Warning: I am not a professional copywriter, I am just a big fan of watching Mad Men on TV and that is what gives me the authority to produce content on the topic of direct response copy writing.
Well the statement above is half true I do watch a lot of Mad Men, but in all seriousness over the last 6 months I have have launched hundreds of different Facebook ad campaigns along with marketing campaigns on Adwords, Twitter, and more.
I have directed paid traffic to a slew of different types of web pages. These pages include squeeze pages, pre-sale pages, lead landing pages, advertorials, review sites, shopping carts, multi product eCommerce sites, iTunes Store, Amazon product pages and more.
Everything I am sharing with you about copywriting, I have learned through trial and error.
To sell anything online your copy needs to have the following
(A) Authority: So you created this amazing sales letter about this new weight loss product that your trying to sell, you plan on blowing it up by sending thousands of clicks to it, hoping to generate sales off those clicks.
In your sales letter you talk about this amazing break through and how you discovered this weight loss formula in Wyoming, while taking a leak on the side of a road during a cross country road trip. In the story you speak about tasting a piece of fermented corn in the back alley of an abandoned farm, and how 1 day later you felt amazing and you had no appetite.
You then tell us how about you went back to the farm, and performed chemical analysis on this incredibly corn and then you tested the weight loss affects of the corn on pigs and all the pigs ended up losing weight.
What an incredible story, everyone reading it is most likely galvanized. We have all the same questions though, who is this guy/gal and what background do they have to writing on the topic of weight loss?
You need to have authority on any topic you write about as people need to trust the source that they are getting information from. If people don’t trust you, then they won’t buy.
(B) Perspective: I define perspective very simply, “what is your connection to the cause”. For the example above, you would ask why did you come out with a diet product, were you an overweight child? Did you have a sibling who always got picked on cause of their weight?
You also need to explain why you are writing about this, and it has to be “real” and has to have “emotion” attached to it. People need to connect with your story that is why perspective is so important.
(C) Correct Words: I like to research my audience thoroughly specifically on answer sites such as Yahoo Answers, Answers.com and more. When I create content I like to speak to my audience specifically in words that they would use. When you speak to someone in words that they will use, they tend to believe that you understand them and you can build trust almost immediately.
(D) Validation: Once you state your authority, then you need validate your authority. If your an expert in losing weight, you should talk about specific cases and people that you have helped lose weight. The key here is to be specific, if you use a testimonial be as specific as possible with that testimonial. Think of it as though, every person who reads your content will reach out an validate your testimonial even though they won’t.
(E) Empathy: This goes hand in hand with “correct words” but you have to communicate to your audience that you know what’s its like to be in their shoes or you were at one point in their shoes. You have to feel their pain but at the same time you have to speak to them from a position of authority.
If you can both empathize as well as speak to someone from a position of authority they will immediately trust you and be more willing to take the next step and buy your product.
