My Copywriting Process for Writing a Social Ad

Last week, I challenged myself to create a social ad for a health tech company, ZocDoc.

Here’s the final product:

Image preview

While it was fun, I thought I’d share my entire creative copywriting process with you.

Onward and forward!

The design

I’m no design savant, but I’ve practiced for the last few years on Figma and, most recently, on Adobe. And I love learning how design complements copy.

I found this image on Unsplash by looking for things related to Zocdoc and patient care.

These were the words associated with both:

  • Convenience
  • Time
  • Patient
  • Healthcare
  • Care

I kept looking around for images until I found this clock with a lovely yellow background. It matched Zocdoc’s brand color (yellow).

And I like that I could work with it around time and care.

Workshopping the image in Adobe

The next step was workshopping the image in Adobe. So, I typed in Generative AI next to the clock hands.

This is what it offered me. I liked the visual of a heart and a bandage because it emphasized time and patient care.

Finding the right message

Finding the right message is always a challenge. You want to emphasize the value of Zocdoc – patient convenience and care. And I didn’t want it to sound cliche and boring.

Prior Zocdoc ads looked like this. It didn’t stand out. It didn’t hook my attention.

Zocdoc — Kyle Kelly-Yahner

My focus was first recognizing the value proposition, which I found on Zocdoc’s About Page.

We help millions of people find and book healthcare providers who are right for them. With Zocdoc, they can choose in-network providers, highly rated ones, highly specialized ones, ones nearby, ones who can see them soon, ones who can see them virtually, or all of the above.

That’s the zinger that I needed on this social ad.

But I also needed a captivating and fun headline that would stand out. I needed something perfect for Zocdoc.

The next step was brainstorming phrases, rhymes, and anything related to what Zocdoc offered patients.

  • An apple a day keeps the doctor away
  • Prevention is better than cure
  • On the mend
  • Fit as a fiddle
  • Just what the doctor ordered
  • Under the weather
  • At death’s door
  • Take your medicine
  • In good hands
  • A bitter pill to swallow
  • The picture of health
  • A clean bill of health
  • In the pink of health
  • Cough up
  • Have a heart-to-heart
  • Heart of gold
  • Go under the knife
  • Healing hands
  • Back on one’s feet
  • Take care of number one
  • Healthy and wise, better to rise
  • Cough and sneeze, and spread disease
  • Careful care can clear the air
  • No pain, no gain

Keep pushing the creativity

I really liked Apple a Day Keeps the Doctor Away. But couldn’t think of a natural way to workshop it as a headline. Here’s what I came up with:

  • Stop eating apples. Start booking instant appointments with Zocdoc
  • Apples won’t book your appointments
  • Apples keep the doctor away. Zocdoc keeps doctors close

It always felt forced. Until I had a zing of inspiration around the phrase: “Patience Is a Virtue” Instead, it could be “Patient Is a Virtue”

It meant treating patients well is a key virtue for healthcare providers. So, it worked perfectly.

Then I took this section from the About Page and workshopped it:

We help millions of people find and book healthcare providers who are right for them

I workshopped it to be shorter.

Helping patients find and book appointments in minutes.

Final product

Creating captions is about finding the value in Zocdoc. It was about having social proof. This is what I found in my research when I was looking at Zocdoc’s website:

  • Thousands of in-network providers that patients can book in minutes
  • Millions of patients use Zocdoc
  • Quickest and easiest way to book appointments.

I put it all together and bam! That was my entire process for creating this social ad for Zocdoc.

This Is Copy