How To Get More People To Happily Buy Your Stuff

[jamawebinc]

There seems to be an impression that to get people to buy your stuff,
you must convince them with your carefully worded slick salescopy that
will magically make them want to reach into their wallet and give you
their hard earned money.

Ya know, If you learn some power words, or how to tug at their emotions,
they will suddenly hand over their money to you because your salescopy
was so convincing.

This is exhaustive physically and emotionally and does not work like
people think it does, if it works at all.

What does work is being real and providing some content that people
want, and truly helps them, or sets them on the path to solving
their problem.

Worry about really helping your web visitors first then let them know you
can help them more with your paid information.

I call it "completion" and I will explain it below.

However, this will only work if you are selling either a system/strategy
or a series of tips. Like "20 tips to saving money with your car"

If you have 1 big tip to sell, obviously you cannot give away the
tip and expect people to give you money for it.

If you give them a couple of those tips - Just flat out give it to them
and really help them out, you don't need to spend so much time
on trying to write manipulating and fancy salescopy.

If the tips you gave for free were genuinely helpful, the person
will want to see all the tips you have to complete their initial
investment of time they have made with you.

Have you ever started watching a movie on tv when you had
somewhere you had to be or had other more important things to do?

But, you couldn't pull yourself away before the movie ended?

You liked what you were watching, made a time investment in
it and had to see it through to completion.

If you try this way of helping people you can end the problem
of trying to convince people to buy your stuff with some slick
or manipulative sales copy.

Just help people. This forces them to make a time investment
with you and then ask them to purchase to bring their time
investment to completion.

Sometimes they will ask you if you have something they can buy
before you ever present them with a paid offer.

[Alex Williams]

Yes, I do agree with you on helping people. But strong sales copy is also necessary.

Additionally, sometimes you might find that when you give valuable advice to people for free, they want it all free - sure, why pay. So yes, provide value and overdeliver. But train your customers to become buyers as well

[Lisa Gergets]

Great advice. Be genuine, give value freely, create solid relationships.

[Tinkerbell]

There seems to be an impression that to get people to buy your stuff,
you must convince them with your carefully worded slick salescopy that
will magically make them want to reach into their wallet and give you
their hard earned money.

If you're writing copy to "convince" anyone to do anything, you're missing the boat.

Copy isn't meant to convince. It is meant to provide the exact amount of information necessary to a potential customer who is thinking about buying to help them decide on their own that it is in their best interest to buy your product. Erm...I think. If I'm wrong, I'm sure a few hundred people will correct me.

Tina

[NixTheNews]

Thanks for the information. Personally, I like to us ea mixture of goodsales copy and "being real." Adding a bit a humor never hurts either. :~)

[jamawebinc]

I am not so sure on the "build a relationship" part to be honest.

What I was talking about was more about increasing the desire of your prospect so they are more inclinded to buy your product.

I think giving people a taste of really good information proves something to them. It proves your stuff is good an works without having to use a bunch of testimonials which many people don't believe anyway.

It really is the old method of sampling.

Like the girl in the food court in a mall who gives hungry people a piece of food on a toothpick. If you get a taste and really like it, you know what you are going to get and your desire to have more increases.

They don't try to convince you by stating "It's so delicious"..."The best food here" and other statements meant to try to convince you.

They simply give you a taste and then your desire to purchase an entire plate of the stuff increases.

Your salescopy can then provide more detailed information about how the complete product will help them.

Adobe does this with free 30 day trials of their software.

You use the software (sometimes some functions are disabled) and then it expires.

You have made a time investment to learn the software, become familiar with it, perhaps even create things using the software. You have made an investment in it and your desire to purchase the full copy increases on it's own.

If the free stuff is really good and is what they are looking for, I don't think there is a need to build a relationship.

To me, "build a relationship" makes me picture an image of someone who spends months getting to know the person before they will buy anything.

If you had to wait months before getting any income or seeing any results, your business would not survive because of cashflow problems.

And you would become frustrated at all of your effort producing no income.

[jbode]

The best approach in my opinion is to give one good tip that they can immediately use and see some results with...

you don't want to give away everything -you'll train them to be freebie seekers

the most important part of sales copy is the offer!

a crappy sales page with a great offer will always sell better than a great sales page with a terrible offer!

[jamawebinc]

I agree with giving away just 1 or a couple of tips.

I have read advice online to keep giving people a boatload of content so they know and like you, and eventually they buy from you. This is detrimental advice.

I have also heard the advice to give away your best thing. I have not seen this done by the people who give this advice as I don't really think this is to be taken literally.

The word "thing" is open to interpretation anyway.

It goes back to "completion" if you give away one of your 12 techniques you are selling (or whatever number you have) this builds the prospects desire to see the other 11.
They have invested time with the 1 you gave them and now they need to see the complete set.

Assuming the 1 you gave away is top quality.

[strategic telemarketer]

Offer services or products that you are truly passionate about. Gather happy clients' testimonials and post them on your website, that way people will realize what they are losing by not buying info-products or services from you. Hope this helps!

[patselby]

You have to think about when you purchase something. How do you decide what to buy? The next time something comes to your attention that you just have to buy, recognize the feelings that you get. That's what you want to invoke in your potential customers.

[JAIDEEP2959]

Every business depend on demand and supply principles.

You need to identify demand for the product first for making sales.

If you find such customers, they will buy the product irrespective of sales copy.

[JohnMcCabe]

This approach is a balancing act. You have to balance what Eben Pagan calls "moving the free line" and what Zig Ziglar calls "spilling your popcorn in the lobby."

Trying to rely purely on slick copy to create a desire that isn't there is a hard way to make a living - like being the prettiest hooker at the Gay Rights parade.

On the other hand, while building relationships is important for repeat sales, the key word is "sales". In your marketing efforts, do you want a list of sort-of friends, or a list of people who buy your stuff?

Borrowing again from Ziglar, the term is "professional salesperson", not "professional visitor."

I like the food court analogy. It's much more benign than the image I got - the drug dealer approach.

Your average street dealer isn't smart enough to do the Harold Hill thing and create desire. He is smart enough to understand "here, try this, I got more." Once the desire is locked in (through physical addiction in this unsavory example), then the commercial relationship starts.

Minus the physical addiction, the best bet is a sample along with strong persuasive copy. Like most things in marketing, this isn't an either/or choice...

[jamawebinc]

My kids take swimming lessons in the indoor pool in my apartment building.

I cannot swim, and my wife can. I surely don't want them to end up like me.

Now, the instructor heard that I can't swim and noticed I don't even go in the water.

He wants to teach me how to swim and offered to give me the first half hour lesson for free.

If I had a desire to learn, I would jump on it. Of course, the fear of learning to swim is stronger than the desire to learn right now.

But that's a great example.

I would make a time investment with that swim instructor, and hopefully like his approach and the progress I make in that one lesson. My desire to learn more would increase.

I have made an investment with him, I'd like to know more of what he already taught me.

This would work much better than saying,

(Pardon my quick headline off the top of my head)

"Do you want to Swim With Your Kids Like Other Parents?
Want to Learn Just a sample of what Michael Phelps Does So Well?"

I can teach you...Only $45 bucks for the first lesson.

That does nothing to increase my desire. That's just trying to convince me to do something with slick copy.

[wantselltrade]

Great topic. I like to give out valuable advice or ideas that will put potential customers on the right track. Something that will help them solve initial problems etc. What I highly suggest is the personal touch. I know it takes a lot of time to personally answer emails but always be there to respond. That goes a long way in building relationships and bottom line, future sales.

[Og Mandino]

Nice... "Test food" metaphor.

Giving people a bite of value (solution / supply) which they can be assured the offer meet their expectation (problem free / demand).

[jamawebinc]

You have to be careful of giving out too much stuff.

If you show people the whole movie, where is the motivation to pay to come back to see it.

If you show them an exciting trailer, it builds desire to go pay to see the entire movie.

Are you giving something with a lot of content in your offer for the persons contact information? This person is then "full" and has no more hunger that needs to be fed. Until they use up or go through the content they just got for free.