anyone who does? I don’t. And is “2-megapixel resolution” really congruent with the claim that the pictures will be displayed “in their true resolution without loss of quality or details”? Who uses a 2-megapixel camera anymore?

I’d have to give this effort a C-, mainly because it’s all spelled correctly and the writer avoids profanity. Next class, we’ll discuss why this writer probably lives in a bigger house and takes more vacations than I do. Dismissed!

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