Giveaway: Win Tuition for Internet Marketing Copy Makeover

It’s been a little while since we did a sweepstakes/giveaway, hasn’t it? Well, let’s do one today! Up for grabs:

1 FREE Tuition for Internet Marketing Copywriting Makeover

One lucky winner will receive full and complete access to the 4-week IM Copy Makeover Coaching program (valued at $447). This 4-week intensive program shows you how to remodel their existing sales copy (or create brand new copy) for increased response. You’ll be able to hone your copywriting skills through hands-on, practical application. This coaching includes a full and detailed copy critique and plenty of opportunity for follow up.

Here’s How to Enter

Take a look at the coaching information page. If you can use this for your business, move onto step #2.

Write a comment below with your full name, state/province and country stating that you’d like to enter. Please include one sentence (or more) on why you’d like to get your hands on this prize.

Deadline for entry is 10 PM PST Tuesday (November 4, 2008 - Click here to see what time it is in PST).

By random draw, we’ll pick a winner and announce it on Wednesday. You MUST claim your prize within 5 days or we will draw another winner.

Good luck!

What Is The “Right Direction” For Your Business?

It’s very easy to “get off track” with your business decisions, no matter if you’re new or have had your business for years. Analyzing your business and your goals every so often is beneficial to knowing if you are heading in the right direction.

A good sign of success is continued happiness - Do you wake up each morning excited to go to work? Do you enjoy what you do? Do you thrive on speaking with your customers and planning ways to build your business and meet their needs? If you’re happy with your business chances are it’s on the right track.

Growth is another sign of success - Is your business growing steadily? Has your sales grown? Has your customer base grown? Growth doesn’t have to be substantial to determine success; it just has to be steady. If you are reaching your goals as quickly or consistently as you’d like then your business is headed in the right direction.

Think about what your customers say about your business - Do you receive positive feedback and responses from customers? Are you building positive relationships? Happy customers are worth their weight in gold. If your customers are happy and are expressing their happiness, then you’re definitely headed in the right direction.

Consider how you can expand your business - Do you have room for growth? Some industries are short lived, such as a website which sells pet rocks, Chia pets or other trendy and short lived fads while other industries have unlimited potential for growth. The ability to grow and expand your business is a sign of future success.

Thinking realistically about your business and the path you want it to take will help to insure your future success. Business plans are not meant to be written in stone. They should be fluid documents that changes with the times and adapt to your new ideas.

Personally I have made major decisions in business when I wasn’t happy, I think we all should. In the end, yes it is about the money but it’s also about your happiness, asking these questions often will help keep you on track.

Do you think there should be changes made to a business when you’re not happy with it? Or do you think you should just continue on your plan without disrupting anything?

Free Download: Power Words Pack a Punch for Your Copy

Here’s a list of 115 power words / phrases (they’re a little excerpt from one of the IM Copy Makeover lessons) that you can use to add some oomph to your sales copy. These words invoke emotion, curiosity and interest. You can use this list to add little something to your existing copy or use it as a reference as you write new copy.

Download Yours: Click here (PDF)

MYTH: Killer Copy is All You Need

Killer Copy (n): Emotionally-based website sales copy designed to sell a product to as many prospects as possible.

Okay, the smart and ethical business person already knows that simply having good copy is not enough. Having a good product and customer service to match is important too.

But that’s not really what I’m talking about.

I’m talking about when the killer copy becomes the sole focus or main focus of the whole marketing process. You bet, copy is important…but it doesn’t stand on its own for long-term business success.

I’ve had the honor of learning copywriting from some of the greatest direct marketing masters out there, but I have to tell you, some of them scare me a bit. They share amazing techniques about increasing conversions to astronomical proportions and it’s very impressive. On the surface, it sounds like a very good thing. After all, who doesn’t want to sell more?

But selling more can mean a lot more unhappy customers.

Realize that many of these direct mail and online marketers simply sell products via direct response…they aren’t necessarily into branding, building a reputation, etc. If you’re running a business for the long term, you need to ensure your copy does a few things:

• Your target market should be clearly defined. Sure, killer copywriters are good at targeting a market, but because the copy is so emotionally based, they often sell a product to segments of the market for which it’s not really intended. If that sounds confusing, let me give you an example - Let’s take your garden variety Internet marketing product using killer copy. The copy usually is written to appeal to people who want to make easy money. Well, just about everyone wants easy money. The copy plays on the emotions of this group when realistically, they don’t want to set up an Adwords campaign, write articles or whatever the product teaches you to do.

• Your copy should match your offer. Killer copy often overplays the benefits of a product and that leads to disappointment by the prospect when they don’t receive quite what they were expecting. For example, things that are labeled as “push button” or promise “results overnight” often simply can’t deliver.

So, if killer copy is this dangerous, why do people to do this? Well, it’s simple. Even though they may have a high refund rate (and this is very often the case if they’re honest), the overall high conversions result in a lot more initial sales.

And remember, all they’re really interested in is the INITIAL sale.

But for the business working to build a brand and reputation, the initial sale is not enough. One of the important keys to your success are repeat customers and word of mouth. If your customers aren’t totally satisfied, they certainly won’t buy from you again and they won’t recommend you to others. In fact, they may spread the word, but the result won’t be positive.

Instead, stick with copy that effectively targets your prospect, matches your offer and inspires customer loyalty. If you need step-by-step help in doing that, you can grab your copywriting course here and of course, do share your thoughts below.

Escape Velocity and Your Internet Business

My 7 year old 2nd grader, who is homeschooled, is particularly interested in space travel and airplanes. So, we read a lot of books on the subject for science.

One day while doing some reading with him I came across this concept of “Escape Velocity”. I was immediately struck by the implications of this principle for internet business and had to share this with you. (See how these great ideas for blog posts come at the funniest times?!)

What is Escape Velocity and what does it have to do with your online business?

Wikipedia puts it this way:

“… (escape velocity) is commonly described as the speed needed to “break free” from a gravitational field (without any additional impulse)…

… the escape velocity is the minimum speed an object without propulsion needs to have sufficient energy to be able to “escape” from the gravity, i.e. so that gravity will never manage to pull it back.”

Explaining this to a 7 year old, I basically said that the space shuttle has to take off SO FAST with all the power the rocket boosters have so that it can break away from the earth’s atmosphere. Then once it gets free of the pull of gravity, it’s in orbit and it takes very little energy to stay up there.

Do you see any implications here for your business?

What are you doing to create escape velocity?

Everyone loves to talk about “passive income”. What they don’t say as much is that while passive income is very possible, it takes a whole lot of WORK to create it.

It ain’t passive in the beginning.

We have to “escape” the “gravitational pull” of the following:

• Our own procrastination
• Time restraints (we have other stuff going on besides our business)
• Learning curves
• The competition
• Our fears, insecurities, lack of confidence
• Insert your own gravitational pull here

So, the question is: How do we create escape velocity?

Here are a few ways to get into orbit.

Get Mentored and Coached

Getting good coaching from someone who is already AT where you want to BE is a wonderful way to shave months (years?) off your learning curve. Why do Olympic athletes hire coaches - people who were once top athletes themselves? Because they know their stuff. If you want to get to the top you must learn from others who are already there.

Hanging out with other successful people is also important. One of the things that can drag us back to “earth” are our negative thoughts. If you don’t know anyone offline who is making a full time living from the Internet, you won’t have much of a cheering section. Get with people who are a few steps ahead of you and observe what they do. If they can do it, so can you.

Create Public Accountability

Create a challenge for yourself that stretches you. As an example, I recently launched a challenge on my blog. I planned on writing 30 articles to promote my business in 30 days. When I first heard about someone else doing this, it sounded unreasonable. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized it was actually quite doable. So to make it more fun and create accountability for myself, I issued a challenge on my blog. Surprisingly, almost 50 people have joined me. We’re cheering each other on and the majority of us will get it done because we want to be able to brag about it at the end.

There are challenges like this all over the internet. You can join a group doing it or create your own - how hard was it for me to simply write a blog post? You can pay to get “in” to a challenge group or do it for free. Doesn’t really matter. Just look for the opportunities that scare you just a little bit!

Don’t Wait - Work

Do NOT wait until everything is perfect to get going. Right now I’m helping my mom launch her blog. While she is articulate, funny, a great writer and entertainer and has had several successful businesses through the years, she thinks she won’t have anything interesting to say on her blog! That’s utter nonsense of course - but what many newbies don’t realize is that the best education comes in the process.

If you wait until your blog/website/information product/etc are perfect, you will never get going. It’s like waiting for the perfect time to get married or have a baby - the perfect time doesn’t exist!

What’s more - the thing about procrastination is that it’s often more fatiguing than the actual work involved. We are so creative at coming up with all the “reasons” we can’t do something. One of the participants in my 30 Day Article Writing Challenge kept twittering about why she couldn’t do it - until she joined us and DID. I sent her a message that teasingly said, “I was wondering when you would stop wasting energy saying No and just say Yes”.

I hope these tips help you realize the importance of getting going and getting ON with it. Think about how you can create Escape Velocity in your business - and come back in a month and tell us how different your business looks.

A Simple Copywriting Strategy To Boost Your Sales

If you sell a general product to a general market, here’s a simple yet powerful copywriting strategy that will increase your sales.

Let’s say you wrote an ebook that teaches job hunters how to get a job in 30 days. And you wrote a sales letter with the headline:

“How To Get A Job In 30 Days Or Less.”

Now, you may be able to generate some sales with that letter. But here’s a strategy that will boost your sales. It’s so simple that it’s surprising how many experienced marketers overlook it.

It’s called market segmentation.

You see, just because your ebook is a general product that appeals to a general market, doesn’t mean that your sales letter has to be general as well.

When it comes to communicating your sales message, a customized message will always outperform a general one.

And that’s where market segmentation comes in.

Instead of writing a general sales letter that targets everyone, write multiple letters that target multiple market segments while selling the same product.

How To Segment Your Market

One easy way to segment your market is to study your keywords. If you’re advertising on Google AdWords, look at the keywords being used by your market.

Going back to the job hunting ebook example, some of the keywords that job hunters use could be:

• Sales job
• Secretarial job
• Engineering job

That’s three market segments right there.

Now, you can customize your sales letter for each market segment. So, your new headlines will be:

“How To Get A Sales Job In 30 Days Or Less.”

“How To Get A Secretarial Job In 30 Days Or Less.”

“How To Get An Engineering Job In 30 Days Or Less.”

So, when job hunters use the keywords “sales job” on Google and arrive on your sales letter with the headline, “How To Get A Sales Job In 30 Days Or Less,” they will definitely be more interested in reading the entire sales letter and eventually be more inclined to buy your ebook.

Do you see the simplicity of the strategy?

All you have to do is write a general sales letter. And then, use it as template to customize your sales message for various market segments.

And don’t worry, it only takes 5 seconds to customize each sales letter. Just use the “Find And Replace” function in your web design software and you can create a customized sales letter for several market segments easily and quickly.

With a sales letter customized for a specific market segment, your sales will increase. I guarantee it.

Just Loaded Up Oct-Dec 2008 Planning Sheets

When we loaded up the 2009 Planning Calendar, quite a few people said they wanted to start NOW! Yeah, I guess it’s still 3 months ’til 2009, but it’s never too early to start planning.

If you downloaded all the documents, you’ll see that all the sheets could be used in 2008. All that was missing was the monthly sheets. Well, we’ve loaded some up for you that you can download and print.

But just a note - the monthly pages are actually quite simple, so if you like the system and want to use it beyond 2009, all you need is monthly calendar sheets that you can print out from Outlook or any other scheduling program. Then you can print out all the sheets included in the original zip file and customize those with the relevant dates.

Enough yapping, here’s the 2008 sheets:

Download the Oct - Dec 2008 monthly sheets (PDF)

Now, get planning and strategizing!

Growing Your Brand With the Internet

Branding for the small business owner is an incredibly important part of marketing your business. You want your customers to think of you first, to trust you, and to ultimately purchase from you. A small business owner’s most powerful branding tool is their personality, which will also be interpreted by customers and prospects as the business personality.

Here are a few great ways to use the internet to express your personality:

Blogs are a super easy way to both communicate with your customer and to offer them value. Every business can benefit from having a blog, which is simply a way to teach your readers something new and to form a relationship with them. A blog has the added benefit of being interactive, with the reader posting comments or questions to which the writer can then respond.

Video is rapidly becoming one of the most popular marketing tools for small business owners with the popularity of YouTube. For some business owners, speaking is easier than writing and it gives you the same ability to communicate with your prospects and customers as a blog does. In fact, you can upload a video to your regular blog to mix up the content and to give your audience a new perspective.

Audio precedes video as a marketing tool however it is still very popular. When you’re speaking to your prospects and customers, about any subject relevant to your industry, your personality comes through in your voice, your inflections, and even in the words you choose. Audio is also a popular choice because your messages can be downloaded to an mp3 player so your clients can take your words with them through their day.

Content is an excellent form of personality marketing and many forms, such as ebooks, articles, reports and ezines, are viral. Viral simply means the information can all be forwarded to friends and associates of your prospects thus increasing your reach and your exposure.

Using pictures on your website helps you connect with your clients. Ever flip to the back page of a book to see what the author looks like? I do it all the time. Why? Curiosity. I just want to know what the author looks like. The same holds true for your business. A picture of you as the owner and pictures of your team help visitors connect with you as a person.

Social networking gives business owners the ability to connect with people on an entirely different, non-sales, level. You can establish a profile on any number of networking sites, such as Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook, and meet, greet, and connect with prospects, customers, and even potential future business partners. Social networking is personality branding kicked up a notch.

Branding is a continuous process and for the small business owner it means more than a logo and a catchy name. Your website is often the first impression a customer gets before making a decision to use you or not. Include an About page, Company Philosophy, or Mission Statement on your website for customers to read. Small business branding is all about connecting with your customer on a personal level and the internet has made it easy and accessible for all.

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