Dear Friend

[dave147]

One of the things that turn me off a sales letter is when I see the "Dear Friend" intro. This has being used in direct mailings for many years and is still used today for online marketing, although many marketers are getting more creative with their sales letter introductions, many have yet to come up with a better line.
I believe the Dear Friend" sales letter is distant and is not very appealling. If you've got the "Dear Friend" intro then I suggest you try changing it to something more relevant to your sales copy, I believe it will increase your sales.
Some examples are:
Dear Internet Marketer,
Dear Ebook Enthusiast,
Dear Article Marketer,
Dear Business Seeker,
Dear Blogger,

or start with a Hi ... or Hello ... or Greetings ...
anything except that dear friend intro - let me know what you think about this

[avani]

Heh, I agree that the Dear friend is getting to be a bit trite.

When I see a "Dear whatever", though, the skeptic in me automatically reads it as "Dear willing victim,..."

The rest of me sort of ignores it and moves on. I'm not sure, for instance, if a (bad) choice of greeting would ever go as far as ringing the "scam alert" bell, but sure - more creative ones may grab your attention early on, and the sooner you impress, surely the better!

[firegold21]

What about "Dear Person Reading My Sales Letter"? Would that work, do you think?

On a more serious note, I'm wondering if anyone has split-tested the traditional greeting with a less common one. It may be a matter of us being habituated to sales letters and thus finding it old and clichéd, where the reader hasn't encountered it enough times to be put off by it.

Joshua

[AlanCarr]

It's still used because it still works.

Your conscious mind says "Bah, humbug! Scam artist! Charlatan! I aint his friend!"

Deep down, you're thinking "OK, he's friendly, what's he got to offer? Let's see if he really is friendly.."

Human nature


In contrast, a 'Dear Fellow Warrior' style intro CAN build rapport - but can just as easily backfire.

How many people truly consider themselves "warriors"? Not so many.

How many think of this forum's name, rather than just 'the forum' they visit?

There's a sweet spot of loyal visitors who actually do take a degree of pride and ownership in calling themselves warriors - but probably a lot fewer than you might expect.

Thing is, not only do you jolt them just as hard and negatively as 'dear friend', but you don't inject the subconscious "I'm friendly" message. In fact "Dear friend", being so common, is easily over-looked and forgiven, if not forgotten.

"Dear Fellow Warrior.." is noticable. You see it, you think about it - and that's not what copy is about. You don't want the reader thinking about your writing, you want them thinking 'what's in it for me?' and answering that question, along with overcoming their objections.

Note I'm using 'warrior' merely as an example, as we're here.

When more personalised greetings DO work is with people who are outright enthusiastic about being part of some group or at least their enthused about the topic.

'Dear fellow tennis nut' would actually work if selling limited edition or rare, over-priced tennis items for example. They notice it but welcome it - because they ARE a tennis nut and cheerfully admit it.

So yes, 'dear friend' is cheesy - but cheesy is what catches mice.*



B.


* I know, it's a cliche; they don't really like cheese.

[Rezbi]

Don't forget, there are plenty of people out there who haven't been over-exposed as you have.

[ajcox22]

i normally try multiple campaignes at once while testing and fine tuning sales copy, little things like that will and do make a difference, it all depends on who you are marketing to and how you want to be percieved by the reader

[firegold21]

LOL That got me laughing, WordPro. I think I'll pass on trying that in my sales letters, though ... don't think the idiom would translate very well.

Joshua

[Kyle Tully]

Originally Posted by Bigsofty

It's still used because it still works.

Your conscious mind says "Bah, humbug! Scam artist! Charlatan! I aint his friend!"

Deep down, you're thinking "OK, he's friendly, what's he got to offer? Let's see if he really is friendly.."

Human nature

Actually a LOT of the split tests I've seen shows it lowers response.

I rarely use dear-anything in my letters.

Just jump right into the action.

[Raydal]

There was an interesting post on Rich Scheferen's blog a couple days ago about
a split test he ran with two version of a video pitch. And the one that people
HATED THE MOST WON!

When are we going to get accustomed to the fact that what people SAY they
like and don't like means NOTHING! It's what they do. Rich was shocked
to see the video that most people hated blew the other video that people
'loved' out of the water.

Apathy is the greatest scourge of the copywriter.

If people come away from my sales letter without feeling agitated
then I didn't do my job.

On my 15% conversion sales letter, readers use to email me and
complain all the time. They claimed that my headline was
deceptive because I said the traffic wouldn't cost them a dime.
Of course the traffic was free but you had to pay me to reveal
my secret.

The more people complain the better you are doing.

-Ray Edwards

[sarahberra]

Good point. I never really use dear friend for sales copy, but I have used it on my blog a few times. My first post says. Hello Friends! Welcome to my blog.

[Paul Hancox]

Originally Posted by Raydal

When are we going to get accustomed to the fact that what people SAY they like and don't like means NOTHING! It's what they do.

Ding, Ding.... we have a WINNER! Step up and claim your new car!

What people say, and what people do, are often two completely different things.

It's like the woman who says she wants to date someone who's nice, stable, with a good sense of humor... and then goes out with a "bad boy".

As copywriters, we need to pay attention to the deeper things that are going on in their minds, not merely the surface stuff they - our potential customers - tell us.

That's why split testing is so important, because so many times, people SAY one thing, and DO another.

[BrianMcLeod]

"I hate those damned greedy gooroos.. they only care about gorging themselves on my wallet... BEWARE!"

(closes browser, opens email, clicks thru to sales letter and buys another product)

: )

[Alexa Smith]

Originally Posted by Bigsofty

It's still used because it still works.

I doubt it: I suspect it's still used largely because people who have done no split-testing since the war just copy it from each other imagining that it's still used because it still works.

Originally Posted by Raydal

The more people complain the better you are doing.

I don't doubt this nearly as much!

[jmarketer]

I think that since we as marketers and copywriters see the dear friend all the time, we all get tired of seeing it. However, many of those searching for info online are still new to it all, so it still works. For marketers, it's just tiresome to see all the time.

In any event, more creativity in the opening is always helpful.

[lisag]

Originally Posted by jmarketer

I think that since we as marketers and copywriters see the dear friend all the time, we all get tired of seeing it. However, many of those searching for info online are still new to it all, so it still works. For marketers, it's just tiresome to see all the time.

In any event, more creativity in the opening is always helpful.

You are so right about writers being exposed to the same thing over and over, but forgetting that their are new fresh eyes reading our copy every day.

I have a client I've written 31 sales letters for,. The 32nd is on my screen now. 90% of each letter is the same stuff. I swap out the product name and the benefits and the testimonials. A few changes to the reason to buy, depending upon the product, and wham! Another one in the can. I am bored to tears writing for him but, after 31 letters, we know one thing... they pull.

I have practically begged him to let me do some split testing with a different formula, but he's not hearing it. The letters make him money and he doesn't want to screw with the formula.

And so I write...

Dear fellow dog lover,
Dear fellow cat lover
Dear fellow gun enthusiast
Dear long haul trucker
Dear stay-at-home mom

And I cash his checks.

[AlanCarr]

Kyle, I never argue with split testing - but what markets?

What was the headline?

What was the opener?

Splits are great at isolating points when all else is equal - but only applies to that being tested, else it aint equal.

More to the point, I should ask that of the person complaining. Certainly in some places 'dear friend' would suck large but I don't think you can just blanket dismiss it. In some situations ANY salutation would suck, but would you dismiss salutations altogether?

Actually, reading your post you would. I respectfully disagree


B.

[Kyle Tully]

Originally Posted by Bigsofty

Kyle, I never argue with split testing - but what markets?

What was the headline?

What was the opener?

Splits are great at isolating points when all else is equal - but only applies to that being tested, else it aint equal.

I know how split testing works

That info is my IP gained from thousands of dollars in tests. You won't see me posting it here.

Originally Posted by Bigsofty

More to the point, I should ask that of the person complaining. Certainly in some places 'dear friend' would suck large but I don't think you can just blanket dismiss it. In some situations ANY salutation would suck, but would you dismiss salutations altogether?

The only rule is there are no rules.

There's not much I would blanket dismiss -- I've seen some crazy results that go waaaay against "conventional" wisdom.

And I DO use "dear whatever" on occasion. (Mostly offline because testing shows it works better there.) But online there are generally far better ways to start a letter.

[Paul Hancox]

Yes, "Dear X" is a great way of starting a LETTER, sent through the post.

But strictly speaking, we don't really write sales letters online. We write sales web pages.

We still call them sales letters because of the similarity with direct mail letters (and because much of the wisdom on writing them came from direct mail), but they are not quite the same.

I think if we viewed them as sales web pages, we'd see the "Dear X" thing as less natural online.

[Manfred Ekblad]

Originally Posted by Raydal

When are we going to get accustomed to the fact that what people SAY they
like and don't like means NOTHING! It's what they do. Rich was shocked
to see the video that most people hated blew the other video that people
'loved' out of the water.

Reminds me about the chapter in Buyology (by Martin Lindstrom) where he is trying to predict the success of different TV-shows using the latest neuroscience technology.

People said they didn't like Quizmania, but their brains did! His predictions turned out to be correct, Quizmania became a popular show.

Now, I hope someone will publish a brain scan report on the "Dear Friend"... meanwhile, I'll stick to split testing.