Professional Copywriting
Ten years back, my soon-to-be wife, Cindy, and I first noticed the bombarding beat for Marshall Mather?s ?My Name Is.?What an ass,? I said as the two of us sat to watch the Grammies a year later. ?It?s sad he can sell so many records just by being vile. Really, how much talent can that [.]
Step into a bookstore, find the business section, and pull out a book. Then flip the book to the back cover.
Here’s what you’re sure to find on virtually every business book: A selection of well-chosen fascinating bullets.
And there’s a reason why bullets make it to the back cover of a book.
It’s because you tend to read the title, then the subtitle (on the front cover) and then flip the book to get the gist of the book.
Yes there’s the yada, yada, yada about the book on the back cover. Yes, there’s an index. Yes, there’s a contents page.
But you ignore most of the yada, yada, yada and head for the bullets.
You do it because bullets are like flashing Christmas lights
They flash because of their ability to create curiosity. And not just a little bit of curiosity, but a massive amount of curiosity.
So here I’ve got a book on my desk that’s about podcasting. And at the very top of the back cover are the following bullets.
- How to find and download audio and video podcasts to your computer or portable media player
- How to develop, format, produce, edit, encode, and upload your audio or video podcast, including in-depth information on using music legally
- How to set up an effective audio studio, including the complete and updated “The podcast studio buyer?s guide”
- How to create great video, including tricks of the trade such as the law of thirds, the line, and the three-point light technique, as well as tips on casting, locations, scheduling, and more
- How people are marketing and making money through podcasting in the era of Web 2.0
Notice how they’ve put the entire guts of the book in those five simple points?
And notice how each of those points started with a ?how? statement?
So let’s tackle those two ideas one at a time
Idea 1: notice how each of those points started with a ?how? statement?
It doesn’t matter what the line. If you put the word ‘how’ before it, it instantly becomes interesting and gets our curiosity going.
Or you can always add a ?why,? which does the same trick.
For example:
I went to Ireland this summer.
versus
How I went to Ireland this summer.orWhy I went to Ireland this summer.
Another example:
I make butter chicken.
versus
How I make butter chicken.orWhy I make butter chicken.
Of course you won?t use a sentence that?s as boring as the ones above, but you do get the point, right? The only question that remains is how do you get all of these sentences. And the clue lies in Idea 2.
Idea 2: Notice how they’ve put the entire guts of the book in those four or five lines?
So take your entire book or course, or speech, or whatever. Split it up into distinct parts.
For example, my product The Brain Audit has seven sections, so it could naturally be split into seven distinct bullets. Or you could also select just five.
Then pull out something from each part to describe the benefit the reader could get from that section.
So for The Brain Audit, the bullets read like this:
- How to instantly get (and keep) the attention of the customer.
- The roller coaster sequence (and why it matters when selling).
- How to create a uniqueness factor in a matter of days.
- How to know if a customer is really interested in your offering.
- Why benefits and solutions aren’t the most effective way to sell.
Each of those bullets represents a different part of the book
And each of them has a simple ?how? or ?why? structure to get and keep attention.
In fact, this same technique that you see at the back of a book can be used for any persuasive piece of writing, be it a sales page, an event, a speaking engagement, product, or service.
The fundamentals are simple
Take your product/service. Split it into five or seven parts and pull out the most important highlights or benefits.
Take those highlights or benefits and put a ?why? or ?how? before each one.
And there you have it: a collection of fascinating bullets.
And that’s how you make your product/service or course stand out. Like flashing Christmas lights.
About the Author: Sean D?Souza offers a free report on ?Why Headlines Fail? when you subscribe to his Psychotactics Newsletter. Be sure to check out his blog, too.
Before you get too impressed, hear this: I did it all in self-defense.
Let me give you some quick background.
I have extreme Tourette?s Syndrome, as Sonia noticed recently. Tourette?s makes people move or vocalize involuntarily and occasionally results in unspeakable awesomeness. My motor tics range from eye blinking to punching myself in the face to even stranger things. My phonic tics range from clearing my throat to hooting and yowling and snarling and slobbering and screaming like the Tasmanian Devil.
Did I mention that I work in a quiet library?
There are only a couple of things that help when it gets bad. Guitar, kettlebells, talking, and writing — they are all forms of distraction that force the itch out of my brain for a while.
But sometimes none of them work. In September I was having a horrible time and couldn?t shake it. I needed a project to focus on. A big fat distraction.
Enter the guest post ultra marathon.
Come one, come all!
I wanted everyone to know they could ask for a guest post, but I still got a lot of ?My blog?s probably too small, but . . .? I have a lot of readers with big blogs, and a lot of readers with tiny, new blogs that are still swaddled in onesies. All were fair game.
The criteria
I asked everyone who wanted a post to provide:
- A URL and blog title
- A topic
- A word count
- An interesting angle to approach it from
I said I wouldn?t write about anything I felt was unethical, morally reprehensible, or obvious spam. I didn?t want this bio floating around the web:
About the author: Josh Hanagarne is the author of Cialis Rules! He enjoys popping a few Vicodin in the morning and a dozen Viagra for lunch. His hobbies include MAKE CRA-Z MONEY FROM HOME! and topless tell-all webcam romps.
Luckily, I didn?t get any of those solicitations. Well — not many of those.
The response
Uh oh.
I published my post, subtitled ?Let?s Get Stupid,? at about seven in the morning in the United States. By one o?clock my teeth were chattering with fear as I looked at my inbox: over 70 submissions.
Refresh. 75.
Refresh. 80.
Uh oh.
Who were these people? I was going to be writing guest posts for blogs about stock options, personal development, computer programmers, home schooling, study skills mentoring, blogging, advice for women, fussy academics, chemists, Capoeria buffs, kettlebell nuts, corporations in the process of building websites and trying to make everyone get along, and so on . . . .
A smarter man, a man whose brain was less of an apocalypse, might have scaled things down or extended the deadline. But this was exactly what I needed.
To work, then.
The first week and onward
I wrote 15 guest posts in week one. They all published within a few days. When the dust cleared, RSS numbers had jumped by 200 during those seven days.
The remaining six weeks were similar. Sometimes I wrote more. Sometimes less. Sometimes I wrote guest posts that I never saw again. My posts appeared with different titles, different pictures, different fonts, and the traffic just kept coming.
After about 10 days, my tics had subsided, but I was committed to the project. I was having a blast.
Lessons learned, surprises, and observations for anyone who wants to try this
By November 1 I had written over 50 posts. 42 of them had aired on other blogs. Here is what I learned:
- A lot of bloggers seem to have a fear of guest posting. Get over it or be happy with your current rate of growth.
- You will meet awesome people.
- Those people will act like you are doing them a favor by borrowing their traffic.
- You are doing them a favor, provided you give them something they can use. I love to have guests!
- This marathon approach is not for everyone. Do not try to write more than you are capable of. Test yourself but don?t flame out. I have a masochist work capacity and I still wound up with more than I could handle. I thought I would get the 80+ posts written before November 1. Life, sleep, the flu, a book proposal, and kettlebells all conspired against me.
- Don?t commit to anything that will prevent you from taking care of business at home(page). There?s nothing more pointless than writing a killer guest post and having all those new visitors land on a dancing Hello Kitty graphic that?s a year old.
- Don?t pretend you know things you don?t. If you can?t talk about stocks, either find another approach or turn it down. Don?t be a poser.
- Don?t be afraid to say no when people pitch ideas to you. You made the rules, right?
I don?t regret doing the marathon, but I won?t do it again if I don?t have to. I still have nearly 40 posts to get through before I?ve knocked out that initial batch. I?m going to honor them all. In the meantime, if you?d like to be added to the queue, you know where to find me.
I can handle it.
About the Author: Josh Hanagarne is the twitchy giant behind World?s Strongest Librarian, a blog about living with Tourette?s Syndrome, kettlebells, book recommendations, buying pants when you?re 6?8?, old-time strongman training, and much more. Please subscribe to Josh?s RSS Updates to stay in touch.
Ever heard of Charley Hill? He seemed like an average, ordinary guy.
He lived in a mid-sized town with his wife, two children, and a dog. He went to church on Sunday, coached Little League, and drove a pickup truck. He was friendly but quiet, the sort of guy you could walk by on the street without noticing.
But appearances can be deceiving. Charley Hill was one of the most successful farm equipment salesmen in the Midwest. People would travel hundreds of miles to see Charley, even when there were plenty of dealers much closer to home.
What did Charley have that other salesmen didn?t? Not a thing.
He sold the same equipment as everyone else. Carried the same parts. Provided the same service. Yet his sales were typically two or three times that of similar-sized dealers. The reason?
Charley Hill didn?t believe in ?fair? offers
Every customer went home, shaking his head, thinking that good old Charley was the most unfair salesman they had ever dealt with.
But they thought is was Charlie who was getting the raw end of the deal.
Charley didn’t cheat his customers — no, quite the opposite. He simply made offers that were so compelling, and seemed so skewed in his customers? favor, people just couldn?t say no.
What is a ?fair? offer, anyway? A reasonable price? There?s nothing wrong with that. But there?s nothing very exciting about it either.
An ?unfair? offer, on the other hand, is very exciting. It?s a deal that makes customers feel as if they’re getting far more value than what they’re paying for. It?s an arrangement that makes a purchase seem irresistible, easy, and free of risk.
How do you make an unfair offer?
First, let’s consider what an offer is. The most basic offer is simply ?Here’s something I’m selling and this is what you have to pay.? But an offer can be so much more.
Consider some of the other elements that could go into an offer, such as:
- The unit of sale (each? two for? set?)
- Optional features (personalization? e-book or hardcopy?)
- Presentation of price ($40 or $39.99? $12 a month or 40 cents a day?)
- Terms (credit card? delayed billing? installments?)
- Incentives (free gifts? discounts? contests?)
- Guarantee (money-back? buy-back? refund unused portion?)
- Trial period (30 days? 60 days? 90 days?)
- Time or quantity limit (respond before date? reply in 10 days? only 500 available?)
- Shipping and handling (extra or included?)
- Future obligations (buy 3 more in 6 months? no obligation?)
Once you have an idea of the parts that make up your offer, you can improve each one-by-one. For example, let’s say you’re selling an e-book on your blog and your price is $30. Here’s a breakdown of the possible elements of your offer:
Unit of sale: 1
Optional features: none
Presentation of price: $30
Terms: credit card payment
Incentives: none
Guarantee: none
Trial period: none
Time or quantity limit: none
Shipping and handling: none
Future obligations: none
So basically, you offer an e-book for a flat $30 and you want payment upfront. That’s it.
If you’ve built up the benefits of your book, it seems like a fair offer. But how could you turn this into an unfair offer? Let’s look at each element.
Unit of Sale
You’re selling one e-book. Okay, makes sense for most individuals. Though if your market is business or government, you could offer a lower price for a higher unit of sale, say 10 for $250. This works even better if you’re selling physical items.
Optional Features
Many people prefer books in hard copy. A hard copy also seems more valuable because it’s a physical object rather than just an electronic file. In fact, many people print e-books to make them easier to read.
So you might offer a printed version for $10 more. Perhaps the printed version could have an extra chapter or bonus features. Once you have a finished book design, hard copies can be relatively simple with print-on-demand services, such as Lulu.
Presentation of Price
You’ve done your research and found that $30 is a good price for the type of e-book you’re selling, but you could use a ?price break? to make the cost appear smaller. You can present this price as $29.99 or $29.97 or $29.95.
It costs you only a few pennies, but transforms a thirty-dollar price tag into what feels like a twenty-something price tag. For simplicity, you could even set the price at a flat $29.
Terms
There’s nothing wrong with accepting credit cards. But you could also accept PayPal. And as odd as it may seem, some people don’t like to use credit cards or Paypal and prefer to send a physical check.
I work with a political organization that sells products online and we always allow payment by check for the small percentage of people who feel more comfortable with that. It is more time-consuming, so you would have to evaluate whether it’s cost-effective for you. With many online businesses it’s not practical.
Incentives
Here’s where you can really pump up your offer. You can offer a free gift or bonus (or two or three) with each sale. This might be other e-books you already have or sections that you pull out of the main e-book. Offering a 100-page e-book with a 20-page free bonus is more attractive than offering a 120-page e-book.
You could also offer special discounts, such as $10 off for the first 4 weeks of your promotion, then raise the price later.
Guarantee
Here’s another great way to strengthen your offer. Remember that people don’t know what they’re getting until they get it. They’ve been ripped off before and have doubts any time they buy something sight unseen.
You could offer a 30-day money back guarantee to assure them that you’re honest and stand behind what you sell. Better yet, a 60-day or 90-day guarantee. It may seem counterintuitive, but the longer the guarantee, the less likely people are to return something.
Trial Period
If you’ve promoted your e-book as a ?system,? such as how to build blog traffic step-by-step, you could turn your guarantee into a risk-free trial.
Try my blog traffic-building system risk-free for 3 months. If you’re not satisfied with the results, I’ll refund your money no questions asked.
Time or Quantity Limit
Quantity limits work for physical items. ?Hurry. Quantities are limited.? Time limits work for anything. ?It’s available only for the next 19 days.? A time limit forces an immediate decision and increases sales.
If you don’t want to set a limit on your e-book, you could set a limit on a bonus. ?Order in the next week and get the bonus e-book free.?
Shipping and Handling
For an e-book, there is no shipping and handling. But if you choose to offer a hard copy or physical item, it is acceptable to add a reasonable amount to cover your shipping costs.
You could also offer free shipping as a bonus offer, which is popular for online sales. By the way, most cities have one or more ?fulfillment? businesses who will package and ship your items for a small fee.
Future Obligations
Book clubs sometimes offer special low prices on an initial purchase if you agree to make future purchases at the regular price. ?Get 3 books for 3 bucks. Order 5 more books later for our regular low price.?
I’ve not seen this offer used with e-books, since there’s a chance you could get ripped off by your customers. But for the right audience, it could work.
Okay, so let’s pretend your e-book is called ?The Magic Blog Traffic Building System.? Here is your original ?fair? offer:
Order The Magic Blog Traffic Building System for $30
A little boring, huh? Now let’s compare that to this ?unfair? offer using some of the elements above:
Try The Magic Blog Traffic Building System risk-free for 90 days. Your satisfaction is guaranteed. If your blog doesn’t explode with traffic, return the book for a full refund, no questions asked. Order in the next 30 days and pay just $19 ($29 after March 15) PLUS get 3 FREE BONUS reports: 9 Ways to Boost Blog Traffic with E-mail, Blog Design Secrets that Make Visitors Come Back, and The Lazy Blogger’s Way to Create Popular Posts.
How could you turn down an offer like that? It’s so good, it actually appears ?unfair? to the person selling you the e-book.
?How could anyone make money asking so little and giving me so much? That’s the impression you want to create. And that’s what can turn a boring ?fair? offer into an exciting ?unfair? offer.
Old Charley Hill came before the Internet and wouldn’t know a blog from a bullfrog. But he understood the idea that customers come first. When you make people feel you’re giving them more than you’re getting in return, you make sales. Lots and lots of sales.
Want learn more about putting together killer offers, and presenting them in the most compelling fashion? Subscribe to Internet Marketing for Smart People, the Copyblogger email newsletter. It?s some of our best stuff, no junk, no fluff, and no charge. Hey, that’s a great offer!
About the Author: Dean Rieck is one of America’s top freelance copywriters and publisher of the Direct Creative Blog and Pro Copy Tips, a blog that provides copywriting tips for professional copywriters.
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