12- COPYWRITING TIPS TO MAKE YOUR
ADVERTISING MORE PROFITABLE...

© Copyright 2004 Thom Reece All Rights Reserved

“ As a homeowner, you know how maintenace costs
are climbing every day... ”Year after year people
make the same mistakes in direct-response copy and
advertising.

You can avoid the most common and costly
blunders by following these proven tips...

1. WRITE IN DIRECT-RESPONSE LANGUAGE:
Use short paragraphs and short words. This article
has 68% short words-five letters or less. Strive for
at least 65%-75%. Never go under 50% unless you
are writing to Ph.D's.Make your sentences and
paragraphs flow like a breeze.

Ignore good grammar when you have a good reason.
Keep the bucket brigade going: Start paragraphs with
And, But, So you see, However...Use the freshest
concepts and the most colorful language you can
without disturbing the flow.

Use hot words: free, profit, new, now, secret, easy,
save, guarantee, today... and the hottest word of all:
YOU!

Use bullets... lots of them.

2. WRITE LOTS OF HEADLINES.

Always think up dozens of alternative headlines.
Put your strongest benefits in them and test your
best alternatives. When writing headlines for web
sites make sure they include key search words and
phrases along with the benefits.

3. DROP THE WARM-UPS...
You'll destroy your entire letter/ad by starting off,
"As a homeowner, you know how maintenace costs
are climbing every day...".

Take your first draft and try cutting out the first
two to three paragraphs... you'll usually find the real
"meat" starts to appear in your copy after you have
started to "warm-up" to the writing.

4. STAND OUT.
Separate yourself from the competition as clearly as
you can. Discover, isolate, and dramatize all the reasons
for doing business wity you...today..., instead of your
competitor.
Build your entire package or ad around these reasons
(benefits).

5. SELL BENEFITS, NOT FEATURES.
Readers don't buy products or features of products.
They buy the benefits-of-use of the product or features.
Be humble enough to realize that a buyer will not give
you one red cent for any product or feature until you
convert the features into benefits-of-use.

6. LEARN TO GIVE.
Most advertisers and charities think of direct response
strictly as a device to "get". Unfortunately, most readers
also want to get. So, to succeed, you must adopt a "give"
attitude... beyond what you offer in the product or service.

Give them something immediately in your ad, your letter,
your web page. Give them news, business tips, interesting
stories, resources, freebies, special deals.

7. USE TESTIMONIALS.They're proof that you're as
good as you say you are, and that you'll do what you
say will do.
Like..."I increased profits by $100,000 last year using
your services..." Joe Smith, President, Smith Corporation
The more specific the testimonial the more power it has.
Give full attributions whenever possible.

Testimonials give you believability and credibility.
You can't do successful direct-response without these
two essential factors.

8. OFFER A MONEY-BACK GUARANTEE.
Whatever you are selling, make sure you offer a money-
back guarantee. It's a critical factor in getting someone
to send in their monty to someone they don't know or
maybe never heard of.

9. CREDIT CARDS, TOLL FREE NUMBERS.Credit
card purchases and toll-free "800" numbers can increase
your response by as much as 50% to 400%.
If you're on the web make sure you opt for secure on-line
transmission (SSL) of credit card orders... or allow other
means for your customer to provide their credit
information to you.

10. ASK FOR ACTION.
It's amazing how often otherwise good copy never gets
around to asking for the order. If you don't ask for action...
you won't get any.

11. BUDGET YOUR TIME.
Devote about one third of your writing time to the lead
elements, headline, subheads, teasers, opening paragraphs.

12. KEEP CURRENT.
Direct-response is more scientific than other types of
advertising. Like any fast-moving science, it has it's
discoveries daily. This is especially true of writing for the
Internet/World Wide Web. Subscribe to industry trade
journals such as Target Marketing, DM News, Direct,
and other relevant publications.

About the Author:
Thom Reece is the CEO and Senior Consultant for
On-Line Marketing Group... His website...
On-Line Marketing Resource Center ...
( www.e-comprofits.com ) is visited by thousands of
internet marketers daily. Thom can be reached at:
808-929-7377, Fax: 808-929-8711, or by email at:
thom@e-comprofits.com

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Brent Bush
913-244-6766
http://webbizmarket.com

3 Tips To Profit From Newsletters Without Writing Them Yourself
I'm sure you have heard many online marketers touting the benefits
of having a newsletter.

I have used newsletters in the past for many sites.
I've used them as a source of revenue by having advertisements
embedded within the newsletter content. They are also effective as a
means to keep a site sticky - to "anchor" clients and bring them back t
o the site.

Newsletters can also be a great selling tool to provide free information,
samples of your expertise or services, and as a taste of your full
product/service. The lure of free content from newsletters can
help you to turn casual surfers to potential customers and then finally
paying customers.

“ Dear clientname ”
I find the biggest problem for me personally is to consistently provide
new content (which is strange since I have no problems writing a daily
blog, go figure!). Consequently I have looked for methods to get around this
problem.
Many of the sites I control I enjoy for the business management side
of things and don't actually provide the core services myself. For
example at BetterEdit.com I don't do any of the editing. I have
professionals on staff that handle that aspect of the business.

Consequently I have found it difficult to write newsletters that appeal
to my target audience. Other times I've just grown bored of the subject
matter and it becomes a chore to write a newsletter. If you don't have
enthusiasm your output is not going to be very good.Over the years
I've developed ways to make money from newsletters without writing
them myself.

1. Hire WritersThe first and most obvious way is to hire people to do it
for you. I did it this way for a community site I built with over 1000 members.
In this case it was quite easy to find people that had experience and enthusiasm
for the subject matter;
I posted a news announcement looking for newsletter writers.
I hired two people and paid cash on a per newsletter basis though at one
point my writers were happy to write for free, they just enjoyed contributing
to the community (though I made sure to pay them whenever there was
advertiser revenue).
To make a profit I just made sure I had more revenue from advertisers than
I had to pay my writers. A simple equation but one that takes time to balance
since you need an audience, advertisers and writers. If you have a popular site
(the audience) the other two variables should come easily.

Alternatively you could try searching for a freelancer to write for you.

2. Other People’s ContentAnother method that I've utilised is to put
together a summary style newsletter that simply links to content online.
You take the time to find the quality articles and links for your members
but you don't have to actually do any writing yourself. IncWire is a good
example of a newsletter like this. It provides links to great entrepreneurship
articles that have been drawn from all over the net.

The newsletter is free and sponsored by advertisers. Of course you can
also make use of article repositories such as EzineArticles.com and simply
use other people's articles in your newsletter. This is a reliable and easy
option since there is no shortage of great articles available for free publication
everyday.

3. E-CourseYou can also try an e-course style newsletter. This is a bit
different to a traditional newsletter. Your visitors sign up and then over a
period of time intervals they get sent the course via email. You can use
plain text emails (this is the best method in my opinion - keep it simple
stupid - kiss!), or HTML email or Adobe PDFs.

You can send them out once a day for the next seven days or once a
month for a year. It's up to you but generally the sooner the better
because you want to continually build up interest over a short period
of time. Will Swayne at Marketing-Results.com.au recommends a
consecutive seven day e-course. While initially you do have to write
the content yourself once it's written your done. You don't have to
constantly provide new content and your course can be sent out to
unlimited subscribers.

The benefit of an e-course is that you can really focus on what your
speciality is. Your course acts as a showpiece for your core competency,
your skills, and allows people to try before they buy. You can monetise
the course by inserting affiliate links, advertisements or selling your own
services/products (or all three!).

Newsletter SoftwareYou might be thinking this is all well and good,
but how do I manage my newsletter. How do I handle an e-course
being sent out every day for seven days to hundreds of different
people without being blocked by SPAM blockers. What technology
is available and what do I recommend.
Personally I use Marketer's Choice to handle all email communications
but if you just want a newsletter service it's definitely way too expensive
- it's more of an all-in-one marketing tool. I've tried a few different
newsletter software packages.

Some you install on to your own server and then manage online,
others that are externally hosted subscriber based services and one
that functioned a lot like an email client that sits on your desktop and
sends out emails through your mail server. All of these have pros and
cons. Of course it depends on your budget, but as I have stated you often
get what you pay for so be wary of the free packages out there.

I recommend you try my favourite script source, The PHP Resource Index (http://php.resourceindex.com), in particular the Mailing List category
should be your first port of call. You can try good old Google search as well.
Anti-SPAMBefore you commit to any newsletter software make sure you
check how they deal with SPAM. Do they have an official policy and
description of how your newsletters will be received? Are they just mass
broadcast?

Your newsletter software should provide double-opt in protection which
means your subscribers have to opt-in and confirm their subscription via
email before they receive anything. This helps to keep you from being
accused of spamming. One of the main reasons I chose Marketer's Choice
was because they have a very good system to make sure your mail is delivered
to your subscribers. They have an in-built SPAM checker which reviews email
you send out and tells you the likelihood your mail will be blocked by anti-SPAM
software. It has the capability to personalise every email that is sent out so it
appears with "Dear clientname" rather than just a generic "hello".

This is an important feature both as a sales tool (people tend to read emails
that start with their name) and it's more likely that your mail won't be classed
as SPAM by anti-SPAM software, which flag non-personalised email as potential
SPAM. It's the extra benefits that professional services provide that make them
worth the cost, but you do have to go out there and test to find what suits your needs.Newsletters Are Ace!

Really I can't think of many reasons not to have some form of newsletter
or e-course on your site. Yes it does take time to set things up but it's worth
the effort. I suggest you write it in your to-do list now if you don't have a
newsletter already!

About the Author:
By Yaro Starak
www.entrepreneurs-journey.com

Do you want to profit from your own successful home based Internet
business?
Learn from Yaro Starak, a young entrepreneur from Australia.
Get your free articles and audio now - visit his Internet Business Blog.

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Brent Bush
http://webbizmarket.com

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