Copywriting Tips And Tricks

If there’s one thing that bugs me about the copywriting market is the lack of a standard measurement that copywriters need to meet in order to call themselves copywriters. Maybe it’s the scientific part of me that says you should be able to measure just about anything. Or maybe it’s just the onslaught of new “copywriters” I’ve seen online who I honestly don’t think deserve that title.Think about any other profession, even real estate, you need to take license exams or complete some course that allows you to attach a title to your name. But for copywriting, you can take that name at will.

Now I’m not going to pretend as though I have no self-interest in requiring this benchmark. I want the industry to recognize some standard and so customers can cut through the confusion and know the quality of a copywriter they are working with. But more so, I see the industry being watered down by title bearers without much qualification, if any at all.

Now my suggested requirement may go against the very spirit of entrepreneurship. Most entrepreneurs think that formal education or any ‘false standard’ should not define your success. In fact, most business people will boast of their accomplishments without having attended college.

But this is not just about education although it is. I would even go as far as suggesting a core set of books that copywriters should at least read before they carry a member card. Now for sure, different copywriters would want to include different books, but so do different schools for the same course and sometimes the same educational institution for the same course.

Okay, so along with the basic course requirement how would I measure a copywriter? I’ve seen many different elements suggested and so I’ll like to investigate each one at a time and then suggest the benchmark I would use.

1. Conversion rates. Some would suggest that a copywriter should be measured by the conversion rate of the sales letters he or she writes. The only problem here is that I’ve seen some high conversion rates achieved by sloppy sales letters all because of the market these letters targeted.

For example, markets that generally take “advantage” of the natural “lust” of the human heart normally do very well. This (for me) would include dating, gambling, pornography, sex, ‘get rich quick schemes’ and items that border on the illegal. If a copywriter does well at selling a drug addict cocaine, that’s nothing to cheer about.

2. Writing for famous clients. Many copywriters present as proof for their superior skills the fact that they have written for famous gurus. While I cannot blame them for flying these flags, many times these letters are used as a first draft and even chosen because of the low fees. That’s right. Top gurus often go the low fee route and then adjust the copy themselves. So copywriting clientele is no proof either.

3. Top Trainer or Coach. If a copywriter was taught by a famous coach then it could be assumed that this would recommend them to be gifted by association. Who wouldn’t want to be taught golf by Tiger Woods? But again having an excellent teacher doesn’t make you an excellent student.

4. Length of time STUDYING copywriting. In this business of writing if you simply study about writing without actually practicing, then you’ll remain a novice. You have to be in the trenches fighting the battle with many scars to prove your involvement and results to show for it. I’ll prefer a gauge of the number of pages of copy written than the total length of time studying copywriting.

5. Amount of money earned. “Million dollar Producer”, “My Copy Sold Billions”-these are the usual advertising blurbs we see advertising copywriting services. Now I don’t personally have anything against making a lot of money, but this is often a gauge of one’s business skills and the market you write for rather than your raw abilities. In other words, if you are ‘lucky’ enough to write for a big company with huge mailings, then it’s highly probable the profit will reflect the company rather than the writer.

And one successful piece of copy written for the ‘right’ company can earn you a “dollar amount title” that may not reflect your skills or experience.

So what is the solution? How do you measure one copywriter against the other? Can I write for the same product and same market and try and beat the control of another writer to prove myself better? Maybe this will be a fair measure, except that I should allow the control writer to try and beat my new control. You must admit that time changes markets and the same letter would get different results over time-hence the need to have the old control writer update his copy.

It seems that we are still at the very point we started, but we have made some progress since we have eliminated some options. I’m suggesting that your copywriting skills cannot be measured by conversion rates, famous clients, gifted teacher, length of time studying the discipline or money earned.

So what’s left after this?

I would suggest that a copywriter should be measured by the results of writing for a NEW product to be introduced to a market where the need is NOT already very obvious and in which the product creator had little or no previous credibility with the market. When such a sales letter is judged against the result of other letters written for the same market and product, then you have a safe standard to judge your skills.

Now this may seem like a hypothetical situation and indeed it may be. But introducing a new product to market is where the tire really meets the road. Of course there is no 100% new concept, but there was a time when the PC was “new”. So were the personal video recorder (VCR) and many other modern inventions. And this is why I have such high respect for the early copywriters who had no swipe files to refer to except those filed between their ears.

So write me a new letter for a new product for a new market and if you knock the ball out of the park I’ll be in the stands cheering you on.

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If it wags its tail, eats and barks like a dog, then it must be a dog. At least so goes common wisdom. Yet I’ve reviewed many a great pieces of copywriting with all the important elements–great headline, a great open, effective bullet points, remarkable close, guarantee and offer–and yet the copy fails to sell.

Oh dear, what can the matter be?

The copywriting client is often confused because he knows there is a market for his products and there is “nothing wrong with the copy”, so why the dismal sale results?

More than any other reason for poor sales with ‘great copy’ is the failure of the writer to tap into the deepest desire in the minds of his prospects for his product. If you write a sales letter assuming that the greatest desire of your prospect is to save money and it is actually safety and reliability, then your copy will fall flat on its face even though this approach would convert like crazy in another market.

Let me explain …

In copywriting there are three critical elements that go into creating effective copy, and they are:

(1) Clear understanding of the prospects fears, desires, dreams and strongest emotions towards the product.

(2) Comprehensive knowledge about the product itself.

(3) The sales letter or marketing message itself.

And there is no way to get to (3) before going through the pathway of (1) and (2).

Now if we were to analyze the first element further we would realize that there are three dimensions to any human desire. First, there is the actual intensity or urgency of the demand to be satisfied, second, the repetition of the demand for the desire to be satisfied and finally extent or size of the market who shares this desire.

These three dimensions can be uncovered for any product by asking the appropriate questions which can be stated as:

‘How intense is the desire for my product or solution?’

‘Is this a one-time desire or a continual one?’

‘How many people need this desire satisfied?’

For example, one of my clients sells a product that gives relief to arthritic pain so these questions can be answered as: arthritic sufferers have a very intense desire to overcome pain, need an ongoing solution and the statistics show that there are over 43 million people diagnosed with the disease in the Unites States alone.

Now as the copywriter I must choose the most urgent of these desires for this product and center my sales copy on that main desire, which in this case was immediate and permanent pain relief. Of course there are some secondary desires such as pride of physical appearance and desire for physical activity but reliable pain relief is by far the greatest.

And this is the point at which many great pieces of copywriting fail–it does not tap into the deepest desires of the prospect and so no other trick in the book could deliver such a sale letter. So as a copywriter I must find the most powerful desire for my product that resides in the hearts and mind of my prospects and tap into all three dimensions of this desire at the same time.

And here is where the magic begins because I can now use the headline to form a bridge to the rest of my sales letter by voicing this desire, reinforcing it and promising that my product can satisfy it. When I write such a headline I am meeting the prospect where they are at and offering them a clear passage into my show room for my product.

Jerry Seinfeld once joked that when you are in the process of moving everything looks like a packing box and so our final box-the casket-is the ultimate box we were looking for all our lives!

The point is that when your headline resonates with the desires that are already in your prospects minds then you have won half the battle towards the sale already. They will easily see the ‘box’ they have been looking for even if it’s a casket.

Such headlines work because they empathize with the prospect just where they are most sensitive and aware. In other words, you’ve got their attention.

From this point onwards I can choose to start the sales letter by mentioning the product if they are already aware of it and what it does or start with the desire then lead to introducing the product. But if the client is less aware of what his needs are then I can state the problem and tie this to a specific need. So my letter moves from recognizing the desire to intensifying it to finally offering my solution–recognize, justify, and intensify!

The burden of the body of the sales letter now becomes highlighting all the different features of the product and showing the prospect how their desires can be ultimately satisfied. And the trap to avoid here is getting bogged down with the ‘physical’ product without showcase the ‘functional’ product–what the product actually does for the client.

While I’ve seen well-written sales copy that fail to meet their goal I’ve also seen ‘crappy’ writing that sells products like hotcakes simply because it bull eyed the prospect’s ‘sweet spot’. It therefore cannot be overemphasized how important it is for the copywriter to determine the deepest desires of his prospects before writing the very first word of copy.

Bonus Tip: You can seldom sell successfully to the affluent by casting your product in the light of saving them money. Maybe because that’s not their deepest desire?

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