Copywriting For Profits – What Drives Buying Decisions

Copywriting is either really compelling or a total flop depending on whether or not the writer knows how to create writing that makes people buy. This difference is so pronounced that poor copywriters work for as little a few cents a word while the best ones can charge several thousand dollars for one sales page or direct mailer. Can you guess what the most significant difference is between copywriting which sells and copywriting which gets ignored?
The difference lies within understanding what drives people’s buying decisions, and it’s super simple…it’s the basic emotional needs.
The Basic Needs Which Drive Buying
Have you ever wondered why so many spend money irresponsibly, almost to where they can’t control it? The majority of people in our country are broke because of their poor spending habits, and there can only be one reason for this: spending decisions are NOT based on logic, they’re based on emotion. Advertisers spend billions of dollars of research to find out which words, phrases and colors and other things illicit emotional responses in people.
These emotional responses are related to the basic needs for security, excitement and validation. These are the three basic emotional needs which drive all decisions, including the reasons why people buy. Again, the needs are for validation, security and excitement. If you know how to appeal to these needs, you’re on your way to becoming a VERY effective copywriter.
Appealing to the Emotional Needs
So how do you appeal to the basic needs for validation, security and excitement? One way is understanding the contrasting emotional states which happen as a result of not having the emotional needs met. For example, jealousy is a powerful tool for compelling people to buy…it’s because when a person is jealous they feel invalidated, which causes intense emotional pain and pain inspires a person to take immediate action.
For business to business copywriting, it’s invoking jealousy by mentioning how they are going to be “left behind by their competition” if they don’t have your product or service. For business to customer writing, it’s the old “keeping up with the Jone’s” which, as you know, works wonders for getting people to spend money….even money they don’t have.
This appeal to emotional needs is what’s causing other copywriters to collect enormous paychecks while you work for peanuts. So don’t be one of those left behind, learn to appeal to the emotional needs which drive people’s buying decisions and take your place amongst the copywriters who can literally write their own paycheck.