Small Business Marketing Tip – Great Copywriting Equals Big Sales

If you read my last post you probably know that I feel that
copywriting and sales go hand in hand.

The point of copywriting is to draw in your prospect to take
some kind of action that will eventually lead to a sale of
your products or services.

If you create great copy, you will clearly define what you
are offering and create urgency within your prospects to
take the next step to becoming a customer. When you create
great copy, I guarantee your sales will increase.

I talked about this before, but it needs to be repeated.
Keep your information clear and easy to understand. Answer the
questions who, what, why, where, when, and how. If you leave
your prospects with unanswered questions, you are opening up
possible objections and you will lose sales. If they don’t
understand something, they will be less likely to purchase
your product or service.

As you write, try to write from your prospects’ point of view.
People want to know “what’s in it for me?” I call this “WIIFM”
think of it as a radio station playing in your prospects head
24/7. Your job as a copywriter is to answer that question. What
is your product or service going to do for your reader?

Why do they need it?

It is natural for you to want to explain the features and
benefits of what you are promoting. For instance, if you are
promoting an information product you created on designing
websites, you may include a line such as “this product features
a video tutorial that will allow you to follow along and
watch me build a sample website”.

By changing the line to read “this product features a video
tutorial that will allow you to follow along with me as I build
a sample website. It will give you the skills and confidence
you need to build your own website in a simple step by step
manner.” This gives your reader a reason to purchase your product.

Great copy includes a call to action. Don’t get so caught up in
explaining your product/service that you forget to ask the prospect
to buy the product. Some various “calls to action” include the
phrases “buy now”, “call now”, “click here now”.  If you don’t
ask for the sale, you won’t get it. Many people only read the
opening and close of sales letters. Make sure you include a
call to action at the beginning of the letter, and include a
P.S. section at the end that closes with a call to action.
 
When you make your prospects an offer, give them an offer that
is too good to pass up. Offering a discount for a “limited time
only”, for instance, prompts them to act fast. Other incentives
would include a special bonus included with their purchase. To
increase your sales, create urgency within your reader.

Copywriting is a skill that can be learned. It doesn’t come
naturally to everyone. Keep practicing and your copywriting
will become more effective.

Study the sales letter at this link and see how much of what
I talked about is in the letter.

Click Here Now! www.Copywriting-Ebooks.com/ab.htm

Take care,
Blase

Small Business Tip – Copywriting The Basics

Small Business Tip – Copywriting The Basics

By definition, copywriting is the writing of material that
will be used to sell a product or service. This includes
things like advertisements, press releases, brochures, radio
and TV ads, website copy, emails, a sales presentation, and any
other type of device or media you can use to sell something.

I will be the first to admit to be a great copywriter is
difficult and takes years of training and learning from
experience. Many businesses hire professionals to do the
work for them. As a matter of fact I write copy for other
businesses. However, to get better than average results
it is a skill that can be learned fairly quickly.

Here are the basics of good copy.

When you sit down to write copy, you must first know who
you are talking to.Then you must think like that person thinks.
This person is your target market. Try to put yourself in their
mindset. What kind of questions will they have about your
product or service? What do they need to know in order to
make a decision of whether they need the things you are
offering?

Keep your writing clear and concise. Many people are stressed
for time and they are not going to sit down and re-read
something that doesn’t make sense right away.  Use words
that are naturally found in every day vocabulary.

When people sit down to read something, they want to know
the following:

Who
What
Why
Where
When
How

Who is the offer for? This should be your target market, the
reader should understand that the offer is for them.

What is the offer? Are you offering a product, a service, or an
event? Make sure the reader knows what you are writing about.

Why are you making the offer? Is this a new product? Are
you celebrating your first year in business? When will
the offer be available? Is there an expiration date?

Where can your reader find this offer? Do they need to go to a
physical location or do they need to type a URL into their
web browser?

How do your readers take advantage of the offer? Do they
need to purchase something or do they need to register for
an event? Is there a fee gift involved? How much is it?

Give your readers a reason to buy your product or service.
Many people simply list the features and benefits of their
offer. They fail to tell the reader why the reader will
want to buy the offer. If you are selling ice cubes, tell
your readers how much better their life is going to be by
having cold drinks to cool them down on hot days.

Keep things exciting. Grab your readers’ attention with a
catchy headline and keep their attention throughout the
body of your copy.

It is important to include a call to action in your
copywriting. Give your customers an offer they cannot
refuse. Use phrases like “limited supply” or “limited
time offer” to give them a sense of urgency. If you don’t
ask your readers to become your customer, they won’t.

To see an example of what I am talking about go here.

www.copywriting-ebooks.com/ab.htm

Take care,
Blase

Small Business Tip – Marketing Offline To Boost Online

Marketing your small business offline is an outstanding method to compliment
your internet efforts. It helps direct people who otherwise may not notice
your online presence. Plus it helps you target people who have
Internet access and e-mail when you include your URL or internet site
address in all of your advertisements.

To help you gain the most from your offline marketing in your small business,
here are a few tips:

1. Encloses – Ask for media kits from print publications that
target your industry subscribers. Determine their rates for ads.
Let their advertising division assist you to produce a marketing
insert for your products and services that targets Internet users
and includes your URL and email address. Make sure you include a phone
number (toll-free, if possible) for those who have technical
difficulties or want to call.

2. Tell To Sell – Your Small business is about some expertise that you have
so why not give affordable (or free) courses at a local
community center or other educational facilities. Share your
knowledge in your field of expertise with attendees. And be sure
to distribute handouts with your complete contact information,
including your website and email address.

Be pro-active and post-active by announcing your classes in a
press release to the local media; radio, TV, print
publications. Be sure to follow up by inviting students to submit
feedback and referrals to your website form after the class is
over.

Capture their contact info, enter it into your database, and
follow through on a regular basis – sending out your ezine and
product / service announcements, both thru email and regular
regular mail.

3. ORGANIZATIONS – Target your offline marketing to groups of
people who will actually be interested in your product or
service; i.e. local affiliations and organizations.

Check out your Yellow Pages and local newspaper for groups near you
and determine when their meetings are. Call before you attend make
sure guests are welcome.

Then go and network at an easygoing pace, not fast. Slowly work your way into the
group and make sure it will be a good fit for you. When you first attend you will want
to give first, then you’ll receive later on. This process may take awhile, but the
contacts you make will be worth the investment.

Gradually circulate your  calling card with your website and
email address on it. Volunteer to teach about your area of
expertise if the opportunity comes up, naturally circulating your
marketing materials with your website and email address on them,
also.

Use caution, prior to rushing to join during or after the first
meeting. Take your time to be sure the group would be
appropriate for you and your business operations. Occasionally networking group
procedures are lacking or suffer due to board member turnover,
the economy, new industry polices, and so forth. So you could benefit from
waiting to join for several months down the road, or checking out another group all together.

So reach out and promote offline to compliment your online
strategy. And remember to include your site and email address
on all of your marketing material.

I am revamping my main website, but so you don’t miss
out go register now  for more very helpful small business info.

Take care,
Blase

Small Business Marketing – Sales Tip

I had a meeting with a client a few days ago, which prompted
this tidbit of information.

I have said for years that the easiest thing to sell is what
someone wants to buy. Sounds simple doesn’t it? Well I can
tell you from experience it’s not for most sales people.

Here is what happened at this meeting. My client had a
presentation that he was going to give to his prospect
and he wanted me to look it over. I read through it and
it was exactly what I thought it was going to be. He
basically backed up the “it’s all about me truck” and
started dumping.

The “it’s all about me truck” contains all of the information
 sales people think a prospect wants to know, like the XYZ
company has been in business since 1892. We have won this
award and that award. Our customers our number one and then
 our next most important asset is our employees. We have the
 best quality, service and price in the galaxy. If you a
buyer you’ve heard it hundreds of times. If you are a
salesperson I really hope you haven’t said it 100’s of
times, but I think a lot of you have.

So I asked my client, “Bill why do you think this prospect
needs your doodad? Does he buy doodads now? Who does he buy
them from? Does he like the company that he buys them from
now? Why does he buy them from that company? What is it about
that company that he really likes? If he could change one
thing about the company he is buying from what would it be?
If he could change one thing about doodads what would that
be? I could go on, but blogs are supposed to be short and
mine never are.

Here is the point. My client never asked his prospect about
his needs so he could tailor his presentation to the
prospect. I know a lot of sales people that do this and
I think they are untaught, lazy, or afraid to ask.

Remember I said the easiest thing to sell is what a prospect
wants to buy? How are you going to know unless you ask what
they want?

Here is how questioning works in action. I was sitting with
the head of engineering and three other development engineers
at a $500,000,000 dollar equipment manufacturing company.

We were discussing building one of the components of their
machine for them. It was a custom design that cost about
$5000 each and we were talking 100’s of them.

The meeting was over and we were all just sitting there
schmoozing so I asked the head of engineering a question?
I said, “Mr. X, if you could wave a magic wand over this
component and make one change to it what would that change
be?” He sat up and thought for a minute, then he looked me
right in the eye and said, “I want it to be smaller, I want
it to be X high and X wide and X deep.”

I looked him back in the eye and said, “Mr. X, if I can do
that for you will you give me the order?” He laughed and said,
absolutely!

After six months of research and development I delivered the
prototype and booked a massive order.

You see the easiest thing to sell is what the customer wants to buy.

If you like this article tell a friend, then go to http://www.gssam.com/
for more information.

Take care,
Blase