Ad writing is an art

The art of writing an advertising is gift as it is creating a message that addresses people.
Some people have “it” and others don’t.
Still following the guidelines below, you too will be writing ad copies that sell!

Ad guidelines

1. Know your audience for the ad
2. Start thinking like your audience
3. Investigate why would this type of customer buy your products or services?
4. State benefits not features
5. Limit to a single benefit in one ad: only one message can be communicated
6. Promise a credible benefit in order to believe you
7. The short headline needs to attract, to grab attention and to stay with them
8. The headline needs to state the benefit or suggest the benefit using a question
9. Embed an emotion in your message
10. Connect emotionally with them
11. Address the reader: “You” – Be one-on-one with your reader
12. State clearly what you sell – Your unique selling proposition
13. State clearly how you differentiate from your competitors
14. Stand out from the crowd of the other messages
15. Check upon your competitors – look for improvement
16. get inspired by your competitors but don’t copycat
17. Write using plain language in order to be understood by as many people as possible
18. Never use abbreviations as people have no clue
19. Limit the number words in a sentence and prefer to use short words
20. Keep the number of sentences short in the short paragraphs
21. Invite to take action. The Call To Action
22. Offer a discount, a promotion voucher (coupon) obtainable under fulfilling a simple condition
23. Avoid overused phrases as they have lost their power
24. Provide a testimonial containing a minimal identification, the reason and the benefit
25. Add a visual: the product, a person or anything that relates to your product or solution

Ad rework then publish

Read the ad up loudly to preferable someone you have a high esteem for. If it sounds silly then rework.
Rewrite the ad copy several times before publishing. Improve. Shorten. State more clearly.
Try out by running the ad a few times and learn from the responses and comments.
Then rework the ad copy and republish on a larger scale.

What are you waiting for? Go write your ad copy now.

Types of Freebies and Giveaways

Whenever visiting a business trade show, you easily can have enough pencils for the next 6 months which you collect from the desks of the booths.
At the same time you end up with several freebies which are given after a conversation with a sales rep on the booth. These are in most cases toys and in a few exceptional cases really useful products.

There are four types of freebies:
- Office supplies: pens, calendars, clocks, mouse pads, mugs, etc.
- Apparel: T-shirts, baseball caps, golf shirts, socks, etc.
- Fun stuff: toys, games, gag gifts, electronics, etc.
- Perishables: cookies, mints, food and beverage, etc.

Missing Brand Exposure and Short List

If you visit enough business trade shows during your career, you will collect enough T-shirts and baseball caps for lasting into your retirement.

All these freebies are given for lead generation or in the hope the visitor will remember the brand name at the right moment when he makes up the short list for the next purchase.

However what typically happens is that most of the freebies are distributed to the family (kids and wife) or a stored in the closet for later use. As such the brand name doesn’t get the right exposure or disappears from the targeted buyer.

There are also people who will do whatever it takes to get a specific giveaway. Like engaging in a conversation with a sales rep although there is no interest or no project in his company. Not exactly the best spending of marketing money and time of the sales rep.

Even when giving away freebies it is likely the shortlist can be missed just like no freebies would be given.

Lead Qualification Freebies

The problem with freebies is that there is no feed back in this process. The booth staff hands out the freebie while collecting a business card allowing to contact the person after the trade show. The visitor doesn’t need to take any action as the information and freebie go one way.

Wouldn’t it be better if the visitors should take an action like a lead qualification before being given the freebie. This lead qualification should happen after the trade show which could be like completing an online survey.
Of course the cost per freebie would be significantly higher due to the shipping cost to the company. However the freebie would be delivered into the office which will be remarked by other employees and could generate additional interest from colleagues. This interest generated could be more than enough to pay for the shipping costs.

How effective are your freebies or giveaways for lead generation ?
Have you ever calculated the ROI of giveaways ?

More than often the product positioning remains the same for a product throughout its’ lifetime.

Solution changes

This is questionable as throughout the life cycle of a solution more functionality and features are added upon demand of the customers or the salesmen. Due to all these add-ons and changes it is likely the positioning of the solution should be changed. From a straight forward solution due to the additional development the solution has expanded and could target a whole new market segment or even solve a different kind of problem.

Many small can make a big difference

The problem is that these changes are in many case apparently small apparently non-significant modifications or extensions of the solution. However all these small changes can make up quite a different total solution which might no longer fit the original target market or even address a whole new market as the solution has become different or more complex to use.

Market is moving target

On the other hand the market the company used to sell into, will change over time with other needs or different requirements. The market could also diminish in size, becoming so small the market is no longer economically viable. The market is a moving target.
Your original solution that addressed only a small market could become a widely used solution as the market changed in favor of your solution at the right price. Then it is up to management to decide if the sales price can be lowered in order to obtain many more customers.

Market positioning assessment

This is why market positioning of your solutions needs to be questioned and investigated. After each significant change a new assessment should be done in order to see what is the market and type of customers that would require such a solution. A result is a possible different product positioning.
Why else would a company invest in new function and features ?
How would a company ever get a return on investment if the market positioning would remain the same?

Investigating and making an assessment about the market and potential customer type is a must.

When did you make the last assessment of the market positioning of your solution?

In order to influence a purchase in B2B there a wide choice of methods, tools and channels that can be used:
1. Website
2. White papers
3. Case studies
4. Technical articles by third parties
5. Analyst reports
6. Reviews
7. Popular or known bloggers
8. Webinars / Webcasts
9. Video/screen cast
10. Free trials
11. Proof of Concepts
12. Nurturing by email
The problems is that they all are effective, some more than others depending on your market and the product or service you sell, but it is nearly impossible to propose all of them effectively as it just will cost too much money and time.
As a result you will have to make a selection what is best for you.

1. Website without a website people will doubt you are a legit company.
The website plays a large role in all phases of the purchase process.

2. White papers are effective, show your authority and knowledge, but can be too technical or too rational which limits them to the technology influencers. people will download the white papers but gating for this content won’t help much as often free web mail addresses are being used.

3. Case studies have the advantage of a recognizable brand name and a story of a problem getting solved that resembles the existing company. Thus even CxO will read it. However getting the case study written and approved is a long investment.

4. Technical articles by third parties are just to be too technical limiting them completely to engineers and technology influencers.

5. Analyst reports have the advantage that these reports are to be paid by the company or can only be obtained upon request to one of the vendors making these reports more exclusive which drives the interest. Moreover this a a view or insight fro ma third party which is highly respected. There is also a risk involved if the analyst gives you a below average rating.

6. Reviews have the benefit of combining a technical insight, an easy scoring and a short summary for the offering of each vendor requiring not much effort. Even CxO’s will read the conclusion and look into the scoring. Again your product needs to score high as else the review will have a negative effect on your sales.

7. Bloggers that are popular or known will bring their authority and supposed knowledge of the market to the table, which will be taken for granted. As their reviews in their blog posts are short, CxO’s might just read it and stick with it thus you better get a good appraisal.

8. Webinars / Webcasts have the benefit of knowing who is in the virtual meeting allowing for interaction and follow-up. Of course no CxO will ever participate in a webinar, leaving you with technologists, managers and influencers.

9. Videos and screen casts can be great and can be boring – can convince or leave the decision maker indifferent. The cost of creating and professionally editing a video can be high as it needs to be entertaining. One of the problems is that a video is only effective if it is not too long (2minutes) resulting in having to cramp too much information into the short time. And people will press the Fast Forward button missing.

10. Free trials are very tempting and you have to hope the product sells itself. if your product is complex or has special features then you have to make sure people will use these features to make your product stand out.
Actually a free trial can slow down the sales process as the customer first need to install the product which requires time and effort and then during the 15 to 30 days the customer should be using your product which is beyond your control. During the free trial the sales process is being halted as all await the result and conclusion of the free trial, which can take time too.

11. The Proof of Concept is rather similar to a free trial but is mainly to show the solution is actually working within the environment of the customer, but it requires investment of time and money of both the vendor and the customer.
Still the question remains if the potential customer will actually use the system.
And again the sales process is completely halted during the POC (weeks if not months) and the duration of the POC conclusion report (weeks).

12. Nurturing by email is very important too as without it most of the above will be much less effective.

Probably all tactics and methods have their place depending on your market, type of product and what your competitors propose and use. In B2B you have probably be able to offer most of these methods and marketing content as you have to use whatever the potential decision maker expects or requires. Don’t send him an invite for a webinar when he wants a video/screen cast.
Or you have to send a white paper to the technology influencer and a matching case study to the CxO.
Free trials or Proof of Concepts are probably the last step after a longer decision process in order to select between two competitors.
The influence of content by third parties are very important just due to teh fact they are third parties.

What do you use and is effective ?

Lead generation efforts

If you notice a sudden increase of interest for your products or services without having undertaking any important marketing, lead generation or sales effort the maybe your competitor is doing all the hard work.

If your competitor is very actively looking for potential customers by spending large amounts of money on marketing and/or is investing plenty of sales time into cold calling and lead generation, then this will automatically create interest for your products or solutions too as people will research on the Internet for the nearest competitor.

Ride on the coattails of the competitor

Don’t let this opportunity pass by as you soon could be riding on the coattails of your competitor. This requires a high findability on the keywords that are being used by your competitor and a decent Internet presence that gives confidence.
You just need to tease these potential customers enough with your website in order to let them inquiry about your products or services.

Findability- differentiators – trust

Even if you provide a very similar product or service or even a copycat, but are able to bring differentiators, you stand the change to snap away some of his customers at no cost.
All you need to do is getting found, create trust and confidence and clearly present one or more differentiators.
Certainly your competitor will generate more leads and eventually more sales, but at a high cost of marketing spending and sales efforts. Whereas you only have to wait until potential customers show up and explain them the differentiators as hardly any marketing or sales cost.

Competitors make the market bigger

Even the presence of your company and the possibility to inquire about your products or services will eventually also help your competitor to get even more sales only because there is competition and the value of choice.
Hence not only you needs to applaud the sales and marketing efforts of your competitor, he also should be happy with your presence on the market as people like choice and comparisons.

Is your company the sales and marketing driver or are you riding on the coattails of your competitor ?

Web analytics

In B2C Marketers drive their visitors to the check-out like cowboys drive their cattle. They are both herding their cattle towards their goal.
Cowboys used their eye vision and their horses whereas marketers use web analytics to get insight in the flow on their website. The difference is that not a single cow can escape whereas many visitors will escape by leaving the website. Are marketers under performing cowboys ?

Companies versus traffic

In B2B it is not about driving the traffic as cattle towards the goal as:
- Each visitor can be a potential customer and shouldn’t be lost
- Each visitor belongs to a company thus the need to know which visitors belong to which company
- Each visitor has specific needs
Web analytic systems aren’t sufficient and sophisticated enough to know about each visitor and every visiting company.

Website visitor identification

This requires a different kind of website visitor information that:
- Reveals the companies visiting
- Indicates the interest for your products or services by company
- Shows the level of interest by company
- Shows the increase or decrease of the interest level over time by company

This information will allow contacting the interested companies timely with a to their needs suiting message.

Are you a Cowboy or a B2B Marketer ?

International expansion starting with a trade show
If international expansion is part of your business plan you need to at least test the market in a foreign country. A first step could be a presence on a trade show in order to find possible partners and even first customers.
As having your own booth on an international trade show is very expensive most companies test the waters by participating in a government sponsored country booth.

However… there are draw backs:
- You have no control over the location of the country booth
- You probably have no control over the placement on the booth
- In most cases the format of the messaging is standardized in order to give a uniform look to the booth
- On a trade show People look for solutions or information, not countries
- People strolling along are less interested as the booth isn’t focused: different solutions for different markets
- Addressing passengers directly is difficult as they are probably not looking for your solution
- You have no brand awareness

What is needed:
- Clear and short messaging about:
o The problem you solve
o The solution provided
o The context/industry
- Messaging in the local language as even English is often a hurdle
- Logo’s of references that are relevant to the country. Well known logo’s draw attention and build trust.
- Speaking the local language helps, even if you just try

The main goal is:
- Collecting contacts (business cards) from both possible partners and probable customers
- Getting an impression if your solution can have customers in this country.

Internet spam is different from email spam

Sending spam email message to people is not done, considered negatively and will have a negative impact on your brand.
On the other hand spamming on the Internet with content is approved by the search engines and even people.
- The more references search engines find of links your product or website the higher it will be ranked and appear in the searches.
- The more people notice your content and products or website the more likely they will find your brand name familiar. This brand awareness will even create trust.

There is a huge difference between email spanning and content spamming on the Internet.

Unique content spamming

It is important to avoid copying the same content and publishing on different places. Each content should be unique. Unique in the sense unique in the series of words and phrases used. Not unique in true unique content.
The more you leave unique content and messages on the Internet dispersed over many different websites, the more beneficial it will be for the company. The unique content doesn’t need to be really unique as variations on the same theme are good enough.

Hence Web-Spam-A-Lot seems the way to go as this will result in a better findability, resulting in more traffic to your website as people will recognize your brand and will click on the link.
The combination of more traffic and brand awareness / trust will lead to converting more visitors into leads which will eventually become sales.

Do you spam on the web ?

The exclusive CxO conference

Lately we were called by sales reps from exclusive event/conference organizers that offer 14 meetings over two days from a selection of CxO’s from leading companies the industry. Only offered at a steep price to 20 or 25 vendors in the business for meeting up with these CxO’s that have expressed being interested in the type of solutions we provide.

These events or conferences are being held in an hotel and consists of a gala diner on the first evening for networking and 2 days of meetings.

How can one be sure any of these CxO’s are really interested in your solutions ? Especially if the sales rep uses your company’s selling points or features as main   interest of these CxO’s ?

If you hold off your participation because of the high cost, you will get a call from a manager who offers you a 30% discount as first time participant.

What is the benefit for a CxO ?

Isn’t it strange really important CxO’s would come to such an event for a series of sales pitches during 2 days ? Even if they get accommodated, taken care off and nurtured for free ?
Why should any CxO take the time to be hassled by pitches of sales reps for solutions they might not need ? Are they masochistic ?
What is the benefit for the CxO and for the company of the CxO ?

Return On Investment

For the vendor aiming to have 14 sales pitches the steep price ($30,000) comes at a high cost per lead. Even if 5 out of 14 (36%) companies can be qualified as lead, the lead price is $6,000 per lead. Even qualified leads are not sales. Even if these 5 leads would result in 3 sales (60%) the price would be extremely high: $10,000 initial cost for a sales deal (the total sales cost will be much higher).

Thus the vendors can only pitch solutions with a high ticket (>$100,000) and with very high margins in order to cover the lead generation and sales costs.
In most cases with industry leading companies when the price of the solution is high, then an RFI followed by an RFP will be issued by the company. Thus inviting all your competitors almost for free.

The CxO swindle

These exclusive CxO meeting events and conferences seem to be a swindle, only beneficial for the even organizers as the poor CxO’s have to pay by meeting sales reps and listening to their sales pitches.

If these CxO’s were really interested or looking for a solution, then they would order their staff to investigate and setup meetings in order to evaluate and find the best, most feasible or most appropriate solution for the company.

Did you ever participated in such an exclusive CxO conference ?

Massive users amounts

The numbers of people that have signed-up for social networks like Facebook, Twitter and Google+ is overwhelming. Hence the interest of Marketers for using these platforms as communication channel.
The more accounts the owners of these platforms can claim the more value their business has. As their main interest is in the valuation of their business over the real revenue they generate.

Doubting the numbers

Although the numbers of users reported by Facebook, Twitter and Google+ are impressive, we must wonder how many are:
- Active users
- Humans – not bots

If you start to investigate then you will find that many (up to 36%) user profiles are empty and most people never posted.

People:
- Who sign-up but never complete their profile
- Were pushed to take an account: by Google+ or by their friends or relatives but weren’t really interested
- Having signed-up once, but forgot all about or their credentials (username/password) and created a new account on a next occasion.
- Having accounts on all platforms but only use the one that got popular in their social environment
- Having set up accounts for not honest reasons

Business:
It is possible to pay for services that create accounts on social media who will link up or follow you.

All these reasons may confirm the inquiries that indicate that 50% of all the accounts have become obsolete.
This means that 50% of your social marketing efforts are wasted or that the estimated or expected reach of your marketing efforts should be halved at least.

Conversation instead of communications channel

For a start marketers shouldn’t consider social media as an additional channel for publishing commercial messages, instead it should be considered as a platform for starting conversations with potential customers resulting in engaging them.

So don’t use follower and friend counts as success metric, but instead the actual conversations that you have obtained. Real social media marketing consists of bi-directional communications.

Do you social media marketing ?