Everyone makes mistakes in their marketing career. This section aims to help you bypass the whole “experimental phase” and avoid the biggest mistakes ever made in copywriting.
Errors
Mistake #1 Selling before first demonstrating value
Before you blast your subscribers with offers, you must always give them tons of free value and establish a genuine relationship with them.
As a general rule of thumb, words should always be aligned to the left, indented inside slightly and not have too long a word line. This is to prevent a break in the continuity of your visitor’s reading flow. (From left to right)
Also, images should be used sparingly, only if it’s directly relevant to your sales copy and should be aligned to the center.
Mistake #3 Sounding too formal
Let’s face it, of your pitch sounds too formal, you’ll come off as sounding like a sales robot. For goodness sake, throw in some human factor and speak with a casual tone. No one likes to be hard sold, so if you can connect with your readers in a more informal tone so that they can identify with you, you’ll be more likely to make that sale!
Mistake #4 Wasting your reader’s time
Basically, to write a good copy, you should only be adding things which contribute to the sale and removing things which do not. Your reader’s attention is very precious so if you manage to catch their attention, make it count. Don’t bore them with useless stuff.
In short, if you avoid these mistakes and diligently practice copywriting methods as shown above, you’ll get better and better in no time and make more sales.
Handling objections is an integral skill in good sales copywriting.
Objections
Whenever a person reads a piece of sales copy, many questions would pop up in his mind in attempt to “protect” him from “losing his money”. This is a natural behavior, and if you know how to handle these objections effectively in your copy as they emerge, you will be reaping in massive rewards.
Here’s a couple of commonly used techniques for handling objections:
Social proof is something almost everyone looks for when they wish to buy a product. The more convincing and authentic the testimonial seems, the more they will believe the product is good. Try to include testimonials with snapshots of the buyer; video testimonials are even better.
2) FAQS
Having a frequently asked questions section helps greatly in overcoming any objections that appear. Here you can address all the common misconceptions that may sprout up such as how to use the product, who is the product right for and price concerns.
3) Post scripts (P.S)
P.S or Post scripts have been used extensively in sales letters to boost conversions. Before clicking the “Add to cart” button people will usually have a final line of defense which prevents them from making the purchase. If you have a couple of post scripts ready, you can give them that final nudge to make the purchase.
4) Good reasons to buy
A personal favorite of mine, this section gives your readers a couple of good reasons to help them rationalize their purchase and greatly boost your profits.
Incorporate these great tools for handling objections in your sales copy and you’ll soon see a soar in your sales.
The call to action is probably one of the most crucial components of any piece of content. The first thing you must do is determine what is your most desired outcome that you wish for your customers/prospects to carry out.
Different components of your business would usually require a different sort of desired outcome.
Blog – Comments
Facebook page – Likes
Landing page – opt ins
Emails – Click throughs
Sales pages – Purchases
These are the common types of results you would typically want.
So once you have determined that, your call to action must be worded or shaped to facilitate that kind of action.
For example:
For a blog setting, a good call to action would be –
“If you liked this post of have any ideas of your own, please comment down below!”
As silly as it may sound to literally tell a reader what to do, split test studies have shown this to be really effective. So the best way to achieve results fast is to model what others have been doing which works and eliminate things that don’t work
To give another example, if you wish for prospects to make a purchase, you might ask them to
“Snap up your copy before it runs out!”
Note that I’ve added a simple scarcity factor (one of the extra marketing nuggets often used) by claiming that it will run out if you don’t act now.
Adding scarcity factors or time sensitivity to your call to actions often result in high conversions, so don’t forget to include it in whatever you do! Finally, you must bear in mind that the success rate of the call to action is not solely the result of the words of use in the calling, but how you put together different components of your sales copy such as ESPs, handling objections and showing the benefits.
We talked a lot about emotions in the previous chapter. Back in the days, many businesses use something called “Unique Selling Point” or “Unique Selling Propositions” to differentiate themselves from their competitors to rake in more sales.
While that is very important, in the online world, we have something additional called “Emotional Selling Point” – Which is the ability use tap into the emotions of your readers so that you can make them carry out your most desired action.
Here’s an example of an emotional selling point:
“I knew what it was like struggling as a new marketer, learning how to draw traffic to my website. Sometimes, I even had a slice of bread a day because I wasn’t making much money from my online business…”
This classic example relates the hardship faced by the marketer to the person reading the sales copy, who is probably facing the same problems he once faced.
Emotional selling points also deal a lot with powerful emotion stimulating words. For example, in the make money online niche you would use words like: “time and financial freedom, free from the shackles of 9-5, quit the rat face”. These terms are emotional terms related to the niche that people can easily relate to and connect with.
In short, if you wish to use ESPs effectively to market your business, ask yourself these two questions:
1) What niche are you in?
2) What kind of words/stories/situations that people in your niche can identify with?
Once you have determined the answer to these two questions, you can try and brainstorm as many ESPs as possible that you can use in your sales copies or marketing content.
If you’re working on copywriting then Headlines are key.
The headline is the most important part of any copy. If your headlines fail to grab the attention of your readers, it doesn’t matter how good your offer is or how good the rest of your copy is. You only have 5 seconds to make an impact on your readers before they move on, so make it count.
Here’s an example of a good headline:
The headline has to be eye-catching and bolded to immediately get your reader’s attention. The sub headline will reinforce the message of the headline.
In this case, the writer used font face “Impact” and red fonts to grab the reader’s attention. The black words in the header are to break the monotony of the headline. It’s also used to exemplify the important points (Free Of Charge).
Here’s an important thing to note: You should never use FULL caps for your headline. Only use it when necessary.
“IMAGINE WHAT THIS WOULD LOOK LIKE IF THIS WAS ON THE TOP OF YOUR WEBPAGE!!!”
It looks like someone screaming at you – Who would like that? Also, full caps looks spammy and nobody nor Google would like that.
Also, headlines has to use eye-catching words which can instantly excite the emotions. Have you ever seen magazines at a newsstand? The headlines usually sound catchy and uses words which excite curiosity and emotions with topics like sex, money and drama.
Ask yourself,
What niche are you in?
What words can you use to excite emotions and create drama in your niche?
Remember, the ultimate goal of copywriting is to get your readers to perform your most desired outcome. E.g. making a purchase or signing up into your mailing list.
Therefore, it’s very important that you determine what your desired result is before you embark on your copywriting crusade. Clarity is power so it’s important to know what you are after so that when you write, things will go the direction you want it to go
Okay, let’s look at some basics. Bearing in mind that we want our readers to perform our most desired result, we also can’t be too forceful. Here’s rule number one:
You want to be seen as a friendly person who is also an authority figure in your field and not like a blatant salesman. The latter will cause people to dislike you can treat you as spam.
The next thing you must know is that some rules are pretty illogical. But one thing that makes sense is this, good practices have been tested and proven (split-tested) by top online marketers for years, so rather than trying to re-invent the wheel, follow what works and reap the rewards!
However, I strongly encourage you do a little split testing of your own as well. Eliminate things that don’t work and duplicate or multiply things that do – that is the surefire way to success!
Next up, we’ll look into one of the most important components of a good copy – headlines.
“Copywriting is the use of words and ideas to promote a person, business, opinion or idea. Although the word copy may be applied to any content intended for printing (as in the body of a newspaper article or book), the term copywriter is generally limited to promotional situations, regardless of the medium (as in advertisements for print, television, radio or other media).
The purpose of marketing copy, or promotional text, is to persuade the reader, listener or viewer to act—for example, to buy a product or subscribe to a certain viewpoint”.
In the online marketing world, copywriting is used extensively to promote blog readership, get opt-ins for list building and to monetize your prospects.
If you truly wish to be successful in your online business, you’ll have to learn the ropes of effective copywriting so that your readers will love you.
Thankfully, good copy writing practices is a learnable skill.
The ability to turn words into gold is probably the most important aspect of any marketer. If you can do this, it does not matter where you are in the world, you can make money from anywhere, anytime just from your words.
This whole copywriting thing came later on. Back in the day, the best “copywriters” were the great businesspersons of the olden days who knew how to sell anything to anybody. While people possessed powerful weapons, their most powerful weapon was their pen (or tongue).
Today, modern entrepreneurs are making a killing using copywriting techniques in their businesses. Bear in mind, selling things online is a lot harder than selling things offline because you lack the sincerity of voice and body language.
However, if you know how to tap into the power of copywriting to excite the emotions of your customers, you’ll be laughing your way to the bank.
We all have things that leave us on edge. Sometimes it’s an event or a person (like a visit from your mother-in-law). Sometimes we’re more anxious due to more significant issues, leaving us unsure of our safety and well-being, like when a severe illness is going around. Whatever the case, anxiety is adept at derailing our lives and keeping us from accomplishing what we want and need to.
How do you handle this kind of nervous worrying? If you’re lucky, you eventually learn how to take it in stride. For some people, their coping skills aren’t healthy. For others, they flounder, trying to find their way. If you’re in these latter groups, consider this: Visualization is a proven skill shown to reduce anxiety and create a calmer and happier you. Let’s explore how.
Feeling especially fearful? It’s time for a trip to feel someplace safe. For some, this might be the beach. Or perhaps you’d feel more at home by a mountain lake or city café sipping coffee. Wherever you feel the safest and most at home, you want to go there now in your mind. Start by sitting back and making yourself comfortable. Close your eyes and picture yourself in your favorite place. Add in every detail you can to make this experience as real as possible. Include all your senses in the background. Breathing deeply, holding yourself in this place until you feel calm and somewhat refreshed.
Unwind with some String
Feeling all tense and coiled up inside? This usually comes when you’re holding back too many emotions. Picture yourself carrying around all these knotted emotions tangled up with words you’ve wanted to say all day but couldn’t. Make all these feelings into an imaginary ball of yarn. Now sit back and take several calming breathes as you withdraw this ball of yarn and hold it in your hand. Do you feel the weight? Good. Now drop it on the floor, holding onto the end of the string so that the ball rolls away from you, unraveling as it goes. Watch all the strands of yarn unwind, disappearing as they do. Stay in the vision until the entire ball is unwound and gone, and you’re feeling lighter and more relaxed.
Our thoughts can be noisy things. We hear so many voices in our heads, reminding of us deadlines, things to do, and people to see. Add to this the negative self-talk which creeps in occasionally and the half-heard phrases we’ve carried with us, which sound suspiciously like our parents, and you’ve got a lot of chatter and no peace. For this kind of problem, visualize yourself in a room with a big open window. Set all these voices outside the window. Now, take a deep breath and shut the window firmly. This is a nice thick double-paned glass. You can no longer hear the voices when the window is closed.
With visualizations like these, you tell your mind to calm. You take back control where you need it most and set your feet back on a better path. Remember, you’re in charge of what goes on in your head. Don’t let anxiety set the tone for you.
I am currently living in Baku, Azerbaijan – all part of my life plan to visit and live in different countries. It’s been a tough time. I landed here the day war broke out with neighbouring Armenia. It is a conflict which goes back a long way, and not one I want to discuss here.
So I arrived and the government set a curfew from 2100 to 0600 the next day – stay at home unless you have government permission for work reasons. This was on top of some corona virus restrictions. The war ended but curfew didn’t. The in December they went for another lockdown; we needed to send an SMS to get permission to leave home to go shopping etc for a maximum of three hours. So I was back to working online; and trust me, as a teacher of many decades experience I can say Teaching Online is much more difficult than classroom teaching. I hate it. Though I keep at it as I want to keep pushing my students to be their best.
Fortunately, we will be having restrictions removed soon. I haven’t actually taught one of my classes in school since mid March when I was still in Morocco.
We hear a lot about how to be calm and why calmness is essential. But why?! What does “calm” really do for someone? If you’re feeling like being calm gets in the way of your motivation and achievement-focused mentality, you’re not alone.
A lot of people associate calmness with nonchalance, but in reality, it’s what helps you have a clear mind so that you can achieve all of your dreams and goals. You’ve got to start somewhere, so here are five ways to become a calmer person:
1. Go All In
Just like when you learn a new language, in order to become calmer, you need to immerse yourself in the headspace fully. That means the mind, body, and soul. Whether you decide to download a meditation app or start going to yoga classes, the important thing is that you commit to it.
2. Surround Yourself with Calm
Tapping into the immersion piece, another way to become calmer is to surround yourself with calming imagery. Maybe you’ll paint your walls a color that makes you happy and serene. Or perhaps you’ll add a fountain in your room for soothing background noise.
3. Take a Break When You Need One
The hustle is great, but sometimes you need a break. Breaks are good for the mind, especially when you’re usually working hard! Let your mind go through its unconscious thoughts so that its conscious self can get back to work when you wake up.
4. Let Conflict be Conflict
Sometimes, we get into conflict, and we take all the blame. Or we hand the blame over to someone else. Either way, engaging in conflict and letting it consume you is not the way to attain calmness for your mind. The next time you find yourself getting wrapped up in conflict, take a step back, and ask yourself what good it is doing for you. If it’s not doing any good — and most of the time, it’s not—step away and let the conflict be conflict.
5. Observe from Far Away
It’s one thing to choose not to engage in something, whether it be a conflict or a toxic relationship. It’s another thing to decide to observe from far away, detach and then let go. For some people, it takes years to nail down the art of observing and detaching. It doesn’t matter how long it takes you — go at your own pace, and you’ll see progress.
Fairy Hanny 