Making Your Marketing More Effective
By: Stacy Karacostas
Stacy Karacostas here from http://www.success-stream.com with another quick audio marketing tip. In case you don’t like listening to audio, below are the transcripts for today’s podcast, “An Easy Way to Make Your Small Business Marketing Materials Way More Effective… And Make Sure They Get Read!”
I’ve often noticed that when I talk to my clients about their products or services, they say the most amazing, engaging and interesting things. But when I read their marketing materials it usually sounds more like the teacher from the old Charlie Brown cartoons “wha wha, waa waa, waa whaaaa”.
The great ad man David Ogilvy once said “You can never bore someone into buying from you.”
And he was right. The last thing you want is for your marketing to be dry, boring and about as fun to read as a software manual, annual report or thesis statement.
The problem is that copywriting, or writing to sell, is completely different from any other type of writing out there. And it’s the polar opposite of the way most of us learned to write term papers, essays and scientific reports in school.
Which is a bummer, since having effective copy is critical to the success of your business. Because whenever you can’t be there to speak to clients or prospects in person, it’s your copy that does the job for you. But that’s assuming it’s actually being read.
Unless I know for sure I’m going to get something I want or need out of it, you’d have to pay me a boatload of money to get me to read annual reports and scientific papers (and I’m a readaholic who happily browses the back of an aerosol can if it’s sitting in front of me).
Your prospects feel the same way when you use dull, lifeless, academic-sounding writing in your marketing or advertising.
So what do you do?
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Learn to write like you speak!
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Anytime you sit down to write your marketing or sales materials-whether you’re selling to businesses or consumers-think of it as a one-on-one conversation with the reader. To create that conversation your writing needs to sound like a real person, not a textbook.
How do you do that? First, write like you normally would. Then, use these nifty tricks to make your words come to life…
- Get rid of 50-cent words. A good rule of thumb is to find and replace any words with three or more syllables with one or two shorter words. “Better” is better than “preferable”. If you’re struggling here, grab a thesaurus.
- Read your writing out loud, or better yet, have a friend or spouse read it to you. If it doesn’t flow like someone having a casual conversation, it needs work.
- Finally, if you’re really struggling with this, try grabbing a digital recorder or plugging a mike into your computer and record yourself talking about your products or services. Then simply have that transcribed and give it a quick edit and it should be good to go.
Follow these three simple tips and you’ll end up with marketing materials that are more engaging, readable and interesting. That’s sure to translate into more sales.
