March 11, 2010 at 13:52Texts selling or how can words trade?
I was assigned to write about selling texts. To tell you the truth, I am not a supporter of endowing material objects with mythical properties. Therefore, the term “selling texts”, which has become established in the marketing environment, seems to me not quite correct. Agree, texts cannot sell anything by themselves. To stand behind the counter, put on an apron and vault: "Hot, fresh pies, boiled corn, sugar tubes, juche ...". Therefore, before telling about a few secrets of writing effective texts aimed at stimulating direct sales, I propose to understand the terms.
Things in your own name
So, selling texts. This is an allegorical definition of high-quality information and advertising materials, the main task of which is to encourage the reader to take an action: the desire to learn more about a product or service, immediately take advantage of the discount, participate in the competition, call the company, get a free consultation and so on.
“What is missing from your texts to sell more ?!”, “How to breathe life into a selling text?”, “Selling texts sell themselves!” - for a while we will forget these calls of beginning copywriters. Let us try to analyze typical errors in the work on creating an effective text using examples and try to derive a certain unified formula, which should be professional informational materials.
Sewn with white thread
In most cases, selling texts are the basis of good commercial offers, mailing lists, advertising printed products (leaflets, booklets, flyers and special offers), to a lesser extent, sites. At the same time, “selling” texts are not only printed, it may well be a speech at a specialized conference, an appeal through the connection of a speaker in a shopping center, dialogue during a telephone conversation.
The term "selling texts" came to us from the west. The well-established expression “Sales letters”, or selling letters, pleased Russian specialists. One of the first to learn this method was the owner of the legendary sewing machine factory, Isaac Merritt Singer. An unofficial ideologist of American marketing in the 1850s printed an advertisement for Singer sewing machines on the back of church hymns and theater programs. An intuitive desire to solve the problem with sales of sewing machines prompted the businessman to make non-standard solutions. Singer had no doubt, the main thing is to convince housewives of the need to buy a modern and convenient sewing machine and refuse manual sewing with a needle and thread. And they will persuade their husbands to fork out for goods outlandish for that time. Later the technology was called "Direct-marketing" or "One-to-one marketing" - direct response marketing and "Direct-response", when the consumer is invited to participate in a special promotion, get a discount, call the studio, send three labels, guess the rebus . It is believed that these technologies were widely used in Europe during the Renaissance. With the advent of the first printing press, merchants published catalogs where they announced the prices of inexpensive books by talented authors. But it is unlikely that in the 15th century, merchants saw print advertising as an effective method of marketing goods in the future. that these technologies were widely used in Europe during the Renaissance. With the advent of the first printing press, merchants published catalogs where they announced the prices of inexpensive books by talented authors. But it is unlikely that in the 15th century, merchants saw print advertising as an effective method of marketing goods in the future. that these technologies were widely used in Europe during the Renaissance. With the advent of the first printing press, merchants published catalogs where they announced the prices of inexpensive books by talented authors. But it is unlikely that in the 15th century, merchants saw print advertising as an effective method of marketing goods in the future.
Fly with greetings
Not a single universal recipe has yet been invented on how to make the text “selling”. In this regard, I often ask the question: Have you ever met at least once in your life to read a text that would convince you to buy a product that hour? Most of the respondents respond to it positively, provided that they needed this product, and they purposefully went to search for it. In all other cases, no text is capable of independently selling a product or service. The task of the text is to interest the buyer and perplex him to learn more about the announced object. Therefore, let us leave the rhetorical question: “Is the text capable of persuading to acquire what you do not need?” And try to figure out how to write a text that can convince and compose the reader to itself. Here are three fundamental theoretical principles, following which you can take a few steps closer to creating a truly high-quality text. You probably know them:
The first one. The text can be effective if it meets the needs of the target audience, is addressed through a correctly selected channel for the message, it basically contains interesting factual information about the announced object. In addition, the text should be written concisely and not contain unnecessary information that can confuse, create doubt or mislead.
The second one. Thinking through the basis of the "selling" text, remember the terrible truth, nobody wants to read your text. Therefore, you will have to write such an informational message that could interest absolutely any outside person within 7-10 seconds.
The third.When starting to write a text, think about what would be interesting and important to hear for your potential client. To do this, it is enough to determine the range of problems associated with the advertised object, which may confuse the client in your unique selling proposition, what difficulties you can help him solve with a service or product.
Fourth.Follow the basic rules for building text. The text begins with a headline - this is one of the most important components of communication. The title, with rare exceptions, should not be too long, preferably up to 80 characters with spaces. An interesting lead picks up the baton, up to 300 characters with spaces. The lead reveals the main advantage of your offer to the client, intrigues the reader, stimulates him to run his eyes over the text further. The introduction picks up the main part of the text, within the framework of which it is necessary to try to reveal the essence of the proposal in 3-6 sentences. If you manage to present the main message in an original way and not get away from the topic, the chances of reading the text to the end increase. The call-to-action message ends. If you managed to achieve what you want, and the person read the text, consider it led by your word, The customer needs to be gently nudged into action. This is a very common mistake - the text does not end with anything and does not suggest the reader to take any action. The client needs to explain what he can do to learn more or participate and what he will do for it. Mandatory completion of communication should be contact information.
Fifth. The text should be beautifully designed. The graphic design of the "selling" text is no less important than the message plot. The design of the text should be moderately business, modest, without the use of deliberately screaming colors and signs. If this is a commercial offer of a company, the logo of the company must be present. A “clean” and neatly designed sentence increases the chances of reading it.
The art of persuasion with a word
How to write an effective commercial offer? How to give the correct argument? How to identify consumer groups and interest in the proposal? In order to answer these questions it is enough to know what mistakes should not be made in working on texts.
It is completely unimportant to the addressee of advertising communication in which year and under what circumstances your company was formed. No need to talk about the company and its mission. If your offer is of interest, the client will independently read information about the company on the website and find reviews in the search engine.
Tell the client what you offer and what actions he should take to try and take advantage of your offer.
Do not write a lot of letters. Brevity is the seller’s girlfriend.
Do not promise the client golden mountains, even if you can arrange them. The client will not believe it anyway.
Motivate the client, tell us about the most important advantages that he will receive by interacting with you.
An offer may open a new way for a client to solve a familiar problem, be an additional tool in the decision process, or act as a more convenient and convenient service for the implementation of this task. For example, you can offer a client to use a mobile phone instead of shouting through a megaphone connection. This is a new way to solve problems for successful communication. You can offer a person a favorable tariff for communication, which will significantly save his money on negotiations. This is an optional tool. And finally, talk about hands free, so that it is more convenient for the client to communicate on the phone while driving.
Customer tags
In order to formulate a targeted commercial offer, you will have to select all possible consumer groups that may be interested in your service or product. For example, the task was set of promoting an innovative program on the market, which allows to increase website conversion and increase direct sales directly on a corporate resource. Before formulating a proposal, we will describe to whom the program for increasing sales through the site could potentially be of interest.
Entrepreneurs, owners of medium and large businesses, are directly interested in increasing sales through Internet channels. This part of the target group invests significant amounts in the promotion of a corporate website and seeks to increase the efficiency of investments by increasing the conversion of visitors to customers.
Heads of advertising and PR departments, responsible for advertising, PR, corporate website development. We are interested in increasing the effectiveness of advertising, since their position in the company, career and material growth directly depend on this.
Owners of advertising agencies, SEO companies. Interested in services from the sale of which they can receive stable interest.
Independent consultants, freelancers involved in the development of corporate sites. They are directly interested in the growth of their own income through the sale of additional services to customers.
Even such a general description of the consumer market of an it-product will help in writing a text that works to increase sales of the program. Or another example.
Suppose we need to develop a text to announce a partnership program for a building online exchange. The site unites specialists in the repair of apartments, offices, cottages and construction superintendents. Through the site, the contractor can find work, and employers - specialists at the facility. We need to interest owners of construction sites, information and corporate sites on construction and repair, join the affiliate program of this freelance exchange and interest in visiting the site. Text takes up no more than 1 page of word. The main emphasis on the benefits of the program.
The text is based on factual simple calculations that announce the real benefit to the participant. The headline does not shine with creativity and originality. Here it’s enough to say what and for whom we offer: “Affiliate program for construction sites”. Next is the lead: “The annual turnover of the finishing market in Russia is 400-500 million dollars. This is a huge segment of the construction business, part of which may become available to you. The NAME building exchange offers the owners of construction and repair sites a profitable affiliate program. ” Then, in one sentence, we describe the purpose of the affiliate program, thesis, on the points of advantage, the benefit for the participant in numbers and a brief instruction on how to become a partner: “To become a partner, follow the instructions on the site partner.www.ru. We are always ready to help new partners start making money on our program. For any questions, you can contact the support service, which will respond promptly within 2 hours. "
Editor’s Confession:
One day a letter came to my work post with an interesting subject: “5 reasons why it’s beneficial for you to hire me as a copywriter.” The original resume was made ideally in terms of compliance with the technology for presenting information, arranging arguments and accents. It can be seen that the person was trained in courses on marketing and selling texts. However, the text did not cause me anything but a smile. Still, in order to write good texts you need to not only own the technology, but also be able to think competently, beautifully and clearly. To teach this is very difficult.
Olga Koptseva, journalist, CEO of copywriting PR agency Webcontent.ru
Things in your own name
So, selling texts. This is an allegorical definition of high-quality information and advertising materials, the main task of which is to encourage the reader to take an action: the desire to learn more about a product or service, immediately take advantage of the discount, participate in the competition, call the company, get a free consultation and so on.
“What is missing from your texts to sell more ?!”, “How to breathe life into a selling text?”, “Selling texts sell themselves!” - for a while we will forget these calls of beginning copywriters. Let us try to analyze typical errors in the work on creating an effective text using examples and try to derive a certain unified formula, which should be professional informational materials.
Sewn with white thread
In most cases, selling texts are the basis of good commercial offers, mailing lists, advertising printed products (leaflets, booklets, flyers and special offers), to a lesser extent, sites. At the same time, “selling” texts are not only printed, it may well be a speech at a specialized conference, an appeal through the connection of a speaker in a shopping center, dialogue during a telephone conversation.
The term "selling texts" came to us from the west. The well-established expression “Sales letters”, or selling letters, pleased Russian specialists. One of the first to learn this method was the owner of the legendary sewing machine factory, Isaac Merritt Singer. An unofficial ideologist of American marketing in the 1850s printed an advertisement for Singer sewing machines on the back of church hymns and theater programs. An intuitive desire to solve the problem with sales of sewing machines prompted the businessman to make non-standard solutions. Singer had no doubt, the main thing is to convince housewives of the need to buy a modern and convenient sewing machine and refuse manual sewing with a needle and thread. And they will persuade their husbands to fork out for goods outlandish for that time. Later the technology was called "Direct-marketing" or "One-to-one marketing" - direct response marketing and "Direct-response", when the consumer is invited to participate in a special promotion, get a discount, call the studio, send three labels, guess the rebus . It is believed that these technologies were widely used in Europe during the Renaissance. With the advent of the first printing press, merchants published catalogs where they announced the prices of inexpensive books by talented authors. But it is unlikely that in the 15th century, merchants saw print advertising as an effective method of marketing goods in the future. that these technologies were widely used in Europe during the Renaissance. With the advent of the first printing press, merchants published catalogs where they announced the prices of inexpensive books by talented authors. But it is unlikely that in the 15th century, merchants saw print advertising as an effective method of marketing goods in the future. that these technologies were widely used in Europe during the Renaissance. With the advent of the first printing press, merchants published catalogs where they announced the prices of inexpensive books by talented authors. But it is unlikely that in the 15th century, merchants saw print advertising as an effective method of marketing goods in the future.
Fly with greetings
Not a single universal recipe has yet been invented on how to make the text “selling”. In this regard, I often ask the question: Have you ever met at least once in your life to read a text that would convince you to buy a product that hour? Most of the respondents respond to it positively, provided that they needed this product, and they purposefully went to search for it. In all other cases, no text is capable of independently selling a product or service. The task of the text is to interest the buyer and perplex him to learn more about the announced object. Therefore, let us leave the rhetorical question: “Is the text capable of persuading to acquire what you do not need?” And try to figure out how to write a text that can convince and compose the reader to itself. Here are three fundamental theoretical principles, following which you can take a few steps closer to creating a truly high-quality text. You probably know them:
The first one. The text can be effective if it meets the needs of the target audience, is addressed through a correctly selected channel for the message, it basically contains interesting factual information about the announced object. In addition, the text should be written concisely and not contain unnecessary information that can confuse, create doubt or mislead.
The second one. Thinking through the basis of the "selling" text, remember the terrible truth, nobody wants to read your text. Therefore, you will have to write such an informational message that could interest absolutely any outside person within 7-10 seconds.
The third.When starting to write a text, think about what would be interesting and important to hear for your potential client. To do this, it is enough to determine the range of problems associated with the advertised object, which may confuse the client in your unique selling proposition, what difficulties you can help him solve with a service or product.
Fourth.Follow the basic rules for building text. The text begins with a headline - this is one of the most important components of communication. The title, with rare exceptions, should not be too long, preferably up to 80 characters with spaces. An interesting lead picks up the baton, up to 300 characters with spaces. The lead reveals the main advantage of your offer to the client, intrigues the reader, stimulates him to run his eyes over the text further. The introduction picks up the main part of the text, within the framework of which it is necessary to try to reveal the essence of the proposal in 3-6 sentences. If you manage to present the main message in an original way and not get away from the topic, the chances of reading the text to the end increase. The call-to-action message ends. If you managed to achieve what you want, and the person read the text, consider it led by your word, The customer needs to be gently nudged into action. This is a very common mistake - the text does not end with anything and does not suggest the reader to take any action. The client needs to explain what he can do to learn more or participate and what he will do for it. Mandatory completion of communication should be contact information.
Fifth. The text should be beautifully designed. The graphic design of the "selling" text is no less important than the message plot. The design of the text should be moderately business, modest, without the use of deliberately screaming colors and signs. If this is a commercial offer of a company, the logo of the company must be present. A “clean” and neatly designed sentence increases the chances of reading it.
The art of persuasion with a word
How to write an effective commercial offer? How to give the correct argument? How to identify consumer groups and interest in the proposal? In order to answer these questions it is enough to know what mistakes should not be made in working on texts.
It is completely unimportant to the addressee of advertising communication in which year and under what circumstances your company was formed. No need to talk about the company and its mission. If your offer is of interest, the client will independently read information about the company on the website and find reviews in the search engine.
Tell the client what you offer and what actions he should take to try and take advantage of your offer.
Do not write a lot of letters. Brevity is the seller’s girlfriend.
Do not promise the client golden mountains, even if you can arrange them. The client will not believe it anyway.
Motivate the client, tell us about the most important advantages that he will receive by interacting with you.
An offer may open a new way for a client to solve a familiar problem, be an additional tool in the decision process, or act as a more convenient and convenient service for the implementation of this task. For example, you can offer a client to use a mobile phone instead of shouting through a megaphone connection. This is a new way to solve problems for successful communication. You can offer a person a favorable tariff for communication, which will significantly save his money on negotiations. This is an optional tool. And finally, talk about hands free, so that it is more convenient for the client to communicate on the phone while driving.
Customer tags
In order to formulate a targeted commercial offer, you will have to select all possible consumer groups that may be interested in your service or product. For example, the task was set of promoting an innovative program on the market, which allows to increase website conversion and increase direct sales directly on a corporate resource. Before formulating a proposal, we will describe to whom the program for increasing sales through the site could potentially be of interest.
Entrepreneurs, owners of medium and large businesses, are directly interested in increasing sales through Internet channels. This part of the target group invests significant amounts in the promotion of a corporate website and seeks to increase the efficiency of investments by increasing the conversion of visitors to customers.
Heads of advertising and PR departments, responsible for advertising, PR, corporate website development. We are interested in increasing the effectiveness of advertising, since their position in the company, career and material growth directly depend on this.
Owners of advertising agencies, SEO companies. Interested in services from the sale of which they can receive stable interest.
Independent consultants, freelancers involved in the development of corporate sites. They are directly interested in the growth of their own income through the sale of additional services to customers.
Even such a general description of the consumer market of an it-product will help in writing a text that works to increase sales of the program. Or another example.
Suppose we need to develop a text to announce a partnership program for a building online exchange. The site unites specialists in the repair of apartments, offices, cottages and construction superintendents. Through the site, the contractor can find work, and employers - specialists at the facility. We need to interest owners of construction sites, information and corporate sites on construction and repair, join the affiliate program of this freelance exchange and interest in visiting the site. Text takes up no more than 1 page of word. The main emphasis on the benefits of the program.
The text is based on factual simple calculations that announce the real benefit to the participant. The headline does not shine with creativity and originality. Here it’s enough to say what and for whom we offer: “Affiliate program for construction sites”. Next is the lead: “The annual turnover of the finishing market in Russia is 400-500 million dollars. This is a huge segment of the construction business, part of which may become available to you. The NAME building exchange offers the owners of construction and repair sites a profitable affiliate program. ” Then, in one sentence, we describe the purpose of the affiliate program, thesis, on the points of advantage, the benefit for the participant in numbers and a brief instruction on how to become a partner: “To become a partner, follow the instructions on the site partner.www.ru. We are always ready to help new partners start making money on our program. For any questions, you can contact the support service, which will respond promptly within 2 hours. "
Editor’s Confession:
One day a letter came to my work post with an interesting subject: “5 reasons why it’s beneficial for you to hire me as a copywriter.” The original resume was made ideally in terms of compliance with the technology for presenting information, arranging arguments and accents. It can be seen that the person was trained in courses on marketing and selling texts. However, the text did not cause me anything but a smile. Still, in order to write good texts you need to not only own the technology, but also be able to think competently, beautifully and clearly. To teach this is very difficult.
Olga Koptseva, journalist, CEO of copywriting PR agency Webcontent.ru