Dan Kennedy's Ultimate Sales Letter book

I agree with her to a certain extent. And... the approach will vary more dramatically depending on the market. This seems to get kicked around here a lot lately but the style you're going to use to sell an online make-money-fast info product will be far different than the pitch you'd make for something like a supplemental learning program for a grammar school kid or an incontinence product for a senior.

Okay, so what's the real lesson here? To be a good copywriter you need to know your market. Know the people you're writing for. The differences in physical letters and online pitches aren't all that many. One of the main ones is the cost in sending out a physical letter versus the limitless space you have to make your point online.

In my experience it's 100 times more important to know your prospects than it is to know the product. The first question I have for a client is this: Who's buying your product or who do you think will be buying it? And believe it or not, they often have no idea.

You can always get a list of features and benefits for the product but you can’t always get into the heads of your prospects that easily.

There have been a couple of people here lately looking for Forex writers. Is it important to know something about Forex to do a good job with a Forex sales appeal? Yes.

But it's far more important to realize that the vast majority of the people looking to buy Forex courses are Gordon Gecko wannabes. I'm not going to go into all the unsavory aspects of that type of personality, but like it or not, that's the market for Forex products.

About 10 years back I spent four years around day traders and fast-buck option traders along with a few Forex pirates sprinkled in and most of them were completely obnoxious. They're looking for a fast buck and many of them don't much care how it comes, just that it comes. That’s not a judgment either, it’s an observation. So what kind of approach would you take with them versus people looking to learn the ins and outs of mutual fund investing? A much different approach. How about a super-duper appeal to greed? Yep. That's the ticket.

It's good to study the craft but realize that one of your major advantages in writing is to understand people. What makes them laugh, what makes them cry? What makes them proud and what makes them ashamed? The buy button is often directly wired to one of the Seven Deadly Sins. Learn to play that fiddle and you've got this game more than half conquered.

If you're writing for an acne cure imagine what it would feel like to be plagued with pimples. Google acne and then study the images of the poor kids with the condition and imagine how you'd feel going through a week or so like that.

Imagine how pimples would have changed your own childhood, or your kid’s childhood. And if you can, relate that to an uncomfortable situation you may have had in your own life. That way you can personally relate to the problem and you’ll have access to many more solutions based on your own feelings and experiences.

One of the best books on the craft out there is Triggers by Joe Sugarman. Triggers are nothing more than emotional buttons that cause people to take action. And when you learn to work those buttons you'll find it's not hard selling in print, either online or on paper.

People only want three things in life. Those are:

• Money
• Love
• Health

Virtually everything under the sun falls into one of those three categories. When you get up close and personal with the reasons people want what they want, writing will become much easier and more profitable.

I think I answered your question in a very roundabout way. Good luck.

Here's the reason why this topic is debated so much on this forum.

If you send someone a snail-mail letter, the only way to tell them more is to have a longer letter. The reader can read more of the letter, they can buy now, or they can throw it away.

The closest match to this online is a web page that consists of nothing but a long, endlessly scrolling sales letter. You can read more of the letter, you can buy now, or you can leave the site.

Remembering that sales letters are "salemanship in print," some people use video to give the equivalent of the endlessly scrolling letter. You gain the emotional appeal of the person's visage and tone of voice, perhaps along with music and graphics to build the hype. If you don't have playback controls on the video, then the viewer is virtually cornered by a pushy, relentless salesman.

Some people point out that the Internet gives us more flexible options than paper. It's possible to give people the choice of tabbing through sections of a letter, without being forced into endless scrolls. It's possible to let people skip through a video. It's possible to put up offers for a limited time, revealing further videos in a series.

So the question is: what's the most profitable way to use these features? Does giving more control gain you more satisfied buyers? Or does it give more ways to let prospects emotionally disengage from a sales pitch, and lose interest in something they would have ordered if you'd kept them focused?

As far as I can tell, there are not enough split-test controlled experiments to know for sure. That doesn't keep everyone from an opinion from blessing others with those opinions. Or from debating that everyone else's opinions are cursed.

Since you're new to all this, I recommend that you start with the classic issues that endure. How to find a hot market? How to develop or select a hot offer? What are the hot buttons for that offer in that market? How do people expect to be sold? How would they prefer to be sold? Most importantly, how do you test all of these theories to find out what works today?

Focus on those classic points that have to be addressed in any century. You'll build a marketing toolbox that will work no matter what the hot medium of the day happens to be. Who knows, next year we might debate whether pop-over holograms are too intrusive. But the principles of psychology, human nature and salesmanship will still apply... even if we do all start using holographic pitches.

Chris

Selling essentially is the same online and in print, there are differences - but the core sales message is still the same.

If you can learn how to "sell" in print - you can do it online, offline and in person. Fastest way to learn how to sell in print is to copy by hand the best performing salesletters, 30 minutes a day.

That whatever you're selling is going to solve the prospect's problem.

Another thing I thought about - pick up Joseph Sugarman's book "TRIGGERS". It lists 30 triggers which make people buy from you. I just started reading and it's gold.