One of the biggest challenges to selling your product or service online is writing the sales copy. You are basically trying to use text to convey the benefits of your product to the buyer. Hopefully, the prospective buyer has already been searching for the answer to their problem. It is your job to convince them that your offer will satisfy their needs.
You have a product that you believe in and stand behind. Your price is competitive and you offer some incentives to the buyer. The problem is how to write a good, solid sales letter that will lead your prospects to buy from you. There are many ways to write effective sales copy. It is definitely not a cookie cutter science though. Learn to be attentive to the needs of your clients, and explain in simple language why they should buy the product you are selling. It is always in your best interest as a sales copy writer to keep things simple and to the point. With that said, let us move on to what components you should include in your sales letter to make it outstanding.
Start with the main focus of your sales letter: Ask yourself; What is the Unique Selling Position (USP) my company is trying to offer our clients? In other words, how is our product or service uniquely beneficial to the buyer? Answer this question first. Then you will have the basis for writing a compelling online sales message.
The USP must be something that your competitors do not offer, or your company does better for the customer. It might be something about the price, the superiority of your product or even the great service after the sale. Whatever you decide as your unique selling position, be sure to emphasize it more than once using simple down to earth language.
The outline to use for good sales copy includes these things in order of appearance on the page:
1. Benefit Headline. Tell your customer exactly how they will benefit from buying your product now.
2. State your USP in easy to understand text. Let the buyer know they have found a unique solution to their specific need.
3. Give the reader an idea of the many advantages of owning your product. This will keep them interested in reading deeper into your copy to discover if it really is what they want to buy. 3 to 5 bullet points should do it. Make the points clear and try to build desire in the reader's mind.
4. With one line of definite purpose, restate the main benefit you started the sales copy with in the headline.
5. Next, use a small list of the best features your product has to offer. A feature is something that the product has built into it that makes it special. This is important because here is where the buyer will make up their mind as to whether or not your product is right for them.
You have now captured your prospect's attention, interest and hopefully their desire. Some copywriters stress that the closing of the sale is the most important part of the sales letter. It is definitely important to emphasize this part of your pitch to the buyer. Usually a good incentive to make the purchase right now is necessary at this time. Use your judgement as to what you want to offer. This will help increase your sales conversion rate.
Closing the sale really comes down to simply asking for the person to buy your product. It may sound elementary, but do not overlook this part of the process. Experiment with different types of closing statements to see what works best. When you incorporate these elements of good sales copy, you will see an increase in the responses to your offers. Writing your own sales copy can be highly profitable when you follow these guidelines.
December 5th, 2010 at 9:10 am
Hello Andrew
You bring up some salient points above which with your permission, I’d like to elaborate upon a little further…
Copywriting is essentially salesmanship-in-print. Just as a verbal salesman will use emotional cues to direct a prospect into a course of action – a copywriter will do the same using written language.
It is therefore imperative that any copywriter or anyone charged with the responsibility of writing sales copy for anyone…understands a few basics.
First it will help if you imagine, visualize the sales letter as a slippery sales funnel. Think / visualize in your mind’s eye, an upside down inverted pyramid.
Your preheader and main headline are at the base, at the top of the pyramid and your close is at the bottom of the ‘pyramid’, at it’s narrowest point.
The role of the copywriter is to nudge, cajole or positively kick up the rump the prospect, so that they tip themselves over the edge into your sales funnel. (Just like a Venus Flycatcher)
Now, whilst reading your sales copy one has to be extremely aware of how certain words and phrases combined affect emotion/s.
If you want the slippery sales slope to do it’s job effectively the last thing you want to do – is to jar on your readers emotions unecessarily.
The subconscious mind as it feeds on the information presented to it reacts and responds in different ways for different people. The smoother you can make the transition from a prospective, interested warm lead into a very hot lead (by means of the sales copy itself) the more successful your marketing campaigns will be.
So practically most sales letters and direct mail advertising sales copy, will nearly always start with a preheader.
The preheader is right at the top of the page above the main headline on the left hand side.
It’s purpose is to arouse curiosity and to get the reader to read the main headline.
Likewise, the main headline has just the one real purpose only and this is to get the reader to read the first sentence below.
The main headline should be benefit orientated and needs to grab the attention / interest of the reader.
This accomplished, said potential buyer now reads the first sentence.
This first sentence needs to be very short indeed, no more than 6-8 words.
The first sentence serves one purpose only and that is to get the reader to read the second sentence down.
Over-do it, present too much information in your first sentence and you might inadvertently filter your potential prospect out of your sales funnel.
Just like prospecting for gold using a water sluice, you want to use ‘riffles’ in your written language which catch, trap and hold your best gold nuggets (prospects)glueing them to your sales message. Once you have their attention, you can gently mold them as you wish.
There follows the deck of the sales copy, the introduction what is referred to in the copywriting business as the area within which…you create the buyers environment.
Imagine an art gallery, two in fact alongside each other on your local High Street.
You pop your head into the first shop and you’re greeted with a curt nod of the head. Undaunted you walk in and start looking around. The shops layout is terrible, everything is a mess – now, do you feel positively inclined to buy from this art gallery? What is your first overiding impression?
Put off you head next door…
Walking in the atmosphere is warm and welcoming, the art work on the walls is all laid out neatly and you are greeted with a warm smile and a genuine welcome.
An art piece catches your eye – you walk over to it.
The art gallery owner comes over and stands beside you and asks if you would like to see the framed picture in context? Removing the painting from the wall she invites the gentleman into another room which looks like a normal living room.
She invites you to sit down on the sofa and to put your feet up and pours you a cup of tea. Placing the painting on a picture hook above the mantelpiece she next puts on some calming music on the stereo and leaves the room for a minute or two.
Now, from which gallery are you more inclined to buy from?
Are you more inclined to buy from the first art gallery who made zero effort to create a welcoming buyers environment or do you feel more inclined to buy from the art gallery next door, where the extra effort was expended to make you feel at home?
Did the first art gallery get you into a ‘no’ state of mind instantly or conversely the second art gallery….. Did they make such a good impression upon you that they instantly and impulsively got you into a ‘YES!’ state of mind?
This is why setting up the buyers environment is so important, especially at the start of any sales letter.
You can easily do this by asking questions which subconsciously your prospects can only say ‘Yes’ to in their mind.
This is a very important point….. To get your readers ‘nodding’ in agreement with you from the start.
If you garner their agreement with you from the start of the sales copy, in the buyers environment, in the introduction…chances are they’ll continue to agree with you throughout your sales letter and you can now direct them into any course of action you desire.
I hope these further few copywriting tips help out some of your readers Andrew.
Kindest regards and best wishes,
Mark Andrews