Every business owner hopes their ads and letters to customers go well.
This article’s topic is how to get more bang for your buck while using sales letters to market your business. The goal is to avoid writing the same mistakes over and over again. Below are the seven most common causes of ineffective sales letters:
One, people don’t get advertising’s actual value.
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Don’t get me wrong, here. An advertisement for your goods and services is a sales letter. To advertise is, as any advertising representative will tell you, for the sake of exposure, visibility, and brand awareness.
These ideas have merit, but in practice, they won’t put money in your pocket or pay for the advertisement. Ads with images are created to make you feel good about yourself by showcasing your best angles and poses.
Image advertising is a photo of you with your contact information and maybe a generic slogan like “we care” or “we try harder” underneath.
That’s a terrible idea for a startup.
Customers have become more wary than ever before. Catchy slogans or visually appealing advertisements do not sway them.
It takes five to seven years of that ‘image’ advertising before people remember who you are for good, and even then, there’s no assurance they’ll do business with you.
It’s a myth that consumers need to see your advertisement between six and twelve times before they start to remember it. More important than their future recollection of you is their present action of doing business with you or at least identifying themselves to you.
Sales generation is the true goal of advertising.
This includes luring in new customers, encouraging repeat business from existing ones, and reconnecting with long-lost clients. Sales are the only metric that counts. Period!
As the saying goes, “The only purpose of advertising is to make sales.” Author of “Scientific Advertising,” Claude Hopkins
“Sales are the only true barometer of an advertisement’s success.” Money-Making Words You Can Use Right Now, by Ted Nicholas
The first step is realizing that money is the sole true motivation for any form of advertising. When you accept that, everything else is simple.
2. Irrelevant target market promotion.
If you botch this step, the rest of your campaign will fail. It makes no difference if you have a fantastic product, persuasive copy, or an unbeatable deal. I can promise you that if you try to sell this incredible gadget to the wrong people, you will fail.
On the other hand, if you provide a mediocre product to the appropriate individuals at a modest price and with a mediocre copy, you will always make a sale. Not that you intend to do this. I bring this up to emphasize the importance of knowing your target audience.
How do you know you’ve zeroed in on the good market? The first step is identifying the people buying your goods or service. Your goal should be to locate your product’s most extensive potential purchaser base.
However, you should narrow your emphasis so that you’re not trying to please too many people with different tastes. Watering down your marketing to the point where no one is interested is easy.
If your product is successful enough to sell in multiple markets, you must tailor your marketing materials to each target audience.
Putting the spotlight on yourself, your business, or your product in the copy.
This is an issue for businesses of all sizes. Companies of larger size tend to be repeat offenders. Having one’s name in print is a thrill for everyone. I do. You do. They all do.
I have no doubt that your business and its wares bring you great satisfaction and pride. However, I strongly advise you to avoid boosting your ego in your sales letters.
And here’s why. Potential buyers couldn’t give a hoot. They are uninterested in you, your business, or your wares. That’s a harsh reality of the economic world, though.
Customers are primarily concerned with solving their difficulties and achieving meaningful life goals. It’s in our nature to do that.
You probably didn’t think, “Oh boy, here’s the perfect opportunity for me to give McGraw-Hill more money and help Sally Author get on the best seller list!” the last time you bought a book on lowering your taxes through the mail. You were thinking, “Here’s something I can use to hang onto a few more of my hard-earned dollars!”
If you want someone to pull out their wallet, you’ll need to convince them that what you’re offering is so valuable that giving some of it up is a little price to pay. And that’s asking a lot, my friend. This can only be achieved by addressing their concerns, questions, and aspirations.
You must get on the ground level with the subject to accomplish this. Talk in terms of “you” a lot. Get rid of all the jargon and technical terms.
Do away with everything that gives the impression that you are a stuffy, marble-clad establishment.
I don’t even know what that is. You say you need to sound upscale since you’re peddling stocks, diamonds, or something equally high-end. I’m sorry to break it to you. Your expectations have been dashed, and as a result, your business could suffer.
Even the highest class consists of carbon-based life forms who appreciate being spoken to as individuals.
The best marketers are aware of this. They have relied on it over and again to increase their wealth.
Assuming You Are Aware Of The Most Important Benefits To Your Customers 4.
Another arrogant mistake with severe consequences. Companies frequently mistakenly believe they have monopoly knowledge of their product and its merits because they developed it. By doing so, they land in hot water.
Even if your target audience stays the same, its requirements will likely shift several times throughout a product’s lifetime.
The novelty of a brand-new product may be its most significant selling point. Price, quality, and extra features become more important as it becomes mainstream and more competitors enter the market.
Your market’s current difficulties may, likewise, be resolved tomorrow. Then you have to rebrand your product to address new pain points.
You may be wondering where we find all of this vital marketing information. If you want to know your customers’ wants, you go straight to them. You should routinely conduct client surveys to learn about their concerns, desires, and issues. Once you have this information, you may capitalize on it by revising the copy’s value promises.
Fifth, you believe in the significance of your ad or product.
Perhaps, but not in the eyes of your clientele. You, your loved ones, your friends, and your staff depend on it. But that’s about the extent of it.
Potential buyers couldn’t give a hoot. They won’t anxiously anticipate receiving your mail-in sales brochure. They will probably ignore your print ad in the newspaper or magazine. Even if they’re only moderately interested in your goods, you need to be able to catch their attention and run with it.
You do this by highlighting an advantage in your headline that is so compelling that it can’t be ignored.
This benefit’s headline should have as much subtlety as a jackhammer. Look, your ad or sales letter has only a few seconds to grab someone’s attention and draw them into the details.
You only have this one chance to seize the moment before you lose your case forever. The reader loses interest and turns the page or discards your letter.
To prevent this, you must immediately bring out your most significant, loudest rifle. Put it front and center if at all possible. Create something so tempting that only a fool would pass it up.
This strategy is entirely counter to that of conventional advertising. The emphasis is placed on snappy headlines or stunning images. These methods are ineffective to the detriment of their users. Just decorative accents.
Forget your ad and its attractive layout to gain more leads and sales. Put aside any attempts at originality.
Instead, trying to knock your customers over the head with the most significant benefit you can provide would be best.
6. Not keeping a score of your progress and applying your newfound knowledge to increase your earnings.
If you want to make money with direct response techniques, this problem needs fixing immediately. Direct response advertising’s main strength is its quantifiability.
Keying your adverts and sales letters (with a unique department number, suite number, person’s name, or other identification) lets you track exactly how each sales letter performs.
Most advertising agencies insist that their industry cannot be measured. Hogwash! If you type in your advertising and sales letters, you can see how many people respond to each ad, how many make a purchase, and how many repeat purchases.
Keeping tabs on your progress is a strategic asset: CONTROL
What works and what doesn’t can be deduced from your outcomes. And how precisely well everything is functioning. You can then decide which marketing strategies to use and which to adjust or scrap. As a bonus, it reveals the most successful product lines, regions, media, and mailing lists.
You’d think that, given the benefits, everyone would make tracking a regular practice. Not so. In the coming week, pay close attention to your mail. You’ll be astounded to find out how many letters you get aren’t coded and hence untraceable.
Here is the rule I follow on this matter of paramount importance:
Critical tracking information into every marketing material you make.
Everything. Everything from commercials to sales letters to press releases. Anything you can think of has to be typed. If not, you are restricting your financial resources unnecessarily.
You haven’t planned your follow-up effort to maximize profits.
This is a significant consideration. Why? Because a well-executed follow-up campaign can treble or even double your earnings.
It’s proven that selling to a returning customer is considerably more straightforward and cheaper than attracting a brand-new one. Therefore, prioritizing tasks around the house will yield the best results.
But stop and consider it. When was the last time you purchased and immediately received a follow-up offer from the same business? I bet you can’t even think of the last time it happened.
Companies that reap massive profits from direct response campaigns regularly have sophisticated follow-up systems. Join the American Management Association and American Express’s mailing lists. These businesses have the best follow-up programs I’ve ever encountered.
Here are some suggestions for improving your follow-up strategy. Every order you send out should have a follow-up offer attached to it. Give a price cut on your top three or four suggestions. Take advantage of the situation now. At this time, you can make another sale with the least amount of effort.
At the very least, you should send follow-up mailings once every three months (even to individuals who have expressed interest but have not yet purchased). Even better would be once every two months.
Don’t let your customers’ attention drift away from your selling products. A customer’s confidence in you grows as they buy more from you. Plus, they’ll be more likely to return for future purchases. It’s a tremendous self-reinforcing loop. This article may be published in print or online with no changes to the text, provided the resource box has a WORKING link. It would be appreciated if you let us know if you plan on using this article, but it is not essential. Visit http://www.andrebell.com/contact to get in touch with me.
Andre Bell has written a book titled 32 Deadly Advertising Mistakes Every Business Makes (and How to Correct Them). If you’re seeking for techniques to improve the profitability of your advertisements and sales letters,
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