Advertising – Page 2 – Velocity Media

12 August 2014

Five sneaky call to action tips to boost conversions

Your call to action is one of the most important parts of any copy you write. While your words may be clever and compelling, and your images eye catching and engaging, if you aren’t calling people to act, you won’t get the results you want.

So how do you make sure you are calling your potential customers to act effectively? Here are five sneaky call to action tips to help boost your conversions.

1. Map out your sales process

The key to an effective call to action is to know what actions you need your potential customer to take. While it would be nice for a potential customer to go from not knowing you to spending thousands with you instantly, and yes it does happen, in most cases though trust and rapport need to be established first.

This is where your sales process comes in, working out each step that needs to be taken to build trust and turn your potential customer into your ideal customer.

For each marketing piece you write, whether it is a sales letter, brochure or website think about the very next step they need to take. Is it to call you? Answer your phone call? Sign up to your mailing list? Go to a landing page? Download a free resource? Make a small ‘teaser’ purchase that will lead them to a bigger purchase?

Break each step down, giving clear instructions as to what needs to happen next.

2. Create urgency

The whole point of a call to action is to get your potential customers acting now, not saying, “I’ll do that later”. But to do this you need to communicate the urgency.

You can do this by using scarcity and competition to hint at what they could miss out on if they don’t act quickly, and/or using urgent language like “try it now”, “immediate access” or “call today”.

3. Use triggers

Sometimes you need to give potential customers a little extra help to get over the line, that is where sales triggers, little messages that motivate, come into play.

It could be a testimonial with results you know they will want, a risk minimising message like a guarantee or even some bullet points that overcome common objections and establish your value all put near your call to action to ‘seal the deal’.

4. Make your ‘buy buttons’ green or bright coloured

We have been programed in society that green = go and red = stop or a hazard, are your buy buttons giving off the right signal?

While green is a good idea for your buy button, bright colours, particularly against duller colours (if you were wanting to highlight a particular package, membership or option for instance) can also draw the eye and send the right signal.

5. Get rhyming

While it may sound funny or corny, research has shown that rhyming phrases are perceived to be more truthful and accurate. Get a little creative and give rhyming a go for one of your calls to actions and test your results.

Hopefully this has helped you a fraction, what tips will you use in your next call to action?

Amanda

16 June 2014

Six questions to position your brand effectively in the mind of your customers

How your customers and potential customers perceive your brand directly impacts your bottom line. So how do you make sure you position your brand effectively in the mind of your customers?

Here are six questions to help you ensure your brand is more engaging and appealing to your customers, now and in the future.

1. What do you want your brand to stand for?

Work out what your brand stands for, what the purpose of your business is – beyond making profit and what you’re passionate about. What is your vision? What difference do you want to make in the world? What do you believe in? What problems are you solving? Do you have a cause?

When you know who you are as a brand, you not only communicate better with your customers and potential customers, you appear to be more authentic. The decisions and actions you take as a business owner can also be considered more carefully to ensure you stay true to what you stand for.

2. Where do you want to be in the market place?

Determine where you want your brand to sit within your market. Do you want to be the luxury, expensive brand of your industry, the cheaper alternative or somewhere in the middle? Do you want to be seen to be more exclusive to a certain group or available to the masses? Are you the optional extra or the essential?

3. What do you want to be known for?

When your customers and potential customers talk about your business or give you a testimonial, what do you want them to say? When someone sees or hears your business name what do you want their first thoughts to be?

Is it your results, professionalism, creativity or innovation? Is it your consistency, quality, simplicity or availability? Choose what you want to be known for and determine what products and services you need to offer, what actions you need to take and customer interactions you need to have in order to achieve it.

4. What personality do you want your brand to have?

Your brand’s personality describes the way your brand thinks, speaks, acts and reacts, which then gets reflected in your social media, blogs, marketing messages and your day-to-day communication with your customers, suppliers and business associates.

Do you want your brand to be humorous or more serious? Relaxed or professional? Enthusiastic or refined? Elegant or cheap? Young or old? Inspiring or more factual and realistic? Innovative or predictable? Choose what human characteristics you want your brand to have in order to make it more relatable and engaging to your customers and potential customers.

5. What emotions do you want to spark?

A brand, by definition is a collection of thoughts and feelings about your experiences with it. When you create the right emotional affiliation with your brand, you increase awareness, sales and retention.

For this reason, it is important to work out what emotions you want your customers and potential customers to associate with your brand. Is it safety and security? Love and passion? Awe and wonder? Confidence and trust? Hope, excitement or happiness?

Keep in mind that this is different to how you will appeal to your customers through your marketing, as you will normally use more negative emotions like frustration, fear or guilt in order to motivate them to act.

6. What do your customers want from you?

Once you have answered all of these questions from your perspective, answer them from your customers’ perspective. What do they need and want? What are they looking for from you and from your industry? What do they prioritise as most important?

While you may own your business, your customers are the ones who keep you in business, so always make sure your brand is aligned with what they want.

How did you go about positioning your brand in the market place? Are you happy with where you are or is it time to make some adjustments?

Amanda

25 May 2014

Five ways to make your marketing more strategic

Too often businesses take an unplanned approach to their marketing, either following the crowd or acting on a hunch they decide to “try it and see”. But it’s the fastest way to blow your marketing budget.

True marketing magic happens when the right product or service, with the right message meets the right people, at the right time, on the right marketing platform. Though, to do that you need a strategy, and you need to test and measure your results.

So stop doing what you think you should be doing, what the company down the road is doing or what you heard would be good to try and start strategising the best way to create the marketing magic for your business. Here are five tips to get you started.

1. Qualify your marketing efforts

In order to make the most of your marketing campaign and investment you need to:

Check there is a need for your products or services
Craft messages that are relevant and emotionally engaging with the audience that have the need
Ensure the platform or strategy you use will reach a large amount of the audience you are targeting

When you start to evaluate your marketing efforts, strategies and opportunities even on this simple criteria, by asking is it relevant and targeted to your audience and reaching a high percentage of those you are targeting, you can quickly protect your budget from marketing strategies that “everyone is doing” and start to see what to say yes to and try, and what to say no to or stop.

2. Know the purpose

Whatever marketing or advertising you do, there needs to be a clear purpose for it. You need to know what you want someone to do after reading or hearing the specific message you have created, as this will impact the call to action you use.

Is it to call you? Go to your website? Sign up to the mailing list? Buy immediately? Once you know what you need them to do, you can then make sure your copy, call to action and incentive all work together to make it happen.

3. Ensure there are real benefits or an opportunity to get a return

It sounds obvious, but many marketing campaigns have been done under the guise of “increasing brand awareness” (sponsorship can be an ideal example of this) which is fine if you have brand awareness to start with, have a large marketing budget to play with or if it’s a highly relevant and targeted opportunity, but it’s impact is very hard to measure.

Whatever you look to invest your marketing dollars in, there needs to be real benefits and return. So, to use the sponsorship example, find a way to proactively reach your audience in a measurable way like sponsoring a prize and getting the business cards of those who enter.

4. Test your message on a smaller campaign

Before you embark on a larger marketing or advertising campaign test your headline and message on a smaller one.

It could be through a focus group, survey, Facebook advertising campaign, a Google Adwords advertisement or a smaller mail out to test and measure the results. Better to find out a message doesn’t work on a small scale with a small investment rather than a large one.

5. Don’t confuse persistence with foolishness

While you need to allocate a set amount of time to tell if a product, message, platform or strategy is working, you don’t want to keep wasting time, money and effort on something that isn’t.

To prevent this from happening, set a cap or measurement on your efforts. It could be a time limit, or a set amount of mail outs you do to in order to test the product or service, message or platform to see if it is getting a response.

As entrepreneurs we need to be mindful that sometimes business ideas, products or services and marketing campaigns don’t work the way we think, want or hoped they would.

When this is the case, it is important for your business and your bottom line to stop instead of persisting, put it down to education and move on to the next project, idea or strategy.

How do you ensure your marketing is strategic?

Amanda

19 May 2014

Why you need to be a shameless self-promoter

When it comes to self-promotion and marketing there tends to be two kinds of business owners, those who are their brand and those who hide behind their brand. But, in order to create a truly successful business you need a balance of both.

So here are three reasons you need to become a shameless self-promoter, and for those who want to run a mile at the thought of being more in the spotlight, how you can do it while still being somewhat in the background.

1. People need a personal connection

To create a valuable business that you can sell one day (it’s good to have the option) you need to build a powerful brand that isn’t solely dependent on you. But at the same time to create that marketing momentum there needs to be a face, someone they can connect to, a person that embodies the expertise, experience and personality of the brand to build trust and relationships with potential customers.

Now that doesn’t mean your face needs to be on everything, you just be an expert in your own right. If you are not comfortable with being on video, getting up to speak or having your photo everywhere, consider writing, blogging or being active via social media to build your profile that way.

Doing this will also help secure your future, when you have your own profile it is easier to launch new projects, businesses or causes because people know you outside your brand.

2. Your business won’t grow by you playing small

We each have a contribution to make, in life and in business. We have the power to make a difference and impact lives. But playing down your talents and abilities, staying small and hiding in the background doesn’t help you serve your purpose.

Many business owners shy away from talking about their skills and experience as they don’t want to seem egotistical or boastful, knowing this can be damaging to their reputation and relationships. But you don’t need to be arrogant in order to establish your value, and what these business owners also forget is that being too humble and underselling themselves can also damage their business and stunt their growth.

Would you buy off someone who was unsure of themselves and downplaying their abilities? I know I wouldn’t.

Own your skills and talents and have confidence in your abilities to deliver for your customers. Your confidence will in turn grow your customers and potential customers confidence in you leading to more sales and more opportunities to help people.

3. If you deliver a better product or service you have an obligation to tell your customer about it

There are so many people out there who are ready and waiting to take advantage of people with below average products and services, or grand promises they can’t or have no intention of keeping.

That is why you have an obligation to let your customers and potential customers know about you. If you provide higher quality products or services, have more experience or offer more value you owe it to them to try and help them.

Self-promotion doesn’t need to be boastful, salesy or cheesy, and you certainly don’t need to put your head on the side of a bus if you don’t want to.

But in order to generate more publicity for your business and attract and convert more customers you do need to step out of the shadows and build your own profile up too.

By doing so you will find that as your own profile grows so will your business simply because people will want to be involved in what you are doing.

Amanda

26 April 2014

Three ways to drive your customers to act

One of the easiest and most frustrating things for a consumer to do is put off buying your product or service until later. It could be that they’ll buy when they have more money, when they are more established, when they feel they are ready for it, after they compare what else is out there, or any number of justifications – often based around procrastination, fear or refusing to leave their comfort zone, that stops them from taking action with you now.

It can be frustrating, and not just because you haven’t closed the sale, but also because you know that your product or service could really help them, if only they would let it. So how do you create a sense of urgency to move them past their justifications? Here are three ways to drive your potential customers to act.

1. Scarcity

Scarcity marketing appeals to your potential customer’s fear of missing out, and refers to any limitation placed on a product or service in order to increase sales by applying pressure to act immediately. It could be due to limited availability or a time based deadline that is linked to a discount or bonus for acting within a short window of time.

The whole reason scarcity works well is because it forces action, especially when there is significant value offered. If you really want it you need to act immediately, how can you afford to wait if the reduced price, bonus, product, service or package will no longer be offered?

2. Competition

Within all of us is a healthy sense of competition. We want to be the first, to win, to be the leader, to be part of the ‘exclusive group’, to achieve our goals faster and receive the recognition and status that brings. Often appealing to the desire to be the best, the first and get in when others miss out can be quite effective in the sales process.

Of course this sense of competition comes from a place of ego, so the effectiveness can depend on how much your potential customer needs recognition, how driven they are by status and how competitive they are to what you are comparing them to. Competition can also be accentuated by scarcity. By offering limited places, you are giving them the chance to win over someone else.

3. Taking the sale away

As the old saying goes, “people want what they can’t have”. With this in mind if you take the sale away by mirroring their justifications, taking out desired features to make it cheaper or making it appear that your customer base is an exclusive group where customers are chosen like an interview process (where you make the decision not them), can actually make them want your product or service more.

Often when a potential customer senses that you won’t sell them what they want or need they will become more proactive in their pursuit and not only sell themselves on why they want it, but also sell you on why you should have them as a customer.

A word of warning though…

While all of these motivators work, they also tend to be what we despise most in salespeople – right? That is why they need to be handled with care and done with the right approach. You need to be focused on what is best for your customer, what they want and need, as opposed to just closing the sale, and sometimes that can mean walking away. This is the key difference between the annoying, arrogant pushy salesperson and the friend that is gently guiding because they want what is best for you.

“But isn’t this manipulative?” you might ask. It can be yes, especially when it is used in a pushy, sales driven way. Perhaps it is just the marketer in me, but I strongly believe that if you have a product or service that could genuinely help someone, whether it makes their lives easier, saves or makes them money, gives them more time, helps them grow their business, or gets them to achieve their goals faster, you have a responsibility to share that in a way your potential customers understand, see the value and are compelled to act – don’t you?

Amanda

30 March 2014

Turning industry stereotypes into powerful points of difference

Whether we like it or not people make assumptions about us, our business and even how we conduct our business based on the industry we are in.

Don’t believe me? What is the first thing that comes to mind when you think of a used car salesmen, lawyer or journalist? When you call a tradesman are you expecting them to be on time or late? Tidy or messy? What about when you meet with an accountant? Are you expecting a passionate, engaging person or a person who has less personality than their calculator?

While some people certainly do fit their industry stereotypes, many of us don’t. But as frustrating as it can be to be judged according to a perception, idea or bad experience someone else is responsible for, it can provide you with a very clear way to differentiate yourself and a very powerful method to sell.

To show you here are four tips to help you turn your industry stereotype into powerful points of difference.

1. Define your industry stereotype

In order to rise above the perceptions and bad experiences people have had with others in your industry you need to define your industry stereotype. To do this take everything bad (joking or otherwise) someone has said about your industry and combine it with common perceptions people have of someone in your field.

By doing this you now have a list of what not to do, and how to differentiate yourself in the mind of your customers.

2. Create your industry “villain”

Once you have your “not to-do” list, create the “villain” of your industry to give all of the negative attributes a personality. For some industries like real estate or investment, you might paint a really shady, unscrupulous, self serving character, though for others it might be quite mild in comparison yet still appeal to common industry frustrations.

The key is to make this “villain” realistic and relatable, because this is the person you are getting your customers to focus all their negative feelings and bad experiences on instead of you and your industry as a whole.

For example a tradesman might say something along the lines of…

“Have you ever been left waiting for hours without a phone call wondering where your [tradesman] was? Then when they finally arrived [x] hours late, after trampling dirt all through your home, you find out [insert frustration: the job has to be delayed/the job would take longer than anticipated/the job was more expensive than quoted/they don’t have all the materials or equipment they need/it wasn’t done the way you wanted etc.]?” Continuing on with the pain, frustration and inconvenience caused.

3. Become the “hero”

Once you establish the pain and frustration the “villains” cause your potential customers, you then need to establish yourself as the “hero” who swoops in to save your potential customers.

To do this you need to paint the picture of how you, your products and services, the way you deliver them and/or the way conduct your business is vastly different in comparison to everyone else in your industry, using the proof of testimonials where possible.

Through your marketing copy, and when you are talking to your potential customers, show them how you provide what they need and want, taking the weaknesses of the industry “villains” and turning them into your own marketable strengths.

To use the tradesman example above, you might follow on by saying…

“But imagine if instead you received a phone call an hour before your tradesman is due confirming your job details along with his estimated time of arrival. If, when they turn up – on time – they removed their shoes, communicated clearly on how long it would take, explained what was involved, had all of the tools and materials needed in their fully fitted out workshop on wheels and delivered on time, on budget with the highest quality workmanship – guaranteed. Then after they finished, they cleaned up all of their mess leaving no trace they had been there other than a job well done. That is what you receive with [business name]”.

4. Follow Through

While positioning yourself as the “hero” can generate interest and sales, delivering on what you promise is the true key to overcoming industry stereotypes and creating raving fans that will go on and sell your business for you. People can’t help but talk about someone who is breaking the mould, particularly when the person has helped them greatly.

Have you ever found yourself stereotyped based on your industry?

Amanda

24 March 2014

The four-step formula for more powerful marketing and advertising

Every day your customers are bombarded with hundreds of marketing messages and advertisements. They are there when they turn on the television, listen to the radio, drive past a billboard, wait at a bus stop, go to a public bathroom, search online, open an email, read a magazine or newspaper and even check their letterbox.

As a result the customers you are targeting are smarter, more informed and value driven, they research their purchases and tend to see through the marketing hype and the manipulative, pushy sales tactics. They are time-poor, have shorter attention spans, scan more than read and want to know what you can do for them before they give you any more of their time or money.

To reach them, your marketing approach needs to be different, strategic, targeted, customer-focused, value packed and concise. Not always the easiest feat, but here’s a little helping hand, a four-step formula you can follow to help you create more powerful marketing campaigns, advertisements and copy.

Step One – Know who you are marketing to and why

High conversions and great results come from strategic and targeted marketing campaigns where you truly “get” your customers and what they need or want.

To do this effectively you need to be revisiting and redefining your target market regularly. Your customers needs, problems and priorities can change, and who you want to target can change based on your experience, price increases, product changes, the campaigns you are running and your customers’ willingness and ability to spend.

Drill down as specifically as possible so you can find the commonalities in the group of people you are targeting. This will help you uncover which pain point, solution and incentive will be the most effective. I can’t stress enough how important this is to establishing a personal message, the kind that makes your customer feel that you are talking directly to them, even though you may be targeting thousands.

Step Two – Identify what you are really selling

In order to market your business effectively you need to know what you are selling. This doesn’t just mean being an expert in your products and services, it means becoming very clear on what benefits you are offering your customers.

To give you an example, let’s use an accountant. Service wise an accountant may offer customers tax returns, bookkeeping, BAS lodgment and structuring, but what they are really selling is peace of mind and security. Their customers can feel at ease knowing that their financial obligations are taken care of and their assets are protected if worse ever came to worse.

In the same way, a mattress store is selling comfort and a good night sleep. A fencing company is selling safety and security for your family. When you find what you are really selling, you can find the emotional pull, motivator or persuader that will most appeal to your target market.

Step Three – Work out how you do it differently

When you know what you are selling and the benefit it supplies, you need to work out how you do it differently to everyone else. This will allow you to shape a more powerful outcome or result that people will receive simply by choosing to work with you.

Look at what your customers want and need, and then look at what your competitors are doing and not doing compared to you. What is different? What makes your product, service, business or you as a provider different and of more value to your potential customer?

Do you have more experience or expertise? Do you have better processes or follow up? Do you have a guarantee? Do you have consistent or unrivaled results? Do you use higher quality products? Do you have a wider range of colours shapes or styles? Do you have a more personalised service or a quicker turn around?

Step Four – Stop marketing your product, start marketing your value

Good marketing is not about you, what you do or even what you want to market; it is about your customer, what they need and what is going to most appeal to them in order for them to hand over their money to you. You need to get out of your ego, and into theirs.

Be the solution. Look for ways your products or services and what you are really selling can help your customers solve what they need to solve or achieve what they want to achieve. When it comes to sales and marketing “nice guys” who have a genuine interest in their customers and a desire to help them, finish first.

Amanda

18 March 2014

Four headlines that engage and convert customers

Whether you need to capture the attention of a potential customer on your website, convince a journalist to publish your story, increase your mailing list with your website opt-in, generate leads from an advertisement or boost your hits with a blog post, learning to write good headlines is perhaps one of the greatest time investments you can make in your business.

To help you make a start, and get more results from your marketing and advertising here are four types of headlines that can help you connect with potential customers and convert more sales.

1. The threat

One of the most powerful buying motivators is fear and pain. Generally speaking we move faster away from pain and potential threat than we do towards pleasure, so if you can pinpoint something your target market is afraid of losing or afraid of happening, you can really get inside their head and create a headline that is impossible to ignore.

Examples of a threat headline are “The shocking truth about what your child is really eating”, “the [x] lies your [person/brand] is telling you”, “The information/advice your [trusted person] should give you, but won’t”, “If worse came to worse and [specific scenario], would you/your family/your business be protected? Or “Did you know you could be personally liable/held accountable/at risk of/ for [threat], even if you [protective measure]?”

To craft a powerful threat headline ask yourself:

What are my target markets frustrations?
What problems do they have that my product or service solves?
What are their pain points and worries?
What is keeping them up at night?
What do they fear most?
What are the greatest threats to them, their family and their livelihood?

2. The benefit

The benefit headline, as its name suggests is driven by a benefit. The benefit can be positive, drawing your target market towards pleasure like “How you can generate more leads for your business without spending more time, money or effort”, or a negative benefit, drawing them away from pain, frustration or consequence like “Stop paying too much tax”.

Whichever way you go, when mastered, the benefit headline can be incredibly powerful. The key to its success though, depends on how well you know your target market and what they need or desire, in order to appeal to their buy buttons. It can’t just be any benefit that your product or service provides though, it has to be a benefit your target market can’t ignore or must-have in order to incite action.

When crafting a benefit headline ask yourself:

What does my target market want most?
What are their dreams and aspirations?
What do they value?
Who do they look up to or want to be like?
What are their frustrations?
What do they want to avoid most?
What can my products or services give them, save them, help them become or achieve that will help them get what they want or avoid what they want to avoid?

3. The promise

The promise headline is like the benefit headline only more powerful because it comes with a promise of results. It could be that you can provide the desired results within a desired timeframe, or the desired result with a guarantee. Of course you MUST deliver what you have promised, so handle this headline with care.

When crafting a promise headline ask yourself:

What results have I generated for past customers?
What results will motivate potential customers?
Can I deliver results in an assured timeframe?
Can I offer a money back guarantee?
How can I eliminate the perceived risk people have when buying from me?

4. The testimonial

The testimonial headline is one of the most powerful headlines because it uses a customer success story and their own words to sell your products and services. It gives you credibility and proves your value long before you’ve tried to establish it.

The testimonial could be outstanding results you’ve delivered, a relatable situation you helped a customer through, a common problem you solved, a testimonial that addresses common objections people have or even a celebrity or notable person who uses your products or services.

The key to a good testimonial headline is that it needs to be specific, have high impact, connect with or be relatable to your potential customer and prove your value. To do this you may need to give the customer who is endorsing you specific boundaries and prompts of what you are looking for from their testimonial.

Have you found a particular type of headline has worked well for you?

Amanda

3 March 2014

Three tips to help you build your email list

With so much focus placed on how many likers, followers and connections we have on social media, it can be easy to lose sight of the most important number – your subscribers.

As business owners we often spend so much time, money and effort building our databases on someone else’s platform, but what about our own? If you could no longer access your social media accounts or blogs, would you have a way of staying in touch with at least some of your likers, followers, readers and connections?

It can be a scary thought can’t it? To make sure you are building your list while leveraging social media and blogging, here are three tips to turn your likers, followers, readers and connections into subscribers.

1. Create a killer opt-in

In order for a potential customer to give you their contact details willingly, you need to give them value and incentive. It could be a checklist, cheat sheet, fact sheet, list of resources, strategy session, ideas, a gift certificate, newsletter or a whole host of other ideas.

The key is that you need to make it relevant, desirable and where possible shareable, so there is no doubt in your potential customers mind that they (and others they know) must give over their details to get it. To do this you need to be generous. You need to give enough away so it is easy for them to see the value, yet still enough mystery that they need to buy from you.

A good opt-in, depending on your product, service and industry of course, should inspire your potential customer, challenge the way they think or do something, solve a problem or at least start to solve a problem and/or appeal to their ambition or desire to reach their goal. Emotional engagement is key for high performing opt-in.

If it is a newsletter that you are using as an opt in, instead of saying the usual “sign up for our e-news” say what someone will receive from reading your e-news. Will there be tips, hints, ideas, and deals? Look closely at what value it provides, what will your reader be able to do or know as a result of your information?

Also try teaming it with a great offer “Sign up for our e-news and get a $5/$10/$50/$100 (depending on what you sell) voucher to use with your next purchase” or “Sign up for our e-news and receive the [x] game-changing tips/hints/questions to ask/habits to achieve [x]”.

2. Capture details with competitions

We all love the chance to win something, particularly if it is something really relevant, desirable, luxurious or expensive (even if it is perceived value) so use a competition as a way to grow your list. Again, look closely at what your potential customers may want or need to make their life or business easier, more enjoyable, fulfilling or profitable.

While the prize doesn’t need to be directly linked to your business, keep in mind that the more general the prize the more general the people will be who enter it. You don’t just want to grow your database for the sake of growing it, you want to attract targeted, interested people, so take your time when thinking of a prize.

3. Be an information tease

We are really lucky to have tools like blogs and social media at our disposal, so why not put them to good use by doing a little information teaser campaign.

Once you have identified information you think your audience will really value (think golden nuggets of great wisdom, serious money saving or making tips, a step-by-step process or formula, or anything else you can think of that really gives your audience the opportunity to “peek behind the curtain” of your knowledge), do up one or a series of blog posts or status updates incorporating them.

Ideally you want there to be at least 5-10 tips/steps/pearls of wisdom in order to get the most impact. But here’s the catch, you only release half – and not the best half, into the public domain the rest you have under lock and key available only to those who join your mailing list.

Keep in mind though that this only works when the information is relevant, valuable and when done sparingly, when used all the time this tactic can lose its impact. So time it well, after a social media advertising campaign for instance, in order to turn those likers and followers into subscribers.

Do you have any tips for building your mailing list?

Amanda

23 February 2014

Marketing words that boost engagement and conversions

Words are powerful. They can move us, engage our emotions in ways we don’t even realise and persuade us to take a course of action we may not have ordinarily taken.

That is why the words you use to help you tell the story of your products and services are so important. They can be the difference between telling and selling, and someone browsing or buying.

Fortunately, there are some words and phrases that have been tried and tested to help boost engagement and conversions regardless of your industry. So to help you, here are seven words I’ve found as a copywriter to be extremely effective, regardless of who or what I’m writing about.

1. “You”

No word in marketing is, or ever will be, as powerful as the word “you”. The more you can make your marketing about your target audience, and their needs, their problems, their desires and their frustrations the more effective it will be.

Remember your potential customer doesn’t care about you – at first anyway, they want to know what is in it for them and how you can solve their challenges and meet their needs like no-one else can.

With this in mind, one of your main objectives when writing your marketing material should be to use the word “you” as many times as possible. Customer focused words like “you” should appear at least twice as many times as self-focused words like your business name, “we”, “us”, “ours”, “me” or “I”.

2. “Guarantee”

When you are willing to back your own product or service with a guarantee, particularly a 100% money back guarantee, you minimise the risk for your customer and give them a sense of safety and security at the time of purchase.

Offering a guarantee can also help you persuade your potential customer into feeling like they have nothing to lose and everything to gain by buying from you.

3. “Free”

While some marketers over the years have questioned whether the word “free” is still effective in marketing, the fact remains that we all love freebies. The impact of the word, however, depends greatly on what it is linked to.

“A free quote” for instance, isn’t a good “free” incentive. Let’s be honest, would you pay someone to come and give you a quote for a job if a quote was all they were giving? I know I wouldn’t, it’s just something we do in order to generate business.

The key is to offer something that is relevant and of value to your audience. So if you were looking at offering the ever popular “free consultation”, instead of leaving it at that, articulate what value they will receive in a consultation with you (and FYI a sales presentation or the opportunity to come and “find out how we can help you” isn’t value). What will you give them, or talk about in the consultation? What will they have or be able to do by the end of it?

When you start approaching your free offers like this, you will start to see just how powerful the word “free” can be in your marketing.

4. “Instant”

Let’s face it; given our lifestyle, most people you market to will have a short attention span, little patience and a growing desire for instant gratification. You only need to look at the growing credit card debt to see this is true. We don’t want to wait, we want it now and, while some of us may meet it with some scepticism, we are, generally speaking, intrigued by anything and anyone who can deliver us the instant results or changes we are looking for.

If you can build an instant element into your offering and marketing, whether it is instant access, download, delivery, implementation, value or results, it can be incredibly rewarding.

A word of warning though, when you build up a customer’s expectations like this you need to be 100% confident that you can deliver on it. If there is one shadow of a doubt – or you have to rely on someone else to fulfil your “instant” promise (like a third party or supplier) think about what else you could do instead.

5. “Easy”, “Quick” or “Shortcut”

We all want to know the easiest option or the quickest way, it forms part of our desire for instant gratification. We’re willing to look at whatever will speed up the process of being, doing or having what we want, or make the process that much easier.

Perhaps your product or service is easy to buy, easy to use or implement or has the potential to make your customer’s life easier (be specific with how). Or maybe it’s the shortcut they’re looking for that will deliver what they want in record time. The easier and quicker something is, the more desirable it becomes in the mind of your customer.

6. “Never”

The word “never” can be incredibly powerful when you are pointing out the negative benefits of your product or service. If you’re wondering what a negative benefit is, it’s something your customer will avoid (and want to avoid) by buying and using your product or service. Essentially it demonstrates how you can help them avoid pain.

Obviously how you use it depends on your business and what you sell, though some examples are “never miss a payment again”, “never worry about a deadline again” or “never pay too much in tax again”. The key is to make the negative benefit realistic, of high importance to your customers and for ultimate impact something that is weighing heavy on their mind or keeping them up at night.

7. “Proven”

By having a proven system, formula, methodology or product, or a strong track record of generating results, you take the risk and fear out of buying from you. It’s one thing to say that you are great, it’s quite another to be able to back your claims up. The effectiveness and credibility of your message amplifies when you prove you can do what you say you can.

Don’t just make “proven results” or a “proven formula” another claim though, say how and why it is proven or draw on testimonials and case studies to show that it is proven.

So there you have it, seven words that when used right can generate great results in marketing. The next challenge is to find which words will work best for you and your business.

Have you found certain words work wonders in your marketing?