Have you ever run an ad that didn’t work? One that attracted little response, or worse, no response at all?

It can happen, and it can happen for many reasons.

Given that the right people saw your message - which is a happy combination of media selection, placement and luck - one reason for failure could be that your target market doesn’t see a need for your product because your message has not followed some basic copywriter’s rules to attract the interest of your target market, create a desire, generate enthusiasm, and finally to encourage your target market to take action.

If you like mnemonics, you can remember this action plan through the word IDEA, or

1. Interest
2. Desire
3. Enthusiasm
4. Action

Sound easy? It is, and the good news is that the more often you write good advertising, the better you get at writing good advertising. So let’s get started ….

INTEREST
It is up to you to know who you are writing to and to ensure that your audience notices your advertising and acts on it, and not that of your competitors. You need to stand out from the crowd.

Write a headline, not a heading. You are telling a stimulating story about a product that excites you, not regurgitating the minutes of a committee. A headline may be appropriate, witty or just intelligent, but it must capture the interest of your target audience and invite them to learn more ….

DESIRE
You need to find out everything you can about the product you are writing about, then find out everything you can about the people who will use that product or service. As a professional copywriter, you are like a door-to-door salesman without the benefit of being able to actually talk to your customer. You need to know your product and your customer thoroughly, and be prepared to anticipate every question asked by your customer because you just don’t have the benefit of face-to-face communication.

Now you know your product and your customer well, you are ready for the fun bit where you will need to answer some questions honestly. What will interest your audience most about this product? How can you best present this information? Will a website work? Do you need sight and sound to present, ie a commercial, or will the printed word suffice? Is it a simple message for motorists only that can be told by a highway sign? For this product and audience, do you need to create an e-joke that will be forwarded on and on around the world, creating a market everywhere it is seen? Do you have the budget for this – or do you need to pull your big-budget great idea back into an e-newsletter or a direct mail letter box drop?

At this stage you need to check that you are still on track by referring to your original brief or your check-list of what you want this advertisement to achieve. Sometimes it’s helpful to remember some famous Ogilvyisms from the man widely considered to be the greatest copywriter of all time.

In other words, what does your audience read, watch, notice, believe – and how can you best present your product to create a desire in this group to acquire your product.

ENTHUSIASM
You now need to generate enthusiasm in your audience as well as desire. Desire sits back and dreams, while enthusiasm reaches for a wallet.

Consequently, it is more difficult to generate enthusiasm for a high-ticket lifestyle choice like a new car than it is for a chocolate bar, but once you have an enthusiastic buyer you have the sale. It will take a very, very poor salesman at the point-of-sale to lose the business. Just look at the number of committed Ford buyers who regularly argue the respective benefits of their cars with equally committed Holden, Toyota or Mitsubishi drivers. Yet today many of the car models argued over so enthusiastically start life in the same factory, on the same production line.

With some products, you will need to identify and create enthusiasm in two different decision-makers with different perspectives on your product, which will certainly make your task more challenging.

However once you have an enthusiastic buyer, all you need to do to sell your product is to make it easy for them to take action.

ACTION
You may have just written the greatest ad of all times – but forgotten to make it easy for your audience to act. Now you need to think about the steps your audience has to take to get to your product.

Do you have a shopfront, where potential customers can see your product? Do you want your customers to order from a catalogue, or from your website? What can you do to make it easy for your customer to acquire your product?

Do give clients an easy point of contact. Don’t rely on a phone number if there is no-one there to take messages. If you have a website, remember that most respondents will want to talk to a real, live person before they make a purchasing decision.

Eliminate as many bottlenecks as you can by using your common sense and putting yourself in the place of your client. What would you expect, or even prefer? Then, to borrow the words of a great ad, just do it –

Writing ads that work is a lot of fun, but it can also be a challenge. And if you are too busy running your business to take the time to write the ad that works for you, just follow the basic rules of good management and hire a professional.

Talk to us about writing the ad that works …

Ideas Unlimited
idealist@bigpond.com

Australia 07 40977298

PO Box 694, Ravenshoe, 4888

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