Are You Tired of Hypey Sales Language? Are you sick of being tempted by "miraculous" cures, "mind-boggling" profits, and "get-rich-quick" business schemes? I am too. Some marketers believe in the "power" of these advertising cliches. Every other sentence of their copy contains a word or phrase of this kind. But the truth is, it's not necessary. You can sell good products perfectly well without using hypey language. Last week, I noticed a few such phrases in our marketing copy. It disappointed me. So I highlighted the offending phrases and sent the following note to our creative team: "Advertising cliches are self-destructive. They suggest to intelligent readers that you are pandering for their business. "We have great products and services. Our prices are the best in the business. We can do a very good job of selling without resorting to these tired, hyperbolic catchphrases. In fact, by avoiding them we will do a better job. It will make us worker harder to explain ourselves more clearly. And our readers will appreciate the fact that we are speaking to them without cliches." The team responded favorably to my suggestion. So I asked them to identify the most offensive cliches and ban them from our publications. We are working on that right now. Here is a partial list of the "verboten" words you won't be hearing from us in the future.
- Miracle, miraculous, or any other variation of the word
- Mind-boggling profits, performance returns, etc.
- Incredible free offer
Please don't mistake this as a retreat from marketing. We will continue to enthusiastically sell you on all the great products and services we produce. But we will do so without insulting your intelligence. Expect enthusiasm and strong promises. But no more of these hyperbolic cliches. That's our promise to you. Today, Clayton Makepeace reveals why fantasy and belief is at the heart of all good copy. And I talk about: - Wealthy: Am I hanging out with the wrong people?
- Healthy: Better skin without skincare products
- Wise: You don't have long to make the switch
---------------------------------------------- Highly Recommended ---------------------------------------------------- A can't-miss "stock" opener - It's guaranteed to get your reader's attention 9 times out of 10! Read on to find out what it is... --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Choose beliefs that serve your soul -- choose beliefs that serve the grander dream of who you choose to be." Joy Page I Reject Your Reality and Choose to Substitute My Own
By Clayton Makepeace I was down at our new "getaway" digs over Labor Day. It's a great place. Just outside of Atlanta and two hours from our North Carolina home. We bought it a few months ago so we could spend more time with my two older kids and three grandkids. They live in Atlanta, less than an hour away. My plan for the weekend was that we'd all be tear-assing around the lake on our Sea-Doos. Maybe we'd do a little early-morning fishing. In the evening, we'd grill our catch out on the deck, along with an assortment of steaks, burgers, and weenies. You know. Typical, normal family stuff. Instead, I found myself sitting there alone. And I was feeling more than a little alarmed -- having come to the realization that I am the patriarch of a family of nerds. My son-in-law and both sons were spending Friday night in Atlanta, preparing to attend Dragon*Con on Saturday. Never heard of Dragon*Con? I hadn't either. Until my just-turned-15-year-old son said he wanted tickets for his birthday. Dragon*Con is where thousands of nerds dress up like fantasy, horror, superhero, and sci-fi characters -- and then geek out over each other. It was enough to make me want to throw on my leathers, fire up the Harley, cruise over to the nearest biker bar, and drown my sorrows in a gallon or three of Absolut. Don't feel sorry for me. I actually enjoyed the solitude. Gave me time to think. What I was thinking about was the impact our fantasies and beliefs have on us. I saw a documentary on a related subject the other night. Fascinating stuff. It made the point that we are complicit in every lie we're ever told. Our desire to believe makes deceiving us easy. Guess that's why they've sold billions of pills that supposedly make your thingy bigger. Or grow hair on your bald spot. Or burn off that spare tire without exercise. It must also be why Bernie Madoff was able to fleece so many sophisticated investors for so many years. This simple fact of human nature is so powerful, it is dangerous. As a marketer, simply knowing it gives you the ability to become a superhero or a supervillain. Superpowers, as any Dragon*Con attendee can tell you, can be used either for evil or good. Please use this one only for good -- to promote products that truly benefit your prospective customers. And the way to do that is to get inside their heads. Know Thy Prospect Libraries of books have been written on the importance of knowing your prospect. Most extol the virtues of understanding demographic facts about them. They drone on about knowing the sex, age, income level, educational level, etc. of the people you're asking to buy your product. And they go further, lecturing on the need to ferret out their hobbies, interests, and buying preferences. However, few suggest that anchoring your sales message to a commonly held belief can have an explosive impact on your response rate and sales. Case in point: In the 1970s, a new industry appeared to provide objective news, analysis, and advice to investors. There was a crying need for it. Until then, this information had been parsed out by Wall Street brokers. And because they sold the investments they were talking about, they had a massive conflict of interest. In the 1990s, another industry emerged. This time to provide news and advice to people who were interested in alternatives to toxic drugs and life-threatening surgery. Again, there was a crying need. Until then, health information was largely dispensed by drug companies and mainstream experts who were paid fortunes in kickbacks by the drug companies. Every one of them had a vested interest in convincing consumers to blindly follow their doctors' orders. The prospects for both of these huge new industries had one, clear belief in common: You CANNOT trust the establishment. Not with your money and certainly not with your life. Not surprisingly, copywriters for the investment and health industries who began by looking at mere demographic facts about their prospects produced lukewarm results at best. But every copywriter who used his headline and lead to connect to the anti-establishment belief his prospects shared hit it out of the park. Like me, for instance. The "Forbidden Cures" promo I wrote to harness my prospects' distrust of and disgust with the medical establishment mailed in the tens of millions. And I was paid a king's ransom in royalties. Time to put on the old thinking cap... What fantasies are your prospects engaged in right now? What commonly held beliefs do they swear by? How can you connect with those beliefs in a way that will produce maximum attention-getting power, readership, and response in your next marketing effort? Food for thought... P.S. Ready for a marketing and copywriting master class? At Early to Rise's Info-Marketing Bootcamp in November, I will be making one of my few public appearances. I'll tell you everything I've learned during my decades in the business -- at least, as much as I can in three days. And I'll be joined on stage by a dozen of the most cutting-edge Internet marketing experts working today. Find out more about Bootcamp here. ----------------------------------------------Highly Recommended --------------------------------------------------- ETR's $500,000+ Gamble We're betting on your success at our Information Marketing Bootcamp this November. In fact, we'll "see you and we'll raise you!" You see, we've put the 12 gurus we've invited "on the spot."
If you don't learn from them how you could make at least your first $10,000 with your online business by May 2010 ... we're going to give you back your entrance fee. AND we'll give you another $1,000 for your trouble.
Check out all the details on your "sure thing" here. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- More wealth, health, and wisdom from Masterson ... If I gave any credibility to what I read in the newspapers or see on talk shows, I'd believe that we are coming out of the Great Recession. Every day, I hear news about how things are improving. Yet when I look around at the businesses I know, I can count on the fingers of one hand those that are not in trouble. I am friendly with the owners of half a dozen restaurants in Delray Beach. They tell me sales are down between 30 percent and 70 percent. My brother-in-law is in the retail jewelry business. "It's a complete disaster," he says. "Most of the industry will be bankrupt by March," he predicts. My friend Mike wholesales furniture. His outlets are down 30 percent to 50 percent. At Joe's cigar bar, we have plumbers and doctors and brokers -- to name just a few trades. They are all crying the blues. Is it me? Am I hanging out with the wrong people? Am I myopic? All these hurting businesses mean rising bankruptcies and rising unemployment. And rising unemployment means more bankruptcies. Yes, the bankers and brokers who have been "bailed out" are doing fine -- or so they say. Their numbers are up because they are taking in all these freshly printed dollars. But that doesn't mean their businesses are getting better. When the Obama administration finally turns off the spigot, we'll see which of them will be standing. My guess is not many. I'd like to hear from you. How are your friends and neighbors doing? How are you faring yourself? Let me know at AskMichael@ETRFeedback.com. David Cross copied me on an essay in The New York Times that I had missed. It was by a woman who had spent 30 years in publishing. She explained how technology has changed the business. In the beginning, she said, it was "primitive chaos," with typewritten manuscripts, ringing phones, carbon paper, fountain pens, mimeograph machines, and the smell of cigarette smoke. Then came electric typewriters, Filofaxes, and copy machines. The antique Royals and carbon paper were trashed. Then voice mail replaced operators, word processors replaced Wite-Out, and e-mail replaced secretaries. She ended by asking, "Is the screen the new paper? Will publishing houses go the way of old record stores? Is digital-delivery the new bookstore? Is Google the new library?" "I can't answer these questions," she says. "I am no longer in book publishing" But in the italics that follow her essay, we learn this about her: Jan Evans, a former book publisher, is now co-founder and CEO of wowOwow.com, a website for women. If you are in print publishing now, you don't have long to make the switch. Tomorrow is already here... Women, and even men nowadays, spend a small fortune on creams and lotions to keep their skin youthful looking. But there's something you need to know, says Total Health Breakthroughs Editor Melanie Segala. And you won't hear it from the billion-dollar skin care industry. Taking care of your skin from the inside with a healthy diet is far more important than using the most expensive anti-aging products. Vitamin C, for example, helps build collagen, says Melanie. That's the connective protein that makes up 75 percent of skin. And as you age, you lose collagen. That's one way you get wrinkles. But you can help replenish lost collagen by eating vitamin C-rich foods. Strawberries, red peppers, citrus fruits, and tomatoes are just a few. At the same time, you'll be getting much needed antioxidants that prevent chronic disease. No high-priced skin cream can do all that. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Riding out the storm." "I've been reading your newsletter for a good while now. Not all of it applies to me, but I read it all nonetheless. "I've always been confident in my capabilities and those of my fabulous husband of 7 years.... 18 months ago, we left an uber-cushy expat job in Asia to partner in some new ventures in order to provide a legacy for our three kids, then all under 3. "It's tough going -- the recession certainly didn't help -- but we're not going to give up. "Your nuggets of information and inspiration always seem to say just what we need to hear, to suggest a different way of considering things, of riding out the storm. "So, thank you." Nadine
Adelaide, Australia ---------------------------------------------- Highly Recommended --------------------------------------------------- E-Mail Trash or Treasure - Bob Bly wrote an e-mail in five minutes. It generated a $7,449 profit in a single week. Here's what he said... --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Today's Words That Work: Complicit To be complicit (kum-PLIS-it) -- from the Latin for "partner" -- is to participate in a questionable or criminal act.
Example (as used by Clayton Makepeace today): "[A documentary I saw the other night] made the point that we are complicit in every lie we're ever told. Our desire to believe makes deceiving us easy." --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- We want your feedback! Let us know your thoughts on today's issue. Email us at: AskETR@ETRFeedback.com | 
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