Key To An Effective Sales Copy – Play The So What Game

Writing effective copy for a direct mail sales letter, email campaign or to be used in a video, speech or presentation, it MUST to persuade. Simply stating what your product is and how it will help the reader is not enough to get people to do more than toss your letter into the trash, delete your email or tune out your video, speech or presentation.
In letter and internet marketing, studies have shown that 11 seconds is all you have to grab potential client interest. If you make the copy about “why should I care,” you will have a much greater opportunity to keep the client interested and than persuade your client to buy.
For a sales copier to do its job – persuade people to purchase or use your product or service – it must first make the client “desire” it.
This is accomplished by transforming “features” of your product or service (Definition: A feature is something about your product/service that is worth value) into a “benefit” for the client (Definition: What’s in it for me?)
One of the easiest ways to transform features into benefits is to play the “So What?” game.
Here is a sample product: The Widget Coffee Pot with Timer. Now, let’s play “So What.”
Feature: The coffee pot has a timer to automatically perk at a specified time.
Round 1: So What? “Your coffee will be ready when you wake up.”
Round 2: So What? “You will be happier in the morning because you are not alert until you have your first cup of coffee”
Round 3: So What? “Your family will not get on your nerves because you are grumpy”
Round 4: So What? “Spouse, kids and I will be in good moods every morning and I will have a good day.”
Round 5: So What? “If I buy this coffee pot my family and I will be happy.”
Continue to do this until you cannot think of another “so what?” and you have the benefit that will make your reader desire your product/service enough to want to buy it.
Use can use this process to help with all parts of the copy. Let’s look at possible headlines for the Widget Coffee Pot Sales Letter:
Which is the better headline?
“The Widget Coffee Pot with Timer – Imagine Your Coffee Ready When You Are!!”
– or –
“A peaceful morning filled with smiling children and a perky spouse is the ‘new normal’ at my house thanks to the Widget Coffee Pot.”
If your sales copy is more about what makes your client happier, wealthier, smarter, etc. and less about how great your product/service is, you have the makings of great persuasive copy and a new sale!
Happy Writing!