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7 Valuable Tips For Article Writers
1. Let your affiliates use your articles to earn commissions. Simply make your articles available to your affiliates to publish in their ezines or on their web sites with their affiliate links in your resource box. You'll be able to increase...
Case In Point: What You Need To Know About Link Popularity
by Karon Thackston © 2003 http://www.copywritingcourse.com Link popularity. The term has flooded the ‘Net over the last year, and everybody is in a buzz trying to build link popularity for their sites. But do we really understand what link...
Distribute Your Self-Published Book - Part 2
Distribute Your Self-Published Book - Part 2 Judy Cullins ©2005 All Rights Reserved. Where is your book now? With a distributor? In a book store? Or, did it already die an early death after a few months? New self-published authors often...
Freelance Copywriting: How to Negotiate Rates
Lots of people who seek out my copywriting services are concerned about money. Rightfully so. I’m a small business owner too, and I know what it is to have that do-it-yourself mindset. (It’s exhausting!) But entrepreneurs like you and I often...
How To Pluck Fresh New Ideas For Writing Killer Sales Copy...Straight Out Of Thin Air!
If you want to improve your writing, you probably spend a fair amount of time reading a variety of "How To Write Good Sales Copy" kinds of information. True? You probably subscribe to a handful of newsletters like mine... you've read a few of...
Making a Career of Sharing
After battling the sea for nine years, it's time to move on. That's what I told myself when I first stepped ashore to search for a land job. The decision was not made on the spur of a moment but after much thought and soul searching. While I...
Q&A for Writers, Editors and Publishers - Thoughts from Your Peers on Life and Work, Part Two
Part Two -- Question # Six - Editors, how do you locate that next position when it's time to move to a new publishing house, newspaper or magazine? How do you keep that great editing job once you have it?” -- Page Nine Jenny Kasza – “To keep a...
Review: Words That Sell
by Karon Thackston © 2005
http://www.copywritingcourse.com/wordswork.html
It's the Golden Rule of copywriting. "Know your target audience." It is impossible to persuade someone you know nothing about to take any type of action. But the question...
The Strange Avalanche Iceman Headline Techniqu
Curiosity. Intrigue. Mystery. All strong components that grab readers of your headlines by the ear a quite literally drag them into the rest of your copy. Of course, if you’ve spent anytime studying headline creation, you know that the headline can...
Why Copywriting Is The Secret To Your Online Success
Over the last decade, the number of companies selling their products and services on the Web or sharing information online with their target market has exploded. It's no longer frowned upon to conduct your business on the Web, and huge numbers of...
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A Lesson From “The Apprentice” That Can Make You A Master
by Karon Thackston © 2004
http://www.copywritingcourse.com
I have to admit, I was curious. When I saw previews of a new show called “The Apprentice,” it made me want to at least watch the premiere to see what was going on. Immediately, I was hooked. The whole idea of candidates - from all walks of life, not just college grads fresh from their commencement ceremonies - vying for a position in one of Donald Trump’s organizations piqued my interest. What kept my interest were the real-life advertising lessons every business owner needs to be reminded of.
Take, for instance, one episode where the teams were challenged to create an ad campaign. I was, needless-to-say, on the edge of my seat for the entire show. One team immediately decided to phone the client and setup an appointment to find out about the product, the end user, and other aspects that would make a big difference in creating the campaign. (Smart move!)
The other team, however, said they didn’t have time to talk with the client. They were running behind schedule. Meeting with the client - in their opinion - would just waste an hour or two that could have been spent on more important tasks. (Excuse me?)
What happened? First of all, my husband came charging into the living room asking, “Do you believe that? Even *I* know you have to talk to the customer first!” Yes, he had been listening to me after all.
In the end, the campaign from the team who did speak with the client won the challenge. Once the losing team arrived in the boardroom, the project leader, Jason (Mr. “We Don’t Have Time To Talk With the Client”), really got it from all sides.
Donald Trump’s assistants, George and Carolyn, made a point of bringing up the fact that the client was not contacted. Jason’s own teammates made a point of bringing up that the client was never contacted. And Donald? To quote, Donald said, “That was a HUGE mistake… you’re fired!”
This was fairly early in the show so you would have thought the other contestants would have learned from Jason’s mistake. Not so. There was yet another episode where an Apprentice put what they wanted over what the client wanted/needed.
In this task, the teams were charged with selling Donald’s new
product, Trump Ice (bottled water). The winner was simply the team who sold the most in a given period of time. Nick, a salesman by trade, was immediately confident his team would win if they would just step aside and let him work his magic.
Ereka, the project manager for Nick’s team, urged Nick to sit with her at the computer and research the market and the customer base for bottled water. Nick wouldn’t even hear of it. To quote, “Telling me how to sell is like someone telling the Pope how to pray." So off went Nick using his same “high energy” sales pitch on every customer and focusing on what Nick wanted to sell - instead of finding the best benefits for the clients.
What happened? Nick flopped time and time again. A teammate (Bill) jumped in during one sales meeting and helped the client to understand the benefits of buying Trump Ice. Bill made the sale.
In the boardroom, George immediately noted his disappointment in how little the team seemed to know about their prospective customers. And Donald chimed in by saying he had no idea why Nick thought his sales skills were so great when he had no clue about the customers he was selling to. Ouch!
The bottom line? The team lost. Why? Because Nick was busy trying to sell what he wanted to sell, and in the way he wanted to sell it, with no regard for the customer whatsoever.
The moral of the story? Know your customers. They are the ones with the money. It doesn’t matter what you like. If *they* aren’t happy with your site, your copy, your graphics, your product, or your service… they’ll abandon you cold.
When you’re creating a business plan, when you’re writing copy, when you’re creating a website, or developing a brochure. It’s not about you… it’s all about them. If one of the richest and most profitable businessmen in the world tells you target market research is vital to success, you can bet it is a wise strategy to follow.
About the Author
Copy not getting results? Learn to write SEO copy that impresses the engines and your visitors at http://www.copywritingcourse.com. Be sure to check out Karon’s latest e-report “How To Increase Keyword Saturation (Without Destroying the Flow of Your Copy)” at http://www.copywritingcourse.com/keyword.
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