HOW TO WRITE PROFITABLE CLASSIFIED ADS
Everybody wants to
make more money... In fact, most people
would like to hit upon something that makes them fabulously rich! And seemingly, one of the easiest roads to
the fulfillment of these dreams of wealth is mail order or within the
professional circles of the business, direct mail selling...
The only thing is,
hardly anyone gives much real thought to the basic ingredient of selling by
mail - the writing of profitable classified ads. If your mail order business is to succeed, then you must acquire
the expertise of writing classified ads that sell your product or services!
So what makes a
classified ad good or bad? First of
all, it must appeal to the reader, and as such, it must say exactly what you
want it to say. Secondly, it has to say
what it says in the least possible number of words in order to keep your
operating costs within your budget. And
thirdly, it has to produce the desired results whether inquiries or sales.
Grabbing the
reader's attention is your first objective. You must assume the reader is "scanning" the page on which
your ad appears in the company of two or three hundred classified ads. Therefore, there has to be something about
your ad that causes him to stop scanning and look at yours! So, the first two or three words of your ad
are of the utmost importance and deserve your careful consideration. Most surveys show that words or phrases that
quickly involve the reader, tend to be the best attention-grabbers. Such words as:
FREE... WIN... MAKE BIG MONEY...
Whatever words you
use as attention-grabbers, to start your ads, you should bear in mind that
they'll be competing with similar attention-grabbers of the other ads on the
same page. Therefore, in addition to
your lead words, your ad must quickly go on to promise or state further
benefits to the reader. In other words,
your ad might read something like this: MAKE BIG MONEY! Easy &
Simple. We show you how!
In the language of
professional copywriters, you've grabbed the attention of your prospect, and
interested him with something that even he can do.
The next rule of
good classified copywriting has to do with the arousal of the reader's desire
to get in on your offer. In a great
many instances, this rule is by-passed, and it appears, this is the real reason
that an ad doesn't pull according to the expectations of the advertiser.
Think about it -
you've got your reader's attention; you've told him it's easy and simple; and
you're about to ask him to do something. Unless you take the time to further "want your offer," your ad
is going to only half turn him on. He'll compare your ad with the others that have grabbed his attention
and finally decide upon the one that interests him the most.
What I'm saying is
that here is the place for you to insert that magic word "guaranteed"
or some other such word or phrase. So
now, we've got an ad that reads: MAKE
BIG MONEY! Easy & Simple. Guaranteed!
Now the reader is
turned on, and in his mind, he can't lose. You're ready to ask for his money.
This is the "demand for action" part of your ad. This is the part where you want to use such
words as: Limited offer - Act now!
Write today! Only and/or just...
Putting it all
together, then your ad might read something like this: MAKE BIG MONEY! Easy & Simple.
Guaranteed! Limited offer. Send $l to:
These are the
ingredients of any good classified ad - Attention - Interest - Desire -
Action... Without these four
ingredients skillfully integrated into your ad, chances are your ad will just
"lie there" and not do anything but cost you money. What we've just shown you is a basic
classified ad. Although such an ad
could be placed in any leading publication and would pull a good response, it's
known as a "blind ad" and would pull inquiries and responses from a
whole spectrum of people reading the publication in which it appeared. In other words, from as many
"time-wasters" as from bona fide buyers.
So let's try to
give you an example of the kind of classified ad you might want to use, say to
sell a report such as this one... Using
all the rules of basic advertising copywriting, and stating exactly what our product
is, our ad reads thusly:
MONEY-MAKER'S
SECRETS! How To Write winning
classified
ads. Simple & easy to learn -should double or
triple your
responses. Rush $1 to BC Sales, 10 Main Anytown, TX
75001.
The point we're
making is that: l) You've got to grab
the reader's attention... 2) You've got
to "interest him" with something that appeals to him... 3) You've got to "further
stimulate" him with something (catch-phrase) that makes him
"desire" the product or service... 4) Demand that he act immediately...
There's no point
in being tricky or clever. Just adhere
to the basics and your profits will increase accordingly. One of the best ways of learning to write
good classified ads is to study the classifieds - try to figure out exactly
what they're attempting to sell - and then practice rewriting them according to
the rules we've just given you. Whenever you sit down to write a classified, always write it all out -
write down everything you want to say - and then go back over it, crossing out
words, and refining your phraseology.
The final
ingredient of your classified ad is of course, your name, address to which the
reader is to respond - where he's to send his money or write for further
information.
Generally
speaking, readers respond more often to ads that include a name than to those
showing just initials or an address only. However, because advertising costs are based upon the number of words,
or the amount of space your ad uses, the use of some names in classified ads
could become quite expensive. If we
were to ask our ad respondents to write to or send their money to The Research
Writers & Publishers Association, or to Book Business Mart, or even to
Money Maker's Opportunity Digest, our advertising costs would be
prohibitive. Thus we shorten our name
Researchers or Money-Makers. The point
here is to think relative to the placement costs of your ad, and to shorten
excessively long names.
The same holds
true when listing your post office box number. Shorten it to just plain Box 40, or in the case of a rural delivery,
shorten it to just RRl.
The important
thing is to know the rules of profitable classified ad writing, and to follow
them. Hold your costs in line.
Now you know the
basics... the rest is up to you.