I did promise to get this video posted today and I have just about achieved that. You can find the video here but before you watch it, please visit this link (all is explained why in the video) and print off this document as it will really help you work with and understand the concepts I explain in the video.

I have chosen this document so that I haven’t violated any copyrights (I hope) and it serves our purpose really well.

So, go and watch the video with the document at your side and a pencil in your hand!

Headlines

I really hope it helps those of you struggling with headlines.

As ever, I will be pleased to receive all feedback so don’t hold back…

~Ray

From the recent recession busting tips report feedback, your biggest concern seems to be how to write at least 100 headlines for each campaign so that the “right” one is sure to jump out. Marie E says “I have trouble coming up with one headline - let alone 100!”.

Well Marie, you are not alone and so I am putting together a demonstration video this weekend to PROVE how easy it really is to produce at least 100 headlines, probably more. You will see it happen right in front of your eyes. So watch this space…

The reason writing so many headlines is SO important is that only after writing a lot does your brain finally settle down into the “groove” of the idea and starts popping out some really powerful headlines. Unless you can achieve this state, your headlines will never perform as well as they could.

With such a choice of headlines you also get plenty of choices for split testing so you can test your marketplace with different options to see how your customers react. Remember that your customers are human beings too and a headline that you think is fantastic might fall totally flat and produce few responses. Unless you test - you will never know.

Having such a choice of headlines also gives you plenty of strap lines and sub-headlines, all of which help to draw your prospects in to you and gives you plenty of fodder for your marketing media.

So, I will work on this video and hopefully post it here on Monday and dispel the myth that “I can’t write 1 headline - let alone 100!”

~Ray

I was reading our free newspaper this evening. It is the first one we have received in weeks so it made a nice change.

It made dismal reading though. Not because of the lack of substantial local news - we expect that. It was because of the adverts within it. There must be a couple of hunderd adverts in there and every single one of them was the worst kind of ineffective advert that I keep trying to get people to dump. You know the sort - the painter who is looking for work (but no outsides) - the plumber who can fix your dripping taps - the tyre firm who have tyres and exhausts for sale - and so on.

They all look tired, dull and worst of all - they look the same.

The plumber, the kitchen fitter, the tyre company, the painter, the double glazing firm, the builder, the costume hire shop - unless you read them closely - they all look the same.

OK they are different colours and different sizes, but not a single one of them stands out from the bunch. Not one has a strong call to action. Not one has a Unique headline shouting out why you would be mad not to choose this painter, or that builder. Not one will perform any more than mildly average.

It is such a shame that so many businesses are still throwing money at advertising that will not work anything like as effectively as it could for the same investment.

Are you still doing advertising that way?

If you are, because you are worried about changing it in case the trickle of new customers drys up, at least try just one advert in the way I described in my previous series of posts on writing effective adverts. If you have the nerve to try just one new style ad - watch the difference in response you get. You will see how much better the info-ad works and then you will have the confidence to dump the old ways forever.

The worst offenders at selling the “old style” ads are the telephone directory staff. However, it is proven by every person who has ever had a telephone book ad that these just don’t pull enough response to justify the costs. Have a look through your telephone directory right now - it is packed with similar style ads. The challenge is to find a single info type ad in the whole book.

Go and have a look now - and let us all know how many you find!!

~Ray

At last.  I have been working on this report for about a month now and it seems to have grown into a mini-book which isn’t quite what I had in mind.

Anyway, please nip over to the website and get your free copy before the advert comes out next week.  I have limited the free downloads to 1,000 and after that number is reached I will remove the download facility and sell the report for £5.99 instead.  So make sure you zoom over to:-

http://recessionbustingtips.com

right now to secure your copy.  It is fully automated and (hopefully) pretty instant.

Once you have read it, please come back here and leave a comment about it - both good and bad.  The report is not set in stone (although it feels like it if you print it off!) so any extra bits or tweaks are easily incorporated into future downloads.

At least let me know if you helps you feel a little more positive that your business may now have a chance at surviving the recession.

~Ray

A client, whom I shall call “Emma” here called round this morning and returned a copy of Paul Gorman’s book “How to out-sell, out market, out promote, out advertise everyone else you compete against before they even know what hit them” that I lent to her some months ago.

“I don’t see how most of the stuff in this book is relevant to my business” she told me as she handed over the book.  Emma owns a franchise locally providing pre-school activities for young children.  The franchise dictates that only  official marketing materials and flyers can be used, although Emma can personalize these a little with her own details and strap lines.

“I can’t come up with any unique head/strap lines for these flyers” she told me.  “I don’t have the brain for it although I can see they may help if could thing of any”.  “I don’t see how the letters would work though, with all the bold bits and the PS’ at the bottom - I ignore these when I receive them - doesn’t everyone else?”

The discussion wasn’t really about Paul’s book.  It was about a decision that Emma knows she is facing but is trying to avoid.  Every single marketing tactic can be applied to any business at all.  The slant may be different, the target audience will certainly be different, but essentially, the same things work whether you are selling 1p paperclips or £10 million aircraft.

I could see I was in for a difficult time to persuade Emma of the importance of promoting her business in all manner of ways, yes, including letters.  The thing is, she totally loves the work she does with the children and will enthuse about the benefits of what she offers all day long, but she doesn’t want the bother of the office work.  She just wants to be with the kids, doing what she loves.

This doesn’t sound like a problem to most people but to me it shows the turmoil that goes on inside lot’s of people that find themselves running businesses.  Emma got into this franchise because she loves children and believes that the franchise model and facilities are of immense benefit to the development of small children.  However, the only way to do the work she loves was to buy the franchise for her local area.  I don’t believe she actually wanted to run a business, she just wanted to to run the classes.

The problem is the franchise model is working against her.  If she wants to make money from her business, she has to step out of what she loves to do and become a business woman that she doesn’t want to be.  Just running her own classes though doesn’t give her enough turnover to live on.

Emma’s comments about Paul Gorman’s brilliant book are coming from the position that she knows she has to grow the business to improve her income, but she simply doesn’t want to because of all the marketing, admin, bookkeeping, payroll, finding venues, organizing classes and 101 other things that go into running a larger business.

I do see quite a few people with Emma’s predicament.  The simple truth is they have to make a choice.  They can go one of two ways.  Firstly, they can choose just to do as much as they can themselves and earn a small income which barely justifies the cost and ongoing commitment to the franchiser; Secondly, they can expand the business dramatically within their geographic area, take on people to run the classes, become a manager instead of a worker and direct operations from above without much day to day involvement with the children.

A business person in Emma’s shoes that settles for option 1 has to accept that they “own” their job.  But that’s basically all it is.  The franchiser still gets their cut from Emma so they are happy, but Emma, apart from job satisfaction, will never make a decent living.

If however, Emma embraces the idea that she can run her business as a manager, starts taking Paul Gorman’s advice about marketing tactics to grow her business; takes massive action to generate more classes; finds suitable people to run those classes along the lines Emma dictates; she will start to make some serious money from her franchise.  There is nothing written that says Emma is prohibited from running any classes ever again.  She can fill in, or set up a couple of special classes just for her to run.  But her success will be guaranteed.

She just needs to decide which way she wants to jump.

Emma knows I will help her to the best of my ability, but the main decision, whatever it is, is hers and hers alone.   Job or business Emma - it’s up to you!

~Ray

It is absolutely vital that you know who your Target Audience is.

Why? Because if you send out marketing materials to people that are not likely to need your products/services – you are wasting your time and valuable resources.

How do you know who your Target Audience is?

Your TA is simply the people that you would like to do business with. In essence you need to know who your ideal clients/customers are. Once you know this, you will know how and where to look for these people/businesses.

For example, if you are a hairdresser, would you be looking for clients by advertising in a national fishing magazine, or would you be better focusing on people within a 5 mile radius of your salon?

If you are a plumber, would you find many customers by advertising in a national computer magazine, or would a more local approach work better?

If you are a mail-order bookseller, would you put leaflets through 5,000 doors in your local area, or would you have more success with an advert in a national publication?

I know these are slightly extreme examples, but I hope you can start to see the point in trying your best to put your offer in front of the people who are most likely to respond.

Recently I was talking with a coach business who wanted to start running coach based tours for older folks from the Midlands to various seaside resorts for one and two week holidays. They were talking about an advert in “Yellow Pages” for next year. I asked them how many of their target audience would look through that publication if they wanted a holiday. As we started brainstorming, excellent ideas such as Post Offices, Supermarkets, Church Halls, where lunch clubs and tea dances are held, hairdressers and cafes locally would be good places for posters. All places where their Target Audience would be much more likely to see the tour posters and respond to them.

It is the same for any business. Spend some time really thinking about the people most likely to benefit from what you are offering and where to focus your marketing efforts to ensure they see your offer and it is compelling enough to trigger a response.

Are you doing this kind of laser focused marketing at the moment? If so, revisit your original findings and make sure they are still 100% valid. If not, start today.

~Ray

This is a question that vexes most entrepreneurs.  We are all of a certain type of person, excellent with the talk and can mostly persuade an Eskimo to buy snow.  But when it comes to writing a sales letter, advert, brochure or some other marketing material, it all becomes too complicated and tiresome.

We say, “If only I can talk to the right person I can usually make the sale” - does that sound familiar?

The simple way around this conundrum is to record ourselves talking to a prospect.  Record ourselves talking to clients/customers around problems or overcoming objections!  Then get all the recordings typed up!

It really is that simple.  You can then go through the transcripts and pick out the genuine, solid gold, nuggets of information that slip out naturally when we are talking without being conscious of them even being said.

You can then form these nuggets into a logical order and voila! you have, with little effort at all, just written your best ever sales letter!

I bought a digital voice recorder earlier in the year and although expensive, I can, with a client’s permission, just sit it on the table whilst we talk with it set on conference mode.  After a minute or two we forget it’s even there and it gives excellent quality recordings for a transcription service to type up.  It is a wonderful way of working!

I may, thinking about it as I write, put a recorded blog post here shortly just to show that marketing - even blogging - can be fun!

~Ray

Well, it has been a couple of weeks in the making but Chris has now finished his work on the Scout Christmas Directory advert I mentioned recently.  I am sorry about the distortion, that is down to my lack of ability to manipulate images.  The actual advert is A6 not square so the real thing looks much better, and a bit longer!  If you click on the image you should see the image properly presented in it’s full glory!

We have gone for a black and white image to reflect the current gloom the media are peddling all day every day at the moment and Chris decided to link the recession buster theme of the report to the historic “Dam Busters” of WWll fame.  I will do my very best to undo the negative media hype that pushes people into unwize and unnecessary decisions with this report.  That is my aim.

Anyway, love it or hate it, the advert is standing as it is.  Only time will tell if it manages to beat last year’s number of respondents!

I have also basically finished the website that the advert links to although it still needs some tweaking I think.  All the autoresponders are in place… all I now really have to do is finish the report.

I have been making great inroads into writing but it is far from finished.

I have today (weirdly) received a grumpy email from someone who came across the website registered for the report and complained that the report wasn’t attached to the email as I had promised!  Well it wouldn’t be yet would it!  The event was a tad embarassing but it shows that it is a topic very high in people’s thoughts at the moment.

Anyway, I promised to give you Chris Eccleston’s website address so that anyone interested in this young designer’s work has a point of contact.  It is http://thirteendesign.co.uk but there is nothing there yet.  Be patient with him as it is a very busy time for him as he starts to develop his brand new client base.  But don’t hesitate to contact him if you want a really new slant on your own marketing, branding or promotional materials.

~Ray

Thank you for all those who responded to my post about the best direction for the advert I have booked in a charitable booklet.

The person who first suggested the recession busting report was Rachael, although I have to confess I had already listed 24 hot tips to go in the report so it seems lots of you had similar feelings to me.  Perhaps the current financial climate has something to do with our thinking!

I am meeting the talented young designer Chris Eccleston tomorrow and we are going to work on the look of the advert to try and get it to reach out and grab people’s attention over the festive period.  I will put a link to Chris’s new website tomorrow once he has decided on a name!  I spent an hour in this lad’s company on Saturday morning and was really impressed with the way he thinks.  The funny thing is that he was at school with my eldest son, also called Chris…  it’s strange the way things work out!  I forecast a bright future for him and it is a pleasure to meet a 22 year old lad who is so commited to making his mark in the world.

The report is now up to 30 tips and my mind is still buzzing with ideas.  The problem is trying to pick the ones that should go into such a report, and which ones are more suited to other articles or reports.  I don’t want people to be put off by the length of it, but I want it long enough to be seen as having real value.  The 30 tips already earmarked are at least a page each so you can see my problem.

The trouble is that I have worked my way through 3 recessions so I have some idea of what works and what doesn’t and have seen lots of businesses survive and quite a few that haven’t.  The advantage of my great old age I suppose.  But if I can stop even one business from failing, from doing something fatal in a recession, then all the effort involved in writing the report and puzzling over the advert will have been time very well spent.

So I am going to crack on with writing the report and I will post the link to it here first so that I can get some feedback before the advert goes live in December.

~Ray

Good Ideas Urgently Required!

I am about to take out an advert that has become an annual event for me.  A client once asked me to support the local scout group by having an advert in their Christmas post directory to raise funds for them.  Being an old scout myself I didn’t hesitate and I have done it each year since.  The problem is that the directory goes to some 5,000 homes in the area but isn’t a publication that I would normally use as relevant to my prospective target clients.  This is proven by the lack of substantial response from my advert each year.

I am always telling you here to make sure that every £1 you spend on marketing earns a profit so… the challenge this year is to formulate an advert that will have such an irresistable call to action that someone receiving this directory in their home around Christmas will be motivated to respond.

This brings me to where I will really appreciate some feedback from you.

I have so many things in my head after all these years as an Accountant, having lived and worked through many ups and downs in our ever changing economy, that I simply can’t decide which aspect of business to focus the advert on to help the most people.  I have so many possibilities they are blowing my mind.  I will really value your opinion as to which area of accountancy, bookkeeping, business, marketing, tax, cash flow or even tips on business survival in a recession might be of real interest to a householder/business person over the Christmas period.  Compelling enough to get them to visit the web page I am setting up and ask for the report I am going to write specially for the advert.

I am sure you will appreciate that I cannot write the report until I know which area the ad will focus on… a real conundrum!  I have a really talented young designer waiting to put the advert together, I have the website registered, I have the ideas… I just need your help with the focus!!

The list above isn’t all the possibilities, you may have a totally different area or topic that you feel will be of interest to the most people that isn’t mentioned so please let me know.

I am really looking forward to hearing from you about this.  I will give a very public thankyou and a small prize for the best suggestion that becomes the one I use… as well as making sure that each of you get a copy of the report when it is written of course!

~Ray