Copywriting Question From Newbie

It makes sense really as the old saying goes "Practice makes Perfect"

I think it is important to practice your copywriting, and yes Typing is good for me as my hand writing is horrible. It still seems to stick.

Personally I am not familiar with ted Nicholas, It rings a bell, just can't think why?

If you look at it like this, everyone that wants to improve at anything, practices and trains.

I don't imagine the guys that can charge thousands for a sales letter just sat down one day and started banging 'em out, they would have done plenty before people would happily pay that.

Best Wishes

ODA

Ted Nicholas, Joe Sugerman and Gary Halbert are the best teachers you can find.


They have sold BILLONS and BILLONS of dollars of products just through the magic of choosing the right words.

The more you write the better you will become - it's just like anything else - if you get behind the wheel of a car every day when you're learning you'll become a better driver quicker than if you just take one lesson a week.

Ted Nicholas?

Who he?

Ted Nicholas...(can't say I have...)

Seriously though - Ted is one of the best writers you can learn from in my opinion. Along with Gary Halbert, John Carlton, and Eugene Schwartz, you can learn a lot about writing.

The technique he's talking about really does work. Here's why:

When you write letters out by hand, you have to read the copy twice. One before you write it, and once AFTER you write it. By doing this, you actually run the copy through your mind just as the writer originally wrote it.

So you actually write a successful sales letter through OSMOSIS. It's weird, but it works wonders.

You'll see how many of the sentences are structured, why they chose certain words and you'll understand the 'rhythm' they used to communicate with their prospects.

Scott Haines, a protege of Gary Halbert, copied Gary Halbert's entire book out by HAND. The entire book. In donig that, he was able to write a sales letter to Gary and wound up working with him and made a TON of money!

...but he wouldn't have done that if he hadn't written that book out by hand.

I've done it, and it's great. I start copying letters for aboug 10 mins before I actually write copy. It's a good starting point.

It works. Try it out.

Well after my previous post and then seeing evryone seemed to know the guy but me I have spent a day and a half reading some of his stuff.

If your basing your writing on the principles that ted nicholas users then your on the right track.

I Now have a solid month of editing ahead of me due to some new found knowledge.

Great thread thanks everyone

It's 100% true. Dan Kennedy says that's what made him as good as he is.

It's a psychological thing more than anything. When you write something out (has to be by hand), the thought and communication patterns become "burned in" to your subconscious. It starts affecting your internal dialogue and changing the way you communicate and even the way you think and behave.

Just to give you an idea, I've used this exercise to help my coaching clients make changes in their thinking and behaviors. It's damn effective. Give it a shot for about 30 days and you'll see.

Chris Moon is right. And so are the rest. Practice makes perfect. Be honest, straight forward and offer a bonified solution (by buying your product) to a problem that your prospect may have. Make them feel as if your product will in fact fix their problem(s) and always close it with an iron clad satisfaction guarantee. That gets me pretty much everytime.

Never heard of him but I know of Joe vitale. To me , he is God's gift to IM, seriously, google him.He founded the hypnotic writing concept, buying trances. Like I said, google him, Joe Vitale.

Michael Masterson from AWAI also preached in all his courses to write every great sales letter at least 10 times over.

When I started my first copy writing job, the boss man locked me in a room for four weeks and I just read AWAI manuals and re-wrote at least 20 sales letters 10 times each.

I have to admit that it made me much more instinctive in my approach to everything from banners to sales letters.

So I agree that it works!

G

Sounds plausible. Practice makes perfect fits well for this situation.

It's like anything, really - the more you do it the better you become.

Sometimes I'll rewrite my blog posts titles nearly 50 times before I feel I've nailed it.

What a thread...

Ted Nicholas - who?

Joe Vitale - God's gift to IM

hi there

everything you learn you learn by emersion

you gotta out yourself in there and make the mistakes -its the best way -and the only waythat works i think

Yes, Ted Nicholas is a solid source.

Yes, the more you write, the better you get definately! (also you should always split test headlines, copy etc. to determine what works better.

That said, if you are serious about improving your copy writing skills, you should read a variety of authors & books on the subject and take the best of each.

Also, a great way of learning is to read other people's sales copy! Read it, analyse it, pick it apart and figure out why it works! Create a SWIPE file... File of all the best stuff you come across.

For your 1st few projects, don't be afraid to take a successful sales letter from a different product or niche and carefully rewrite it (or parts of it) for YOUR product.

Same with headlines!

There's a famous headline that goes something llike...

"They All Laughed When I Sat Down At The Piano - But When I Began To Play, They All APPLAUDED!"

...I recently heard that very headline revamped for a "Learn A Foreign Language" product. Went something like...

"When I Said I Would Order Dinner In French, She Laughed - But When I Said To The Waiter, (insert perfectly said French phrase here), she was Proud!" (or impressed or whatever...you get the idea).

I actually watch infomercials to get copywriting ideas!

Hope this helps!

Ted Nicholas is an expert! He has his own writing style.

Bernard

I too agree that Ted Nicholas has a good knack over his writing skills. He has proved it many times in the past.

If you're wondering about Dragon Naturally Speaking, it is good, BUT

If you have Windows 7, simply type "windows speech recognition" into the search box in the start menu. The result will appear at the top. Click it and get started.

Windows Speech Recognition is AWESOME. It's just as good as Dragon and IT's FREE. Most people don't even know they have it, but Microsoft went to great effort to create something that could compete with Dragon.

WSR is very intelligent and learns your speech mannerisms. You can use it to do almost everything on your computer without using your hands: write, open and use files, surf the web, and basically anything you can do with a mouse and keyboard.

I write about 5,000+ words/day, so this is critical for me to save my hands. The only problem that I see with either software is that you'll end up having to spend more time editing than if you typed it out by hand.

All Windows 7 users have this on their computer, check it out and you'll be hooked. Just make sure that you have a headset-type microphone. They program won't be nearly as effective if you try to use another type.

And don't waste the money on Dragon! (Although it IS a good program. It's just not free. However, most Wal Marts have a basic version of it for about $50.)