Having enjoyed reading your
biographical, They
can't take that away from me... I
would love to post your article (for my) course for
seniors entitled Autobiography and Journaling ... and
let them read your article as a good example of what
I call the reader's writer, clearly expressed and easy
to read. (Howell)
The French language has
always appealed to me ... so I enjoyed Lavinia's
experiences en
France! (Di Sullivan, Perth, Australia)
I am an American and an
expat here since 1990. I have been a subscriber to Writing
Tip for a few years now and look forward to the Friday
editions. I archive by creating topics of the tips
relevant to me and often refer. (Mary, Lagos, Nigeria)
WRITERS!
Write
Your Own Best Seller!
This
year, don't just read a best-seller ... Write
your own using the software program that works
in the same way J K Rowling writes her Harry
Potter novels!
Who said Aussies would
bet on two flies crawling up a wall? Now I know
better! (Bill Denham, Chicago, USA)
I enjoy reading your page
every week, Jennifer, it's never boring and there's always
something to bring a smile to my face! (Kenny Dima,
Tenerife, Spain)
Great newsletter -
originally found this site after searching for
clarification on a contentious
point amongst work colleagues. Just had to look at old
issues and now look forward to Fridays (Juliet Wallace,
Manchester, ENGLAND)
Advertising Tips
................................ 13 July 2001
This week
32 Easy Ways to Breathe New Life into Any
Webpage Sales Letter (part 2) by Jimmy D. Brown
Quick Tip
~ * ~
Greetings,
The second part of Jimmy Brown's 32
steps to improving your sales letter appears this week - follow this advice to
get results from your efforts. But remember, if you don't have the time to write
your own material, I can do this for you (mention that you're a subscriber and
receive 10% discount). Or, you can use these sales letter templates to produce
professional sales letters in just two minutes: http://www.write101.com/letters/sales.htm
Gail Hornback has submitted the
quick tip for this issue and it contains some eye-opening remarks about
advertising in ezines.
Remember, all past issues of this
newsletter are archived
on site - feel free to browse :) and if you'd like some help with your writing,
you might like to subscribe to my other, free weekly newsletter, the
Write Way
32 Easy Ways to Breathe New
Life into Any Webpage Sales Letter
by Jimmy D. Brown.
Does your website convince people to make a purchase?
If not, here are 32 easy ways to breathe new life into your
sales letter...
Last week, the first fifteen steps were published, now here are the
final steps to breathe new life into your sales letters:
16) Make it stand out. Don't kid
yourself. There are
hundreds, maybe thousands out there on the web doing the
same thing you are doing. How will you stand out among the
crowd? Your sales letter must inject personality. It must
breathe of originality. Your product or service is
different. It's not like all of the rest. It is unique.
Right? Your sales letter must separate you from the
competition. It must create a feeling of "You won't find
this anywhere else."
17) Be believable. "Earn $54,000 in the next
24
hours!!!!!" Delete. Good grief, do they think I am an
idiot or something? Get real. Don't make outrageous claims
that are obviously not the truth. You'll ruin your
reputation. Let me tell you a simple universal fact that
cannot be reversed. Once you have been branded a liar, you
will NEVER be anything but a liar. It doesn't matter if you
launch the most respectable, honest business available
anywhere, people will always have doubt because they
remember the crazy stuff you've said before. Be believable.
Don't exaggerate, mislead, stretch or distort the truth.
18) Be specific. Don't generalize your
information, but
rather be EXACT. Instead of "over 100 tips for losing
weight" use "124 tips for losing weight." By generalizing
information, it creates doubt and questions in the reader's
mind. "What am I really getting here? Does he even know?"
When you use specific information, the reader begins to
think, "This person must have counted. I know exactly what
I can expect." "Platitudes and generalities roll off the
human understanding like water from a duck," wrote Claude
Hopkins in his classic book "Scientific Advertising." "They
leave no impression whatsoever."
19) Be complete. Tell the reader everything
they would
want to know about your product or service. Answer all of
their questions, anything they would want to consider before
making a purchase. Think about it from their point of
view.
Ask yourself, "Why wouldn't I buy this?" Then, address that
in your sales letter. Remove anything that would keep the
reader from making the purchase.
20) Use testimonials to boost your
sales. Share
actual excerpts from what your current customers are saying
about your product or service. Many websites have an entire
section or even a separate page that has endorsements and
compliments listed. Satisfied customers remove some of the
doubt in the mind of the reader. "If these people have
found a lot of value and benefit in the product, then I
probably will too." Especially effective are testimonials
from respected, well known "authorities" within your target
field.
21) Use headlines over and over throughout the sales
letter. A headline isn't just relegated to the beginning of
your ad copy. Use them frequently -but don't overuse. A
well-placed headline re-grabs the reader's attention, brings
them deeper into the letter, and readies them for the next
paragraph. You will want to spend as much time working on
your headlines as you do the entire sales letter. They are
that important.
22) Avoid asking stupid questions.
"Wouldn't you like
to make $1,000,000 a year?" "Doesn't that sound great?"
"Would you like to be as successful as I am?" Avoid any
question that insults the intelligence of your reader or
makes them feel like they are inferior.
23) Offer a freebie even if the customer doesn't
buy.
If the customer decides he or she isn't going to make a
purchase, then you want to follow-up with them later to try
to influence them to buy in the future. By offering a free
item, you can request their email address in order to
obtain the freebie. By doing this, you can now follow-up
with the customer for a potential future sale.
Additionally, you can continue the sales process by having
your ad copy, banners, flyers, etc. within the free item.
And, of course, if your free item is a high quality, useful
product or service which impresses the customer, they
probably will be back as a customer soon.
24) Use bonuses to overwhelm the reader. One
of the
things that I have found very effective in writing sales
letters is to include bonus items that OUT-VALUE the actual
product I am offering. Ginsu made this one famous. They
were selling a set of steak knives, but before the
commercial was finished, you had so many bonus items on the
table it was hard to refuse. Make sure you provide quality
bonuses and not some worthless, outdated junk that damages
the credibility of your main offer.
25) Use connective phrases like "But wait,
there's
more" and "But that's not all." These phrases
effectively
lead the reader from one paragraph to the next, particularly
when the next paragraph is a bullet list of benefits, or
leads into bonus items. Again, the idea is MORE and MORE
value and benefits to the reader.
26) Always include a deadline. By including a
deadline, you create a sense of urgency in the mind of the
customer. "If I don't order within 24 hours, then I won't
get the bonuses." "Oh no, there are only 10 items
remaining, I've got to hurry." Let the customer know what
they will be missing out on if they don't make the deadline.
Remember, they won't miss out on your products or bonuses,
they will miss out on all of the benefits of your products.
Deadlines are very effective. Every sales letter should
have one.
27) Tell them exactly how to order. Be
clear as to
the order process. Point them towards the order link. Tell
them what methods you offer. (I.E. credit cards, checks,
etc.) Make this process as simple and clear as can be. If
it takes more than 2 steps, most people won't continue.
28) Explain when the product will be
delivered. How
quickly will the order be processed? When will the order be
available? Let the customer know exactly what they can
expect when they place their order. The more specific you
can be here, the better. Let them know that you have a
system in place. "Operators are standing by." Their order
will be handled properly. Tell them.
29) Offer a money back guarantee. Take
away their last
reason to hold back. Offer a "no questions asked" 30 day
guarantee. Most people may not realize this, but in most
cases, it's the law of the land. You are REQUIRED to give
them their money back if they are not satisfied with the
product or service. Since it's the law anyway, why not make
it a benefit. Let them know that they are purchasing your
product or service RISK-FREE.
30) Instruct them to respond immediately.
Many people
just need to read those words, "Act Now!" "Order
today!"
"Click Here to Instantly Place Your Order." You've got them
this far, now tell them what you want them to do. Get them
to "Act Fast!" Have you ever heard a mail order commercial
on television that didn't prompt the viewer to order right
way?
31) Include a post script. People will
always read the
P.S. Always. In fact, the P.S. is one of the MOST
IMPORTANT parts of your sales letter. Why? Because in many cases the
visitor at your website will scroll immediately down to the
end of your page to see how much it is going to cost. A
P.S. is a perfect place to recap your offer, so when they
see your price tag, they will also see a very detailed
description of what they will receive for their money. Use
your P.S. to restate your offer in detail.
32) Include a second post script. You
better believe
if they read the first P.S., they will read a P.P.S. Use
this post script to remind them of the deadline or offer
another bonus or point out some compelling factor that would
make them want to order. I guarantee you they will read
it.
Use these 32 tips and I guarantee you that you will see
a significant increase in the amount of responses you
receive from your sales letters. In fact, it would be
impossible for your responses to not improve.
If you don't have the time to put all these tips
into practice, you can start writing powerful sales letters that work, here's a helping
hand.
Ever wondered what happens to people
when they get past their Use-By date?
Now it can be revealed:
OLD ACCOUNTANTS never die, they just lose their
balance.
OLD ACTUARIES never die, they just get broken
down by age and sex.
OLD BANKERS never die, they just lose interest.
OLD CARDIAC SURGEONS never die, they just get
bypassed.
OLD COMPUTER USERS never die, they just lose
their memory.
OLD GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES never die, they just
work as if they had.
OLD INVESTORS never die, they just roll over.
OLD PROCTOLOGISTS never die, they just butt out.
OLD SUPREME COURT JUSTICES never die, they just
get disappointed.
OLD UPHOLSTERERS never die, they just don't
recover.
Thanks to Ben for finding these and passing them
on.
Quick Tip
Don't Waste Time Advertising
By Gail Hornback
As the publisher of three weekly ezines, I have the job of
managing the submission of all the advertising, which includes
classifieds, sponsor ads, and solo ads. I continually wish,
for their own sake, that these advertisers could see their ad
in the context of that big picture.
If they only knew how many ads we receive for the same exact
"opportunity", just with a different ID number in the URL.
Yes, that's right, not even different wording. Many are
obviously using an ad that has been provided by the supplier
of the product or service.
Sometimes I find it hard to run the ad, knowing that it is
a waste of time, not to mention a waste of money! Even though,
as a publisher who offers the service of supplying advertising
space as part of my business, I realize that it is not up to me
to make those judgments after receiving the ad. I often feel an
obligation to contact the person running the ad, to let them in
on my insight. But, the time spent on that would be so
consuming, that it would obviously not be advantageous for my
own business.
So, I am hoping that this article will be a service to both of
us!
Advertisers, take note!!!! Learn from these observations from
the "inside":
1. Beware of the saturated market. Many (if not all) of the
"programs" that catch your attention are old news. In fact, the
truth is, only the originator and the first few "sign-ups" in
any program will be the ones that benefit. And that benefit
will be fairly short lived. And then they have to move on to the
next one. I'm not necessarily talking here about "affiliate"
programs of legitimate tangible products or services that are of
value to the consumer. But programs that are based on a
"down-line" of sorts.
2. No matter what you are advertising, create your own ads!
You're not a writer, you say? You don't really have to be.
Yes, most good affiliate programs give you resources to use,
including pre-written ads, letters, etc. But you don't have
to copy/paste them word for word. Use them as a guide line.
Even go to the site of the product, and take a line here and
there that you feel promotes the product well. Mix it up, and
create an ad that people won't recognize immediately when they
see the first few words. (Trust me - I see it all the time. We run
10 classifieds
per issue in our ezines. Recently I had THREE of the exact same
ad in that issue's set of 10 ads.) You're taking your chances.
A really busy publisher can not always take the time and effort
to hand-place repetitive ads.
3. Choose affiliate programs wisely, and spend time accordingly.
Do as much research of the product as possible before you spend
lots of time and/or money promoting it. Don't react to the hype
of an ad that you see about the product. Use the product
yourself, if possible, before you become a spokesperson for it. Many
products
and services offer a free trial period that is perfect for
getting to know the product.This only makes sense, anyway.
A product that you use, and find value in for yourself will be
EASY to promote. You'll find that writing your own ads for a
product you use and believe in will be a cinch!
4. Ultimately, of course, create your OWN product or service.
Affiliate programs are a great way to build various profit
streams. But you certainly will not build a living off of any
one. Your ultimate goal should be to create your own product,
and get others to be YOUR affiliate!!
(You can create your own
Info-Product by following this simple step-by-step
guide! )
I am always open to your questions
about anything I've mentioned
above. If you have any questions regarding a program that you
see, an affiliate program of a product, or questions about
building your own Ebusiness, please feel free to write me! mailto:gail@webworksathome.com
