How To Give Your Visitors A One-Way Ticket To The Shopping Cart
When web surfers visit your sales page online, they can be in various stages of emotion at their time of arrival. Advertising becomes more than just words on a page when you see your website from your visitor's perspective. If you consider a purchase to be just a logical action by your visitors, you've missed the biggest reason people buy.
No matter what mood your visitors are in when they visit you online, the most effective web copy will develop something inside them the average web page would not. You become, in a sense, an exciter as a copywriter.
The best copywriters in the world are able to bring out certain 'planned' emotions in their audience that would not normally occur by just looking at a regular sales letter or sales page.
Your first step as a copywriter will be to figure out what emotional needs your product satisfies. This cannot be determined with logical calculations; rather, it is a discovery of feelings for you. If you were them, how would using your product make them feel? What feelings would have to be developed in you just before pressing the ORDER button to complete the sale?
The feeling your customers get when using your product cannot be left only to the sales letter. This emotional attachment to your product must be so complete, they almost feel as if they're feeling something new just by using it.
This is not something you can completely control after the purchase is completed, but you can ensure you guide them to the purchase with a certain handful of emotions in tow. These emotions you bring out in them must be so strong, they last a short while after the sale, as well. Customers often get buyer's remorse shortly after a sale, but you can overcome this by making sure they'll walk away possessing a feeling of doing the right thing. If not, chargebacks for you will be monstrous.
These emotions will complete the sale for you and close the deal, almost as if you've grabbed them by the hand on the way to your secure online shopping cart and held onto their hand for the two weeks or so afterwards. One way you can ensure this is to send them a couple of emails or letters, spaced apart, with copy in them that makes the customer feel good about buying once again. Phone calls will sometimes work, also. Keep that feeling of pride in owning your product for a little while longer to make sure the product really sticks.
Stuart J. Agres references Puto & Wells by describing this phenomena in his book 'Emotion in Advertising: Theoretical and Practical Explorations'. Mr. Agres says, 'A transformational advertisement is defined as "one which associates the experience of using (consuming/owning) the advertised brand with a unique set of psychological characteristics, which would not typically be associated with the brand experience to the same degree without exposure to the advertisement" ( Puto & Wells, 1984, p. 638).
It is essential therefore, that your advertising copy transforms your prospects. You must be able to incite certain emotions in them they believe your product gives them. They must be made to feel they would not feel these emotions if your product was not in their possession.
Have you ever read sales copy that just swept you away? You look up from your computer screen, not realizing you have been mesmerized for the last few minutes or so, carried away by great copy. It is usually a great story of some kind, with emotional curves in it, that sweeps you away from reality for awhile.
After reading this type of copy at least once in your life, you'd recognize good copy anywhere. We've all seen it. Words are so powerful, they can make us feel hurt, scared, happy, sad, or any other variety of emotions.
If you've ever read a Stephen King novel, you know what it's like to be carried along by a writer. The fear you feel is so real, you sometimes have to pull yourself out of the book to turn on a light in the room to keep the monsters away!
The best copy I have ever read is a personal story that travels along very quickly, telling a compelling tale that concludes with the happy ending of why the product was necessary for happiness or security.
Decide what emotion you would like your product or service to fulfill. Tell your prospects a wild tale filled with strong feelings. They'll stick with you long after the sale.
About the author: Lynne Schlumpf is Editor of Seed Your Web http://www.seedyourweb.com and the author of a new book "The Little Website That Could". The book's official site can be surfed to here: http://www.littlewebsitethatcould.net