Will Nicklin on why boring brands are brilliant and the joy of being a junior

Will Nicklin, Head of Copy at How&How

I met Will Nicklin last year. He was freelancing at the creative agency behind my company’s rebrand, and the day had come for them to pitch their ideas.

We bundled into an Uber to their fancy office, complete with posh snacks and actually drinkable coffee. It all felt very Mad Men, but with chocolate fingers instead of cigarettes.

Will delivered some mic-drop worthy one-liners during that meeting, and I knew I could learn a lot from him. So I asked if he had any advice for improving my craft.

“Give this a read,” he said, handing me a copy of Twenty-six ways of looking at a blackberry. Business books aren’t usually my cup of tea, but this was. Who’d have thought Greek mythology and Dickens could be so relevant to business writing in 2025?

Looking at topics through a different lens is exactly what copywriting's all about. And it’s what Will does so expertly. Needless to say, he was top of mind when I was toying with the idea of starting All Ears.

Here he is, with a whistle-stop tour of his journey from blogging to branding.

You joined How&How as Head of Copy at the start of the year – exciting! When you take on a new client, what’s your process for putting yourself in their shoes?

Sometimes, I’ll think of a person that reflects the character of the brand. How do they speak, what do they wear, how do they spend their time? Sometimes, I’ll try to capture the essence of the brand by putting on a specific Spotify playlist, or listening to bands that evoke the feeling of the brand.

It doesn’t really matter where you start though. I think the best thing to do is just put pen to paper. Then it’s all about persistence, iteration and (a lot of) editing.

After graduating, you started a blog about trying to find a job. How did you get that blog in front of the right people?

It seems like a lot of people have heard about my blog now but, back then, I couldn't get it in front of anyone.

I’d just left university and had no idea what I was doing. I didn’t have a portfolio. I was living with my Mum. I know I could’ve created some hypothetical briefs or reached out to more people to get work experience, but consistently writing my blog every day proved to be really good practice. There's a lot of stamina in writing and that really helped me build up momentum.

It was also just fun to talk about the interview process I was going through. I was probably competing for jobs against 2,500 graduates, so I had my work cut out trying to be as creative as possible. Some of it was good fun, some of it was desperate. Photoshopping myself into the Hunger Games was particularly mortifying.

In the end though, I only needed one person to see it: my future boss. He said it showed consistency and perseverance, which is what he was looking for… and the rest is (very welcome) history.

You did your degree in contemporary arts. Looking back, do you wish that you'd done something more writing focused?

No, actually. What was great about my degree was that it gave me the freedom to do a bit of everything. I studied theatre and art and writing which, at the end of the day, was all just about coming up with ideas. That could have been working on a script or putting on a performance, but creativity was the whole point.

I think if I’d done a writing course, I might have been a bit hamstrung by it. When it comes to grammar and writing “rules”, I don't really follow that school of thought. So it probably would have annoyed me.

What's your least favourite grammar rule?

I hate Oxford commas.

I love starting a sentence with ‘and’.

And I dislike it when people say you can't write one or two-word sentences. Why not?

Have you ever written copy that just didn't work, and what did you learn from it?

Most weeks. Luckily my team usually lets me know straight away, and clients aren't shy about it either. Obviously a lot of people ask me if I use chat GPT now, which I try not to take personally. Taking it on the chin is something you learn pretty quickly working for an agency.

But more importantly, when someone does say “that's not good enough”, it gives you the chance to do a second draft. And as creatives juggling multiple clients, we don’t always have the gift of time. So, if anything, it's a nice challenge for you to sleep on it, try again and come up with something much better.

Often when provided with a copy brief, what the client has asked for isn’t actually what they need. How do you get to the bottom of the real problem at hand?

I always think about where the work’s going to end up, and that ultimately means going back to the customer. I ask myself: “Why does it matter to them?” and “why is this product or service more interesting than anything else?”

It’s how we build solutions for people at How&How. Whether that's Wild Thingz cooking up sweets that are actually good for your kids, or Big Cartel speaking to creatives who keep putting off their dreams, or Chester Zoo helping people in two minds about whether a zoo is a good thing or not.

The audience is always the answer.

What’s been the most fun project for you?

The brands that seem the most boring on paper are my favourite. There's something really interesting in taking something stereotypically dull and bringing it to life with the right words. About making the driest thing the most delicious.

One recent project that springs to mind is Jupi, an AI-powered tool that helps businesses make faster decisions. We established a tone and messaging that are super impactful and decisive — no added fluff — around a surreally simple idea.

And a lot of that came back to the founder, not the product. Nick is an unbelievable client. He's an exuberant French guy who takes calls from anywhere (his son’s ballet class and Disneyland, for example) in this incredible coat. But more than that, he's really open and it helped that he fully embraced what we were doing, sending us references and getting involved everywhere he could.

Then there’s this British utility company I worked on last year (it’s under wraps for now, sorry!). I have a soft spot for the project, because it was again a bit more ‘boring’, but also a great chance to write in my own voice.

Talking about people doing their weekly shop in Waitrose or popping for a pint at their local felt so familiar. Really colloquial, really British, quite Northern. It has this lovely small town feel that people don’t usually want to hear.

Love that identity, great work. If you were hiring a junior copywriter, what would you look for?

Credit to Pete, my old boss, for imparting this wisdom. I’d look for what he looked for in me: character and potential. Plus a big dose of curiosity. Juniors aren’t jaded by experience – I want them to seem interested and ask all manner of questions.

And sure, you could come in with an incredible book or spin the perfect line, but at that level I just want someone that's really enthusiastic about writing, someone that asks questions and puts themselves out there. Once you put that person in the right environment, they'll get to grips with it and accelerate naturally.

Do you have a favourite line of copy?

The Lucky Saint campaign for Dry January was a real chef’s kiss. You know, “Drink religiously” and “Thou shalt not, not drink”. It’s as clean as their alcohol, and it just feels like the perfect execution. The lines, the art direction, it’s a thing of beauty.

Is there anything you wish you knew when you were 20?

Knowing what a copywriter was would have been helpful.

But going back to my point earlier, probably just how great it is to be a junior. We have a habit of fast-tracking our lives — everyone’s obsessed with becoming a middleweight and then a senior as quickly as possible. I understand why, but when we're faced with the prospect of working until we're 75, so little of our time is spent without pressure.

Why not just enjoy being a bit fresh and wide-eyed?

What are you excited about right now?

I'm working on a naming brief at the moment, and I'm very excited about clients who prefer a longer name.

Normally brands are like, “it needs to be four letters max – that’s catchy and memorable,” but I think there’s a massive space for good, long brand names. Let’s hope we bag one.

There you have it – a window into the world of Will Nicklin. Who knows which brands he’ll turn his hand to next? Follow him on LinkedIn to find out.