Copywriting for Copywriters

Copywriting is my first love in Marketing.

It brings together different disciplines such as story telling, fact gathering, market research, human psychology, technical writing, conversational writing, and much much more… Much to the confusion of corporate marketers.

You see, at the very essence of your business success is the human emotions of your prospect.

And prospects are highly guarded against 'sales techniques'. So modern marketing must delight the prospect with promises of great value – whilst maintaining every possible degree of human respect.

Copywriters seek to connect the dominant resident emotions of the prospect with your company and product. And that may not happen in 2 minutes through a 10 word advert and big pretty pictures… Nor with fancy slogans or cutesy graphics.

Direct response copywriters have known that pictures, entertainment, and attention grabbing wow factors can actually kill sales.

I'll say that again… If you study any decent direct response marketing book, such as the UK's Drayton Bird's book Common Sense Direct Marketing, you will very easily come to realise the obviousness of the truth.

Your prospect wants gripping clarity of the exact benefits you have on offer, and the reason why they should choose you rather than any of the rest of your competition. He does not want 'entertainment'. He wants a promise of benefit. Proof. And simplicity.

3 Copywriting Sins

One copywriter labels 'three unforgivable sins' many ad writers make:

1. Confuse the prospect
2. Bore the prospect
3. Set off his BS detector

The modern customer is highly sophisticated, as is today's marketplace. You must achieve an exact…

Message to Market Match

Copywriters must seek a 'message to market match' that 'meets the prospect where their mind is at', hooking their interest by reflecting what the prospect already inwardly desires, and then building a case through demonstration, credibility, and respect.

I have read many dozens of books on copywriting, taken many courses, had training from A-Grade copywriters earning 7 figures, and what I am left with is knowing their is no magic formula or blueprint to follow for successful copywriting, but a plethora of models, applications, considerations, principles to interpret, and lessons to learn.

I have some mind-maps that I use when copywriting to glean ideas from, and balance the many possibilties, to help make sure I am covering my bases…

Here are some of my notes

8 Preliminary Sales

You must make 8 preliminary sales before your prospect will part with their hard earned money or precious business budget:

1. The Attention Sale – I have to sell my prospect on looking at my ad.
2. The Readership Sale – I have to sell my prospect on reading what I have to say – all of it.
3. The Benefit Sale – Give every single reason and benefit of why he should buy.
4. The Credibility Sale – Convince my prospect that this particular product will fulfil all of those desired benefits.
5. The Value Sale – Why the price I'm asking is tiny in comparison of all the value he will receive by having the product.
6. The Safety Sale – That there is no downside to accepting my offer.
7. The Convenience Sale – That making the order and obtaining the product is simple and easy.
8. The 'Do It Now' Sale – That delaying is inconceivable ad he absolutely positively just HAS to have what I'm offering RIGHT NOW!

My 3 Copywriters Questions

My approach is to narrow the focus to just 3 questions I must answer:

1. Is it desireable?
2. Is it credible?
3. Is it worth it?

This copywriting process lies at the heart of marketing, so let's take it step by step:

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If I can give my prospect solid answers to those 3 questions while making those 8 preliminar-sales in my copy then I will obtain the big sale of my prospects actual order. You can do the same.

In summary, effective sales copy must…

• Engage the reader.
• Fully demonstrate the gain offerred by the product.
• Handle potential objections.
• Deliver social proof in the form of credentials and testimonials.
• Pinpoint the USP (unique selling proposition).
• Make the product benefits incredibly compelling yet totally believable.
• Match with the prospects beliefs, frustrations, and desires.
• Satisfies your prospects skepticism (by being transparent, honest, personal, and logical).
• Remove the risk (with quality assurances and guarantees).
• Build anticipation and excitement of using the product.
• And compell them to take immediate action.

Headline Grabbers

Now, for your articles, editorials, podcast videos, whitepapers, special reports, etc… let's consider a message to market match Headline: E.g.

7 ways your company is losing its top paying clients

That would be attractive to prospects that you know are losing high paying clients.

You can bet that a person experiencing the pain of losing high paying clients is going to be interested in knowing those 7 reasons his company might be losing clients.

And if you have done your research and those 7 reasons that you provide strike the right cord with the prospect, then you have demonstrated value, build credibility in your offer, and given the prospect hope.

You can then bet he will be very interested in reading full details of your product/service offering because of the 'message to market match'…

…Hitting the emotional sweet spot of your prospect in your sales literature so they feel as though you are speaking directly to them, about their exact situation.

This begins the process of building a personalised relationship with your prospect, finding out how they view their current situation with regards your product offering, and finding out from them how you can best present your product to satisfy his desires, reduce his frustrations, and help him sleep more peacefully at night.

One of my own 'products' as a copywriter of course is delivering for you everything I am outlining on my blog to bring you more sales, more consistently, from more sources, more easily.

There are some copywriting samples and examples available and I will share further insights into direct response copywriting on the blog.

I am generally quite busy but feel free to contact me if you are interested in having me write for you – or have any questions about copywriting that I might be able to help you with. I may be available on a retainer basis if I see good potential in working with you. Here's how to get me involved with your Marketing Conversion process.

Continue at the Marketing Conversion main page.

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