A reader asks:

“How do I succinctly present the benefits of my product to my avatar?”

I’ll start with the theory… then get practical.

Here’s the theory:

The key is in framing your product’s benefits as solutions to your audience’s problems, and doing this succinctly.

The worst thing you can do when presenting the “benefits” of your product… is to list off cool things about your product WITHOUT having first thought about how those “benefits” will actually help your reader. With their particular struggles & frustrations. So as always – start with your reader. Step inside their world. Figure out what they want. What they’re frustrated with. What they’re scared about. Then – and ONLY then – start thinking about how your product can help them.

Make sense?

(Maybe those of you who follow my stuff notice an emerging theme: Audience comes first. THEN comes you & your product.)

Until you deeply understand what your audience wants (their desires) and WHY they want it (their pain points & ‘underlying’ desires), all your attempts at presenting product benefits in your copy will just sound like ‘blabber’ to them.

K.

Now, getting practical:

(1) Write down a list of things that your audience wants (as relates to your product/market). Don’t make things up. Only list things that you’ve heard your audience say they want. If you’re a singing coach, this list might include:

• To become a great singer
• To achieve more vocal confidence
• To increase her range
• To improve her stamina
• To be able to sing in public and be proud of it

(2) For each desire you list, write down a corresponding pain point. So to return to the singing coach example, this might look like:

• To become a great singer
  • She feels like an average singer… and hates feeling average
• To achieve more vocal confidence
  • She feels insecure about her ability to sing
• To increase her range
  • She sings at various gigs… and is always terrified of not being able to hit the high notes when singing.
• To improve her stamina
  • She sings at gigs… and becomes tired easily. Which makes it hard to take on lots of gigs. And that’s frustrating.
• To be able to sing in public and be proud of it
  • She’s terrified of singing in public

(3) For each ‘problem’ (pain point) that your audience has… write down 1-2 ways in which your product solves that problem. Don’t worry about being succinct. You can be wordy in this step.

• To become a great singer
  • She feels like an average singer… and hates feeling average
    • My singing course hand-holds you… and walks you through the process of going from ‘bad/average singer’ to ‘master singer.’
• To achieve more vocal confidence
  • She feels insecure about her ability to sing
    • My singing course quickly improves your singing ability… in ways that your audience can actually hear… and so you’ll get more compliments. Which boosts your confidence.
    • My singing course teaches you the techniques that the pros use. And when you know this… that you’re using the same techniques that Freddie Mercury, Christina Aguilera, and Michael Jackson used… you’ll naturally become more confident.
• To increase her range
  • She sings at various gigs… and is always terrified of not being able to hit the high notes when singing.
    • My singing course teaches you certain techniques… that help you improve your range overnight
    • My singing course gives you vocal exercises… that will help you improve your range more and more… the more you use them
• To improve her stamina
  • She sings at gigs… and becomes tired easily. Which makes it hard to take on lots of gigs. And that’s frustrating.
    • My singing course teaches you to use proper *posture* while you’re singing… which, interestingly, improves your stamina
    • My singing course will help you improve the strength of your vocal muscles… which improves your stamina
• To be able to sing in public and be proud of it
  • She’s terrified of singing in public
    • My singing course helps you become really good… in a way that sounds good to your audience. And so instead of being afraid of singing, you’ll want to show off your voice.

(4) Go back over all the ways in which your product is a solution to your audience’s problems… and shave off words. And keep shaving. And keep shaving. Until you have the bare benefits:

“My course…

• Helps you go from good to great
• Gets you more compliments, which boosts your confidence
• Gives you the reassurance… that comes with knowing that you’re using proper technique
• Teaches you techniques that can improve your range overnight
• Gives you exercises that – with time – help you improve your range
• Teaches you proper posture that will help you improve your stamina
• Gives you exercises that grow your vocal muscles, leading to greater stamina
• Makes you want to show off your voice, because you start sounding so good”

And there you go.

Succinctly stated benefits framed in a way that makes sense to your avatar.

Is there more you can do to improve your list of benefits?

Absolutely.

For example, figure out what your audience’s biggest objections are… and re-write your list of benefits so that they both (a) state the benefit, and (b) answer an objection that your reader has.

But time runs short.

That’s another post.

A reader asks:

Q: “How do you stand out from all the noise?”

My answer:

A: Become totally unique and then tell the truth.

The only way to truly sound different from everyone else… is to be different from everyone else. Sure, you can write good copy for a “me too” product. But you’ll never be able to write great copy for a “me too” product – copy that slices through all marketing noise, like a razor blade through a crispy-cold pear. That sort of great copy takes a truly great offer… selling a truly unique & wonderful product or service.

…because as soon as you truly ARE different from everyone else… all of the sudden a vast universe of possibilities opens up, possibilities for all the unique things you can say about yourself and your product and your offer. And out of this possibility, great copy is born.

Okay, I get it.

This suggestion is kind of impractical.

Especially if you’re a poor ‘lil copywriter like me… who usually has very little say over what your product is actually like.

So here are 5 kind-of-practical suggestions:

(1) Do everything in your power to push your product away from being a “me too” product… and towards being totally unique. Offering coaching services? Find a weirdly specific niche, and then brand yourself as being a coach to THAT niche. Find ways to innovate on the delivery of your services… like hosting a free day-long “breakthrough retreat” at your house every quarter, for all your paying clients. Selling something different? Innovate, innovate, innovate. Making your product/service so unique that people have a hard time comparing it to ANY other services.

(2) If you don’t have ability to change the actual product you’re promoting… do everything you can to ‘uncover’ the existing aspects of that product that make it essentially different from similar products. 

(3) Do everything in your power to find the proof points that distinguish your product from similar products. Got some ‘out of this world’ testimonials? Use ’em. Celebrity endorsements that competing products don’t have? Use ’em. Got a unique ‘backstory’ to your product… that shows how the product was made in a unique way?  Tell that story. Research, research, research. Looking for things that show your product to be utterly UNIQUE.

(4) Create a totally unique OFFER for your product that no one else has. Which is good advice for everyone… but especially for people who are having trouble figuring out how their product is unique. If you’re doing something that lots of other people do, like “life coaching,” or something like that… offer a 6-month money-back guarantee that no one else is offering. Or “buy one get one free” coaching calls. Be weird. Stand out. Use your offer as a chance to do this.

(5) Be more personal in your email marketing. Yea, I know, shift of gears. But how you do your email marketing is a GREAT way to stand out from competition. Tell more personal stories. Offer more value. Offer more compassion. Be kinder than all your competition. Build up that trust & emotional connection with your email list… so that when you ask for the sale, your reader happily buys because of how much they trust you (Perry Marshall does this really really well – look him up if you’re not familiar with him).

So there you have it.

Unfortunately, there’s no switch you can easily flip that makes you instantly “stand out from the noise.”

If you want to SOUND different from everyone else…

…you have to SAY different things.

And if you want to SAY different things…

You need to BE different.

Which means offering a unique product or service. Or having a unique guarantee. Or packaging your services in a unique way. And being unique in how you communicate with your audience long-term.

And so I end where I began.

Go become totally unique and then tell the truth.

My mentor – who specialized in email copywriting – taught me to think of emails as having 3 parts:

1. The Hook
2. The Transition
3. The Pitch

And ever since, that’s been my go-to outline for basically every email I’ve written. So let’s talk about it.

(1) The hook is where you grab your reader’s attention & build their desire. And lots of things can serve as your hook:

• Statistics
• Stories
• Current news/events
• Interesting/surprising facts
• Quotes
• Specific, compelling promises
• Parables
• Valuable information

How do you choose a great hook? Refer back to the simple formula for crafting headlines that I gave in an earlier blog post: I = C + B (Interest = Curiosity + Benefit). Great hooks ‘catch’ a person’s curiosity. And they also catch the person’s desire for personal benefit. And then they ‘reel’ the reader into reading the rest of the email. Good hooks play on either people’s curiosity or their desire for personal benefit. Great hooks play on both.

Once you’ve chosen your hook, you can start writing the first chunk of your email. Using your hook, craft your opening lines to catch people’s attention. Then use the following lines to make them more and more interested in reading further and further. Because they get the sense that there will be some ‘pay off’ at the end.

Then comes the transition.

(2) The transition is where you take all the desire you’ve built in your reader… and redirect it so that it’s aimed directly at your offer. Whether that’s clicking through to a sales page… scheduling a phone call… or buying a product.

…because with many emails, the hook isn’t always directly related to the offer. For example, take an email that’s selling a $10 book on digital marketing. And the hook for that email is an interesting/surprising fact about fishing. Obviously the fishing fact isn’t directly related to digital marketing. So you – the writer – will need to do a bit of copywriting gymnastics to bridge the two. That’s the work of the transition. Smoothly funneling the reader’s desire (which was built up during the hook) directly towards the pitch.

(3) The pitch is where you ask for the sale. You link to the sales page. You link to the order form. You enter your phone number and ask the reader to “call now.” Your goal here is to take all the desire that you built up in your hook… and have the reader “convert” their desire into action.

There you go.

Very simple outline.

But it gives you a framework for understanding how to write basically any email you’ll ever have to write.

Alright.

So yesterday I said that the more expensive your product, the longer your copy should be. Then I shared a qualification.

Today I share another one:

Qualification 2: You must take into account what you’re actually selling in each piece of copy you write… and NOT make the mistake of trying to sell whatever product is at the end of your funnel… at every prior step in the funnel.

BIG mistake that copywriters make.

Confused about what I mean?

Let’s look at a simple funnel selling a $1,000 product, to illustrate:

landing page (email capture) –> email sequence –> sales page –> buy $1,000 product

A mistake many people make is they try to sell the $1,000 product in the email sequence. Whereas what they SHOULD be selling people on is *the next step in the funnel* – which is to read the sales page. That’s the only thing the emails in the above sequence should be doing: ‘selling’ people on taking the next action… going to the next step in the funnel… which is to read the sales page.

Don’t jump the gun!

If you have a 4 part funnel… don’t try to sell your end product at step 2!

Why?

Because you just can’t sell a $1,000 product in 1-2 page email(unless – as noted yesterday – they’re already predisposed to buy it from previous steps in your funnel). Doesn’t work. That’s the whole reason why you have a 5 to 50 page sales page, or a phone sales guy: to do the brunt of the selling. Your emails are only there to ‘prep’ your prospects… and then warmly hand them off to your friendly, mighty-persuasive sales page.

Make sense?

Okay.

So what does this have to do with the length of your copy?

This:

You might think that IF you have a $1,000 product at the end of your funnel… EVERY step in that funnel (landing page, emails, etc.) should be long. Because it’s an expensive product. But remember: you have to take into account what you’re REALLY selling in each step of the funnel – and each piece of your copy. And in the steps leading up to the final selling stage… your aim is NOT to sell the final $1,000 product. Your aim is only to send your prospects to the next step in your funnel. So they eventually get to the final stage – which is usually a sales page, webinar, or phone call – where you then sell them on the $1,000 product.

And that’s why your emails probably shouldn’t all be 10 pages long.

Because in lots of cases…

The only thing they’re selling is a link to your sales page.

Behold…

The widely-wondered, hotly-debated question:

“How long should my copy be?” 

…because as you may have noticed, some sales pages are 50+ pages long. And sell crazy amounts of stuff. But then some sales pages are half a page long… and ALSO sell crazy amounts of stuff. So how on earth are you supposed to judge whether your copy should be .5 pages or 50 pages long?

I’m going to give you two answers. The first is the answer that all the pros give:

The usual “Pro” answer: Your copy should be just long to enough to say everything you need to say in order to make the sale.

But see…

While this answer makes sense (and is 100% true)…

I’ve always been a bit unsatisfied with it. Even though it’s what all the pros say.

Why?

Because it’s impractical. For the beginner, whose ‘selling sensibilities’ aren’t honed enough to know how much they have to say… in order to make the sale. It doesn’t help that person much at all.

So in an attempt to be more helpful to the beginner…

I offer another answer to the question:

Sam’s answer: the more expensive your product, the longer your copy should be.

If you’re “selling” a free download… or a $1 ‘mini-product’… you can sell that in a page. Or half a page. Or less. If you’re selling $100-$400 product… that’s going to take a lot of copy. To make the sale. If you’re selling a high-ticket $2,000+ product… that’s going to take a *lot* of copy. Lots of emails, and a long sales page. And if you’re trying to sell a $5,000+ product… that’ll probably take more than just copy. That’ll probably take a phone call, or a live event.

Okay.

That being said.

There are some important qualifications I have to make… before you take this principle and run with it.

Qualification 1: You have to take into account how inclined your reader already is to buying your product.

For example: I recently wrote an email for a client who was selling a $2,500 product. That’s an expensive product! And yet the email I wrote was only 1.5 pages long. So what’s up with that?

Here’s what’s up with that: the people who were reading my email had already attended a 1.5 hour webinar selling them on the product. And presumably, this webinar made many of those attendees *very* inclined to buy the product. So here they were, sitting on the fence. Already mostly convinced to buy the product… but not quite there yet. And knowing this, I knew they only needed a little push. And so that’s all I did in the email. I gave them a little push. Because it would’ve been unnecessary… and even counterproductive… if I had tried to ‘resell’ them and ‘retell’ them everything they’d already heard on the webinar.

Make sense?

Great.

There’s another really important qualification… that you have to consider, before you take my “expensive product –> longer copy” principle and run with it.

You can read about it my next post.

Yesterday I started answering the question…

How do you write persuasive copy… without sounding salesy?

But time was short.

There’s much to say…

And so I left some things unsaid – which I’ll now share:

(5) Don’t forget to offer real value in your copy. So that you prove to your reader that your aim ISN’T just to sell stuff… but rather to *help* them. Plus, it gives them a reason to read your copy… and keep on reading it through to the end… and then open new emails from you, and click on new ads, because they know that they’re going to receive real value whenever they read your stuff.

But what does it LOOK like to “offer real value” in your copy? Lots of things:

• Giving away valuable information. Offer tips & tricks in your emails. Give free advice. Fill your copy with valuable information.
• Being entertaining. This works especially well in email marketing. ‘Entertainment’ is a real form of value (just think how much money people spend on entertainment every day…). And if people start to get the idea that your emails are entertaining… fun to read… funny… they’ll start opening them much more frequently(Ben Settle is *really* good at this). And you’ll have a much more responsive, lively, engaged email list. Who consistently listens to what you have to say.
• Making your readers feel *heard*… and encouraged. This is one that even top copywriters often neglect. Crawl inside of your prospects head & heart… talk about something *specific* that they’re very fearful about. Something that’s a very personal, emotional, and difficult part of their experience. Talk about it… and then offer real encouragement: “If you struggle with X problem… I just want you to know that it’ll get better. I’ve personally struggled with X problem… and it was so hard for so many years. But it got better. So, friend… keep your head up. Even when the Sun’s gone totally dark, and you feel all alone. Keep on moving. The sun will shine again.”
• Giving away free gifts. Every now and then, give something away free to everyone on your email list. A download link for a helpful PDF you’ve created. Or a link to an article… with a bunch of helpful resources. If you do this consistently… then every time your readers get an email from you, they’ll say to themselves, “huh, I wonder if this email with have another cool gift. Let me check and see” … … … *click*

When you offer real value in your copy… you naturally start to seem less “salesy.” Because you’re demonstrating that your goal isn’t just to sell. But to help.

(6) When you’re writing an email sequence, always keep the ratio of “emails that only offer valuable content” to “emails that pitch something” at least 1:1. In other words… be sure you’ve sending at least as many “content” emails as you send “pitching” emails (more on the difference between these in a future post). Here’s how I structure my sequences:

5 email sequence
Email 1: Content
Email 2: Content + Soft Pitch (usually in the “P.S.” section)
Email 3: Hard Pitch
Email 4: Content
Email 5: Hard Pitch

7 email sequence
Email 1: Content
Email 2: Content
Email 3: Content
Email 4: Content + Soft Pitch
Email 5: Hard Pitch
Email 6: Content
Email 7: Hard Pitch

10 email sequence
Email 1: Content
Email 2: Content
Email 3: Content
Email 4: Content + Soft Pitch
Email 5: Hard Pitch
Email 6: Content
Email 7: Hard Pitch
Email 8: Content
Email 9: Content
Email 10: Hard Pitch

…and then if there are more than 10 emails in the sequence, I’ll keep on doing “Content, content, pitch… content, content, pitch… content, content, pitch… etc.” And again, the reason that I do this is to make sure I’m offering real value to my readers. So that they’ll keep opening my emails. And reading them.

Okay.

Final thought.

Here’s what it comes down to:

Your copy starts to sound “salesy” when people start to doubt your intentions in writing to them. If you give off the impression that ALL you’re trying to do is make money off of them… and you couldn’t care less about their actual lives, as long as they buy your stuff… THEN your copy will start to sound “salesy.” 

All of the suggestion I’ve given… have been ways of helping you AVOID that pitfall. And *really* communicate to your prospect that you’re out to help them. And not just sell something to them.

So take the suggestions I’ve given. Run with them.

But also remember the underlying issue…

Your reader needs to know that you’re there to HELP… and not just to SELL.

A reader asks…

How do you write persuasive copy… without sounding salesy?

Great question.

Couple pointers:

(1) Don’t forget what sales is actually about. Despite what many people think… sales (and likewise copywriting) ISN’T about offloading your products or services on your audience. By any means possible. It’s about FIRST figuring out what your prospect wants… what they desire… what they’re searching for… what they need… and then delivering what they need in the form of your product. As an act of service to them—because you’re convinced that your product will actually improve their lives.

So if you think your product will actually improve your prospects’ lives… stop being so shy! Ask for the sale! Promote your product with pride, not shame. Knowing that your product… if purchased… will improve your prospect’s life. 

If you don’t think your product will actually improve your prospects’ lives… fix your product. Or go find another product that *will* improve your prosepcts’ lives. 

(2) Make sure you really know what your audience wants. One reason some people come off as “salesy” is because they’re out of touch with their audience’s actual desires. And actual needs. And actual objections. And so their copy ends up sounding disconnected… and more focused on just selling something. Rather than serving someone. 

(3) Stop trying to cram all the little copywriting tips & tactics that you’ve read about into your copy… and start writing your copy as if you’re having a conversation with an actual, living, breathing human being. Because you are. Just through written word. This helps make your copy more human. And more engaging. When you think of your job not as being a “copywriter” per se… but as a conversationalist. Remember – you’re not just writing words that will float off into cyberspace and magically pull in money! You’re talking to someone. Having a conversation with them. And out of that conversation comes the “response”… the conversion… the sales that you’re looking for as a copywriter. 

(4) When you’re writing a piece of copy, try to imagine a real person standing in front of you – someone you’ve met & talked to before, who falls within the ‘target audience’ that you’re writing to. Try to imagine them standing in front of you as you write… and then just start talking to them through your writing. And write down their name in the greeting section of the copy:

—
“Hey Sarah,

If you really want to learn the secrets of great copywriting…” etc.

Or…

“Hey David,

Have you ever had one of those moments… when you suddenly realize you’re long overdue for a BREAK?” etc.
—

If you have a real name of a real person in your target audience in the greeting section… while you’re writing… it’ll help reinforce the idea in your head that you’re writing to a real person… with real emotions, problems, joys, hopes, etc. Lots of people forget this. And that’s a big reason why their sales copy starts to feel ‘out of touch,’ disingenuous, and “salesy.”  

Many people get focused on the copy. And on the words. When really they should be focused on their audience. Great copy naturally flows out of a great understanding of your audience… and a great focus on your audience’s particular problems & desires.

There’s more to say on this topic.

For Part 2, go here.

A year ago I got an email that sent me to this sales page. And to this day, I consider that to be most compelling & persuasive sales page I’ve ever read.

Copywriting at its very best.

Go check it out.

3 questions, from one of my readers:

1. Where on earth do I even start???
2. How do you get around that need to be perfect and how do you know when you’ve done your best and it’s time to move on to the next step?
3. If you could give me one tip on how to go from being an average copywriter to an amazing one, what would it be?

The advice I’m about to give you may make you think I’m really lazy. And I am. But that’s not why I’m choosing to answer all 3 questions with the same answer. I’m doing this because I think in all 3 cases, the same answer is the best answer. So here goes nothing:

Q: “Where on earth do I even start??? I want my copy to be amazing and original, but it feels like everything has been written and said. I am new to the copywriting scene and really want to do things right!”

A: Start by writing. 🙂

I don’t say that to be coy. I say that because it’s the #1 thing that keeps bad copywriters from becoming good – they don’t write. They read tons of books. They subscribe to all the pros. They know all the theory. But they never actually write. And that’s the biggest mistake you can make.

Copywriting is actually very simple. It’s just basic salesmanship… applied to written word(and basic salesmanship isn’t that complicated). Yes, there are little tricks & tactics you can learn. Yes, a deep grasp of a few important principles will greatly improve your copy. But here’s the thing: it’s not that hard getting the theory into your head. The challenge is getting the theory into your hands.  And this only comes with writing. You can know all the principles & tactics & strategies & techniques in the world… but until you start writing, and consciously practicing the application of these principles in actual writing… your “knowledge” will be useless to you.

…and as you write, do your research. Read the books. Learn the tricks & tactics. Learn the core principles. Read the books. Learn the theory. But ONLY in the context of actually writing.

Let’s continue…

Q: “How do you get around that need to be perfect and how do you know when you’ve done your best and it’s time to move on to the next step? I feel like when I’m writing copy, I tend to over complicate things and try too hard to make it perfect.”

A: Solve by writing.

Okay, now I’ll get a little more practical. Because my answer may seem fairly unhelpful so far… so let me make an addition:

Solve by forcing yourself to write ‘low-bar’ copy every day. ” ‘low-bar’ copy?” Yes, low-bar copy. See… all sales copy falls somewhere on the “how okay it is if my copy sucks” spectrum:

(not okay at all) 1…2…3…4…5…6…7…8…9…10 (totally fine)

Example: sales pages for high-ticket products score something like a 1 or 2 on that spectrum. i.e. it’s not really okay if they suck. You really want to obsess over your sales pages in most cases (especially if you’re selling a really expensive product). Because it’ll make a big difference to your bottom line if your copy sucks. HOWEVER.

Another example: emails (depending on what their function is) usually score something like a 5-8. i.e. it’s not the end of the world if you write a bad one. Because if you write & send a not-that-persuasive email… oh well… just send another one tomorrow. You’ve got as many swings as you want.

…and so by forcing yourself to write *low-bar* copy every day… you give yourself permission to write bad copy. Which you need to do if you’re gonna start writing copy. Which you need to if you’re gonna get good.

But what does this look like concretely – forcing yourself to write ‘low-bar’ copy every day?

I’ll answer that in response to my reader’s last question…

Q: “If you could give me one tip on how to go from being an average copywriter to an amazing one, what would it be?”

A: Write.

More specifically…

Write to your email list(even if you only have 2 subscribers), tell them that you’re going to send them an email every day for 30 days, and then do it. Don’t have an email list? Take 5 minutes, create a free Mailchimp account, and then post a signup link on your Facebook wall… or buy a couple ads sending people to a squeeze page… until you have just 10-20 subscribers. And then write & send those emails.

The goal is not to make sales.

The goal is not to write great emails.

The goal is not to write good emails.

The goal is to write & send bad emails if you have to… but to actually write & SEND 30.

If you do this…

You’ll have done more than what 95% of email marketers have done. You’ll have taken a BIG step out of your head… and into the real world of copywriting. You’ll have flushed out lots of the “copy crap” from your system… as every copywriter needs to do in order to become a strong, healthy copywriter. We’ve all got ‘copy toxins’ in our system which can only get ‘purged’ or ‘flushed’ out of us when we write, write, write.

But how do you know WHAT to write in those 30 emails?

When do you pitch your services… versus just giving quality content in your emails?

Is there a basic template you can use to write all of those emails?

Answers to these questions, coming soon…