Born seven weeks prematurely, my copywriting skills never developed

[Mynt]

So I've come here for help.

Dear Warriros, I'm in the offline niche.

To get a 'case study' under my belt, and a little confidence to do this for money, I helped a realtor/family friend with IM. A few weeks later, success! His site and blogs are on page one for competitive keywords.

So it's time to market to local business owners.

I've excelled as a designer, but linguistically--need lot of improvement!

I've spent days analyzing what might be the perfect headline. Multipurpose headline intended for email subject line, sales letter, and a website where I'll be posting a video sales presentation.

Studying copwriting here, I've learned the importance of appealing to the emotions, proposing a problem, and engaging the prospect in one-to-one conversation.


Challenge: buisness owners, to my knowledge, are very confident.. and perhaps a bit stubborn. My core benefit I'd like to communicate is cost-saving, and simplified advertising, while increasing their marketability.


Ideas:

"Are you paying too much for direct mail?"
Theory: Propose the problem.
Thoughts: A bit dull, and limits to only prospects who use direct mail.

"How I was able to save my client over $1,800/month in advertising, and increase his sales"
Theory: Utilize principal of social proof.
Thoughts: A bit long IMO. Sounds a bit spammy.

"Are advertising costs keeping you behind your competitors?"
Theory: Emotive/fear-driven copy.
Thought: I feel it could be written more consisely, worded more effectively.

"Internet Marketing in Plain English"
Theory: According to an article in latest edition of Harvard Business Review: "desire for simplicity" is the fastest growing behavior trend among post-recession consumers. Headline intended to emotively capture this.
Thoughts: Not enough punch/fear.


Copywriters: how do you word a specific problem or emotive fear, without disqualifying prospects? And how to word it in such way that the business owner must further investigate what I have to offer, without appearing spammy, unrealistic, a cookie-cut-sounding type headline? Criticism of above headlines would immensely help answer these questions.


Any general advice on how to perhaps grapple with my challenge differently, more effectively?


Thanks to all!

[Chris Ramsey]

Mynt,

You're off to a great start. Here's a tip that will be of great use to you.

"Market to everyone and you'll sell to no one."

You must have a targeted market in mind before you try to sell any product or service.

What service do you want to provide, specifically?

In my area, Orlando, I've done pretty well selling newsletter writing services. (OT: If you're in Orlando, contact me and maybe we can do some work together)

Based on what service you want to provide, write your headline to reflect the type of prospect you want to talk to.

PM me and I'll give you a few tricks that I use to find clients that use direct mail, although it's not really targeted to just one area.

[Mynt]

Chris,

Thanks for your reply and excellent advice.
"Marketing to everyone" is likely my biggest pitfall in copywriting.

Have to say, I can't think of any specific IM service I'll be providing, and now that you mentioned--that could be my problem.

I'm thinking of targeting self-employed professionals (dentists, lawyers, accountants) with simple all-in-one internet marketing in hopes of replacing/reducing their advertising budget (the focal feature)... and simplifying their business (focal benefit).

I bill them monthly, and keep them informed with reports. IM would include just about everything. SEO, social media, video/viral, press releases, etc.

My presumed idea is that this demographic has been pitched IM services before, by national SEO companies and local firms with expensive and complicated billing. They're slightly pessimistic paying for such service, and too many doubts, unknowns.

I'll attempt to differentiate myself by challenging this problem and proposing a very simple, monthly, no-contract plan, and my website showing videos/blogging of all IM 'tactics' I use. I have no fear of them learning it, and applying it -- as my target client has no time to manage their marketing.

I should have mentioned on the post: I'm putting a lot of effort in producing a video outlining my IM in a simplified fashion. Modeling it after those "Social Bookmarking in Plain English" youtube videos using a dry eraser board and stick figures. I'll be outlining my case study with the Realtor this way which will include the problem, creative, and results phase.

This video will be featured on my home page, and having it viewed is the main call-to-action for in my email/online marketing. Direct mail/sales letter, and phone call will be different however. Still unknown, but perhaps the same.


So I guess I'm not targeting IM service to business/firms who may already have online presence.


From your experience, do you suggest specializing on just one service?


Thanks again for your reply! Just PM'ed you.

Originally Posted by scheda

Mynt,

You're off to a great start. Here's a tip that will be of great use to you.

"Market to everyone and you'll sell to no one."

You must have a targeted market in mind before you try to sell any product or service.

What service do you want to provide, specifically?

In my area, Orlando, I've done pretty well selling newsletter writing services. (OT: If you're in Orlando, contact me and maybe we can do some work together)

Based on what service you want to provide, write your headline to reflect the type of prospect you want to talk to.

PM me and I'll give you a few tricks that I use to find clients that use direct mail, although it's not really targeted to just one area.

[Chris Ramsey]

Specializing is ALWAYS a good idea. Long gone is the world of one-stop shopping. People want specialists to come in and work their magic.

You're an IM specialist. What part of IM do you like the most? Advertise that. Then after you're in the door with that service, find out what else could benefit them specifically and market that service to them too.

Get your foot in the door with a small $2,500 project, and you'll soon be making $3-4k a month from single clients.