Wow, what a busy week.
2nd Birthday celebrations for the fantastic Archie, seeing both sides of our family, and then going away for a weekend break, the three of us are well and truly pooped.
…although I’m eager to get back into client work.
Some cold sales letters are heading for the post office this week (when I get this damn laser printer whirring up again!).
I know, another sales letter flogging my wares, for business owners to file over the junk mail bin…
Although, I’m not asking for a sale, just a conversation.
A quick chat to see if there’s any way I could put my copywriting and advertising skills to use in their business.
I’ve sent a couple of emails like this out to contacts already, and have had a positive response – so, fingers crossed.
Try doing this with your own marketing, push for an appointment vs a sale.
If you know your product, are passionate about it – and it solves a core problem, the prospect will be eager to sign you a cheque.
Going straight for the sale when your prospect has never even heard of you, let alone know then need your product is a sure-fire waste of money, time and effort, you’re pitching to a completely cold audience this way.
In copywriting, there’s a number of stages to consider when tailoring a sales message.
Stages of Awareness
The stages of awareness, as taught by advertising guru Eugene Schwartz are:
1. The Most Aware: Your prospect knows your product, and only needs to know “the deal.”
2. Product-Aware: Your prospect knows what you sell, but isn’t sure it’s right for him.
3. Solution-Aware: Your prospect knows the result he wants, but not that your product provides it.
4. Problem-Aware: Your prospect senses he has a problem but doesn’t know there’s a solution.
5. Completely Unaware: No knowledge of anything except, perhaps, his own identity or opinion.
Using these stages of awareness as an example, used in reverse order, if a prospect is unaware of you, their problem, let alone any solution or product, it would be pretty difficult to convert them into a sale by talking about the whizz-bang features of your new widget.
Instead, you could send them something that highlights how people like them, may have XYZ problem, and invite them to call or seek further information about the problem – and if there’s even a solution (there is, it’s your new widget).
Think about your current advertising, what stage of awareness are the people you’re pitching to at and does it match your messages?
If not, mix it up, and test the results.
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