Copy Writing to improve SEO

Copy Writing to improve SEO

By Contheosius your SEO expert

“Suppose a grocer should advertise fine, fresh codfish and his rival across the street advertised the largest, sweetest, absolutely the best codfish ever caught, with scales as large as quarters and meat whiter than snow—the finest yielded by the Atlantic Ocean.
Which grocer do you think will sell the most codfish?”
-Richard Hamilton- (Press agent of the late 1800s.- P.T Barnum often used him to write copy)

The right Words Can Bring You Riches. Because Google loves original content. Make sure what you sell is mentioned in your articles to improve your SEO.

Earlier on I taught you that you are in the marketing business and not in the business of providing products or services. Using words to achieve your aims is the single most important activity any business ever performs.

When you write classified’s, postcards and tweets your space is limited you will obviously not write a lot. But practicing your long copy will give you the foundation of writing, and you will be able to trim the fat effectively for your quick marketing media.

Before you start writing your copy you must adapt these boring but necessary policies:

General rules of copy writing and important tips.

Only ONE person will read your advertisement or letter at a time, this is the rule:
Keep it personal, speak or write to the individual. Use words the reader can understand no matter what the education level and use them in the same way you would speak to somebody. For heavens sake don’t bore the individual. Make it fun and interesting.

Long sentences are acceptable and maybe even desirable. However, in most marketing scripts, you need to remember two rules:
Shorter is better.
Variety is good.
So you’ll find that in copy writing that sentences tend to be short, but that there are enough long sentences to provide some variety.
Note, I am talking sentences here, not the length of the body copy. This can be as long as needed.
If a sentence is trying to say more than one thing, then break it up into two or more sentences.

Think of your material as a short story:
Who are you writing the story for?
What is their problem or need for self-fulfillment?
How can your product or service help or provide?
What should you say about your product or service?
How should you say it so that it will lead to a sale?
How can you create an intense desire for the target to own the product?
How can you do it in such a way that the target badly wants to buy it, and you are not trying to sell it?

Know the prospect. (If you find this difficult, try to think in terms of  the guy with the bad breath, the girl who feels insecure about her dry hair and likes to be pampered with a body massage – so don’t talk nonsense, of course you know the prospect – it is you, your wife, your grand parents, the salesman who sold you the car – address the problem or desire they want addressed)
I can write about this until the cows come home. If you don’t know the client, then you won’t be able to complete any of the other steps. Period, end of story, no need to deliberate any further. Cheers.

The more you know about (the needs and desires of) and your client, the better off you’ll be.

Know your product or service
Dismantle the product and study it with tweezers and a microscope. Understand it inside out. Why was the product or service first introduced? How many happy customers are using it? How much does it cost? Where is it produced? How is it made? How does it compare to the competition? What do people think of this product or service? What was it originally designed for? How do they perceive the price?
When composing your ad, begin by listing all your product features in one column, then opposite, list the corresponding product benefits.
People buy for emotional reasons and justify their purchases with logic.

Speak to their problem or circumstance
You have to address the problem or situation experienced by the prospect.
Go through your benefits and see which ones fit with the consumer needs discussed above and concentrate your message around solving those problems with your product benefits!
Then add a little logical reinforcement.
Most people buy for emotional rewards and then look for logical reasons to justify their purchase.

After dramatizing the emotional rewards of your product or service, include a little bit of logical reinforcement.
It helps your prospects act on their impulse to buy. For example:

Offer a special reduced price-if they buy NOW.
-(Logic:”Clever decision. I saved money.”)
Include a brief testimonial from other customers.
-(Logic:”Safe decision. Others liked it.”)
Mention a few facts supporting the value of your product.
-(Logic:”Smart decision. It’s the best money can buy.”)

Tell them how you will solve their problem or improve their circumstance, using proof.
Anyone who is still reading is fairly qualified as a good possible prospect.
Now, before you waste any more of their time, tell them how you can help them with their problem or desire.

Provide proof by:
Providing customer testimonials.
Giving them real-life examples of your product or service in action.
Draw parallels, metaphors, analogies, or otherwise tell a story about your product/service.
Proof is the substance of your argument. If you can think of your headline as the big promise of your product or service, providing proof is in effect saying how you will fulfill the promise.

Without proof, your offer will lack credibility. However, proof isn’t enough to make the sale.

Why you are different (Your U.S.P).
So you have to tell them how you’re different from everyone else providing the same product or service. Maybe you use only the freshest, purest mountain water. Or maybe you offer a loan while repairing. Pick just one thing that makes the offer stand out, and really be bold about telling the customer about it. Don’t provide too many things that makes the offer different, because no one will believe you. One thing is easy to remember, and you want them to remember you when they need to buy what you sell.

Get them to act now.
Don’t forget to tell them what to do. Do they pick up the phone and call? Come down to the store? Visit a web page? Return a coupon? Write in for a special report? Fax you an order sheet?

What is the incentive for their immediate action? Are prices going up in a week? Do you only have a few items in stock? Are you clearing out the store to make space for summer stock?

Write with energy, be enthusiastic, people will pick up on the energy in the ads, they will respond based on what they feel from the ad.

Contrast: This is a handy tactic for showing more than one side of a story. You can use words like these to signal your readers:
But
However
Notwithstanding
In contrast
On the other hand
Despite
Although
Still

For example:
In contrast to Jane who was on the plump side, Mary was built like a Greek goddess .

Drill down into more detail: Most people are geared to go from general to specific when it comes to learning new things, so take advantage of this situation. Structure your writing such that you lead them deeper and deeper into your piece:
Furthermore
Also
Besides
Even
Further
Still more
Too

How long should your copy be?
“Your copy needs to be as long as is needed to make the sale, and not one paragraph more.”
-Paul Myers-

“There’s no such thing as copy that’s ‘too long’ but copy that’s ‘too boring’.”
-Gary Halbert-

“The truth about long copy is that, first of all, there’s abundant, legitimate, statistical, split-testing research to indicate that virtually without exception, long copy outperforms short copy. Some significant research has been done that indicates that readership falls off dramatically at
300 words but does not again drop off until 3,000 words.”
-Dan Kennedy-

In other words, if the copy seems too long, it’s probably not because of the length, but rather, because at some point it started to bore you.

“The person who says ‘I would never read all that copy’ makes the mistake of thinking they are the customer. And they’re not. We are never our own customers. When your message is matched to a target market that has a high level of interest in it, not only does responsiveness go up but readership goes up, too. The whole issue of interest goes up.

The conclusion you can draw from that is this: Those who are not interested in your product will not even read 20 words. Those who are, will want to know as much as possible.

It can be long. In fact it can be very long. You will not read something if you are not interested in the subject. But if you are, you will want to know as much as possible about the subject or product you want to buy.

Don’t be long-winded, and don’t add copy just for the sake of making it long. Keep your eyes on the end result. Sales. Tell your story and provide as much information as is needed to make the sale.

And not one word more.

Lessons from history.
Bruce Barton was a celebrity in the 1920s. He was a bestselling author, confidant to presidents, master copywriter, philanthropist, congressman, and co-founder of the largest advertising agency in the world, BBDO.

Barton’s expertise for writing ads:

1. “first, that a man is interested in himself; second, that he is interested in other people. Our formula for “Every Week” (a magazine) was Youth, Love, Success, Money, and Health, all things in which people are vitally interested.”

2.When he edited magazines, he used provocative titles to stir up controversy and interest. Examples included, “Why I never hire any woman under 30,” “How my wife has hindered me in business,” and the other side of the question, “How my wife has helped me in business.” These interesting headlines guaranteed readership.

3. The visualization.
Barton did not expand on this. But I think he was referring to the layout of any advertisement. He said, “A picture is worth two pages of type, and a headline is worth almost all the rest of the ad put together.” For Barton, the illustration, headline, and body copy made up the layout, or visualization, of any sales piece. Remember you are a small businessmen – you normally don’t have the money to waste on the space a picture will take up. (Unless of course you sell a product “As seen on TV”)

4. Writing the copy.
“The introduction can be eliminated almost always. The mind starts cold when you begin to write, and you don’t get into high gear until the second or third paragraph. Cut out the introduction, and then you have a good hot start.

5. Adjectives.
“After you finish a piece of copy, go back and cut out all the adjectives. Henry Ward Beecher’s father was once chairman of a committee to draw up resolutions on slavery. One sentence in his resolution read: ‘It is an outrage.’ Some one suggested that it should read: ‘It is a terrible outrage.’ Beecher said that was the way he had it in his first draft, but he had cut out the word ‘terrible’ for the sake of emphasis.

“Adjectives are like the leaves on a switch. They make the switch look pretty, but if you want to hit a blow that will cut, you take off the leaves. Literature that cuts has very few adjectives. The greatest things in life are expressed in one-syllable words; love, hate, fear, home, wife, child.”

6. A purpose.
“We should never write an ad without the idea that something is going to happen. What do we want the reader to do? Write with the conviction that he is going to do something when he gets through reading—go to the store and buy; clip the coupon and mail it. And remember the power of the direct command. Don’t say, ‘If you would like this beautiful booklet, we will be glad to send it.’ Say, ‘Sit down right now and fill in this coupon.’ People want things made easy; they want you to make up their minds for them.”
There is the language of pictures or how things appear, how we see or view them in our mind as well as out there in the real world.

Second, there is the language of sounds or what we say to ourselves and what we hear on the inside.

And third there is the language of feelings, like when something wonderful grabs hold of us and makes us feel warm and special inside.

But not just the little benefits – the big picture benefits.

Chances are, there’s a dramatic story in your product, and how it benefits people. But you may be too close to it to see it clearly. Or perhaps you take it for granted.  But if you could take a step back – you might be able to see it with a different perspective.

Look at your product from a distance?
Look at the big picture.
What are you really selling? Is it software, or a better, faster way to do your job? Is it life insurance, or is it perfect peace of mind? Always keep in mind the old marketing example that when people buy a drill, they don’t need a drill. They need a hole. They would like to make the hole in style though. Explain to them how easy and precise they are going to make the hole.

Keep asking “And that means?.”
You need to get to the ultimate benefit, which is almost always the most important. For example, if you’re selling toothpaste, the obvious benefit is clean, fresh breath. But is that the ultimate benefit? Do people want clean, fresh breath simply for it’s own sake?
Maybe, but here the ultimate benefit is healthy teeth and gums for many years. It also promotes self confidence not having to walk around with stained rotten teeth.

Eliminate the benefit.
A great way to get to the ultimate benefit might be to pretend your product doesn’t exist. What would people have to do instead?

Use emotional appeal.
People buy for emotional reasons and justify with logic.

Demolish the five basic objections prospect might have within your copy:
I don’t have enough time.
I don’t have enough money.
It won’t work for me.
I don’t believe you.
I don’t need it.

Activate your writing.
Whenever you write the words “is,” “was,” “are,” or “to be,” train yourself to stop and change them to something more active. “The meeting is tonight” sounds dead; “The meeting starts at 7 PM sharp tonight” feels clear, direct and alive. “Pieter Goosen is the finest promoter in the
country” doesn’t convey the excitement that “Pieter Goosen creates corporate events that you will remember for many years” does.

Tell them something they don’t know.
Fascinate your readers. The more you tell, the more you sell. Long copy usually works better than short copy, as long as the copy holds interest. After all, people read whole books. They will read your copy IF it interests them.

Tell them why.
Max Sackheim, famous for the long-running ad “Do You Make These Mistakes In English” and originator of the book-of-the-month concept, says this: “Whenever you make a claim or special offer in your advertising, come up with an honest reason why, and then state it sincerely. You’ll sell many more products this way.” Dr Cialdini found in research that the word “because” is extremely powerful when used to persuade. Strange thing is that one can actually use the word “because” just like a child – without further expanding after the “because”. People like to know “why” – so tell them.

Seduce the prospect to continue reading.
Keep your reader reading any way you can. Questions, unfinished sentences, involving statements, sub-heads, bullet points, quizzes, all work. These techniques also handle the skimmers who just glance at your copy, as well as the word-for-word readers.

Call a spade a spade.
Be specific. Whenever you write something vague, such as “they say,” or “later on,” or “many,” stop and rewrite those phrases into something concrete, such as: “Neil Goosen said…”, or “Saturday at noon” or “Seven people agreed.” Don’t say cat when you can say Siamese.

Testimonials.
Get as many testimonials as you can. The more specific, the more convincing. In short, deliver proof that your claim is for real.

Remove the risk!
Give a guarantee. Less than 2% of your customers will ever ask for their money back, so offering a guarantee is a safe risk.

Ask for the order
Sales copy should SELL. At the end of the message remind them to order now “if you snooze you loose” – make it easy for them to order.

Use words that stir a bit of magic.
Announcing, astonishing, exciting, exclusive, fantastic, fascinating, first, free, guaranteed, incredible, initial, improved, love, limited offer, powerful, phenomenal, revealing, revolutionary, special, successful, super, time-sensitive, unique, urgent, wonderful, you, breakthrough,
introducing, new, and how-to.

The psychological impact of the words and phrases you use.
And consider the connotations of the words you use: “workshop” sounds like work while “seminar” sounds like fun. “Read” sounds hard while “look over” sounds easy. “Write” sounds difficult while “jot down” sounds easy.

Emotional Words.
Words are not messages in themselves. They have different meanings to each of us. While many words can be used to communicate a single message, the words you choose can dramatically alter its emotional impact. In copy writing, the meaning behind the word is more important than the message:

“Cost” versus “investment;”
“Beautiful teeth” versus “beautiful smiles;”
“Skinny” versus “slim” or “slender;”
“Products” or “services” versus “solutions;”
“Cost-effective” versus “return on investment;”
And “house” versus “home.”

Positive Words.
Avoid using negative words. Say what it is, not what it isn’t. Dr. Maxwell Maltz, author of the bestseller “Psycho-Cybernetics,” states that the brain is a goal-seeking organ – it needs a goal in order to function. For example, if I told you *not* to think of a yellow balloon, you will have hard time since your brain needs a goal – it will naturally picture what it is supposed to avoid because the mind can not function when blank.

Instead of saying “inexpensive,” say “economical;”
Instead of saying “this procedure is painless” or “pain-free,” say “there’s no discomfort with this procedure” or “it’s quite comfortable;”
And instead of saying “this software is error-free,” “bug-free” or “foolproof,” say “this software is very stable.”

Get pumped up!
Show your excitement for your product. If you aren’t pumped up about it, why not? Enthusiasm sells.

Rewrite and test ruthlessly.
Test. Test. Test. A change of one word can increase response 250%. Sackheim tested his famous ad at least six times before he found the headline and format that worked. Most copy isn’t written in one day. You have to write, rewrite, edit, rewrite, test, and test again. Keep asking yourself, Would I buy this product? and Have I said everything to make the sale?

Instantaneous satisfaction!
Make it possible for the buyer to be able to order immediately – supply a Telephone number or a link on your web space from where they can order.

Sincerity sells.
Don’t offer fluff, mislead, or lie to your prospects. Tell them the truth.  While rarely done, it actually helps sales to admit a weakness or a fault. Remember the ad, These neckties aren’t very pretty, but they’re a steal at a nickel each! Tell the truth in a fascinating way.

Get them to take action.
Use Words that Speed a Sale. When composing ads for publications, or writing a sales letter, make sure that you ask for an immediate order – and tell your customers or clients precisely how to order. And, for a prompt response, choose words that suggest urgency.

Here are some words and phrases that will give you an urgent tone:
Only a limited quantity available
Priority
First come, first served
Last chance!
This special only until 30 December.

And to summarise again.
Write the headline (the most important part);
Add qualifiers (e.g., sur headlines and sub headlines);
Create the opening or introductory paragraph;
List the features, advantages and benefits
Expand on key items for the main body;
Integrate headers at every two or three paragraphs;
Incorporate story blocks (i.e., highlighted stories, remarks or sidenote’s, which all aim to give the reader a break and at the same time reinforce key benefits, reasons, urgencies, etc);
Create the offer and boost its value (such as by adding bonuses, premiums, discounts, options, packaging, comparisons, etc);
Build credibility and believability (such as by adding background information, testimonials, proofs, factoid’s, guarantees, etc);
Close with a call-to-action statement;
And plug some “PS’s” at the end to restate the benefits of the offer, emphasize the sense of urgency or add a bonus not yet offered.

and remember…
Cheapness is never a strong appeal or motivater to buy. People like to be able to afford the best. If you let them feel that they are cheap they will resent you.

A headline of an advertisement is far more important than any picture. Space is very expensive so rather spend a LOT of time getting the ideal headline than wasting money on a picture.

People don’t like to be sold, they like to buy.

People want it to be their idea when they buy.

Differentiate your product and service. Even if you spend a month or more to find your unique difference you must have this to stand apart from your competition. If your competition markets as well, then you are at war (less the blood and guts – in the illegal drug trade the war is for real though) and you need to make yourself different. Al Ries and Jack Trout says it bluntly in their latest book – “Differentiate or die”

Test your copy:
Does it have a good feel?
Do you want to buy?
Are you seduced or repelled?
Read it out loud. Does it flow and convince?
Read the copy out loud. Why? if you verbally trip, then you need to edit or rewrite that section of the story.

Layout of your copy.
Graphics, fonts, and layouts don’t sell, but they can help bring attention to your sales message. If you create a display add, you do not need to fill every bit of space with words. Leave some white space – the add must also look pleasing to the eye.

The mighty headline

Now we are talking bait. The cherry on the cake, the puller, the fly on the fish hook in fact the headline is the most important part of any marketing message, written, spoken or visual.

The people or potential clients you wish to attract are bombarded by over a thousand marketing messages per day. They see them on bill boards when they drive to work, hear them on the radio when they drive, see it in newspapers and magazines they read when they are supposed to work, and when they eventually settle down after work, T.V. continues the bombardment every 15 minutes (and they have no choice – so naturally the brain gets ‘blunt’. Your message must also make an impression amongst all of these messages.

But let me justify with a example:
If you were in the market for a new fridge you certainly will take note of any material coming your way about fridge’s. Your headline is what will filter the garbage out and draw your prospects attention to your message.

The headline makes up 90% of your marketing budget.
Stuff up the headline and you stuff up your marketing budget.
It is .90c of every rand or dollar you will spend on marketing.

A bad start will kill the rest of your message, no matter how good it is.

The first thing you must get rid of is your “personal feelings on headlines” or how you think it should be done. If you know better then stop reading now and suffer the consequences. The principles in this book has been tested and tried by the marketers of marketers – it is scientific fact and apart from my own expensive tests in newspapers and magazines my research included works by:
Jay Abraham, David Ogilvy, Joe Vitale, Joe Sugarman, Garry Halbert, Sean D’Souza, Dan Kennedy, Al Ries, Jack Trout, Conrad Levinson, and the list goes on forever.

To emphasise my point I quote some of the old masters:

“On the average, 5 times as many people read the headlines as read the body copy. It follows that unless your headline sells your product, you have wasted 90% of your money.”
David Ogilvy

“Some of the most tremendous flops among advertisements contain body matter filled with convincing copy. But it just wasn’t captured into a good headline. And so the excellent copy didn’t even get a reading.”
Victor Schwab

“Based on hundreds of tests conducted, a good headline can be as much as 17 times more effective than a so-so headline. And this is with exactly the same body copy!”
Ted Nicholas

The headline is the opening sentence or paragraph in your sales letter or marketing message no matter who will read it. It’s the first words you or your sales people (including telephone marketers and floor sales people) should utter when they speak to anyone inquiring about a sale. In fact use it when someone asks you for directions to go to the toilet.

It is also the first paragraph you speak when recording a commercial or when meeting people at a trade show in your booth. Your company should answer the phone with the headline (see also U.S.P)

The purpose of a headline is to grab your prospect’s ATTENTION. Your headline should grab the attention of those who wishes to buy your product (your target market) If you want to reach cell-phone owners, put the word “cell phone” in the headline.

The human mind loves to satisfy it’s curiosity. (Curiosity killed the cat, that is why a lot of people will still open and trigger a virus file they receive via email ) Get the prospect curious, then they will continue to read.

A good headline will compel the reader to continue to read further.
It should tell the reader instantly and in precise words what you’re going to expand further in body copy of your marketing message. The headline should give the reader a Big Benefit or Big Promise or relieve from a BIG problem. So, create a headline that tells the right people precisely the benefit or answer to the problem you are offering them.

Every headline or opening statement should appeal to the reader’s or listener’s self-interest. It should promise him or her a desirable, powerful and appealing benefit or solution.

People are looking to gain more advantage, result, benefit, pleasure, or value, from their lives … from their actions … from their jobs or their businesses and definitely from their relationships. And they want to avoid or cure pain, dissatisfaction, frustration, mediocrity, and unpleasantness from their lives. People want you to solve their problems.

The concept of YOU! is the key to further attention. Nothing is so important to any human being than himself/herself. Everything a person achieves is the direct result of the opinion such person has of himself/herself.

Avoid headlines which mean nothing unless you read the entire copy: because if you don’t gain your prospect’s attention and desire immediately with your headline, that prospect won’t read the rest of what you wrote.

The headline needs to be so specific so the reader will magnetically be drawn into the body of an advertisement. It must tell the person that it will really be worthwhile to continue reading.

This “attraction of the specific” is worth your special attention not only as relating to words and phrases, but also concerning headline ideas themselves. For example, compare the appeal of “We will Help You to Sell More” with “We will Help You Pay the Staff, Rent and for your next holiday” — The 2nd phrase is a lot more precise and it creates a mental picture.

Good Headlines always promise a reward, solution or emphasize the problem and explains how the reader, save, gain, or accomplish something beneficial through the use of your product or service
How it will increase this: his or her mental, physical, financial, social, emotional or spiritual needs, satisfaction, well being, or security.

In short, good headlines spotlight the greatest “benefit” you are offering a sales prospect.

Be specific when you count or use numbers in your headline.
Instead of making it general it is good practice to use exact numbers.
(We have over a 1000 installations) say “On 31 May 2013 at 11.15pm we sold 300 nanokiss PCI systems”.

If you deliberately tackle the negative, then point out how the reader can avoid “reduce,” or “eliminate” risks, worries, losses, mistakes, embarrassments or some other pain in the ass condition when they use of your product or service.

Headlines can also promise to decrease your prospect or customer’s fear of poverty, illness, or accident, discomfort, boredom, and/or loss of business or social prestige or advantage, success, prosperity, richness or wealth.

A headline can be longer than what you think. So don’t be scared if it appears too long. If you must trim it, make sure it does not loose impact.

Here are some words that have been tested and work well in headlines.
The two most valuable words you can ever use in the headline are “free” and “new.” You cannot always use “free,” but you can always use “new” If you try hard enough. The word YOU yields immense power.

Other words that work wonders are: “how to,” “now,” “announcing,” “introducing,” “its here,” “just arrived,” “an important announcement,” “improvement,” “amazing,” “sensation,” “remarkable”, “revolutionary,” “startling,” “miracle or miraculous,” “magic,” “offer,” “quick,” “easy,” “simple,” “powerful,” “wanted,” “challenge,” “advise to,” “the truth about,” “compare,” “bargain,” “hurry,” and… “last chance.” “secret”,”Breakthrough,” “Sale”.

Don’t scoff at these clichés they really work and bring results.

Use quotation marks. Research suggests that quotation marks in a headline seem to improve readership as it brings credibility to the statement. It is in our human nature to believe more what a person says than what your company says.

Always incorporate your selling promise into your headline (See U.S.P). And make that promise as specific, desirable and advantageous to the prospect as you possibly can.

Negative headlines
Research shows that most negative headlines don’t work-unless you use negativity to underscore any undesirable results the prospect can expect to eliminate or avoid. But we also need to look at research done in these areas:

Why is bad news 90% of the news bulletin.
Negative news has a stronger impact on our minds than positive news because nastiness makes a bigger impact on your brain.

And that, says Ohio State University psychologist John T. Cacioppo, Ph.D., is due to the brain’s “negativity bias”: your brain is simply built with a greater sensitivity to unpleasant news. The bias is so automatic that it can be detected at the earliest stage of the brain’s information processing.

In studies he has done, Cacioppo showed people pictures known to arouse positive feelings (such as a Ferrari or a pizza), those certain to stir up negative feelings (like a mutilated face or dead cat) and those known to produce neutral feelings (a plate, a hair dryer). Meanwhile, he recorded electrical activity of the brain’s cerebral cortex that reflects the magnitude of information processing taking place.

The brain, Cacioppo demonstrated, reacts more strongly to stimuli it deems negative. That is, there is a greater surge in electrical activity. Thus, our attitudes are more heavily influenced by downbeat news than good news.

Our capacity to weigh negative input so heavily evolved for a good reason— to keep us out of harm’s way. From the dawn of human history our very survival depended on our skill at dodging danger. The brain developed systems that would make it unavoidable for us not to notice danger and thus, hopefully, respond to it.

and on the other side of the coin….
It seems that people love optimists. Optimists tend to make other people feel hopeful and positive.
This uncommonly startling statistic comes from the book ‘Learned Optimism’ by Martin Seligman.

People buy for these reasons:
Most people want to either avoid pain or gain pleasure. They want to fulfill their needs — from survival needs to self- actualization needs. But “pain” and “pleasure” mean different things to different people.

Try to translate the avoiding’s or gains in words people understand and appreciate. So developing and describing mere product benefits is never enough. You must look at the specific buying motives to which those benefits cater. It can be a very frustrating task for some people to translate “features” into benefits, as you must stay out of the picture.

Here is some guidance to help you in developing compelling benefits.
Abraham Maslow, the famous psychologist who developed the hierarchy of human motives, said that the foundation of all human needs is our need to survive. Once satisfied, the next one is our need for safety. Our need to be with other people is next, followed by our need to feel appreciated. Finally, our need to be challenged is at the top.

The “pain-pleasure principle” states that people either fear pain (and try to avoid it) or crave pleasure (and try to gain it). When given a choice between the two, avoidance of pain is a superior motive. Our need to survive and feel safe, which are at the bottom of Maslow’s pyramid, rule over all other needs.

So, a headline that instantly communicates a problem (i.e., a painful situation or a potentially painful one that may arise without the benefits of your offering) will have more impact. People who associate with the message will feel compelled to read more, which also helps to qualify your readers, it isolates the “serious” from the “curious.”

Whenever you write your headline or opening statement, remember this:
Your customer is not buying a product or a service. They are buying a result, benefit, advantage, protection or increased pleasure or solution. Always, always focus your headlines on the benefit or specific result your target market will be receiving. As Jay Abaraham would say, they are buying the hole not the drill.

The power of making the headline “personal”
The most common mistake most people make when writing or creating headlines is they forget to adopt the “YOU” attitude. To create a powerful headline, your message must try to make the benefits as personal as possible for the prospect. Your headline or message never should talk about “we or “our” product, service, or company. Each and every possible benefit or result must be written or expressed with the individual reader or prospect’s selfish, direct interests in mind. Speak to one person, not to a crowd.

Even when writing in first person singular (for example, “How I learned to sing in 4 days”), the reward promised is so described that it is, in effect, really saying, “You can do it too!”

Formulas to create headlines:
Address the people who can’t buy your product:
If You’ve Already bought a new car, Don’t Read This. It’ll Break Your Heart

Anger:
“2nd hand car dealers Are Ripping You Off! Here’s Why …”
Assurance:
“… In Less Than 60 Days, Guaranteed!”
Challenge:
Which Twin Has the Toni? And Which was at the hair salon?
Compare:
“Duracell batteries lasts six times longer …”
Convenience:
“How to Increase Your Chances With …”
Curiosity:
Closely Guarded Secrets For …
Difference:
The Difference in Shell Petrol is In the Additives
Directness:
To the Man Who Will Settle for Nothing Less Than a Mercedes
Envy:
“How Fellow Marketer Pummels Competitors By …”
Fear:
Over 98.4% of People End up Broke When …
Greed:
“Boost Your Income By More Than 302% When …”
Immortality:
“Reverse The Aging Process With …”
Jealousy:
“They All Laughed When …”
Limiting beliefs:
You Are Twice as Smart as You Think
Love and Lust:
“Make Her Fall in Love With You With …”
Metaphorize:
Melts Away Ugly Fat!
Morality:
Is It Immoral to Make Money This Easily?
Mystery:
The Five Biggest Mistakes to Avoid By …
Newness:
New! Cook without heat or electricity…
Pain:
Suffering From Sinus Pain? Then ..
Pitfalls:
Don’t buy a second hand car until you read this guide!
Pride, Power or Ego:
“Make Fellow Workers green with envy …”
Size of the claim:
I lost 10kg in 2 weeks by Using (anti-fat product)
Shock:
“Finally Exposed! Get The Dirty Truth On …”
Laziness:
“Slash Your Learning Curve By 57% When …”
Snob:
Only 80 Pink Ferrari’s Are Produced Annually.
Speed and effectiveness:
In Two Seconds, Bayer Aspirin Begins Relieving Rain!
Story quotation:
Would You Believe It-I Have a Cold!
Question:
Who Else Wants Whiter Teeth even if you smoke?

Problem solving as a marketing technique.
Here you actually use the problem as a headline. For instance…
“Lost all your data through a virus or hard drive crash?” – we can get it back!
The headline above will definitely draw more attention than the normal method “We restore lost data”.

If you decide on the problem approach headline then you must remember that the primary objective of a headline is to strike as directly as possible right at a situation confronting the reader.  Sometimes you can do this with greater accuracy if you use a negative headline which pinpoints the reader’s ailment, rather than the alleviation of it. An example would be “Do you have embarrassing pimples?”

So when you face that kind of situation, you can “emphasise the negative”

Remember, Rule Number One for high impact headlines is “State the Benefit or address the problem”

How to test your headlines.
Testing of a headline is crucial, but as a small business your budget might not allow for fast or regular testing so…
My advice is just to adapt and copy the classic and already tested headlines to suite your own needs as you as a small business owner do not have unlimited funds to test. But do test if you can afford it.

How to Test if you can afford it:
Tell the prospects to specify a department number when they call or write-(there doesn’t have to be an actual department).
Have the caller ask for a specific person – (the name can be fictitious).

You must be able to attribute each response to one of the approaches you are testing.

Remember Prospects are fine, but sales are what you are after….

Before you mail to 10,000 untested people do a small mail test with just 500 or 1000.

Test the same mailing pieces or advertisements with two different headlines. Repeat the headline on the outside of the carrier envelope. Try different body copy with the same headlines. Try different orders.
Test as many things as possible in the smallest possible arena before you risk a big part of your advertising budget on one expensive marketing approach to a large audience.

On a persistent scale of marketing you will soon find out what works, and what doesn’t. Once you have the answer stick to it. Even if you and everyone else gets bored of it.

And Finally…
Please remember that great copywriters and legendary masters of marketing sometimes takes weeks to write the ideal headline. They do this because they know how they will trigger huge amounts of sales with the right headline.

Don’t limit yourself to creating just one single headline.

The great masters I’ve studied would write no less than 100 different approaches before they kicked out the three to five best, most powerful selections they would test out.

You should not settle for anything less.

The more headlines and opening propositions you write, the more this mind-set will become your own.

Try this simple exercise if you get stuck: Ask yourself to fill in the blank describing the most powerful result or benefit your product produces. If you were talking to a prospect about this result you’d be telling them how to what? Once you fill in that blank with the answer to the result your product or service produces, you’ve written your first really good headline-so keep going!

After you’ve written quite a number of good headlines pick out the best five that make the advantage or result apparent to the customer.

I guarantee you this: If you create 50 to 100 trial headlines and choose the best five. One of those five will out produce your current headline or sales opening by at least 35%.

Some copywriters will even write the same headline in a hundred different ways and then afterwards, read and reread what they wrote until they are only left with a short list which goes through the same process of elimination again.

You can and should beg steal and borrow.  You must build up a swipe file..

Study and model successful copy writing as much as you can.  Buy magazines and newspapers and study which advertisements are often repeated… Ad space in magazines are very expensive. If an ad is repeated in more than two issues, preferably copy-intense ads or full-page advertorials, common sense tells you that the ad is profitable.
Rip out the ad and put it into your swipe file. If you cannot buy all the magazines, write down the headlines of those you see at news stands, cafes and even when visiting the doctor.

Then, copy the headlines into a document. They can be easily converted into “fill in the blanks” formulas. And believe me, they will work well with almost all markets. High end as well as low priced articles.

All “great” copywriters do this. They steal. They recycle. They copy. They model. They swipe.

And they adapt.

Of course, don’t copy the headlines literally. Do not plagiarize just remodel. Your swipe file samples can easily be adapted to fit the market, the offer and the message.  Turn your swipe file advertisements into templates so that you can almost fill in the blanks.

In the sample headline section I have supplied a lot of samples of the best headlines ever written to get you started on your swipe file.

The cosmetics of a headline is equally important. The type must be bold, large and prominently placed, even written in a different font or type style. It must “scream” at your readers. Don’t worry if it’s too harsh or too long. Experience and research has shown that the longer headlines pull the most. Don’t “reverse” print anything where the background is black and the letters are in white. It always diminishes the effect you want.

In conclusion

  • Does the opening statement beg for attention?
  • Does it arouse enough curiosity?
  • And does it genuinely cater to the needs, motives and emotions of my target market?
  • Is the language easy to understand?
  • Is your add personal? Is it getting through to the person with the need?

The sub headline

The sub headline (the headline AFTER the headline) is a statement that qualifies the headline and instills a sense of urgency. It is a good place to add a statement like a word or expression that pulls readers further into your copy. The purpose being, if after reading the headline a person is not compelled to read any further, then the sub headline can then pull the target reader into the copy.

Sub headlines can include words that add a sense of urgency, scarcity or curiosity to the headline — such as with those magic words “free,” “guarantee,” “limited” or “deadline.”
“Without a sense of urgency, desire loses its value.”
-Jim Rohn-

However, here’s an important note: How many times have you been given a time-limited or quantity-bound offer, but with no apparent urgency? You probably thought, “I’m sure that offer will be there when I come back.” (And more than likely, you never did go back.) So as long as you justify your sub headline by backing it up with a truthful urgency, you will be more credible, increase desire and pull more people into your copy.

The science of persuasion and SEO.

Watch the video and learn a lot about the instinctive behavior of the people you want to target. We all want to be different at times. But we need to belong to a tribe to show that we are different. Marketing is a bitch. Just when you think logic and common sense will bring the bacon home. It falls flat on its face.

And then once you have all the right convincing words, and everything in place on your website. And no one knows you exist. So you stroll over to Facebook to let the world know you breathe.

Only to find everybody is selling what you selling, and disappear in the madness of constant marketing bombardment. I was there. My name is Contheosius. Life changes as we speak and entropy is always at work. You need to stay on top. The SEO algorithms are constantly changing. What works today. Will not work tomorrow. You need to be a constant nerd to stay on top with SEO and life changes.

But…. then you discover SEO and all of a sudden you appear in google’s search results. And business picks up. SEO has amazing power. And if you can get people to click on your link. And they like where they land. You will get business and sales if you can connect with your market. And don’t forget Bing. Some people never change their windows so they end up with BIng. You need to cater for that search engine as well.

What does your target market want?

Most of you are tempted to be under the assumption that if your service or product is of better ‘quality’ then the clients will flock to you. I suppose you also heard the fairy tale “build a better mouse trap and….”

Sure, you will get the occasional referral and do business this way, but be honest with me now. Is your business booming?

You see a lot of people try to use “my service is excellent” or “my product is better” as their marketing strategy. Bung! – people ASSUME that when they buy something that the product will be good and the service excellent. This is not a “marketing strategy” – it is what the client expects by default. You do too, what makes you think you are different to other consumers out there.

On the reverse side, if you supply a bad service or product you will get bad-mouthed so fast that you will have to do business further and further away from “home” until you eventually see your arse.

Now that you know what the target market does not want, here is what they do expect. They want to be supplied or serviced by someone they can trust, someone they can rely on if needed. They want the supplier to be knowledgeable in his/her field of expertise. They want to deal with someone they like – YOU! — If you can supply the above, you almost have a ticket to make your own price.

Jay Levinson, author of the famous Guerilla Marketing books said the importance of the buying decision is based on 5 steps and I list them from the most important to the least:
1. Confidence and trust in the company they buy from.
2. Perceived quality, and expertise the supplier shows in what he/she offers.
3. Service.
4. Selection.
5. Price. (Big Note! — see it is listed last)