Here’s a quick fact: It’s easier to distinguish your business from a benefit and service point of view than from a product or feature angle.

For example, if you sell telephone headsets, perhaps you can distinguish your product by saying it has a mute button, comes in 5 colors, and is lightweight.

So what? What benefit is that to me as a customer?

But from a service/benefit aspect, you can offer these benefits, which are MUCH more interesting to me:

· In stock or it’s FREE

· We never close

· 4-hour guaranteed repair

· Trade up when you outgrow your system

· Order 24 hours a day

· Choose from 100 different systems

· Same-day shipping — only $15

· Order by midnight and get same-day shipping

· Prepayment discounts

· FREE technical support

· Toll-free ordering hotline

· Priority-member ordering hotline

· Order over the Web from your own computer

· Money-back guarantee

· Saves you at least $10,000.00 a year in productivity or your money back

· FREE report with any purchase

· No minimums

· Guaranteed everyday low prices

· Business leasing — $0 down payment

· Expert sales consultants

· And much, much more

So tell your customers about the Benefits, not the Features of your service or product – and don’t be shy!

John Thornely
© John Thornely www.johnthornely.com 2008

To learn more about how YOU can
Profit From The Internet – Fast, visit
www.Internet-Tycoons.com

Great sales copy – and an ‘irresistible offer’ – are essentials for success in any marketing campaign.

And your copy just has to engage people if you are to have any chance of getting that sale… or whatever action you want them to take.

Avoiding The Bin

You have around 3 or 4 seconds to grab your prospect’s attention and avoid the bin… So just how do people view a Website or Mailing Piece? Well, there are two key elements here…

Firstly, their perception will be coloured by their own circumstances and experience – they will be pre-conditioned before they arrive at your page. So you’ll need to think about your target prospects and how they may perceive the look and content of your page – it’s a case of reality vs. our perceived reality.

And the timing of when your prospect receives your contact may be important to their perception – or even their availability or willingness to look at it.

First Things First

What is the first thing they see….? The headline on your email or web page; or the Envelope? What impact does it have? What frame of mind does it put your prospect in? Does it make them want to open it or read on? You don’t want their first action to be to bin it or click away, do you?

But there are no ready answers to what works and what doesn’t – so you need to find a happy compromise between using formats that you know have been successful (or, failing that, ones you think are good) and being different enough to stand out and shout “open me” or “read me”! And test, test, test!

Great Copy

So what makes great copy? What makes people read on and take the ‘most desired action’?

Well, here’s the little-understood secret of great copywriting… Are you ready?

· The purpose of the Headline is to make the prospect want to read the next paragraph…

· The purpose of each paragraph is to make the prospect want to read the next…

· The purpose of every sub-header is… You guessed it!

· And the purpose of the whole piece is to make your prospect want to take the ‘most desired action’

Cunning, heh? Well no, not really! Just think how you read a sales letter and what makes you want to take the ‘most desired action’. So it’s simple, really, isn’t it?

Priorities

Now, think how you scan a sales letter. Most people read the headline, then flip to the close or order form to see how much it costs, often reading the ‘PS’s next, then the guarantee, and so on. So focus your efforts in that priority.

Headliner

What’s the most memorable headline you’ve ever seen? Did it make you buy? Or was it just memorable? Now here’s another little secret: Memorable Headlines and Headlines which work cannot co-exist 99% of the time! This contradicts conventional wisdom but is a reality of marketing. But if you can achieve both – you’ve just struck gold!

80% of success of the sales page depends on the Headline, so it needs to be catchy and intrigue the reader enough to make them read on. It also needs to capture the flavour of the benefit your product will give them.

Time tested results indicate that enclosing the headline in quotation marks produces a 28% greater response, the use of specific figures has much greater impact and Title Case is most successful format. Best font colours are black, mid-red and blue.

Other ‘checklist’ items for your headline: it must command attention, draw in your target audience, communicate your offer and promise a desired benefit. Effective ‘keywords’ include You, Now, Free, How to, etc. Testimonials make great headlines.

In a nutshell, the headline is the offer in a raw, attention-getting form, so it should contain all 4 ingredients to an extent!

Story Board

We communicate by telling stories – think of your last casual conversation in the pub or at home – it was probably relating a story in some form or other, even if it was just relating what happened to you today.

So use stories. Your body copy needs to build a story to engage your reader and present the truth in a fascinating manner. Provide as much ‘social proof’, endorsements and testimonials as you can to show your product or service works. Avoid entertaining or dullness and don’t use ‘fact-less drivel’. Keep every element relevant – build to the ‘most desired action’ and remove anything unnecessary.

Sub-Headers

As well as making your prospect want to read on, these should allow the ‘skimmers’ to understand the whole of your sales page if they just read the subheaders and also ‘punctuate’ your body copy.

Think of possible objections or second-guessing of headline and neutralize them. The Headline is mainly an attention-getter, so you need to explain a little more.

Bullets

Bullet points should be ‘blind’ – teasing and hinting at the benefits but not should never reveal the content or the secret. In the form of little-known nuggets or unique or privileged information they can give credibility but should be specific and convey urgency in providing a benefit.

Call To Action

This should clearly spell out exactly what you want the reader to do – the ‘most desired action’ – or they’ll do what they always do – nothing! Create a strong, unapologetic close and use scarcity tactics such as ‘time-limited offer’, ‘only 100 available’ (and explain why), etc, to get your reader to take action NOW.

P.S.

The P.S. is the third most read element and can MASSIVELY affect response. So DON’T write it last! It should be a ‘mini-summary’ of the whole offer, re-stating the ‘USP’ and benefits, together with the ‘no-risk guarantee’. But you can also add extra surprises or hidden benefits and emphasize the urgency or ‘limited offer’.

When Is An Order Not and Order?

Never call an order form an order form! Sounds silly, but it has a big psychological effect! Your order device (‘Reservation Certificate’, ‘Priority Booking’ or whatever) should re-state the offer, No-Risk Guarantee and bonuses. It should preferably be on a separate web page (or one-sided sheet if printed) and should CLEARLY state the action you require your prospect to take, including mailing address or whatever.

Including your contact details and a REAL address and phone number increases confidence in you and your offer.

The Lift Letter

A very effective device is to include a ‘lift letter’ from someone the prospect already knows and, preferably, trusts. This should present a dramatic summary of offer and can take the form of a testimonial or actual letter, in a slightly different ‘voice’, and is preferably signed by someone else.

I know of one recent offer that did well when accompanied by a lift letter but bombed when sent to a ‘cold list’. So think of the Lift Letter as a ‘talk-show host’ giving a guest (the main copy) a good build-up. Touch on the offer without giving too much away.

Action Bonus

Bonuses can be used to incentivise speed of response or increase perceived offer value, or ‘Thud Factor’! Attach a specific value to each bonus, so that they carry real weight – some people will buy the product just for the bonuses!

You can also allow purchasers to sell the bonuses too – so each should have a mini-offer all of its own. However, there may be good reasons NOT to dilute your offer with a bunch of bonuses, so think through your prospect’s reactions.

It’s Guaranteed

When framing your Guarantee, think ‘risk reversal’ – take all the risk away and even incentivise them by offering eg “4 times your money back if you don’t get the result” etc. Think like your prospect… They’re looking for the catch in your offer, so defuse it.

The reality is that there are ALWAYS refunds – 10-20% is quite common – but even 40% refunds can be profitable! I’d happily accept 80% return rate if I was getting a 10% response rate! So concentrate on the offer and try to overcome the ‘Fear of regret’ that many purchasers experience once they’ve cooled off a bit.

Go With A Bang!

So, to recap, your sales letter or email needs to include the following elements:

1 - Headline with Unique Positioning Statement

2 - Benefit-Oriented Copy

3 - Testimonials

4 - The Offer, with bonuses

5 - Guarantee

6 - Call to Action

7 - Postscript (PS)

Remember, you need to focus on (and think like) your prospect. So ‘walk a mile in your prospect’s shoes’ – get inside them – where do they live, what do they eat and wear, what do they do in their leisure time and what do they worry about? What makes them tick?

Put 50% or more of your effort into the headline – write 10 or 20 alternatives until you find one that has all the right elements.

Make sure your body copy builds steadily, with suitable sub-headlines, to a resounding ‘call to action’ and that your ‘no-brainer’ offer is supported by an ‘unbeatable’ guarantee and a pile of mouth-watering bonuses!

John Thornely
© John Thornely www.johnthornely.com 2008

To learn more about how YOU can
Profit From The Internet – Fast, visit
www.Internet-Tycoons.com

Only a very small proportion of visitors to your website will buy straight off – experience shows that most will require 6 to 7 contacts before they’re ready to purchase.

So how are you to arrange to be in contact with prospects on a regular basis? The answer is by email. And this is why the whole objective of the initial landing page of your website must be to BUILD A LARGE EMAIL LIST of prospects and customers.

Once you have an email list, you can make regular contact with your prospects and customers and begin to make SERIOUS MONEY.

So how do you capture email addresses? List-building expert Duss Rogers offers you the following suggestions…

1 - Offer A Freebie

You have to give in order to get. If you want people to offer up their email address, you`re going to have to offer up an incentive – it’s known as an ‘ethical bribe’. Nothing works better than something that`s complimentary (you spell that F-R-E-E). You can give away no-cost reports, books, software, or even sample pages or chapters of a book.

2 - Use Pop-Ups

Pop-ups are one of the most common methods you can use to capture email addresses and build your email list quickly and with ease. Simply construct a web page containing code for a form and set the page to open (pop up) when visitors ENTER OR EXIT your site.

Make sure the pop-up offer is something that`s valuable enough to motivate visitors to take time to give you their contact information. Your offer can be a complimentary report, download, or ebook that arrives instantly through your autoresponder to their email inbox when they give you their email.

-Tip: If you need a pop-up, you can find one free by doing a search on Google for “free popup generator”. Many browser systems now block pop-ups but there are many systems which still work well.

3 - Use Postcards

If you have a mailing list that contains snail mail (street) addresses, convert it into an email list by sending out a postcard and inviting people to VISIT YOUR WEBSITE to receive a gift of some kind — a report, a discount coupon, etc. Visitors don`t have to pay in order to receive their

gifts, they simply need to enter an email address.

- Tip: In the US, postage is much less expensive for a postcard than a standard-size letter. (Not only are they economical, postcards are more likely to get your message across since the consumer doesn`t have to open an envelope.)

4 - Subscriber Box On Every Page

This is a clever trick that so many people overlook. Put a RESPONSE FORM ON EVERY PAGE of your website offering a newsletter or other freebie. This will increase the number of email addresses you capture exponentially.

Why? When search engines index the pages of your website, a visitor may come directly to a page other than your home page.

If you only have a subscriber box on your home page, you`re missing the boat, not to mention the thousands of visitors who bypass your homepage.

5 - Contests

Contests very often prove to be a good way to generate traffic and buzz for your business. Create a contest and put a form on your site or in a pop-up box. The entry “fee” is their email address.

-Warning: Not all the people who sign up for your contest are good prospects. Many are just contest “junkies” — people who are only looking for freebies and have no intention of buying a product or service.

-Warning: If your prizes are cash or large-ticket items, you should be sure to check with local agencies to make sure you`re not violating any contest laws.

6 - Display Your Autoresponder Address

Most people give their website link when they place solo ads, ezine ads, or other marketing messages. To be one step ahead of the game in collecting email addresses, LIST YOUR

AUTORESPONDER ADDRESS instead of your URL. This way you can capture email address and funnel them into your follow-up sales letters.

7 - Just Ask

If you`re chatting with a prospect on the phone or a potential customer stops by your place of business, don`t be shy: ask for an email address or business card (which usually includes their email address).

Okay, you know what you want…you know what you need. It`s time for you to set your traps and CAPTURE THOSE EMAILS!

John Thornely
© John Thornely www.johnthornely.com 2008

To learn more about how YOU can
Profit From The Internet – Fast, visit
www.Internet-Tycoons.com

So, you have your business up and running… You’re ready for business. But, wait.

Where are all the people? You are all ready for them, but they have no idea who you are, let alone what you are offering. What do you do now?

You have to market your business. However, you need to be careful on how you do this. Advertising could be what helps your business soar, or it could be what brings it down. Take the time to research to find the most effective way to advertise your business.

Google Maps is growing more and more popular for businesses of any size. Whether you have a company that only delivers locally or one that delivers around the world, Google Maps can reach anyone on the internet.

People use Google Maps for many reasons. Sometimes they are looking for a place, while many times they are searching for a specific type of place in a specific area.

For example, someone might be moving to a new home, and needs information on daycare centers. If they go into Google Maps, they can type in daycare centers, and all of the daycare centers in that general area will pop up.

Or, if you are a business owner ready to take the advertising step, you can utilize Google Maps to target potential customers in a specific area. Listed below are tips on why and how you can use Google Maps to target potential customers and increase sales.

Tip # 1 - Reach new customers using Google Maps and Google AdWords

Google Maps offers Google AdWords. This service allows your ads to appear next to related map search results. You pick keywords that describe your business. When a person enters in one of your keywords, your ad will appear directly on the map. People will then click on your ad, and will be connected to your business.

This is a great service to those advertisers who want to market their products or services to a very specific location. You may have a service or product that you are only offering delivery to locally because you do not have the resources to deliver all around the world. Therefore, you will only want to target specific areas for advertisement.

Google Maps has made it very easy to customize a target audience. With just a few clicks of the mouse, you can now define your location. All you have to do is click-and-drag the map, and zoom into find your location or target area. Then, enter in a distance of at least 20 miles around your location target. A circle will appear next to the areas you chose. Check to be sure the circle is near the neighborhoods you wish to reach for potential customers.

Advertising your products or services through Google Maps will reach those potential customers at the exact moment they are searching. Millions of people use the internet to find information at their fingertips. Many will be looking for products or services in their general area. Listing your business in Google Maps will generate traffic to your websites, and potentially increase sales significantly.

Tip #2 - Google Maps works for businesses of any size.

Google AdWords is an effective tool and offers excellent marketing opportunities for a business of any size. Through Google AdWords, you are able to control your budget, because you pay only when someone clicks on your advertisement. You do not have a minimum spending requirement, and you can set a daily budget of a few dollars or pounds. This works well for small businesses that only have a certain amount to spend on advertising or larger businesses that are able to spend a little more.

Regardless of whether a business has a lot or a little to spend, the benefits remain the same. You are able to target your advertising campaign to specific locations, demographics and a select market. Google AdWords offers real-time control. You are able to pause, resume, increase, decrease or change any of your advertising specifics, instantly. Your company will begin generating traffic immediately.

Tip #3 - How to Effectively Use Google Maps to increase your sales

The goal you have should be to reach as many people as possible that are searching for your ‘specific’ product or service. It should not be to reach as many visits as possible to your site, but to reach quality targeted clicks.

It is important to advertise cost-effectively. Many companies waste hundreds or thousands of dollars on “unwanted clicks” that do not generate business. You’ll want to target people that are truly looking for your product or service, and not pay for clicks that don’t generate sales.

In order to find these people searching for your specific product or service, you need to create a keyword list that is unique to what you are offering. Using specific keywords, rather than broad or generic keywords, will ensure those people are finding exactly what they are searching for.

This in turn, leads to ‘true’ potential customers, which leads to ‘potential’ sales. And, in the end, leaves your paying for less unwanted clicks.

Determine if your product or service will be local, national or global. Google AdWords allow you to specify the exact areas you would like to target. Analyze your product or service. Determine keywords that are unique to what you offer, and try to be as specific as you can about the description of your product or service.

Tip #4 - Update your listings at any time

Google allows you to update your listings at any time. It is imperative to carefully manage your account in order to reduce expenses for ineffective advertising and gain the maximum benefits Google Maps has to offer. Along with carefully considering your keywords, you should monitor them, too. And, you should continuously manage your cost per click.

Increasingly, Google is presenting maps on its everyday searches, so this can help your business!

So - Check out what Google Maps can do for you!

John Thornely
© John Thornely www.johnthornely.com 2008

To learn more about how YOU can
Profit From The Internet – Fast, visit
www.Internet-Tycoons.com