I was in London last week, visiting my mum.
While lounging around and watching a little TeeVee (I don’t have one at home), I couldn’t help but criticise the vast majority of what’s supposed to pass for advertising.
My younger brother, a lawyer and much more intellingent than I could hope to be, couldn’t understand why.
You see, like too many people, my brothers have the notion that if an advert looks good and wins awards, then it’s a success.
So I asked my brother one simple question…
“Assume you’ve just paid an agency to create an ad for you. It’s looks good; it entertains its audience; and it even wins awards. But… it fails to get you any sales. You make no money from it. Basically, that agency has just used your money to improve its own profile. How would you feel?”
He replied he wouldn’t be too pleased.
Then I asked him if he understood the difference between a good ad and a bad one. And he replied he did.
A good ad is one which makes money for the advertiser. A bad ad is one which doesn’t.
End of story.
Filed under advertising by on Apr 10th, 2010. Comment. 
I’m a bit of an aficionado when it comes to adverts. I love the old classics.
And, if you’re anything like me, you may have heard of an ad written by Maxwell Sackheim for the Sherwin Cody English course.
The headline for this ad was…
“Do You Make These Mistakes in English?”
This ad out-pulled all others for the product and ran for around 40 years.
In fact, see what Sackheim himself said about it:
“That ad was one of the determining factors in putting my name in the all-time Copywriters Hall of Fame…Other copywriters compared its results with a lot of other ads but ‘Do You Make These Mistakes In English’ always came out best.”
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Let’s take a look at why this advert was so successful.
The first thing you might notice is that it just looks like something you might want to read. It doesn’t look like so many typical adverts might do.
If you look at the photograph of Sherwin Cody, there’s a quality about it that seems to draw you in. He just looks authoritative… someone who may have something of importance to say.
And, the thing which stands out most to me (and maybe to you), is the value the copy provides. There’s information in there that could be worth taking the time to read.
And, if you continue to read, you find that, indeed, the information is of value to the target audience.
When you read on you realise the way it’s written. You get the impression the writer really knows his market. As if he is the market.
Now let’s get down to specifics.
The headline, “Do You Make These Mistakes in English?” is speaking directly to the intended audience.
First, it addresses him or her by the use of ‘You’, making it personal to the reader.
Who is the reader? The one who makes ‘Mistakes in English’.
Then it states, specifically, ‘These Mistakes’, highlighting the fact there’s information of value in the body copy.
Take a look at this last part again, the word ‘these’ grabs the reader’s attention. It points to specific mistakes in English. This fact alone makes you want to read on to find out what ‘these’ mistakes are. The curiosity value.
The question is literally directing you to the answer, which is in the body copy. If you want to find out what ‘these mistakes’ are, you have to read on.
And, when you do, you get a free lesson in English, which pulls you in, ensuring you read the rest of the ad. In fact, it doesn’t even seem like an ad: Just some valuable information.
Then, after you’ve had a taste of what’s to come, the ad has set you up to go further.
But it makes it even easier for you.
You can even order a free book and a 15 minutes test, which are the perfect components to get you to sign up and make the order.
A perfect close.
Best,
Rezbi
www.eadim.com
www.commonsensedirectmarketing.com
Filed under copywriting by on Mar 23rd, 2010. Comment.
I’m sitting here tired and falling asleep. Too tired to write but, here goes nothing…
When you write a headline, make sure it’s alive.
Give the reader a reason to feel restless… stir his emotions… pique his interest till he can’t bear it, and he just has to read on to see what’s coming next.
A headline, of course, is… AN AD FOR YOUR AD! Gary Halbert
Your headline should demand to be read. It should stop your reader in his tracks and create an irresistible desire to read further and find out more.
On the average, 5 times as many people read the headlines as the body copy. It follows that unless your headline sells, you’ve wasted 90% of your money. David Ogilvy
The right headline can mean the difference between doubling your readership, and more. According to John Caples, one headline increased sales by 19 times against another.
When one advert brings in twice as many responses as another, despite the only difference being the headline, it stands to reason one headline is alive and the other is dead. And, when something is alive it can go to work and get results. If it’s dead, it can’t do anything.
…Your headline is the most important part of your website Michel Fortin
This is a fact regardless of where your advertising is – whether it’s online, in a magazine or a newspaper, or anywhere else. The principles of advertising are the same everywhere. There may be minor changes required from one medium to another, as in print or on television, but the principles will remain the same.
What your headline must do is to grab your prospect by the eyeballs and keep them glued to your advert. And, by the law of averages, if more people read your ad, then more will respond.
When writing your headline you always need to keep in mind that everyone is busy. Especially with the internet, no one really wants to read any more as they used to.
So you will have to ensure your headline is like the proverbial arrow that hits your reader right between the eyes. It’s got to be so interesting to your reader he can’t tear his eyes away. When you can manage that, you know you’ve hit the bullseye.
And you don’t get a second chance to hit that bullseye. Once your prospect loses interest and leaves – that’s it, end of story.
So here’s what you need to do – according to John Caples there are three types of headlines you should be looking to write if you want it to be successful:
- Self-interest – This type of headline is the best as it involves something that appeals to his interest, his desires. Remember that all he cares about is what he gets out of it.
- News – This can be something that is new, or a new angle on something old. Combine this one with something which is of interest to your reader and you could have a home run.
- Curiosity – As the name suggest, this is the type of headline which piques the interest of your reader. This type of headline, while it can work, is more of a gamble. If the reader is curious he may or may not bother to read it as it does not appeal to his selfish wants.
Remember that the headline needs to make a big promise. You can’t afford to mess around here by trying to be funny — or clever — or arrogant – and you certainly should not make any assumptions of your reader. He doesn’t have to read your copy at all. So you need to give him a bloody good reason to take time out of his busy day to read your ad.
Take a look at these headlines (taken from John Caples’ Tested Advertising Methods)
- “NO… NO… DON’T CALL ON ME!”
- THE ODDS ARE 9 TO 1 AGAINST YOU
- “I’LL NEVER GIVE ANOTHER PARTY,” SHE SOBBED
- A TEST OF HOW “WELL READ” YOU ARE
- IS WORRYING ROBBING YOU OF THE GOOD THINGS OF LIFE?
And how about Yahoo!’s latest offering:
This time it’s personal. It’s y!ou
Now, I don’t know about you, but the only thing to go through my mind when I saw that was, “What!?”
When you think that this excuse for an ad is actually competing with successful one’s it makes you wonder how long this company will stay in business with advertising like that.
I’ll bet the advertising agency has made enough to survive for some time, though.
What it boils down to is this, if these adverts fail to capture the attention of the intended audience, then the ad has failed. That’s all there is to it.
Not one of these headlines makes any big promises. None contains anything that promises any benefit to the reader, nor do they offer any news.
So keep that in mind – if you want your headline to succeed, make sure it promises something to the reader. Make sure it works on his emotions – his wants and his desires.
Oh, one last thing, unlike with my blog, when I write a sales letter I take a heck of a lot longer to come up with a healined. Not a few minutes, or even a few hours. It can take days… and involve a LOT of writing.
Best,
Rezbi
Filed under copywriting by on Nov 14th, 2009. 4 Comments.
No one reads your advert just for the sake of reading it. If you want your reader to continue to read your advertising, give him a reason to do so. Otherwise he will take one look and switch off. You’d be surprised by the numbers of ads which actually do just that.
When you write a sales letter, don’t make it so blatantly obvious you’re selling something. And certainly do NOT make it dull.
You cannot bore people into buying your product. You can only interest them in buying it. David Ogilvy
What you want to ensure is to write your advert in such a way as to ensure your reader’s attention is grabbed… and kept. This is what increases the value of your advert: The fact that people actually remain interested in it from the headline to the subhead; from the subhead to the first paragraph; from the first paragraph to the next. And so on.
As you can see from the paragraph, the sales message begins with the headline. If your headline can grab your reader’s attention by the eyeballs, and keep hold of it, 80 to 90 percent of the job of the ad is accomplished.
… the headline is 50 to 75 percent of the advert. John Caples
David Ogilvy went even further. He said:
On the average, five 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 percent of your money.
When you take into account the fact your headline is competing with other headlines, especially if your advert is in a print magazine or newspaper, you can see why it’s even more important to get it right.
One way to ensure you have a successful headline is to ensure it contains some news element. You could announce a new product; a new way of doing something which already exists or a new way of making use of it; a new way of saving money. Or basically anything with news which pulls at the heartstrings of your reader: An emotional desire.
Whatever it is you say you need to make a big promise. As far as your reader is concerned it has to be worth his while taking the time to stop everything else and reading your message.
Leave your comments and let me know what you think.
Best,
Rezbi
Filed under copywriting by on Nov 1st, 2009. 4 Comments.
