Why does copywriting seem so scammy?

Nothing tested, reiterated, and proven again-and-again, to produce the highest possible conversions to sales in the widest number of categories.

A lot of the alternatives just don't work as well. Because these approaches fit in with the advocates comfort zone, they're fine with the trade off. They'll willingly trade results for having their world view confirmed.

However, direct response is diverse, and has developed some alternatives. These include advertorials, white papers and such. These fit with the concept of consultative selling.

The downside is you have to 1) Develop an outstanding product with competitive advantages (Much of the "scam" is to make up for marketing work that wasn't done when the product was developed.) 2) In depth customer insights

Finally, tests confirm, when you force users on a scavenger hunt and disintegrate the long page into many, you lose users for each additional page you send them to.

Gifted products get white papers and advertorials. Scammy products get scammy copy.


Related:

Apple Computer iMac

Tuffbook Ruggedized Laptops are an ideal subject for a high information (dare I say it: Information Marketing) approach. I think there is too much fragmentation going on, but you take what you can get.

The deal is simple: it works.

If you look at the individual products on your own site, the product description you're using is essentially a mini-salesletter. And I'd be willing to bet if you added more information about the product you'd sell more. Also YOU appear to be using "fake" price cuts, do you expect someone to believe the full price for a guide on how to build a chicken coop is really $197? Do you respect your customers that little?

I think it depends on how many sales pages you've seen. I had this argument with an acquaintance a few years ago, he was a web developer who argued that one of my sales pages looked "too scammy." Yet it had the basic elements Paul mentioned above and it wasn't a scam.

I told the web developer that since he spent a LOT of time online, he'd probably seen a ton of sales pages, including a few scams, and gotten kind of jaded by looking at them all the time.

But I think the average buyer hasn't seen a lot of sales pages, and won't be as jaded.

Or maybe we DO need a whole new approach, as some folks are doing...the "anti-sales page" look.

Scammy is generally a pronouncement from non-buyers, people not in the market who wouldn't buy no matter what you did.

If an alternative works, you can test it against the so-called scammy version. If it out-pulls, then use it. If not, then you have to make the choice of accepting lower sales in exchange for the positive comments of critics who may know a lot about what doesn't work.

The honest sites do this because it works.

The scam sites do it to look like non-scam sites.

Whatever the honest sites do, the scam sites will copy it.

So we may as well do what works.

Not sure if it's "killing" or not because we all have different definitions of killing.

Do you consider selling about 4,000 books a month at $39.95 "killing" through an infomercial?


For small time operations like most of us are running... yes it is. But what about for a company the size of Boardroom (with all their employees)? Probably not. (My guess the website gets most if it's traffic from viewers of the infomercial who would rather order the books online and not have to talk to a live operator and be upsold.)

Another factoid:


Boardroom sells over 40,000 books a month (at $29.95) through direct mail. "Killing" anyone?

Hey,

I think you raise some really good points. And I think sales pages, like with anything, follow the pattern of 90% of what's out there sucks like hell, and then you have a rare 10% that pulls away from the pack and performs wonderfully.

I made those statistics up but you get the drift.

Good observations.

David

Have you ever met a sales man?
Listen to the way they talk. They are always using action words, positive words, ect. They are always upbeat.

When you are in line at a grocery store can you pin point a sales man from the rest of the customers? sure you can just by the way they talk and hold a conversation and how they look you in the eye.

A sales letter seems so scammy because of all of the action words that are in them. As a copywriter I need to get a picture in the mind of my potential customers and using action words allows me to pull at there most needed wants.

If I was sitting with you on your porch enjoying each others company over an ice tea and I was to let you know about a cool car that I test drove and was exited about, I would probably use several hype up action words to help paint a picture in your mind of a tottally rad "Candy Apple Red" supper suped up corvett with a tottally hot hood scoop that shoots fire out of the exhaust every time it is reved up.

Get the picture. Hope this helps.

I'm not sure how a page can "look scammy", it's either a
scam or not. All thieves don't come with a hood on
their heads and a gun in their hands, some look like the
most respectable members of society.

So a scam has to be determined by more than appearance
and I'm not sure there is a defined look.

-Ray Edwards

Lemme see the tests then I will see which works? I am sure people used to think infomercials were scammy, but they still pull, same with direct marketing letters and mag ads but they still pull.

I really dont know why the sales letters work better (but my own tests show they did on one of my products) but until I see something better, more data, i'll continue using that format.

I think it matters what "mode" the web browser is in...problem solving or random surfing that determines these scammy thoughts.

i guess it looks scammy because you can only see the good sides of the products. it seems to be too good to be true. of course, it isn't good to put the side effects and people often find those products bad because they thought those products should have been perfect or some sort.

If you were a business owner surfing the net looking for ways to increase sales and you came across the two sites below... which one emits the sweet smell of verisimilitude upon first glance? (Ignore any person's name associated with either site.)

Hmmm...

It's not copywriting that may seem scammy... it's
the people writing the copy that are probably scammy

Personally, I don't care about the "fake price cuts, only 25 copies left, etc". As long as the product meets my need, the sales letter is compelling and convincing enough that the product works and most importantly, have a reasonable price, it'll have me whipping out my credit card.

A couple of points to make:

First, two men.

A walked the streets of Palm Beach in expensive custom made clothing, had a big yacht in the harbor, one of the biggest and most expensive homes (had several homes) and when he walked by people would whisper; "There goes one of the greatest money making geniuses in the world, just LOOK at his success".

B lives in the suburbs of Omaha, drives USED cars and would be hard to pick out in the mall. Nothing at all spectacular about his appearance or lifestyle.

WHO would you pick to trust with your money? Who would you want "investing" your money?

A Bernie Madoff
B Warren Buffet

Many "scammy" people and promotions have a highly polished sophistication about them.

Point two. I looked at 8 products at your affiliate site and clicked on the sales page link, 7 of 8 of those used the exact "scammy" look you described. The other one was so awful on my eyes it hurt.

So, can I assume you are looking for a way to offer information products different from the ones you are offering now?

OK. Take a look at a very successful Information Products marketer, Bill Myers at bmyers.com He's been at it for over a decade and uses what he calls the "VendoMatic" approach.

Click on his videos for sale, then select ONE. There you'll see the "VendoMatic" NON-scammy, hype free, "sterile" but successful copy you seek.

The "VendoMatic" approach assumes you don't need to hype a good product. It is a product approach, not a COPYWRITING approach. That is, he sells products people WANT and doesn't need to convince them, twist their arms, persuade/influence them.

And he's done very well and so have many people who take this approach. In fact, outside of the IM world of the WF, Clickbank, affiliate marketing world, you'll find MANY successful information product developers and sellers who use a less than "scammy" approach.

But what matters is what works.

IF you are selling information products, and being successful promoting products which use by your own definition, a scammy approach, you just need to keep on what you are doing.

IF you want to try a "test" do an A/B split test on 5 of your best selling products by eliminating the 'sales page' button on your site. Then you will have RESULTS which are always a good thing to have.

gjabiz

If sales letters looks or smells scammy, it is NOT a good sales letter. Period.

Would you buy from a fishy salesman that looks like has something to hide? I bet not, unless you do not trust your guts at all.

If you want to write good copy, and appear genuine and honest, you need to JUSTIFY your choices, from start to finish. Why does your product cost $47 instead of, let's say, $17? What do you offer that may justify the price? If the product is a 20 page ebook, $47 sounds a little too much, unless the sales letter is convincing enough to trust the seller that it is actually worth every cent.

Also, why such a huge price drop, from $197 to $47? Buyers are not stupid, at least not as much as many copywriters think. You do not need an IQ of 230 to do 2+2 and understand that that price cut sounds a little fishy. Giving a reason (for example, price cut only for the subscribers of my newsletter) makes it a lot more credible, and the value of the product will increase in the eyes of the customer.

It's such a simple concept and unfortunately very easily overlooked.

"Scammy" is when you overstate the value you are actually offering. Yes, yes, I know value is a relative issue and one person's value is another person's scam , but let's face it... If the marketer is talking about huge value and delivering mini value, it's a scam. So the trick to identifying scammy pages are, anything that tips you off to the possibility that the marketer is way overstating the value actually delivered. Bonuses often tell the story.

Anybody using sales copy has an opportunity to build a relationship with the reader; so pages delivering higher value in relationship to what the offer states are likely to win the reader's over as fans and repeat buyers. Tha't where the real money is, so scammy is when the writer is willing to make a quick hit with an offer that actually delivers low value. Other than that, do what works most successfully. Let high delivered value rule what is and what isn't scammy. You have to read into the offer a bit, or do your homework on what is being said about the marketer.

It gets people to take out their plastic and buy.

Rich

I understand why the thread starter described the usual sales letter design as scammy -- because of the bad eggs that spoil the good community. A lot of crap being sold out there use the same format of the IM sales letters. Why? Because these sales letters and the way they are formatted really do work.

I did not buy an iPhone because of a sales letter with red headlines and a big "Buy Now or else" button; the typical sales letter (big red headlines, bullets, testimonials, bonuses, scarcity) work for products that need to be hyped.

You don't see these format of sales letters being used by established companies, because they have big budget advertising. They don't have to hype to make a sale.

But for IM and info products, expect some hype to push a sale specially for a new product that has been untested.

What you have to consider is that, in the long run, people will use what works in the long run. If you look at what the entire field looks like. If the majority is using the "scammy" looking pages, the chances are that it is the most time effective way to produce sales. There are always other ways of doing things, but these will most likely take lots more time for not an equal jump in sales. What you do simply depends on whether this is your one and only or if your are serial copywriter.

When things work, they get repeated.

It only looks scammy if you have seen too many of them.

Think like your customers and you will see things differently.

G.

Two reasons why they may seem "scammy" to you...

1 The message isn't written for you, it's written for another target group. Another way to put it...you are not the buyer. The buyer has different buying criteria than you.

2 The message may be targeted to you, but you think it's "scammy" because the writer lost credibility with you by what he/she said.

All the best,
Ewen

Is this scammy? The wording is where I find my scammer flag blowing in the breeze. (that and when they show a Ferrari and a
12 ft pile of cash behind it)

None of what you think is scammy is scammy to me.

Scammy is "How to make $3,347 every week on autopilot while
you are out having fun!"... located in the WSO section from a guy
who has not made a nickle doing what he is selling (allegedly)

You are absolutely right friend. I think this format has become so popular that nobody want to try anything new. But i personally hate this type of format. I usually try to write something new and different with unique format.

The deal is simple: it works.

If you look at the individual products on your own site, the product description you're using is essentially a mini-salesletter. And I'd be willing to bet if you added more information about the product you'd sell more. Also YOU appear to be using "fake" price cuts, do you expect someone to believe the full price for a guide on how to build a chicken coop is really $197? Do you respect your customers that little?

A translation for the simpleton:
1) Product Description is NOT a sales letter. A sales letter is promotional - a product description is not.
2) Of course, more information is helpful and might well LEAD to more sales. Called a 'no-brainer' to us less-endowed mortals.
3) Straw man. The people looking for information are not likely to know the price of the valued information they seek. If they knew it, they probably wouldn't be looking into YOUR hobbit hole full of fanciful things that they OUGHT to know they could buy for a bit cheaper. Lets just call it a boater.

Well anyway -- @OP -- then get yourself a blog. Use it to inform potential customers about your industry, about products, your company and how it is making innovations (or whatever you are doing that is better and different from your competitors) and use it as a sales vehicle.
This is a proven method used by tons of super affiliates and other savvy sales pros.

I agree that those super-long single page sites tend to turn a lot of people off. I'm sure that some will buy anyway but the scammy look comes from terrible graphics and the font being all different sizes / colors / spacing / etc. every couple of lines. This makes it look like a bad MySpace profile.

That model would probably work even better if people took basic aesthetics into account.

I too associate a typical sales page with being a scam. It's hard to put a finger on why but they all seem to have a bit of a seedy connotation. When most people (including myself) think of an Internet Sales page they associate it with one of those sites selling Cheap Drugs, Viagra or 'Guaranteed Traffic Increase'.

Having said that, the more research I do the more I realize how important these pages are to actually making sales and this AIDA formula seems to be the norm:

1. The Offer
2. The Headline
3. The Opening/Introduction Paragraphs
4. Credibility
5. Benefits
6. Features and specifications
7. Prove It
8. Bonus Items
9. Value build-up
10. Ordering/Tell Them to Buy
11. P.S/Post Script


One more thing: The two most recent books I have read really help to make you stand out from the rest of the crowd. To me they are my Bibles.

"Web Copy That Sells" - Maria Veloso
"Hypnotic Writing" - Joe Vitale

Thanks for the post!