5 Tips to Get More Results from Your Marketing Materials
By Michele PW, July 14, 2006
The moment I decided to specialize as a direct response copywriter (which means you get a response directly from the marketing materials, there's no middle person involved, like a sales rep) I knew there would be one thing that would determine if I would be eating steak or eating mac and cheese.
And what's the one thing? The results I got for my clients.
Therefore, improving results became a pretty big focus of mine. You might even call it a passion. (Some people who aren't nearly as nice have called it in an obsession.)
Regardless, here are 5 tips that can help you improve the conversions of your marketing materials.
1. Know who you're talking to. If I hear anyone say "women are my potential customers" or "anyone with skin is my target market" (yes, that really was a direct quote from someone who sold Mary Kay or Arbonne or something like that) I will send my border collies (all 3 of them) to your house and force you to play fetch with them until your arm falls off. Seriously, the quickest way you can end up with the most dismal results imaginable is to try and talk to everyone. Come up with a specific customer -- the more specific the better -- and make sure your marketing materials speak directly to that customer.
2. Make sure you write benefits, not features. This one is probably the hardest one to "get" but also one of the most critical. People buy benefits, not features, so if you only talk about features you're just asking for people not to buy what you're selling.
So what is the difference between features and benefits? Features are a description of a product -- for instance, if we're talking about a diet pill, a feature would that the product is a pill. A benefit would be the solution the product provides -- in this case, losing weight.
As much as you possibly can, write about why someone should buy your product. No one buys diet pills because they like taking pills, they buy them to lose weight. Think of the solution your product or service provides and write about that.
3. Work on that headline. David Ogilvy, famous ad man and author of Confessions of an Advertising Man, has said that people make the decision to read your marketing materials based your headline.
Your headline should: a. speak to your potential customers, b. contain a benefit, c. be so compelling your target market is compelled to read further. That's a lot to ask for from basically a handful of words. So don't rush the process -- take as much time as you need to create the very best headline for your particular piece.
4. Don't forget the call to action. You've got to tell people what to do next. If you don't tell them what you want them to do, chances are they won't do anything.
Don't assume your potential customers know what you want them to do. They don't. They can't read your mind. Nor do they want to. They're busy people. They don't have the time or the energy to figure things out. Tell them what to do next, or don't be surprised when they don't do anything.
5. Use P.S.'s or captions. Postscripts (P.S.) are the second most read item in a sales piece. What's the third? Captions. (The copy under photos, diagrams or other illustrations.) Now that you know that, think of the ways you can use either or both of those items in your pieces. Maybe you put a special offer in there or you highlight a particularly compelling benefit. Or you tell them again what you want their next step to be. Whatever you do, don't waste that space.
If you even do just one of these tips, you should start seeing better results. Work on all five and you might be amazed at how much your results improve.
About The Author
Michele PW (Michele Pariza Wacek) owns Creative Concepts and Copywriting LLC, a copywriting, marketing communications and creativity agency. She helps people become more successful at attracting new clients, selling products and services and boosting business. To find out how she can help you take your business to the next level, visit her site at http://www.michelepw.com. Copyright 2006 Michele Pariza Wacek.
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
You Must Know Your Market
You Must Know Your Market
By
Lance Winslow, July 21, 2006
When launching a new product or service into the marketplace in a particular market sector you must understand and know your target customer. You must know the demographics of your market including the buying behavior of the customer and the trends that are happening in the marketplace. You must know your market.
If you fail to understand and adapt to the market changes as they occur or if you fail to register the reality of the marketplace before you start you will decrease your desired results. You want to make sure that your marketing teams understand all of this or you will increase chances of failure or greatly decrease your chances for achieving your intended goals.
Moreover the chances of not achieving your goals in the marketplace are almost guaranteed. In a competent marketing team or marketing plan which takes into consideration knowing their market and understanding their customer has a better chance of succeeding. One of the simplest ways to do this is to survey the customer and ask potential customers what they want and study their buying behavior.
This is more than just doing surveys and ad hoc interviews. You must get into the minds of the consumers and potential customers, which will be buying your product in the marketplace and find out their needs and desires.
Additionally you'll need to determine how much they're willing to pay and make darn sure you can afford to produce the product or service to their liking and their specifications for the price that they're willing to pay. I hope you will consider this in 2006.
About The Author
Lance is a retired entrepreneur and now writer traveling full time giving his insight, observations and knowledge to the World.
By
Lance Winslow, July 21, 2006
When launching a new product or service into the marketplace in a particular market sector you must understand and know your target customer. You must know the demographics of your market including the buying behavior of the customer and the trends that are happening in the marketplace. You must know your market.
If you fail to understand and adapt to the market changes as they occur or if you fail to register the reality of the marketplace before you start you will decrease your desired results. You want to make sure that your marketing teams understand all of this or you will increase chances of failure or greatly decrease your chances for achieving your intended goals.
Moreover the chances of not achieving your goals in the marketplace are almost guaranteed. In a competent marketing team or marketing plan which takes into consideration knowing their market and understanding their customer has a better chance of succeeding. One of the simplest ways to do this is to survey the customer and ask potential customers what they want and study their buying behavior.
This is more than just doing surveys and ad hoc interviews. You must get into the minds of the consumers and potential customers, which will be buying your product in the marketplace and find out their needs and desires.
Additionally you'll need to determine how much they're willing to pay and make darn sure you can afford to produce the product or service to their liking and their specifications for the price that they're willing to pay. I hope you will consider this in 2006.
About The Author
Lance is a retired entrepreneur and now writer traveling full time giving his insight, observations and knowledge to the World.
Spy on Your Competitors - 10 Tips To Monitoring The Competition
Spy on Your Competitors - 10 Tips To Monitoring The Competition
By
S. Housley, October 29, 2006
The old adage, "keep your friends close, and your enemies closer", is applicable not only to personal relationships but business relationships as well. While I'm not suggesting that you befriend your competitors, it is important that you are cognizant of your competitors' business ventures and methods.
It is important to realize that while monitoring your competitors is essential, it could easily become an obsession. Therefore, it is crucial that you strike a balance when incorporating it into your business plan. There are several ways to conduct successful stealth competitive intelligence operations. While it is fanciful to imagine yourself as a secret agent or spy, none of these techniques are difficult, hidden or secretive. In fact, most of them are tools or services available to all businesses.
1. Ego Searches
What are ego searches? Ego searches are keywords or keyword phrase searches for a specific brand, product, or company name. Ego searches are a great way to monitor mentions of a competing product. You can automate the set up of ego searches using RSS, so anytime a competitor's product or brand name is mentioned in the news, blogosphere, or print you receive notification and the details in an RSS feed.
How to Setup Ego Feeds - http://www.feedforall.com/ego-searches.htmCreate RSS Ego Searches - http://www.rss-tools.com/ego-search-feeds.htm
2. Competitive Intelligence
Competitive Intelligence is defined as the process of gathering actionable information in a competitive environment. Competitive Intelligence is researching the business environment or techniques that another business uses. Competitive Intelligence is often used to influence a strategy for business development.
First, it is necessary to know your competition. Background research can be conducted using the tools at DNS Stuff http://www.dnsstuff.com , and various other websites. The DNS stuff website will allow you to do a whois lookup. A number of other research tools are also available on the site.
3. Google Alerts
Receive notification via email on the latest relevant Google search results (web, news, etc.). Define the Google Alerts using a competitors company name or product name.
http://www.google.com/alerts
http://www.googlealert.com/ (3rd party tracking service) - Google Alert is the web's leading automated search and web intelligence solution for monitoring your professional interests online. It tracks the entire web for your personalized topics and sends you new results by daily email.
4. Meta Tags
Have you ever considered what keywords or phrases a competitor is targeting on their website? Have a peak at their meta tags by simply viewing the webpage source. Pay particular attention to the header tags that include title, description, and keywords. Are these keywords part of your marketing mix?
5. Information
Arm yourself with information. The Googspy website is particularly useful when used properly. Enter a keyword, company name, or domain, click the results and view the companies top 25 competitors. If any of those websites are using pay per click on Google, you will also be able to obtain a partial list of the adwords they have purchased. The website gives you a glimpse inside competitors, but the list they provide is by no means exhaustive. http://www.googspy.com
6. Incoming Links
There are a number of ways to determine who is linking to a competitor.
A simple search can be conducted in Google and MSN for "link:domain.com" (replace domain.com with competitor's domain). In Yahoo enter a search for "linkdomain:domain.com" (again replacing domain.com with your competitors name). The search will produce all webpages that provide a link to your competitor. Ideally you can request links from the websites as well.
Other BackLink Tools - http://www.webuildpages.com/tools/
Search for Places to Submit to; this site auto-generates http://www.webuildpages.com/search/ another tools that works in a similar way - http://tools.seobook.com/general/link-suggest/ ; simply enter the keyword and a list of sites that will allow you to request links appears.
7. Alexa Ranking
Use Alexa to determine not only who is linking to a competitor, but also to determine what sites are related (list yours) . Alexa monitors web traffic trends, and a list of similar websites. Alexa also has the ability to show a website's popularity trends. http://www.alexa.com
8. Website Monitoring
It is generally a good practice to monitor competitors, and you can do this using a tool like CodeMonitor. CodeMonitor takes a snapshot of a websites' HTML and notifies of any changes. The differences in the web pages are highlighted, making it easy to discern what changes occurred. CodeMonitor is a free online tool, that can be found at: http://www.emarketingperformance.com/tools/codemonitor/
9. Comparison Tools
MarketLeap has some great search comparison tools that allow for you to compare domains and ranking. Marketleap's Trend/History report gives you a view of how you or a competitors website's Search Engine Saturation has performed over time. It also verifies search engine placement based on keywords so you can quickly discern a competitors ranking for various phrases in the top search engines. http://www.marketleap.com/publinkpop/
10. Other Useful Spy Tools
Domain tools has a mark alert that allows you to monitor the use of a trademark. They also have a number of domain tracking and monitoring tools that can be helpful. http://www.domaintools.com/
Keep in mind that while you should be aware of the direction a competitor is moving. I do not advocate copying a competitor. These tools above are to assist businesses in monitoring their competition. I am not suggesting that you replicate, duplicate, or copy anything that a competitor does. Use the competitive intelligence to make sound business decisions about the direction you want to take.
About The Author
Sharon Housley manages marketing for FeedForAll http://www.feedforall.com software for creating, editing, publishing RSS feeds and podcasts. In addition Sharon manages marketing for NotePage http://www.notepage.net a wireless text messaging software company.
By
S. Housley, October 29, 2006
The old adage, "keep your friends close, and your enemies closer", is applicable not only to personal relationships but business relationships as well. While I'm not suggesting that you befriend your competitors, it is important that you are cognizant of your competitors' business ventures and methods.
It is important to realize that while monitoring your competitors is essential, it could easily become an obsession. Therefore, it is crucial that you strike a balance when incorporating it into your business plan. There are several ways to conduct successful stealth competitive intelligence operations. While it is fanciful to imagine yourself as a secret agent or spy, none of these techniques are difficult, hidden or secretive. In fact, most of them are tools or services available to all businesses.
1. Ego Searches
What are ego searches? Ego searches are keywords or keyword phrase searches for a specific brand, product, or company name. Ego searches are a great way to monitor mentions of a competing product. You can automate the set up of ego searches using RSS, so anytime a competitor's product or brand name is mentioned in the news, blogosphere, or print you receive notification and the details in an RSS feed.
How to Setup Ego Feeds - http://www.feedforall.com/ego-searches.htmCreate RSS Ego Searches - http://www.rss-tools.com/ego-search-feeds.htm
2. Competitive Intelligence
Competitive Intelligence is defined as the process of gathering actionable information in a competitive environment. Competitive Intelligence is researching the business environment or techniques that another business uses. Competitive Intelligence is often used to influence a strategy for business development.
First, it is necessary to know your competition. Background research can be conducted using the tools at DNS Stuff http://www.dnsstuff.com , and various other websites. The DNS stuff website will allow you to do a whois lookup. A number of other research tools are also available on the site.
3. Google Alerts
Receive notification via email on the latest relevant Google search results (web, news, etc.). Define the Google Alerts using a competitors company name or product name.
http://www.google.com/alerts
http://www.googlealert.com/ (3rd party tracking service) - Google Alert is the web's leading automated search and web intelligence solution for monitoring your professional interests online. It tracks the entire web for your personalized topics and sends you new results by daily email.
4. Meta Tags
Have you ever considered what keywords or phrases a competitor is targeting on their website? Have a peak at their meta tags by simply viewing the webpage source. Pay particular attention to the header tags that include title, description, and keywords. Are these keywords part of your marketing mix?
5. Information
Arm yourself with information. The Googspy website is particularly useful when used properly. Enter a keyword, company name, or domain, click the results and view the companies top 25 competitors. If any of those websites are using pay per click on Google, you will also be able to obtain a partial list of the adwords they have purchased. The website gives you a glimpse inside competitors, but the list they provide is by no means exhaustive. http://www.googspy.com
6. Incoming Links
There are a number of ways to determine who is linking to a competitor.
A simple search can be conducted in Google and MSN for "link:domain.com" (replace domain.com with competitor's domain). In Yahoo enter a search for "linkdomain:domain.com" (again replacing domain.com with your competitors name). The search will produce all webpages that provide a link to your competitor. Ideally you can request links from the websites as well.
Other BackLink Tools - http://www.webuildpages.com/tools/
Search for Places to Submit to; this site auto-generates http://www.webuildpages.com/search/ another tools that works in a similar way - http://tools.seobook.com/general/link-suggest/ ; simply enter the keyword and a list of sites that will allow you to request links appears.
7. Alexa Ranking
Use Alexa to determine not only who is linking to a competitor, but also to determine what sites are related (list yours) . Alexa monitors web traffic trends, and a list of similar websites. Alexa also has the ability to show a website's popularity trends. http://www.alexa.com
8. Website Monitoring
It is generally a good practice to monitor competitors, and you can do this using a tool like CodeMonitor. CodeMonitor takes a snapshot of a websites' HTML and notifies of any changes. The differences in the web pages are highlighted, making it easy to discern what changes occurred. CodeMonitor is a free online tool, that can be found at: http://www.emarketingperformance.com/tools/codemonitor/
9. Comparison Tools
MarketLeap has some great search comparison tools that allow for you to compare domains and ranking. Marketleap's Trend/History report gives you a view of how you or a competitors website's Search Engine Saturation has performed over time. It also verifies search engine placement based on keywords so you can quickly discern a competitors ranking for various phrases in the top search engines. http://www.marketleap.com/publinkpop/
10. Other Useful Spy Tools
Domain tools has a mark alert that allows you to monitor the use of a trademark. They also have a number of domain tracking and monitoring tools that can be helpful. http://www.domaintools.com/
Keep in mind that while you should be aware of the direction a competitor is moving. I do not advocate copying a competitor. These tools above are to assist businesses in monitoring their competition. I am not suggesting that you replicate, duplicate, or copy anything that a competitor does. Use the competitive intelligence to make sound business decisions about the direction you want to take.
About The Author
Sharon Housley manages marketing for FeedForAll http://www.feedforall.com software for creating, editing, publishing RSS feeds and podcasts. In addition Sharon manages marketing for NotePage http://www.notepage.net a wireless text messaging software company.
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