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By Russell Kern
In my B-to-B Insights column in the April issue of Target Marketing, I presented a baker's dozen of copywriting tips that can be leveraged to create response-generating direct marketing campaigns. But I was just getting warmed up, so here are six more prose pointers you could apply to your creative efforts for stronger results.
1. Make your headlines and subheads so compelling, readers will want to act now. People don't read direct mail, or even e-mail, in a linear fashion. Their eyes jump around, looking for information that helps them understand the value and benefit of investing more time in your message. They start at the top, quickly skim the subheads, glance at any copy presented in an interrupter (such as a sidebar box), read the first sentence and possibly go to the end to examine the P.S. If they like what they've seen, they will go back and get more details. Look at your headlines and subheads and see, have you revealed enough information to draw in your reader? Do your heads and subheads present an engaging and emotional story that is enough to get the reader to act now? If so, bravo.
2. Never forget, they don't care about you. Your readers don't care about your company, your quarterly goals, your products and services, or anything else you want to sell them. All they want to know is "What is in it for me?" The battle for direct marketing starts when they open an e-mail, read a direct mail package or turn to your direct response ad in a newspaper or magazine. Let's assume you have a new product that's 55 percent faster than the competition's product. Let's also assume that you know the target market is over-stressed, over-committed and burned out. Let's say your e-mail arrives on the same day in the same inbox as your competitor's e-mail. One of these e-mails promises, "The New Sunstream 422 is 55% faster in duodecaflop mode than any competitive unit available today." The other e-mail promises, "Now you can get more done faster and easier. You will be able to get ahead at work and spend more time with your family, too." Which one wins? Which one do you want to be your e-mail message? It's the second message that talks to the recipient like a real person who has real problems. And years of testing prove it. Capture their hearts to get to their minds. Their wallets will follow.
3. Design should enhance readership, not distract from it. OK, this is not a copy technique, but it is my biggest pet peeve. Art direction should enhance copy readership and the story idea. Period. Let's start by making the type large enough to read. If you're marketing to anyone over the age of 40, start with 12-point type. The eight-point reverse type, out-of-black spreads that are so hip for teens, surfers and skiers are guaranteed reading killers for a business professional. And avoid putting images behind any letter copy. It's hard enough to get prospects to become engaged in your message—there is no reason to put some ghosted logo design in the center of your letter, just to make it even harder for them to read. Readership first, response second, then ECHO-award-winning design if you can.
4. Don't mix strategies. Are you doing one-step mail order and lead generation? Making sure you have a clear strategy is critical to delivering the correct copy. A good way to evaluate your strategy is to ask: Is what we want the copy to accomplish simply difficult or virtually impossible? For example, selling a $49.95 software upgrade might be difficult, but it's possible. Selling products for less than $200 in a one-step mail-order manner is challenging, but reasonable. Asking people to send in money today should be part of the copy platform. And if you want to boost orders, you always can put a "sweetener" in the copy, such as a gift with purchase offer. On the other hand, if you're selling a $2 million software upgrade, asking for the money in the lead package is virtually impossible. In this case, even presenting the price of the software upgrade is a great way to kill your results. Thus, high-ticket, high-consideration products require classic lead-generation, offer-centric copy approaches.
5. Test your creative with five customers before you go. Here is the simple way to avoid wasting tens of thousand of dollars. I am very skeptical of focus groups trying to accurately predict winning direct copy. However, if you create a small "customer research" panel, it can be used as an outside resource to determine if your message is effective. How could it be more honest and hit their emotions harder? How would they rate the value of the offer? Is it something they would like to receive, get or attend?
6. Can your eighth grader understand it? Bits, bytes, feed speeds, specs, mission critical. 'How many buzzwords can we cram into a message?' seems to be a common mantra in marketing. One of my favorite copy tests is to ask an eighth grader to read the copy and then tell me what he understands. (Unfortunately, I've got to use my teammates' children, because mine are all grown.) See how much of the message they can play back for you. Ask them, what do we want you to do and why?
Russell Kern is president of The Kern Organization, a fully integrated offline and online direct marketing agency in Woodland Hills, Calif. He can be reached at (818) 703-8775 or via e-mail at russell@thekernorg.com.
In my B-to-B Insights column in the April issue of Target Marketing, I presented a baker's dozen of copywriting tips that can be leveraged to create response-generating direct marketing campaigns. But I was just getting warmed up, so here are six more prose pointers you could apply to your creative efforts for stronger results.
1. Make your headlines and subheads so compelling, readers will want to act now. People don't read direct mail, or even e-mail, in a linear fashion. Their eyes jump around, looking for information that helps them understand the value and benefit of investing more time in your message. They start at the top, quickly skim the subheads, glance at any copy presented in an interrupter (such as a sidebar box), read the first sentence and possibly go to the end to examine the P.S. If they like what they've seen, they will go back and get more details. Look at your headlines and subheads and see, have you revealed enough information to draw in your reader? Do your heads and subheads present an engaging and emotional story that is enough to get the reader to act now? If so, bravo.
2. Never forget, they don't care about you. Your readers don't care about your company, your quarterly goals, your products and services, or anything else you want to sell them. All they want to know is "What is in it for me?" The battle for direct marketing starts when they open an e-mail, read a direct mail package or turn to your direct response ad in a newspaper or magazine. Let's assume you have a new product that's 55 percent faster than the competition's product. Let's also assume that you know the target market is over-stressed, over-committed and burned out. Let's say your e-mail arrives on the same day in the same inbox as your competitor's e-mail. One of these e-mails promises, "The New Sunstream 422 is 55% faster in duodecaflop mode than any competitive unit available today." The other e-mail promises, "Now you can get more done faster and easier. You will be able to get ahead at work and spend more time with your family, too." Which one wins? Which one do you want to be your e-mail message? It's the second message that talks to the recipient like a real person who has real problems. And years of testing prove it. Capture their hearts to get to their minds. Their wallets will follow.
3. Design should enhance readership, not distract from it. OK, this is not a copy technique, but it is my biggest pet peeve. Art direction should enhance copy readership and the story idea. Period. Let's start by making the type large enough to read. If you're marketing to anyone over the age of 40, start with 12-point type. The eight-point reverse type, out-of-black spreads that are so hip for teens, surfers and skiers are guaranteed reading killers for a business professional. And avoid putting images behind any letter copy. It's hard enough to get prospects to become engaged in your message—there is no reason to put some ghosted logo design in the center of your letter, just to make it even harder for them to read. Readership first, response second, then ECHO-award-winning design if you can.
4. Don't mix strategies. Are you doing one-step mail order and lead generation? Making sure you have a clear strategy is critical to delivering the correct copy. A good way to evaluate your strategy is to ask: Is what we want the copy to accomplish simply difficult or virtually impossible? For example, selling a $49.95 software upgrade might be difficult, but it's possible. Selling products for less than $200 in a one-step mail-order manner is challenging, but reasonable. Asking people to send in money today should be part of the copy platform. And if you want to boost orders, you always can put a "sweetener" in the copy, such as a gift with purchase offer. On the other hand, if you're selling a $2 million software upgrade, asking for the money in the lead package is virtually impossible. In this case, even presenting the price of the software upgrade is a great way to kill your results. Thus, high-ticket, high-consideration products require classic lead-generation, offer-centric copy approaches.
5. Test your creative with five customers before you go. Here is the simple way to avoid wasting tens of thousand of dollars. I am very skeptical of focus groups trying to accurately predict winning direct copy. However, if you create a small "customer research" panel, it can be used as an outside resource to determine if your message is effective. How could it be more honest and hit their emotions harder? How would they rate the value of the offer? Is it something they would like to receive, get or attend?
6. Can your eighth grader understand it? Bits, bytes, feed speeds, specs, mission critical. 'How many buzzwords can we cram into a message?' seems to be a common mantra in marketing. One of my favorite copy tests is to ask an eighth grader to read the copy and then tell me what he understands. (Unfortunately, I've got to use my teammates' children, because mine are all grown.) See how much of the message they can play back for you. Ask them, what do we want you to do and why?
Russell Kern is president of The Kern Organization, a fully integrated offline and online direct marketing agency in Woodland Hills, Calif. He can be reached at (818) 703-8775 or via e-mail at russell@thekernorg.com.
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