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Another attention-grabber kind of headline is the comparative priced magazine headline: Three For Only $3, Regularly $3 Each! Still another of the "tried and proven" kind of headlines is the specific question: Do You Suffer From These Symptoms. And of course, if you offer a strong guarantee, you should say so in your headline: Your Money Refunded If You Don't Make $100,00 Your First Year.
How To headlines have a very strong basic appeal, but in some instances, they're better used as book titles than advertising headlines. Who Else wants in on the finer things - which your product or service presumably offers - is another approach with a very strong reader appeal. The psychology here is the need of everyone to belong to a group - complete with status and prestige motivations.
Whenever, and as often as you can possibly work it in, you should use the word "you" in your headline, and throughout your copy. After all, your ad should be directed to "one" person, and the person reading your ad wants to feel that you're talking to him personally, not everyone who lives on his street.
Personalize, and be specific! You can throw the teachings of your English teachers out the window, and the rules of "third person, singular" or whatever else tends to inhibit your writing. Whenever you sit down to write advertising copy intended to pull the orders - sell the product - you should picture yourself in a one-on-one situation and "talk" to your reader just as if you were sitting across from him at your dining room table. Say what you mean, and sell HIM on the product your offering. Be specific and ask him if these are the things that bother him - are these the things he wants - and he's the one you want to buy the product...
The layout you devise for your ad, or the frame you build around it, should also command attention. Either make it so spectacular that it stands out like lobster at a chili dinner, or so uncommonly simple that it catches the reader's eye because of its very simplicity. It's also important that you don't get cute with a lot of unrelated graphics and artwork. Your ad should convey the feeling of excitement and movement, but should not tire the eyes or disrupt the flow of the message you are trying to present.
Any graphics or artwork you use should be relevant to your product, it's use and/or the copy you have written about it. Graphics should not be used as artistic touches, or to create an atmosphere. Any illustrations with your ad should compliment the selling of your product, and prove or substantiate specific points in your copy.
Once you have your reader's attention, the only way you are going to keep it is by quickly and emphatically telling him what your product will do for him.
Your potential buyer doesn't care in the least how long it's taken you to produce the product, how long you have been in business, nor how many years you've spent learning your craft. He wants to know specifically how he is going to benefit from the purchase of your product.
Generally, his wants will fall into one of the following categories: Better health, more comfort, more money, more leisure time, more popularity, greater beauty, success and/or security.
Even though you have your reader's attention, you must follow through with an enumeration of the benefits you can gain. In essence, you must reiterate the advantages, comfort and happiness he'll enjoy - as you have implied in your headline.
Mentally picture your prospect - determine his wants and emotional needs - put yourself in his shoes, and ask yourself: If I were reading this ad, what are the things that would appeal to me? Write your copy to appeal to your reader's wants and emotional needs/ego cravings.
Remember, it's not the "safety features" that have sold cars for the past 50 years - nor has it been the need of transportation - it has been, and almost certainly always will be the advertising writer's recognition of people's wants and emotional needs/ego cravings. Visualize your prospect, recognize his wants and satisfy them. Writing good advertising copy is nothing more or less than knowing "who" your buyers are; recognizing what he wants; and then telling him how your product will fulfill each of those wants. Remember this because it's one of the "vitally important" keys to writing advertising copy that does the job you intend for it to do.
The "desire" portion of your ad is where you present the facts of your product; create and justify your prospect's conviction, and cause him to demand "a piece of the action" for himself.
It's vitally necessary that you present "proven facts" about your product because survey results show that at least 80% of the people reading your ad - especially those reading it for the first time - will tend to question its authenticity.
So, the more facts you can present in the ad, the more credible your offer. As you write this part of your ad, always remember that the more facts about the product you present, the more product you'll sell. People want facts as reasons, and/or excuses for buying a product - to justify to themselves and others, that they have not been "taken" by a slick copywriter.
It's like the girl who wants to marry the guy her father calls a "no good bum." Her heart - her emotions - tell her, yes, but she needs to nullify the seed of doubt lingering in her mind - to rationalize her decision to go on with the wedding.
In other words, the "desire" portion of your ad has to build belief and credibility in the mind of your prospect. It has to assure him of his good judgment in the final decision to buy - furnish evidence of the benefits you have promised - and afford him a "safety net" in case anyone should question his decision to buy.
People tend to believe the things that appeal to their individual desires, fears, and other emotions. Once you have established a belief in this manner, logic and reasoning are used to support it. People believe what they "want" to believe. Your reader "wants" to believe your ad if he has read it through this far - it is up to you to support his initial desire.
Study your product and everything about it - visualize the wants of your prospective buyers - dig up the facts, and you'll almost always find plenty of facts to support the buyer's reasons for buying.
Here is where you use the results of tests conducted, growing sales figures to prove increasing popularity, and "user" testimonials or endorsements. It's also important that you present these facts - test results, sales view, and not that of the manufacturer.
Before you end this portion of your ad and get into your demand for action, summarize everything you've presented thus far. Draw a mental picture for your potential buyer. Let him imagine owning the product. Induce him to visualize all of the benefits you have promised. Give him the keys to seeing himself richer, enjoying luxury, having time to do whatever he would like to do, and with all of his dreams fulfilled.
This can be handled in one or two sentences or spelled out in a paragraph or more, but it is the absolute ingredient you must include prior to closing the sale. Study all the sales presentations you have ever heard - look at every winning ad - this is the element included in all of them that actually makes the sale for you. Remember it, use it, and don't try to sell anything without it.
As Victor Schwab puts is so succinctly in his best selling book, How To Write A Good Advertisement: Every one of the fundamentals in the "master formula" is necessary. Those sitting across from him at your dining people who are "easy" to sell may perhaps be sold even if some of these factors are left out, but it's wiser to plan your advertisement so that it will have a powerful impact upon those who are "hardest" to sell. For, unlike face-to-face selling, we cannot in printed advertising come to a "trial close" in our sales talk - in order to see if those who are easier to sell will welcome the dotted line without further persuasion. We must assume that we are talking to the hardest ones - and that the more thoroughly our copy sells both the hard and the easy, the better chance we have against the competition for the consumer's dollar - and also the less dependent we will be upon the usual completely ineffective follow through on our advertising effort which later takes place at the sales counter itself.
As always,
To your success!
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