The Proven Formula For Writing Powerful, Effective Online Ads, Landing Pages, Sales Letters and Email Marketing Pieces!

First of all, I want to pass along to you a formula that is quite ‘Old School’ and not as sexy as more modern Buzz Words - but one that serves me well even today.  What it amounts to is a bare-bones structure that will work for every ad you ever write.

1. Headline: If at all possible, grab the reader’s attention by appealing to a strong desire that you think he possesses. Again, I want to point out that it’s possible to grab the reader’s attention with just about any kind of startling headline, but, to the degree that headline isn’t directed at his immediate needs, you’ll have to be all the more benefit oriented very quickly in the copy immediately following the headline. If the headline appeals to the reader’s needs, it gives you a big head start.
2. Subheading, opening paragraph, or both: Again, your focus should be on trying to make the reader say to himself, “Hey, this ad is about me!” If you don’t accomplish this right from the outset, the chances are excellent that the reader will move on to the next page. People are interested only in ads that propose something that will be to their benefit. By now, this should be a great truth indelibly stamped on your forebrain.
3. Body copy (main text): State every reason you can think of why the reader should reach into his pocket and buy your product or service. Twenty reasons may not be enough. It may be the twenty-first reason that causes him to buy. You’re paying for every inch of white space in the ad, so do both yourself and the reader a favor and fill most of it with copy. The more reasons you can think of why the prospect should buy your product, the better your chances of selling him. Give it your best shot; it may be the last one you’ll ever have to sell the person who’s reading your ad right now.
4. Closing: Close the sale by (A) throwing in one or two parting lines, perhaps repeating your strongest selling points and then ‘Tell Them What To Do‘! Tell them ‘click here to buy‘ or ‘Join our Ezine Now‘. Leave nothing to chance, tell them what’s next.

If your work involve (online) PR you communicate quite often with editors of web sites and magazines of your interest. Here are some tips that can be of help.

1. Don’t send immeditely you see some new section/site about your/your client industry. Find some time and read what kind of articles they publish, how they are written to see if they use more formal or funky style in writing, how long are the articles etc.

2. Go to the meeting with the editor. Many people never find time to see the editor of the certain site/magazine. They think it is enough to send a press release and content-hungry editors will publish it if they like it. Internet is great but don’t avoid face2face meetings.

3. Don’t send the same press release to everyone. Try to identify your most important media partners and adjust your press release and content of your email to them. It is not enough just to change the name of the recipient when you write Dear, [editorname]. Everyone likes to see that they are important, and also not many editors like to publish the same content like dozen of other media.

4. Don’t bold keywords and sentences in your press release. Editors are smart enough to know what is important and what is not so imporatnt.

5. Send objective news and not over-hyped press releases. Usually editors don’t want to publish over-hyped press release because they will sound as a free ad and not informative news and they won’t bother to adjust your press release.

6. Proofread your press releases.

7. Give a proper Subject name for your emails. Many people send press releases with blank Subject line or with the Subject line: For immediate release

8. Send your press release in the body of email and as an attachment. Because many editors won’t publish it immediatelly and they want to save the file somewhere, but some other editors don’t like getting attachments. Also, some local letters can be shown in error if sent in email because of recipient email client’s settings.

9. Don’t be pain in the ass. Once you sent the news don’t call every day and ask when it will be published. It is good to know what is the standard schedule for publishing and if you see that it passed too long since they got your email (in case of web sites several days) you can call them.

10. Give some benefit to journalists. Some exclusive information, product review or taking them to your company travel/conference or sponsoring their trip that can be later used in their articles is usually a nice thing to do. They will appreciate it.

UK will be probably the first country from the group of major advertising countries in the world where the total online ad spending in 2009. will be higher than total TV ad spending according to a study released by agency GroupM (part of WPP network).

Also, it is estimated that online ads will surpass TV ads in Sweden within the next 12 months. Logical answer for UK market is that BBC is publicly funded so they are not depended on advertisers.

WPP’s GroupM in their study “This Year, Next Year” study doesn’t think that online ads will surpass TV ads in UK in 2008. they predict that at the end of 2008. online ads will have 24.8% and TV ads 26% of marketshare.. However, they also think it will happen in 2009.

It is interesting that the forecasted Internet spending be more than 10% of the total global ad spending.