Are Your Headlines Reaching Your Customers?

Copywriting is a crucial part of grabbing and maintaining your customer’s attention.  From direct mail pieces to web copy, from sales letters to brochures, there are countless marketing materials which demand well written copy.

Unfortunately, hiring a professional copywriter is often not affordable for small business owners or independent professionals, especially in the early stages of starting their business.  But, there are ways that a solopreneur can take a DIY approach to copywriting and achieve respectable results.

The first step is to learn proper “marketing syntax”.  This is one of the cornerstones of the Action Plan Marketing System which we include in all our marketing programs.  Marketing Syntax is understanding that it’s not just “what you say”, but that the order in which you say it is equally important.  It all boils down to making it clear to your prospect that you work with people in their situation (Defining your target audience), that you understand their challenges (Identifying your prospect’s problem), and that you have a solution (Sharing the ultimate outcome).

If you use Marketing Syntax correctly, you will capture your prospect’s attention in a way that simply telling them what you do or what you sell, never will. 

Proper Marketing Syntax is at the heart of sincere, effective written and verbal communications.  But writing your own marketing materials can still be daunting, if you’ve never done it before.  I’ve included some resources which may help you learn how to improve your writing and start seeing better response rates.

Copywriting Courses / Products / Articles

Lorrie Morgan-Ferrero of Red Hot Copy offers a weekly newsletter, full of great tips and articles about copywriting.  Her website has information on her speed copywriting course, copywriting bootcamp, and other products and services to help small business owners and solo-professionals learn how to write for themselves. 

Kenneth Yu of Mind Valley Labs has written an article called Email Marketing Demystified which includes a 4-step process to improve your email writing skills. It’s a well-written piece which gives you advice you can start using right away. You can read it at:
http://blog.mindvalleylabs.com/email-marketing/540/

Transforming Your Networking With A Compelling Audio Signature is an article I wrote which goes into further detail on Marketing Syntax and also includes a podcast which you can access at: http://www.smartbusinessowners.com/transform-your-networking-with-a-compelling-audio-signature/

Although the article deals with verbal communications, the key message is about understanding and using the proper marketing syntax so it definitely applies to written communication as well. 

Idea Generator is a blog by coach and writer, Linda Dessau.  She offers writing prompts and ideas that will help you jump start any written word project from content for your blog, website to special reports and boosk.  Visit the site at:  http://lindadessau.typepad.com/ideagenerator/