Tag Archives: Copywriting

Create Headlines That Stop Your Prospects in Their Tracks…

And motivate them to take action!

Imagine yourself standing in a long checkout line at the grocery store.  You’re surrounded by sleazy tabloids and “fluffy” gossip magazines, but there’s no way you’d let anyone catch you looking at them.  Yet… you’re curious.  You just can’t help using your peripheral vision to take a peek.

As your eyes scan all the headlines, you see one that intrigues you.  That can’t be true… could it?  Before you know it, you’re throwing the magazine in the cart hoping no one will notice your lapse in judgment.

So what happened?  The headline stopped you in your tracks.  What’s more, the headline intrigued you enough to buy the story.

Now, I’m not here to talk to you about impulse magazine buys in the checkout line, but what this scenario does do is illustrate the importance of a headline that motivates a prospect to take action.

When it comes to marketing your business, headlines are arguably the most important element of your copy– whether it be for your website, a print promotion, an email blast or any other marketing piece.  The reason?  Because the headline is what attracts your prospect.  And, if your headline doesn’t blow their socks off, it could be the last thing they read.

The signs of frightful blogging are obvious… foaming at the mouth, ghastly tales of competitors and unnerving lists of links. All are toxic recipes for disaster and can come back to haunt you and ultimately hurt your business.

This doesn’t mean you should let your fear of blogging hold you back; it is a powerful tool if done correctly.

90 Ways to Attract Customers with Magnetic Copy

90 Ways to Grab hold of Your Customers’ Emotions and Move them to Take Immediate Action

90 ways to Relate to your Customers so Well You Freak Them Out

90 ways to Seduce Prospective Customers and Get them to Go On a Second Date

90 ways to Use Emotional Charm to Sweep Customers Off Their Feet

90 ways to Break Down the Wall Between You and Your Prospective Customers

90 Ways to Slay the Emotional Dragon and Win the Heart of Your Customers

90 Ways to Hook Your Prospective Customers Using Emotions as Bait

Clients are always asking me, “How do you get customers to buy more?”

My answer:
You must connect with them on an emotional level. People make purchases based on their emotions, and once you have created an emotional bond with a customer you increase chances of getting repeat purchases from that person. If you tell a prospect your product or service will make her so attractive that nobody – man or woman – who passes by will be able to stop themselves from staring at her in awe and amazement (or with eyes full of envy) you will turn that prospect into a customer. Then, if you deliver enough added value to that customer, she will come back again and again and will become a loyal customer who will even refer her friends to you.

It doesn’t matter what you’re selling or what industry you’re in…if you selling online or offline you can only stay in business if you’re making a profit. That profit comes from either increasing sales or reducing your expenses…

This blog is about both, because when you make your marketing materials more effective — you’ll increase your bottom line.

I’ll reveal strategies for designing attention getting marketing materials that will motivate your customers to take action!

Whether you’re an actual designer, the CEO, Marketing Director, Entrepreneur or on the team, I’ve got success strategies for every stage in the development process. I am going to assume you already know who you target markets are, and have a clear understanding of your products and services… If not, that’s the first thing to put on your list of action steps.

Using Relevant Keywords is the Most Important Element to Increase Your Site Traffic

Everyone I talk to as an Internet Marketing Consultant wants to know how to get more site visitors from search engines.  It starts with a basic understanding of how the search engines work-or rather what their responsibility is to their user-the searcher.

The search engine’s job is to provide the best and most relevant results to the person using their search engine to find solutions to their searches. To do that they need to catalog a site’s content and while there are every-changing algorithms for top rankings a critical element for search engine optimization (SEO) is the content, which of course is made of WORDS.

Those words when filled with your “keywords” make up your content.  Knowing which words to use and where to put them on your site is a huge element of SEO to get more traffic.   Keywords and keyword phrases are the same thing.

Here are a few tips for keyword success:

1. Make a list of the main types of prospects you want to attract.

Create a marketing profile for the typical prospect and customer for your business in a word doc. Get as specific as you can so you can put yourself in the “mindset” of the type of people you want to attract.  Ask yourself and evaluate what keywords you think they would type into a search engine to find you, your products or services.

2. Do your research.

Look at your website statistics because that will show you what words people are using now to find you. It doesn’t mean they are the best words, but your stats will show you what keyword phrases they are using now.  We use “Google Analytics” for sites. It’s a free service, easy to implement and offers a ton of benefits.

You want targeted traffic that will convert into customer leads and sales.  Many years ago I optimized my Internet Marketing Speaker website for my name “Ford Saeks” but because my first name Ford is also a major automotive company I was receiving tons of spill over traffic for people looking for Ford cars and Ford car parts, and not my professional services to help people improve their marketing results and profits.  The keywords we use now are related and relevant to what our prospects and customers are searching for to find our solutions.  The research results, our site statistics and usage of the popular keywords research tools all help us optimize our sites for top rankings.

Two of my favortite Keyword tools are:

It’s a fact: People won’t use your website if they can’t find their way around it.

Yesterday’s Web looked far different from today’s Web, and tomorrow’s Web will look more different still. Amidst all of this change, however, one aspect of Web use remains the same: The sites that offer the best, easiest, most intuitive experience are the ones people visit again and again.

To ensure that your sites provide the best user experience, you and your web developer need the essential guide from Steve Krug “Don’t Make Me Think; A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability” (2nd Edition)  that distills his years of on-the-job experience into a practical primer on the do’s and don’ts of good Web design. His book is a quick read and while there are a couple of points I don’t agree with for SEO reasons, I agree with his basic concepts outlined below.

The number-one usability rule, most often expressed by users…  

1. Don’t Make Me Think. Basically your website visitor doesn’t want to venture into a site that requires them to figure it out. It should be self-explanatory. Web pages should be obvious and self-explanatory. Buttons should have short text and look ‘clickable.’ The default search for your site should be simple.

2. Design for scanning not reading. By observing users Krug found that people glance, scan some text, and click on the first reasonable option. People scan Web pages, they don’t read them. We don’t make optimal choices, we click on impulse.
 

** In our copywriting courses (Ford Saeks), I express that there are two main types of people reading your copy (text in print or online) and those are “scanners” and “readers.”  You should write your copy for both types of readers. Give enough headlines, subheads, and bullets along with limited use of bold and color to help the scanner get the gist of the main benefits or message, and then enough information for the reader to get the necessary details. Formatting is just as important as the copy. **

Okay, back to Steve Krug’s Book points…

If you want to increase your sales, then improve your copywriting and target marketing skills. 

Start by putting yourself in the mind of your prospect.  Think about what they want and why they would take action.

Most importantly, target your message to each type of specific prospect.  This applies to your website, print materials, and multimedia.

Sending the same marketing message to multiple markets waters down the message and will most likely reduce responses.  Aim for sending specific messages to specific audiences.

Can anyone write great copy? I get asked that all the time. I tell them all the same thing: You already know how to do it! Because you already know how to tell stories. I just have to teach you the proper structure, and UNTEACH you all the stuff your elementary and high school teachers taught you.

If you ever made up a story for your children, you’re a copywriter. If you’ve ever gathered with friends as a teenager and told ghost stories, you can write copy. Great copywriters simply paint visual pictures of events. Events that happened in the past, events that may happen in the future, or events that won’t ever happen, unless you buy their product. You either paint the picture of the joy the prospect will get using your product, or you paint the picture of the hardship he will continue to endure without it. Why?

When one of my clients says to me, “Ford… I’m not sure what to write about.  Aren’t press releases just for big news?” I tell them that kind of assumption just isn’t true. You can create press releases for a wide variety of topics, as long as you keep a few key elements in mind.

One of the most important ones to always follow is to adapt your “story”(or theme) to a favorite media topic in the news. That will make it more interesting to your media contact, as well as to their readers. To help you get started, here are my TOP 5 topics that I use to increase the chances of getting publicity through traditional sources like newspapers, magazines, and newsletters.

HEALTH is one of the most popular topics covered in the media. Can you find a way to tie your product, service, or media promotion to a current, health-related topic? One of my clients runs a successful pilates studio and even though it’s a local studio, her press releases and articles have been published in several national publications and on tons of sites.