http://marketingsource.com/articles/ Articles at marketingsource.com Articles Library en-us http://marketingsource.com/articles/book-promotions/business/copywriting/copywriters-5-critical-mistakes-you-may-be-making-in-your-consulting-business.html http://marketingsource.com/articles/book-promotions/business/copywriting/copywriters-5-critical-mistakes-you-may-be-making-in-your-consulting-business.html Thu, 09 Sep 2010 23:32:48 -0500
One thing I learned is that writing is a very small part of being a successful entrepreneur. Don’t get me wrong. You DO need to know how to write. But your success depends largely on your savvy as a businessperson. How do I know? Because I’ve played it from both sides of the street. And I didn’t begin to enjoy success until I started doing some very distinct things in my business.

Please let me share with you some of the mistakes I made starting out so you can avoid those pitfalls yourself…and catapult to success much faster than it took me.

Mistake #1: Don’t attract new clients
When I first started out in 1999 I had exactly one client. He kept me very busy…for awhile. Then, without warning, he suddenly shifted his business to 100% offline and began using a copywriter with more experience in that area. I floundered for 10 months before I got back on my feet again from that blow.

Solution: NEVER stop marketing yourself. Even if you have a full practice, don’t stop getting the word out. Write articles and press releases. Do interviews whenever possible. Start an ezine and/or a blog so your name is always out there. Don’t get caught flat-footed.

Mistake #2: Don’t effectively manage your clients
At first I was so grateful to have any clients that I let them call all the shots – regardless of what was in my best interest. It took me a long time to realize every client is not a match for me. Sometimes they were unreasonable in deadlines. Other times they would call me at all hours…including 6 a.m. and even on the weekends. (Until I learned to communicate better and eventually even fired a few clients!) Bottom line is you can never have enough communication.

Solution: Have the client fill out a detailed questionnaire to open up lines of communication or have a long phone interview (which you record). Get a feel for his or her expectations. Add an extra cushion to your deadline. If possible, get a gatekeeper (assistant) to set up a schedule so you can focus on what you do best – writing.

Mistake #3: Poor time management
Eager to please, I often did not give myself enough lead time for an assignment. I’d say, “I’ll do it!” before I looked at the reality of my schedule. So I’d have to pull all-nighters or miss important family events. I was incredibly stressed and not a lot of fun to be around.

Solution: Plan your daily schedule BEFORE you go to bed at night. Turn off email until you’ve made some headway with your copy. And use a kitchen timer to work in increments of 35 minutes (studies show after that frame your mind craves distraction). When the ding goes off, get up, stretch and clear your head.

Mistake #4: Not getting paid enough
Face it…in your business you do a lot more work than most people realize. You have to do deep research in your industry, around your competition, and with your own target market. You have to attract leads. Then you have to write powerful copy that crawls inside the head of the prospect and leads them to a specific action. You should get paid what you are really worth – no exceptions.

Solution: Value yourself enough to get paid what you’re worth.

Mistake #5: Don’t invest in yourself
I have read the classic “Think and Grow Rich” 16 times. Every time I read it, I learn something new. I have watched the motivational movie “The Secret” 6 times to date. I go to seminars (even when I’ve heard the speakers before). Because I learn something new every time. I have a huge marketing library of books, binders, home study courses, CDs, DVDs, MP3s and I listen to them over and over. Again, every time I go through the material, whether it’s new or old, I learn something new.

Successful people in all walks of life invest in themselves. It’s one of the keys that separates them from the less successful. (Trust me, at times it hurt to part with the massive amounts of cash I’ve laid out for this education. But the payoff happens every time. Just do it.)

Solution: If you’re looking to attract more money into your business, start by investing in yourself. Think LONG TERM. As the old adage says, “If you’re not growing, you’re dying.”

http://www.kickstartcart.com/app/?af=1241548 ]]> http://marketingsource.com/articles/book-promotions/business/copywriting/one-of-20-insider-secrets-to-great-copywriting.html http://marketingsource.com/articles/book-promotions/business/copywriting/one-of-20-insider-secrets-to-great-copywriting.html Thu, 09 Sep 2010 23:25:14 -0500
So how do you get going? Grab a kitchen timer or stopwatch, a piece of paper and a pen. Your bite-sized drill today is to separate out the features from the benefits. So let’s do an exercise.

Before you write a single word of copy, you must define your product or service using features and benefits if you want to really connect with your reader. (When I’m trying to get my features and benefits to poke their heads out, I like to write by hand. I think there’s a connection between the brain and handwriting.)

So, now that we’re on the same page, here are the definitions of each.

A feature is the adjective of the product. It describes what the product is.

The benefit is the emotional component of what the person gets out of the product.

Now schedule 15 minutes of uninterrupted time to play and let’s go!

1.Set your timer for 10 minutes. So take a sheet of paper and fold it in half vertically. In the left hand column write the word “Features”. And on the right, the word “Benefits”.
2.Start brainstorming about what features you offer to clients. Then for every feature find a corresponding benefit. Benefits are what sell. Remember we all want to know, “What’s in it for me?” That’s just the way we’re wired. “How is your product or service going to benefit me?” While the timer is doing its thing, let the ideas flow freely. Don’t judge your answers or edit yourself. Stop on schedule. (You’ll edit later).
3.Reset the timer for the last five minutes. Review your list. Circle the ultimate benefit – this is the benefit your copy and headlines should focus on.
4.Put the other benefits in order of importance. These will become your bullets and subheads.
It’s no secret. The amount of money you make with marketing comes down to how well you craft your words. It’s the most valuable skill you can learn for making money online.

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]]> http://marketingsource.com/articles/e-books/how-to-set-up-a-7-day-e-course.html http://marketingsource.com/articles/e-books/how-to-set-up-a-7-day-e-course.html Thu, 09 Sep 2010 21:21:37 -0500
I highly suggest you subscribe to other people’s e-courses in your field and study what information they offer too.

HERE’S HOW TO GET STARTED
STEP ONE: Outline your topics. First you have to figure out what you think people would want to know about. Do a brainstorm exercise where you limit yourself to 5 minutes (use a timer). Write down all the topics you can think of on your area of expertise. Then edit down until what you have left is what you think is most relevant. For example, here’s the basic outline of my free e-course on copywriting.

Day 1: Overview of copywriting
Day 2: Tips on attracting your target market
Day 3: Features/benefits brainstorm exercise
Day 4: Single most important aspect of writing copy — headlines
Day 5: Keep them reading with the inverted pyramid
Day 6: Copywriting tricks the pros use
Day 7: The Cardinal Rule of Copywriting: Expect to Rewrite

STEP TWO: Go deeper in each subject. Really provide some content here.
Make 2-3 points about each topic. Don’t be afraid to do some hardcore research. Find statistics and trends and use them. Your message doesn’t have to be long, just information-packed. You have the attention of people who “asked” to learn from you. So give them something valuable.

STEP THREE: Tease them till next time. After you’ve educated them, let them know that the next lesson will have something even more mouthwatering. The less specific you are, the more tantalizing the copy. Here are some teaser phrases I used in my e-course. Feel free to swipe versions of them for your own use:

“Hang on till tomorrow and I’ll give you some tips to turn the heads of your target market.”

“In Day 3, you’ll learn the secret method I use in getting copy to sell.”

“Tomorrow you’ll learn the SINGLE most important aspect of copywriting.”

“Next I’ll show you how to keep them reading once you’ve snared them with your headline.”

STEP FOUR: Sign off. End your email like a real letter with a closing like “sincerely”, your name, business and some ways to get a hold of you. Add your website and any tagline you use too.

STEP FIVE: P.S. Alert them to your other products or services. You have something to sell, right? But the purpose of your e-course is to educate and develop a relationship, isn’t it? Don’t worry. You can do both. As long as you’re giving good content, people often like to know if you have something else to buy they would be interested in. For a gentle call to action, I recommend putting a product link with very little text in the P.S. (Studies show that people read the headline first THEN the PS. Weird, huh? But it’s true.)

So to recap. Follow-up is one of the biggest problems in doing business. Autoresponders do it effortlessly

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]]> http://marketingsource.com/articles/email-tips/keys-to-writing-a-solo-email.html http://marketingsource.com/articles/email-tips/keys-to-writing-a-solo-email.html Thu, 09 Sep 2010 19:31:09 -0500
You may not want to hear this – in fact it may even make you mad. But a great way to let people know you have something special for them is through a solo-mailing (an email with a single offer sent to your permission-based list of subscribers).

Solo-mailings are so prolific because they WORK. While I don’t advocate abusing your list by sending them more than a few times per month they ARE effective when done correctly. They have kind of a bad rep because some marketers have a “buy or die” attitude. They send solos out daily or every couple of days until you either buy or unsubscribe. They aren’t worried about building loyalty and trust. They just want a quick buck. (I do not share this philosophy.) Even when you offer something of great value I’ve found three definite trends you can count on with a solo-mailing:

1.You WILL get unsubscribes
2.You WILL get hate mail
3.You WILL make money
It is number 3 that I want you to laser focus on. See, I WANT you to make money. Since you have entrusted me with your email address, I consider it my job to show you as many tactics as I have learned about how to run a successful online business. That being said, here are the 5 keys to making solo-emailing work for YOU:

1.Attention-grabbing subject line. Do you sort through your email and select “delete” without even opening some? Me too. But if the subject line is intriguing the email is much more likely to get read. It’s really the headline for your email. Also try to keep the number of characters on the short side so the words don’t get cut off in the email program. Here are the maximum subject line lengths for some commonly used email programs:
Outlook: 64 characters
AOL: 52 characters
Hotmail: 45 characters
Yahoo: 80 characters

Some of my more successful subject lines were:
I’m not that kind of girl
She didn’t want me to tell!
May I critique your copy?
How to get lucky on Valentine’s Day
Are you in?

Remember, you’re competing with hundreds of other emails so make your subject line strong.

2.Make it Personal. Studies show an increase in response when first names are used in the copy. Think about it. If you were in a busy airport and you heard someone holler out your name, wouldn’t you turn to see who it was? Of course you would. Works in email too. (Techno Tip: The code looks like this: {!name} but when it comes out it reads as the subscriber’s first name. You have to use a delivery system that supports this mail merge tactic.)
3.Dazzle them with your hook. Nothing kills a sale faster than boring copy. So throw in a little soft shoe entertainment. Give your readers a reason why you are having this special sa!e or 0ffer. Tell them a (brief) story. Marketer Jason Potash does an excellent job with hooks. One email explains how he needs his subscribers help to get him out of the doghouse with his wife… so they should buy his product. Tellman Knudson caught my attention with a tale of how he was unable to sleep at night… so I should buy his product. Perry Marshall spun a brilliant story of how as a kid he wanted a robot to do his chores for him but that was just a fantasy; today he knows copywriting is as close as you get to an effortless marketing solution… so you should sign up for his teleseminar. All of these hooks tie back into the offer. A good story keeps them reading.
4.Don’t forget the 0ffer! Let’s have a little chat between the two of us, k? The purpose of your solo-mailing is to generate cash. So remember to ask for it. Allow me to grant you permission to ask for business. Poof! It is okay to ask for business. It is okay to market. It is okay to make money. You, like me, are in business to make a living, correct? So marketing ourselves is a given. I expect to be marketed to… and so should you. Like the late, great Ray Charles said, “If you think in pennies, you get pennies. But when you think in dollars, you get dollars.”
5.Make your P.S. work harder. Your post script, or P.S. is a very highly read bit of copy. It’s that last afterthought of the email. And our eyes are drawn to it like a magnet to steel. So this is a great place to encourage them to take action NOW and place the order link. Even scanners are likely to read the P.S.
For better or for worse, we are all in sales. So face your fears, gulp hard and get out there and market!

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]]> http://marketingsource.com/articles/blogs/what-the-blog.html http://marketingsource.com/articles/blogs/what-the-blog.html Thu, 09 Sep 2010 07:21:36 -0500
See, blogs add humanity and instantaneous expression to the web. Like ezines, blogs are a way for your customer to get to know you.

However, unlike ezines, blogs help you with search engine rankings. Did you hear me? I said, unlike ezines, blogs help you with search engine rankings. That’s a big one.

Entrepreneur Magazine, Business Week, even the FCC (Federal Trade Commission) all believe blogs are here to stay. Michael Powell, chairman of the FCC, started one. His initial post drew over 30,000 readers. A Microsoft spokesperson says Bill Gates is considering starting a blog. And filmmaker Michael Moore built a blog to promote his controversial movie, Fahrenheit 9/11.

But who has time to read a blog anyway? Exactly! The job of a blog is to cut through the information overload and deliver searchable, relevant and current content. Blog Ads recently conducted a survey of over 17,000 blog readers. Here’s what they report:

Blog readers are older and more affluent. 61% of blog readers are over 30, and 75% make more than $45,000 a year.

Blog readers are more cyber-active. 54% of their news consumption is online. 21% are themselves bloggers and 46% describe themselves as opinion makers.
Blog readers are media-mavens. 21% subscribe to the New Yorker magazine, 15% to the Economist, 15% to Newsweek and 14% to the Atlantic Monthly.

Whether on the left or right, blog readers have traits in common that often are absent in today’s public spaces: passion and initiative.

Blog readers have apathy towards traditional news sources. 82% say that television is worthless. 55% percent say the same about print newspapers. 54% say the same about print magazines.

Meanwhile, 86% say that blogs are either useful or extremely useful as sources of news or opinion. 80% say they read blogs for news they can’t find elsewhere. 78% read because the perspective is better. 66% value the faster news. 61% say that blogs are more honest.

Blog readers appear united in their dissatisfaction with conventional media and their rabid love of blogs.

Don’t you want to be a blogger too?

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