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Started reading
May 30, 2019
My definition says that an ad or commercial has a purpose other than to entertain. That purpose is to conquer a sale by persuading a logical prospect for your product or service, who is now using or is about to use a competitor’s product or service, to switch to yours. That’s basic, or at least, it should be. In order to accomplish that, it seems to me, you have to promise that prospect an advantage that he’s not now getting from his present product or service and it must be of sufficient importance in filling a need to make him switch. —Hank Seiden, Vice President, Hicks & Greist, New York
Copy cannot create desire for a product. It can only take the hopes, dreams, fears, and desires that already exist in the hearts of millions of people, and focus those already-existing desires onto a particular product. This is the copywriter’s task: not to create this mass desire—but to channel and direct it. —Eugene Schwartz, Breakthrough Advertising (Boardroom, 2004)
the reader finds nothing of interest after five seconds of scanning the letter, she will toss the letter in the trash.
Here’s what David Ogilvy, author of Confessions of an Advertising Man, says about headlines: The headline is the most important element in most advertisements. It is the telegram which decides whether the reader will read the copy. On average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy. When you have written your headline, you have spent eighty cents out of your dollar. If you haven’t done some selling in your headline, you have wasted 80 percent of your client’s money.
“The best headlines appeal to people’s self-interest, or give news.”
Your headline can perform four different tasks: 1. Get attention. 2. Select the audience. 3. Deliver a complete message. 4. Draw the reader into the body copy.
If you can legitimately use the word free in your headline, do so. Free is the most powerful word in the copywriter’s vocabulary. Everybody wants to get something for free.
Other powerful attention-getting words include how to, why, sale, quick, easy, bargain, last chance, guarantee, results, proven, and save.
When you write a headline, get attention by picking out an important customer benefit and presenting it in a clear, bold, dramatic fashion. Avoid headlines and concepts that are cute, clever, and titillating but irrelevant. They may generate some hoopla, but they do not sell.
the reader into the body copy, you must arouse his or her curiosity. You can do this with humor, or intrigue, or mystery. You can ask a question or make a provocative statement. You can promise a reward, news, or useful information.
Remember, as a copywriter, you are not a creative artist; you are a salesperson. Your job is not to create literature; your job is to persuade people to buy the product.
Question headlines should always focus on the reader’s self-interest, curiosity, and needs, and not on the advertiser’s.
The “4 U’s” copywriting formula—which stands for urgent, unique, ultra-specific, and useful—can help.
1. Who is my customer? 2. What are the important features of the product? 3. Why will the customer want to buy the product? (What product feature is most important to him?)
Showmanship, clever phrases, and ballyhoo do not, by themselves, make for a good headline.
It’s easy to forget that the real purpose of an ad is to communicate ideas and information about a product.
you sell more merchandise when you write clear copy.
“Borrowed interest” is a major cause of confusing copy. There are others: lengthy sentences, clichés, big words, not getting to the point, a lack of specifics, technical jargon, and poor organization, to name a few.
When you write your copy, you must carefully organize the points you want to make.
The headline states the main selling proposition, and the first few paragraphs expand on it.
His rule is: “Tell them what you’re going to tell them. Tell them. And then, tell them what you told them.”
He found that sentences became difficult to understand beyond a length of about 34 words.
the best average sentence length for business writing is 14 to 16 words.
When is it okay to use technical terms, and when is it best to explain the concept in plain English? I have two rules:
The words sound nice, but say nothing. And the ad doesn’t sell because it doesn’t inform.
the headline is the most important part of an ad, then the lead paragraph is surely the second most important part.
If you feel the need to “warm up” as you set your thoughts on paper, do so. But delete these warm-ups from your final draft. The finished copy should sell from the first word to the last.
There’s a world of information just waiting for you. But to use it, study it, enjoy it and profit from it, you first have to get at it. Yet the facts can literally be right at your fingertips—with your own telephone, a modem, and the IBM Personal Computer.
Not one of the Fortune 1000 companies even comes close to our rate of growth. And no wonder. Computers are the hottest product of the 1980s, with no end to demand in sight.
His rule of thumb for writing strong bullets: Be specific about the problem; be vague and mysterious about the solution. Plus, do it with a twist, hook, or unusual angle.
The bullet that the copywriter came up with: “How a pickpocket can make your back pain better.” He is specific about the problem (back pain), but mysterious about the solution (how can a pickpocket help with back pain?).
To sell, your copy must get attention . . . hook the reader’s interest . . . create a desire for the product . . . prove the product’s superiority . . . and ask for action.
“The object of advertising is to sell goods,” said Raymond Rubicam of Young & Rubicam. “It has no other justification worth mentioning.”
But now, you’re faced with a new challenge: writing words that convince the reader to buy your product.
A feature is a descriptive fact about a product or service; it’s what the product is or has. A benefit is what the product does; it’s what the user of the product or service gains as a result of the feature.
ten reasons why salespeople fail to make the sale. “Customers don’t buy products or services,” the firm explains. “They buy what these products and services are going to do for them. Yet many salespeople describe only the features, assuming the customer knows the benefits. Salespeople need to know how to translate features into benefits, and then present them in a customer-centered language.”
Show that your company is reliable and will be in business a long time. Talk about number of employees, size of distributor network, annual sales, number of years in business, growth rate.
Make it easy for the reader to take action. Include your company name, address, and phone number in every piece of copy you write.
And, if possible, give the reader an incentive for responding now: a price-off coupon, a time-limited sale, a discount to the first 1,000 people who order the product. Don’t be afraid to try for immediate action and sales as well as long-range “image building.” Ask for the order, and ask for it right away.
“People buy based on emotion, then rationalize the purchase decision with logic.”
“Only five percent of our thought processes are fully conscious,” writes Dan Hill, president of Sensory Logic. “There’s neurological evidence that we make an emotional response—in effect, a decision—about a product or service within three seconds. So businesses need to make an emotional connection with consumers.”
as long as the logical argument seems credible and sensible, your readers will accept it.
Copywriters, like lawyers, are advocates for the client (or employer). Just as lawyers use all the arguments at their disposal to win cases, so do copywriters use all the facts at their disposal to win consumers over to the product.
Samuel Johnson said, “Promise, large promise, is the soul of an advertisement.”
If your product is no different from or better than other products of the same type, there is no reason for consumers to choose your product over someone else’s.
USP (and I am quoting, in the italics, from Reality in Advertising): 1. Each advertisement must make a proposition to the consumer. Each must say, “Buy this product, and you will get this specific benefit.” Your headline must contain a benefit—a promise to the reader. 2. The proposition must be one that the competition either cannot, or does not, offer. Here’s where the unique in Unique Selling Proposition comes in. It is not enough merely to offer a benefit. You must also differentiate your product from other, similar products. 3. The proposition must be so strong that it can move the mass
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One popular method is to differentiate your product or service from the competition based on a feature that your product or service has and they don’t.
“the art of getting a USP into the heads of the most people at the lowest possible cost.”
“A copywriter has to create perceived value. He has to ask, ‘What is the nature of the product? What makes the product different? If it isn’t different, what attribute can you stress that hasn’t been stressed by the competition?’
Testing shows that, at least in consumer direct marketing, small promises don’t work. To get attention and generate interest, you have to make a large, powerful promise.
