Copy Writing Lessons From Joseph Sugarman Advertising Secrets of the Written Word (Notes) - Part 2

Continued from:  Copy Writing Lessons From Joseph Sugarman Advertising Secrets of the Written Word (Notes) - Part 1

Axiom 9
Never sell a product or service. Always sell a concept.

Physical facts
You need to talk about weight, dimensions, limits, speed, etc. Don't give readers any excuse to not buy. If you don't give the customer all the facts they won't order. List the physical dimensions even in cases where you think they are not that important.

trial period
You must offer a trial period for any product the consumer cannot touch or feel at the time of purchase. Make sure that the trial period is at least one month. The longer the trial period the less chance the product will be returned and the more confidence the consumer will have in dealing with you and purchasing the item. A customer just knowing that they could return an item is enough to make them feel comfortable holding the purchase.

price comparison
Whenever possible, show the price comparison to another product. This established value in the mind of the purchaser. This will link out that the product is great value. If your product is the most expensive you want to suggest that it has more or better features. If your product is less expensive, then you want to focus on better value and use a price comparison. Your comparison must be 100% accurate and fair or you could be sued by the company whose product you are comparing.

Testimonials
A testimonial is a great way to add credibility. This technique can not only be used in the copy but also in the headline or photo. See if your ad copy could use a celebrity for a testimonial. Make sure the testimonial makes sense for the product. Whatever testimonial you use make sure it is authentic and honest. The public will see right through a lie.

Attach product to concept
Chess computer. Story of two proffesional chess players playing against each other. Once one has won say he may have won but he is no match for this computer. Then introduce the computer. The concept of the chess match will have sucked the reader in.

Sell a concept not a product.
E.g for a calculator that can store phone numbers. Don't sell the calculator sell the feeling of pulling out your calculator in a group of people and seeing the disbelief on their faces. Sell the unique selling proposition.

Price
If your selling a product at a very good price then make it larger. After all you want people to see that benefit very clearly. If the product is expensive and it's not the price that will sell it, you want to underplay it. Put the price in a logical position in the copy. Highlight it in a bold typeface so when a reader scans the copy they can easily find it.

Offer summary
It's a really good idea to summarise what you are offering to the consumer somewhere near the end of your ad. 'So here's my offer. Order two pots with Teflon coating and you'll receive the two posts plus our handy cookbook and video for the price of only £30.18

Avoid saying too much
Think is there a simpler way of saying this.

Ease of ordering
Make it easy to order.

Ask for the order
Always ask for the order near the end of your ad. Believe it or not, this is often forgotten by many copywriters. At the end of an ad, say something like 'I urge you to buy this at no obligation, today.' Do it at the end when you've finished selling your prospect. Summarise the offer and your prospect is ready to buy.

Feeling of involvement or ownership
Give your reader a feeling of involvement or ownership of the product you are selling. S.g in Joseph sugarmans ad he said 'hold the litronix 2000 in your hand. See how easily the keys snap to the touch. See how small and how light the unit is.' Another example 'when you receive your exercise deceive, work out on it. Adjust the weights. See how easy it is to store under your bed' in short you are making them feel that they have already bought the product.

Honesty
Your advertising must be honest. Consumers are much cleverer than you think. The consumer can tell whether you are being truthful in what you are trying to communicate. The more truthful you are in your advertising the more effectively your message will be accepted by your prospect's. For example point out the flaws to the products and then of course explain why the flaws really don't amount to much and why the consumer should still buy the product. Consumers really appreciate the truth.

Integrity
Integrity can be reflected by the choices you make in the layout of your ad. Is it clean and neat? Or is it shouting out at you with color bars and rubbing in different directions and headlines screaming and words underlined and pictures exaggerated? The integrity of the person delivering the message is always amazingly clear to the recipient.

Credibility
Credibility is about being believable. In an ad product whose price is exceptionally low, you've got to convey that the offer you are making as great as it may seem, is indeed a valid offer. Let's say you are offering something for £10 that everybody else is selling for £40. Your job is establishing credibility for your price. You might explain that you are buying a very large volume from the Far East and that you were able to buy the remaining stock from a manufacturer for a very low price. Credibility also means truthful less. Does the consumer really believe you? Rash statements, cliches and some exaggerations will remove any credibility your offer may have had. A thing that will dramatically decrease your credibility is by high ding or avoiding an obvious fault of the product or service. You need to raise all objections and resolve them. You enhance the credibility through the use of a brand name or product. Adding an appropriate celebrity endorser is another effective way to enhance credibility.

Value and proof of value
In an ad you want to convey, through examples or by comparison, that what the customer is buying is a good value. For example you could compare prices will similar features and point out that you are providing a better value. By positioning and comparing it with others or proving the value of something even though the value may not be apparent, you are providing the logic with the prospect can justify the purchase. Simply educating the reader to the great value of your product is equivalent lowering its price. In a such intense competition in the world you must resolve the question in the readers mind that goes 'am I buying the product at the best price?'

Justify the purchase
A question people think about while reading an ad is 'can I really justify this purchase?' Once again this is another question that must be resolved. Somewhere in the ad you must resolve any objection by providing some justification to the purchaser. Sometimes it's just by saying 'you deserve it.' Other times you have to justify it by terms of savings(the price is a one time value) heal reasons(like it will protect your eyes, recognition (the men in your life will love the way you look in it) dozens of other reasons based on the wants and needs of your prospect, the higher the price point the more need there is to justify the purchase. The lower the price point or the more value the price presents the less you have to justify the purchase.

Greed
Greed in the form of attraction to bargains is a very strong motivating factor. Don't hesitate to recognise greed as a very strong factor in either low priced merchandise or expensive products offered at low prices. Too low a price may diminish your credibility unless you justify the low price. When you lower the price of a product you usually end up with more unit sales. Keep lowering the price, and you'll continue to generate more unit sales than before it the price drop is big enough. Go too low and you'll have to add a little justification for the lower price as it will start raising credibility issues with your prospects.

Establish authority
There is always something that you can say about your company to establish your authority, size, position or intention. For example calling a company 'America's largest single source of space age products' you are establishing authority as you are establishing the company as a major supplier. If you are the smallest you can say 'the hardest working bunch of guys in the chimney sweep business. Examine your company and you will find something that you can say to establish your authority and expertise in what you are selling. People love to buy from experts. So buy establishing that authority they will naturally see you as an expert. People want the reassurance and that line of authority will be just what they need. People naturally respect knowledgeable authority. If you have that authority presented people will listen to you when you describe the product and even if they don't know what you are talking about they will still feel like they are making the right choice buying that product. Nobody wants to make a mistake. If you trust the sales organisation, the experts, then you won't need any outside expert opinion. People need reassurance that they made the right purchase.

satisfaction conviction
It basically conveys the message from you to your prospect that says, 'hey, I'm so convinced you will like this product that I'm going to do something for your benefit to prove how incredible my offer is.' If your potential customer after reading what you are going to do says something like, 'they must really believe in their product' or 'how can they do it' or 'are they going to get ripped off by customers who will take advantage of their generosity?' Then you know you've got a great example of satisfaction conviction. An example of this: 'if you're unhappy with BluBlockers, I'll let you return them anytime you want. There is no trial period.' Here you conveyed to the customer that they are going to be so satisfied because you were willing to do something that was rarely done. Another example 'if you aren't happy with your purchase, just call me up and I'll personally arrange to have it picked up at my expense and refund you every penny of your purchase price including the time you took to return the product.' The ideal satisfaction conviction should raise an objection and solve it. And when resolving it go beyond what people expect. For example 'what if I don't buy from your 2 year bulletin over a two year period' and then Joseph sugarman resolved this problem with a satisfaction conviction - something that went beyond what people expected. 'Fine send us your membership card and we'll fully refund your five Dillard's plus send you interest on your money' make sure the satisfaction conviction makes sense for the offer. You don't want to raise an objection and then satisfy it with the wrong solution. Make sure the objection is indeed satisfied by the correct resolution. In short it's got to make sense.

Nature of product
First realise every product has its own unique personality, it's own unique nature, and it's up to you to figure it out. How do you present the drama of that product? Every product has one very powerful way of presenting itself that will express the true advantages and emotion that the product has to offer and motivate the largest number of people to buy it. Examples include - what is the nature of a toy? It's a fun game- so you bring out the enjoyment. Very often common sense is all you need to understand and appreciate the nature of a product. You must understand the nature of the product you are selling or you won't effectively sell it. Final example a burglar alarm- the nature of this is a serious product that should be easy to install, work when it is supposed to and provide protection to concerned homeowners.

Current fads
Be aware of current fads so you can determine the hottest product categories and also the new language of our time.(a fad is an intense and widely shared enthusiasm for something, especially one that is short-lived; a craze.) you want to recognise and harmonise with them. Fads generate publicity. Fads generate publicity, catch a fad at the right time. The minute there is a lot of publicity about something and it has the potential of turning into a fad, consider the possibility that is a good signal for you to exploit the opportunity. A fad can die as quickly as it can grow. Knowing how to recognise a fad and capitalise on it can be a very powerful tool if your timing is right.

Timing
Timing has a lot to do with fads. You want to be involved at the beginning of a fad and not enter in the middle or the end. You don't know when it is a good time to introduce a new product. But for example when crime j creased, it was good common sense to offer burglar alarms. Timing can kill or make a product.

Desire to belong
People buy a specific product because they subconsciously want to belong to to the group that already owns or uses that specific product. For example the people who buy a Mercedes often want to belong to that specific group of Mercedes owners. The Mercedes owner wants to be indenture with the class or group of people who also own a Mercedes. The desire to belong to and identify with a group of people who own a specific product is one of the most powerful psychological motivators to be aware of in marketing and copywriting.

Desire to collect
For example a watch buyer. An enthusiastic watch buyer is your perfect prospect for another watch. Targeting customers who have previously ordered watches and then sending ads to them for other watches received a great response. This is because people like to collect things. When selling recognise that there is a very large segment of the population who for whatever reason have an emotional need to collect a series of similar products.

curiosity
A level of curiosity surrounding a certain product will make it more attractive to a prospect. 'What is the product really like?' Might be the typical thought of a prospect. For example blue blocker sun glasses. Video tape the reactions of people putting them in. Present the great reactions and deliberately don't show what it looks like to look through them. This adds curiosity as it makes the prospect ask the question 'what was it like to look through these glasses-that pair of sunglasses with the orange lenses that was making everybody go wild?'In copy you can tease the prospect by telling them what they will find out by reading your copy. Realise that there are many other products that lend themselves to holding back part of the story in order to arouse curiosity and create a demand. Show too much and tell to much you run the risk of killing whatever advantage you had.

Sense of urgency
Once you've sold the prospect and the prospect believes in your product you might think you've done it. However many of your customers say 'well let me think about it' when ever a prospect does this chances are they won't buy. To avoid this you must provide prospect's with an incentive or reason to buy now. This is what you don't want to do. By the end of your copy the prospect has dpeny a lot of time on your ad and you've convinced him or her to buy. You don't want to blow your integrity by making a statement that is not true at the end of the copy. Like a statement saying 'if you don't respond within the next few days, we'll be sold out,' or some other deceit to turn off the prospect. Whatever you say at the end must be true. How do you add a sense of urgency? For example calculator ad- the wrong price was listed and the acutely price was £20 higher, but you had a few days to purchase the product at the old price before the new price went into effect. You can also add sense of urgency by offering limited editions. 'We only have 1000 sets and this will be our last advertisement. A fatal error includes leaving out important information that the buyer needs to make that buying decision. If you leave it out they can make the excuse 'there's a question I have but I'm too busy to call and find out the answer' other ways to create a sense of urgency include: low supplies, close out opportunity, price rise, product shortages, limited time price opportunity or limited edition opportunity. Say 'but now so you can start enjoying the benefits of my product tomorrow' the sense of urgency statements always go at the end of your advertising.

Instant Gratification
This is a big advantage of retail. The prospect can pick up the product look at it and hold it. To do this is copy you should convey the advantages of ordering from you via mail or the assurance that you ship promptly and that the customer will have his or her purchase within a few days.

Exclusivity, rarity or uniqueness
These are very strong motivating factors for the right product or the right situation. Make the prospect feel that he is special if he buys a particular product- that he will belong to the very small group that can be envied for owning this very limited item. The emotional appeal of this approach is quite strong. Everybody likes to feel special. Most people like to belong to a rare group that owns a product that few people can own and enjoy.

Simplicity
You must keep your advertising copy simple. Your offer must be simple. In short you want to keep your entire presentation as simple as possible while still getting across your message. There are times although when you want to turn something simple into something complex like in product explanation. Focus on what you are trying to accomplish and eliminate things that either complicate your presentation or aren't necessary. Use simple words as they are the most understood and gave the greatest impact. Keep your layouts simple too. Offering a customer too many choices is a very dangerous thing to do. Giving a consumer a confusing array of choices means that the consumer will back off and not buy. The watch example. People who bought from the simple ad get shown the second ad with more watch choices later after their purchase. This is because the people who bought the first watch will be interested in Swiss army watches and will be likely to buy more.

Human relationships
It is always important to relate the product or service you are offering in human terms. How the product will fit, how it will feel, how it will look-all are just some of the ways you can relate. Buying is an emotional human experience. When creating an advertisement it is important that you create a condition where your customer is in perfect harmonic resonance with your copy. Make the prospect start nodding their head by asking yes questions so when you ask for the order they are likely to say yes. Think of your ad a a group of tuning forks. They all vibrate at the same frequencies. One fork might be the headline, another might be the picture, another might be the caption, and in to the first sentence and through the copy to the final offer. In a print ad, the vibrations must be conveyed through the elements in the advertisement. In order to create these positive vibrations, you must first interest the prospect in reading your copy and then you must really 'tune in' and relate to your prospect. Add a human element by rating a story in your copy. Stories hold peoples interest. You could also use a byline and write copy in the first person using conversational tone. Using humour is also a way to develop a human relationship with your prospect. Another approach is to use a picture of a human hand holding a small product. The hand adds size and perspective to what is being presented and also adds that human element. You could use attractive models as people relate to pretty women or handsome men even if they themselves are not attractive. In your advertising you want to use as many positive human elements as you can without risking any negative vibrations from emotional reactions.

Guilt
Example of guilt- when you buy from a company and in the parcel you receive the product and a 1 dollar bill or a colourful stamp. You receive something of value and feel the obligation to take some action in return. In print the way you do this by giving the reader plenty of compelling information and reading entertainment-so much so that they sense an obligation to respond. Repeat mailings cause guilt. Keep sending someone mailings and after a while they will feel guilty that they haven't responded.

Specificity
Being specific in your explanations is very critical and can establish your credibility. Example 'new dentists everywhere use and recommend capsnap toothpaste,' it sounds like typical advertising lingo designed to sell a product. It's too generally. Instead say '92% of new dentists use and recommend Capsnap toothpaste,' it sounds much more believable, the consumer is likely to think that we did a scientific survey and that 92% was the result. Statements with specific facts can generate strong believability. Saying 'the blue blocker sunglasses block out blue light damaging your retina . You block those blue rays that don't focus on your retina and therefor objects appear clearer, sharper and more defined.' This is specific and is a lot better and more believable than saying 'blublocker sunglasses let you see clearer, sharper and with more definition. Being specific also makes you sound like an expert. By being specific you sound like you are an expert on your product. This build trust and confidence between you and the prospect. Making specific claims using exact facts and figures is a lot more believable.

Familiarity
If somebody sees an advertising format-something they have seen many times before-and recognises your logo and company name, there use a feeling of familiarity.. You are familiar and as a result there is an attraction to your offering. Just like how Joseph sugarman felt an attraction to his American supplier in Hong Kong. Advertise enough times or sell a product whose name is familiar to your prospect and you will create the same attraction. People feel most comfortable with people they are familiar with. They feel confident and trusting and allow themselves to be more vulnerable. They trust a brand name, are more confident that they are buying the right product and are more inclined to do so. A big mistake is to kill campaigns because they have been used for a long time. Keep running it until the public tells you to stop by virtue of lower sales. The orders simply stop coming in or you have replaced your ad with something that pulls more response. 'Tweak' your ad until it does better, never drop a campaign because you are simply tired of it. Use familiar words. There are certain words that are more familiar to most people. For example if you ask somebody to pick a number from 1-10 right off the top of their head, chances are 7 will be chosen more often than any other number. Therefore using 7 in a title like 'the seven ways to improve your relationships' is utilising the most common and familiar integer of the first 10. You are therefore vibrating with the familiar and harmonising with your reader. Asking somebody for a colour off the top of their head and they will answer 'red' the majority of the time. The most familiar piece of furniture is a chair. Find these familiar words in books by David ogilby or John caples. Use Powerful words like 'sale' and 'free' . Then there are the not so obvious ones, the ones that relate specifically to your product and which you passionate devotee of your product already know. As a copywriter be aware of the powerful force of familiarity to make a person feel comfortable with your product or service. Realise that the importance of a familiar brand name, logo that appears many times and becomes well known, a layout that people instinctively know is yours, familiar phrases(not cliches) and words that your public can harmonise with- all of these create the bond that familiarity creates between you and your prospect.

Hope
Hope can be a great motivator in the buying process. For example. A woman buys new face cream that offers hope it will make a difference to her wrinkles. In short, there is an implied possibility that using a product or service will provide future benefit. The future benefit is not assured or guranteed, it is a possibility. Example- Joseph sugarman had a problem under his skin. A scientist offered a formulae that could eliminate the problem completely. 'I'm just a few months they'll be gone' in short Joseph sugarman received an explicitly clear time frame during which his growths would melt away and disappear. The promise wasn't in the form of a hoped for result or dream or even a possibility. It was a definite warranty that they would disappear. The scientis made a fatal error although. When sugarman saw little results in the first few months he was disappointed. If the scientist had not made any claims about specific expected results sugarman would have continued taking the product waiting and hoping that the stuff would kick in and work. When using the psychological trigger of hope you must avoid the trap of making a specific claim that can be measured or guaranteed. You want to allude to what the product is used for without making any promises if an exact outcome. The key is to imply results through testimonials. You need to determine the nature of your product and find something that you can imply about a future result without stating a specific guarantee. Focus on credibility. One aspect to focus on when you create an ad using the power of hope is credibility. If you present yourself as a credible person representing a credible company, then what you say will draw out confidence on the part of your prospect. The whatever you say your product did for your precious customers will be taken as a possibility for your prospect, and the power of bike will compel your prospect to order. It might be a book on relationships and how information changed your life and those of previous readers.

Axiom 15
The more the mind must work to reach a conclusion successfully, the more positive, enjoyable or stimulating the experience.

Make the reader think
Advertising which pleasurably engages the senses, emotions and thought process as well as our innate intuition will tend to be successful. Make your advertising stimulate the 4 parts of the brain. These 4 parts of the brain include the part that controls thinking, the part that controls intuition, the part that controls sensation and the part that controls emotion. If you make your copy too obvious the reader will either feel looked down upon or bored. Provide a little suspense so that the reader has to come to a conclusion on his or her own using intuition, thinking, sensation and emotion. For example 'the Seiko chronograph alarm sells for £300. The watch costs jewellers £150. And jewellers love the item, not only because of the excellent reputation of the seiko brand, but because it's probably America's best-selling new expensive digital watch. And seiko can't supply enough of them to dealers' what he didn't say was that the jewellers were making a small fortune each time they sold a seiko. He didn't have to say it, yet the readers could come to their own conclusion all by themselves using intuition, thinking and emotions. Had he made it obvious by adding the line 'and jewellers are making a small fortune', it would not have been as powerful. The mind had to work a little to reach a conclusion through its own thought processes. This makes the difference between talking down to a prospect and making the prospect think along with you. Anything that causes the mind to work hard to reach a conclusion creates a positive, enjoyable or stimulating effect in the brain. The opposite is true if the mind does not have to work hard and the conclusion is obvious.

Telling too much will hurt a sale
Telling too much in copy can actually harm a sale. How do you write copy that doesn't say too much? You do it in the editing process. You go over your copy after you've written it and you edit with the thought in the back of your mind 'am I saying more than I have to?Am I challenging my readers minds? Am I being too obvious?'

Sell a cure, not prevention
The key to successfully marketing certain products lies in the nature of that product and the way that the product is viewed in the market place. Always sell a cure and avoid selling a prevention. For example if I tried to sell you a magic pill that would help prevent cancer, chances are it would be a difficult sale. On the other hand if you suddenly discovered that you had cancer and I said to you that I had a magic pill that would cure the disease, you would be not only willing to try it, but willing to pay considerably more. It's a humans nature to think you're never going to get the disease I affliction that the preventative can prevent, so it becomes tough to sell. The second is if you do get the disease or affliction you're willing to pay a whole lot more for the cure than you were for the preventative and it's easier to sell. You must first make a decision when evaluating a product. Is this product a preventative or a cure. Can the product be positioned as a cure rather than a preventative? Is the market trend changing the perception of your product from being a preventative to a cure? Or do you simply have a preventative that does not have a broad enough market? If you've got a cure and the market is large enough, you've got a powerful product. If you've got a preventative, think in terms of how you can change it into a cure.

How to make a preventative a cure
You have to emphasise the curative aspects of the product and underplay the preventative features. Belief is one of the strongest motivational factors in human nature. If your prospect believes in something he or she will move mountains to obtain it. That is why it is difficult to sell breakthrough products as people find them hard to believe. This is why you have to convince them and make them believe that they work. You can charge a lot more for a cure than a preventative. Some products can be changed from a preventative to a cure.

Axiom 16
Selling a cure is a lot easier than selling a preventative unless the preventative is perceived as a cure or the curative aspects of the preventative are emphasise.

Telling a story
People love stories, and one of the really good ways to relate to your audience is to tell a story. A story can be invaluable and often provides an emotional relationship that keeps the reader riveted and reading. Stories have lessons to teach. If you can tell a story in your advertisement that is relevant to either selling your product, creating the environment or getting the prospect well into your copy and into the slippery slide, you are using this wonderful and powerful tool as a very effective way to sell your product or service. Some stories add a human element which allows you to relate more closely with your prospect. 'I realised that selling is a matter of capturing peoples attention and holding it with a good story.' Using a story is a great way to relate to your readers. Often the best stories are told in the first person and sound like a personal message from the writer to the prospect. Other stories are told in the third person, but because they are in story form, they still sound quite personal and very compelling. If you weave a story around a product, it makes for both interesting reading and a way to develop your slippery slide and that perfect buying environment.

Remember this
Selling in person is very similar to selling in copy.

Axiom 17
Telling a story can effectively sell your product, create the environment or get the reader well into your copy as you create an emotional bonding with your prospect.

Rating your writing level
There is a way to rate how good your copy is and how clear it is to understand. To reach a mass market you must keep your ad copy simple, the sentences would be short and you wouldn't use big words. If you wanted to reach a very upscale audience you might use bigger words and longer sentences. These are the ways to grade your copy:

1) take a sample of copy-start with 100 to 125 words from the very beginning of the ad.

2) count the words in each sentence.
Dates and numbers equal one word and independent clauses count as separate sentences(e.g 'we studied, we learned' would be two sentences.

3) divide the total number of words by the number of sentences to get the average sentence length.

4) count the number of long words(those of of 3 or more syllables):

A. Do not include proper names
B. Do not count short word combinations like 'yellow tail'
C. Do not include verbs that have become 3 or more syllables by adding 'Ed' or 'Es'.

5) divide the number of long words by the total number of words in the selection to get the percentage of long words.

6) add the average sentence length to the perception long words.

7) multiply the total by 0.4 to get the grade level. Let's say you do all this and get. 4.9, this means your copy is comprehensible to anyone reading at about the 5th grade level and above. Make sure to test this with different parts of your copy to test how consistent your style is.

Remember the more comprehensible your copy is the broader the appeal and the greater response it will have. However do not be obsessed with achieving low scores on this test at the expense of common sense.

Make sure not to make mistakes at the end
You can write a great ad but then miss some great opportunities at the end. And the end of the ad is when the buying decision hard to be made-it's a critical point in any advertisement. In the Victoria's Secret example they forgot to raise the objection of what if the customer after buying the catalog was disappointed. They did not talk about their return policy. They could have said 'we are so confident that you'll love our catalog that we are willing to give you a complete refund if you are at all dissatisfied.'

Raise an objection then resolve it
Don't hide the faults or problems. Be honest with your readers and highlight those problems to them, then explain why the either don't matter or why they are insignificant. Don't try to resolve an objection without actually addressing it. This is what the writers of the DC-10 aircraft copy did. Lesson learned, realise the importance of raising an objection regardless of how embarrassing or detrimental it may seem and the do your best to resolve it.