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But I’m not a writer and I can’t write!

Guest post by: Ron Ruhle

Article Overview: 5 years ago, if you’d have said to my parents that I was going to be a writer and copywriter they would have been rolling around on the floor laughing! They would have laughed every single day about what you’d said. Every time they saw you they would just curl up!

But I’m not a writer and I can’t write!

If you'd have said to my English teacher the same thing then she would have thrown you out of the classroom! As it happens, I've recently seen my old English teacher and I had to stop myself from telling her. I couldn't bring myself to do it because she wouldn't have believed me anyway.

I wasn't completely rubbish at English but then it wasn't rocket science either. The fact is, I never showed any flair for writing whatsoever. I had to ask my sister what to write in job applications for heaven's sake! I thought that Microsoft Word was a type of word, like a verb or an adjective! (Don't ask me what those mean either!)

All I do is write the way I talk. Punctuation? Well all I do for that is to read it out loud and if it sounds like it needs a pause, I put a comma in! Oh yeah, two more things. I stick to a structure and I always make sure that my writing flows smoothly from beginning to end.

How I Write Good Copy

Whenever I write a sales letter, it works!

A bit of a bold statement but it's true. The reason for this is because I know why they work and how to make them work. I am going to transfer some of this knowledge to you in this article.

Some courses tell you to write other sales letters out in longhand. This is good. This does actually help you generate ideas but it is not completely essential.

The first step for writing a sales letter is to study the product. See what benefits you get from it and write them all down. The next step is to take away the pressure. The pressure in this case is the pressure of making the letter work. Remove this pressure. How do you do this? You write a letter to someone you know PERSONALLY who is the person least likely to buy whatever it is you're selling.

For instance, I write my first draft of a sales letter to my father. He's just impossible to sell anything to. He's the most sceptical person ever. He buts in whilst you're trying to prove a point and he makes all the excuses under the sun not to buy.

But and this is an important point, he will buy something only if it's HIS idea. In fact, he won't do anything at all UNLESS it's his idea. This is the type of person you are selling to. Maybe I've got a bit of an advantage having a father like that, I don't know.

The prospect will only buy if it's his idea to buy it. This rule HAS to be adhered to for a sales letter to work. Why? Because you're not there when they read it and it HAS to be their idea to buy it.

This rule prevents you from saying things like, "This is the best on the market." And "This is brilliant! It will solve all your problems..." Of course you WANT to say those things about your product but there is HEAVY resistance to those phrases. Let the prospect figure out that it's the best on the market by telling them what it will do for them. Let the prospect figure out that it's brilliant by showing them that it will solve all their problems. The prospect is not a complete dunce but an intelligent human being. They can judge whether it will solve their problems by what you say it will do for them.

And forget about 'magic words' in your copy. They don't 'wash' any more. There are loads of books etc out there that teach the prospect how the copywriter gets them to buy. They know all this stuff and as a result are very resistant to it. All of it!

The moment they see the word "FREE REPORT" or something, they think, "Aha! I saw that word before and it cost me money!"

The fact is this. Copywriting is changing. Changing from over exaggerated claims to honest but appealing claims. And you do that by writing a letter to someone you know. Don't send it to them though! It's just an exercise.It gets you to 'see' that person and imagine all the objections they'd have. It gets you to write with respect for the reader. It gets you to write to one person in the first person.

Top and bottom, it gets you to write a sales letter that works!

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Article Tags: advertising copywriter, copywriting jobs, copywriting services, freelance copywriter, marketing copywriter, seo copywriting



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