Sales Letters . . . The Back-bone of Direct Mail. What "NOT" to do
| Category: Copy Writing - sales copy | Date: 2003-09-05 |
There is nothing more important and useful to your marketing program than the sales letter. Despite the other forms of marketing and advertising you use, you will always need and should always use sales letters.
People like to get letters. And if you put the right thing in your letters people will read them. Further, if you put the right offer in them, people will respond favorably to them.
So what makes a sales letter successful? To answer that, let's first discover what does not make a successful sales letter. Let's answer that by examining what makes a very bad sales letter. Here is one I received some time ago. I've kept for one reason. To show my readers what mistakes to avoid.
I will reprint the letter here along with my comments on the letter. See if you agree with me.
Dear Ms. Hutcheson:
"The _____company wants to keep its position in the field of office equipment."
(Well, keep it. I don't care. What's this got to do with me? I'm very busy this morning. I have a pile of work on my desk. So get on with it or you're outta here.)
"We've been a leader in the industry year after year and want to continue to be."
(Oh big deal. So you're big and rich and famous. Do I really care? I think not. All this talk about your enormous success makes me feel small and unimportant.)
"We want to service all of our accounts quickly and effectively, and we want your business."
(You want! You want! You pompous ass! I'm worried about interest rates going up. Whether I should be in stocks or bonds or cash or simply kill myself. And here you send me this damn letter that I really don't have time to read and tell me all about what you want.)
"Will you please put ________Company on your preferred list of companies to do business with?"
(Preferred list. You have your nerve! You ask me to put you on some sort of preferred list and you haven't given me one reason to do so. I have a list to put you on but it isn't called preferred! )
" A prompt acknowledgment of this letter would be appreciated. Please let us know if we can be of service to you."
(Fool! You mail me a cheap form letter. You tell me how awfully great you are. You manage to make me feel very small in comparison to your enormous status and then you ask me to write to you! Please! Give me a break. I have, at least, I would like to think I have, more to do with my time than write you a letter.
My dogs need shots. My cat is agoraphobic and my computer needs repair and you want me to write you! You did'nt even enclose a postage-paid card or give me a toll- free number to call. I think not my friend. No way!)
Do you ever get letters like this? I surely do. Companies telling me how big they are, how wonderful they are, how much business they did last year.
Unfortunately, they fail to say one thing about what they can do for me. Now, if it were the Salvation Army telling me what they did and how my donation would help I might be inclined to care. But when a business is trying to sell me something, I don't want to hear any more about them then I have to. All I want to hear is what they can do for me, how well and how quickly and at what cost to me. That's all. No more. No less. Period.
The biggest mistakes I see in letters that clients and prospective clients send me for evaluation are (1) amateurish writing and letters that are entirely too long in verbiage and short on getting to the point and (2) letters that tell the reader how great they are and failing to mention what they can do for the reader. Or if they do mention that fact they leave it until the last, by which time the reader has already thrown the letter away.
I would have thrown the above letter away if I wasn't critiquing it. Believe me, I have no interest in reading such a letter. Nor, I suspect, do you.
The point, of course, is that no one really cares about you, your company or your product or service UNTIL they know what you can do for them. What will using your product or your service do for him or her? How will it make his or her life better? That's what people want to know.
You need to get right to the point and tell the reader what he'll get from reading the rest of the letter. Tell her why she should read it.
You only have a few seconds to get a person to read your letter. Don't waste those few seconds talking about how great you are. The reader will know how great you are if you can solve one of his problems. And that's exactly what your letter should promise to do.
About the Author
Copyright 1994-1996 by Susanna K. Hutcheson. All rights reserved.
This article may be redistributed provided that the article and this notice remain intact. This article may not under any circumstances be resold or redistributed for compensation of any kind without prior written permission from Susanna K. Hutcheson Enterprises.
If you have any questions about these terms please contact us via telephone (316) 684-0457
shutches@feist.com
http://www.powerwriting.com
People like to get letters. And if you put the right thing in your letters people will read them. Further, if you put the right offer in them, people will respond favorably to them.
So what makes a sales letter successful? To answer that, let's first discover what does not make a successful sales letter. Let's answer that by examining what makes a very bad sales letter. Here is one I received some time ago. I've kept for one reason. To show my readers what mistakes to avoid.
I will reprint the letter here along with my comments on the letter. See if you agree with me.
Dear Ms. Hutcheson:
"The _____company wants to keep its position in the field of office equipment."
(Well, keep it. I don't care. What's this got to do with me? I'm very busy this morning. I have a pile of work on my desk. So get on with it or you're outta here.)
"We've been a leader in the industry year after year and want to continue to be."
(Oh big deal. So you're big and rich and famous. Do I really care? I think not. All this talk about your enormous success makes me feel small and unimportant.)
"We want to service all of our accounts quickly and effectively, and we want your business."
(You want! You want! You pompous ass! I'm worried about interest rates going up. Whether I should be in stocks or bonds or cash or simply kill myself. And here you send me this damn letter that I really don't have time to read and tell me all about what you want.)
"Will you please put ________Company on your preferred list of companies to do business with?"
(Preferred list. You have your nerve! You ask me to put you on some sort of preferred list and you haven't given me one reason to do so. I have a list to put you on but it isn't called preferred! )
" A prompt acknowledgment of this letter would be appreciated. Please let us know if we can be of service to you."
(Fool! You mail me a cheap form letter. You tell me how awfully great you are. You manage to make me feel very small in comparison to your enormous status and then you ask me to write to you! Please! Give me a break. I have, at least, I would like to think I have, more to do with my time than write you a letter.
My dogs need shots. My cat is agoraphobic and my computer needs repair and you want me to write you! You did'nt even enclose a postage-paid card or give me a toll- free number to call. I think not my friend. No way!)
Do you ever get letters like this? I surely do. Companies telling me how big they are, how wonderful they are, how much business they did last year.
Unfortunately, they fail to say one thing about what they can do for me. Now, if it were the Salvation Army telling me what they did and how my donation would help I might be inclined to care. But when a business is trying to sell me something, I don't want to hear any more about them then I have to. All I want to hear is what they can do for me, how well and how quickly and at what cost to me. That's all. No more. No less. Period.
The biggest mistakes I see in letters that clients and prospective clients send me for evaluation are (1) amateurish writing and letters that are entirely too long in verbiage and short on getting to the point and (2) letters that tell the reader how great they are and failing to mention what they can do for the reader. Or if they do mention that fact they leave it until the last, by which time the reader has already thrown the letter away.
I would have thrown the above letter away if I wasn't critiquing it. Believe me, I have no interest in reading such a letter. Nor, I suspect, do you.
The point, of course, is that no one really cares about you, your company or your product or service UNTIL they know what you can do for them. What will using your product or your service do for him or her? How will it make his or her life better? That's what people want to know.
You need to get right to the point and tell the reader what he'll get from reading the rest of the letter. Tell her why she should read it.
You only have a few seconds to get a person to read your letter. Don't waste those few seconds talking about how great you are. The reader will know how great you are if you can solve one of his problems. And that's exactly what your letter should promise to do.
About the Author
Copyright 1994-1996 by Susanna K. Hutcheson. All rights reserved.
This article may be redistributed provided that the article and this notice remain intact. This article may not under any circumstances be resold or redistributed for compensation of any kind without prior written permission from Susanna K. Hutcheson Enterprises.
If you have any questions about these terms please contact us via telephone (316) 684-0457
shutches@feist.com
http://www.powerwriting.com
Copyright © 2005-2006 Powered by Custom PHP Programming