Dynamic Copywriting

Whether you sell a product or a service, you will put yourself miles ahead of your competition if you include an education element to your marketing process. This is why white papers, case studies, informative web content and ebooks are such popular and powerful marketing tools these days. It is also why many marketers find themselves in front of audiences giving speeches, seminars or workshops.

The fact is that companies or professionals who take the time to educate and share their knowledge can establish a much higher level of credibility in their customers’ eyes than those who simply go after the sale.

But what about educating customers and clients after the sale?

I found myself thinking about this after reading John Jantsch’s recent article Teach Your Way To Referrals in his blog on Duct Tape Marketing. (By the way, if you aren’t reading Duct Tape Marketing yet, you are missing out on a wealth of great ideas and information).

Jantsch makes the excellent point that after sale education efforts pay off big time in referrals, and I would also add repeat business.

This is simply not that hard to do. I am working with a client right now who has asked me to create an ebook and email marketing campaign for sales people who use his products. Without revealing confidential information, his products help a variety of sales people and small businesses generate leads.

The ebook he wants me to write is going to be a free, downloadable educational product that will give his prospects marketing tips and ideas. And once the ebook is downloaded, the prospect will receive regular emails that offer more tips and advice. (I'm sure you will recognize this as a classic "Permission Marketing" campaign).

Similarly, you can easily find a variety of ways to communicate your own knowledge and expertise to your target market and existing customers. It isn't a difficult process, just identify the problems customers want to solve or questions they ask (or better yet, look for the questions they should be asking but don't yet know enough to ask them). Create simple info products or presentations that address these hot buttons and you have an educational marketing campaign.

Jantsch puts it this way:

I know I love it when I get buy a product and the first thing I receive is a getting started guide, followed by a full tutorial, followed by daily “have you tried this” emails. Every business, product or service can do the same.

Check out his article at Teach Your Way To Referrals, and if you are not already reading his blog, start doing so now. You’ll thank me later.

And one more thing. If you would like to learn more about this educational approach to marketing, be sure to download a free copy of my own ebook, How To Increase Your Sales By Sending Out Emails. You will read about other businesses that have gotten excellent results by educating their customers and prospects.

COPYRIGHT © 2008, Charles Brown
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If white papers and case studies were siblings, the white paper would be the older, serious-minded member of the family, while the case study would be the younger, creative one who tends to color outside of the lines.

And yet, I would argue they are both members of the same family and are essential tools in making a complex sale.

Imagine you are an executive with a company that needs to buy a software program to solve certain problems. Your job depends on your due diligence and your attention to detail. When you make your presentation to the board, you had better have all your facts together with every possible "i" dotted and "t" crossed.

But that said, buying decisions, even at that level, are based on emotions.

This is why companies that only produce white papers, or companies that produce dry "business school style" case studies are missing the point. Even high-level board members are people too with all the emotions of an individual consumer.

I am constantly urging my clients to include fiction-writing techniques like suspense, characters and plots into their case studies. The more your case study looks (and more importantly feels) like a feature article the better.

In fact if you want an example of what a really effective case study should look like, read the Wall Street Journal's middle column on its front page for a week. All of these middle column articles are features and many of them are case studies about companies that overcame - or are presently struggling with - serious challenges.

And they almost always include characters, suspense and plots.

Stories sell. But dry, emotionless case studies of the type many marketers learned in business school, are a kiss of death. The writers of such case studies might as well have just written another white paper. But then, the white paper format does a far better job of presenting purely factual information.

If you only want to appeal to the buyer's logical side, you are better off sticking with white papers.

So use the combined power of both "siblings" in your marketing. Let your white papers distill raw information, present the hard facts and persuade by logic and reasoning.

And let your wilder, creative case studies color outside the lines a little bit.


COPYRIGHT © 2008, Charles Brown
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Larry Bodine, who writes the Law Marketing Blog wrote an interesting piece this week called, Evidence That Yellow Pages Are Trash.

As you probably know, lawyers and law firms are among the most prolific Yellow Page advertisers. Larry mentions that in his local pages, lawyer ads run from page 497 to 538, with little to distinguish themselves other than pictures of gavels and scales of justice.

Sigh. This means I am going to have to get on my lawyer-marketing soapbox again.

As many of you know, I used to be a lawyer and one of my peeves is how poorly lawyers and other professionals market their services.

Frankly I believe this is one of the reasons practicing law is such a high-pressure profession. Poor marketing leads to taking on bad clients with bad cases who leave swaths of stress and frustration in their wake. Many of the cases and clients in a lot of lawyers' files are there simply because they couldn't afford to be selective.

Good marketing enables all professionals to be selective and lets them work with the people they really want to work with.

Back to Larry's article. Larry looked out his window one morning and saw what appeared to be a bag of trash laying in his front yard. When he went out to throw it away, he found it was the local Yellow Pages. His point is that the lawyers who bought expensive ads probably would not have preferred to have it presented as trash in someone's front yard.

I will grant Larry's point that Yellow Pages could be presented much better, but my mind took what he said and went off on its own direction. I believe Yellow Page advertising could be productive for professionals if they were handled better.

Instead of cookie-cutter ads with gavels, scales of justice or pictures of stern looking lawyers, why not use these ads to offer free information kits on different areas of the law?

For example, if I were looking for a lawyer to handle my medical malpractice case, do you think I would be attracted to an ad that listed medical malpractice within a laundry list of other specialties? Or do you think I would gravitate to an ad that offered a free booklet or case study on medical malpractice?

This is the difference between one-step vs. two-step advertising strategies.

Decades of direct response advertising and generations of copywriters have proven that two-step advertising, in which a person merely has to request free information, almost always gets a higher response.

Alternatively, a one-step ad which requires that the person must call a phone number to schedule an appointment, requires much more of a commitment on the person's part, and therefore gets a much lower response.

Two-step advertising requires less of an initial commitment on the part of the potential client, but gives the firm the opportunity to build a list of prospective clients and follow up with these people with subsequent mailings or emails.

These days, the term, Permission Marketing is used interchangeably with "two-step advertising." The ad's sole purpose under this strategy is to gather a list of prospects and follow up with them by offering valuable, free information. Repeated contact with potential clients who have opted onto a list invariably converts more of them into actual clients.

What kind of information can be offered both as the initial inducement to opt in or as follow up material? Problem-solving information pieces like white papers, list articles, FAQs, or case studies all make excellent free info products.

The added benefit with these materials is that they all position the lawyer or other professional as an expert in that area of their practice. They go from someone who just mentioned "medical malpractice" as one of several areas within a laundry list, to someone who is knowledgeable enough to have written material about it.

So, Larry Bodine's point is very well taken that Yellow Page ads may lack a lot in their presentation, but I would urge professionals who do Yellow Page advertising to simply write ads that are intended to build lists of prospective clients.


COPYRIGHT © 2008, Charles Brown
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Why Overly-Biased White Papers Are The "Emporer's New Clothes"

A white paper lives or dies by its perceived objectivity. One whiff of salesmanship and your white paper's reader is out of there.

The reason for this has to do with who white paper readers are and why they read them.

These people are decision makers tasked with doing extensive due diligence before giving the green light on a major transaction. They view a well-written (and objective) white paper as a necessary tool to help them with this due diligence. They accept that the paper has a bias, but also depends on it for information.

To reach (and influence) these decision makers, your white paper must be seen as a trusted resource. The information it provides must be painstakingly truthful, even if it means admitting your product's faults and limitations. (Incidentally, these minor admissions may just be the most persuasive aspect of persuasive writing. See my article Sell More With Ethical Marketing for more information on how to do this.)

And yet, from your point of view, a white paper must still move a decision maker toward a favorable decision. It is still a persuasive device.

One thing that helps me balance these needs for objectivity and persuasion, is my background as an attorney when I had to write legal briefs. A legal brief is a lot like a white paper except that it is written for a judge. Judges, like the decision makers mentioned earlier, rely on briefs to give them the information they need to make their rulings.

They understand that a brief is a written argument, but they expect sound reasoning based upon the law and evidence when making that argument.

Somewhere back in college I found a small book on writing English essays that gave me a formula I used all through law school and in my legal practice when writing legal briefs. And I use it now when writing white papers.. (I no longer have the book and don't remember the author's name, so I cannot give it the attribution it deserves).

First, according to this formula, I acknowledge the opposing point of view with a sentence like, "Although ________ ."

Then, I state my opinion (the thesis statement) with a sentence like, "Nevertheless ___________ ."

And finally, I offer support for my position with, "Because ________."

These three sentences were the outline for every legal paper or brief I ever wrote and it remains a bare bones outline for my white papers today.

Now recently I found a book that expands this argumentative framework idea beyond my simple formula, and I think this book will be a very good resource for white paper writers.

The book is titled, "They Say / I Say" by Gerald Graff and Cathy Birkenstein. It is written for academic writers who must author academic papers. One reviewer of this little book called it the "Strunk and White of academic writing."

What I found particularly relevant to white paper writers are the templates (much like my formula) listed in the back of the book. In fact, "They Say / I Say" grew out of a series of templates Cathy Berkenstein developed in a writing course she taught.

White papers, like legal briefs and scholarly papers and articles, must interact with opposing ideas in order to get readers on board with a different idea.

For example, here are some of Ms. Berkenstein's templates (note that some of these are written in the first person, which would need to be changed in a white paper):

"While it is true that ____, it does not follow that ____."
"By focusing on ____, X overlooks the problem of ____."
"Although I grant that _____, I still maintain that ____."
"X is right that ____, but she seems on more dubious ground when she claims that _____."

So the point here is that objective writing must acknowledge other points of view, and the strengths they present, before they can be challenged and replaced with your own positions.

Your competitors' products have strengths and your own are not perfect. Get these matters out into the open and lay them on the table right away. When you do this , you build trust with the person reading your white paper that cannot be easily shaken later on.

Too many white paper writers try to ignore their competitors' strengths and their own products' limitations, and hope the reader will not notice. Unfortunately, this tactic is a lot like the parable of the "Emperor's New Clothes." The truth is out there for all to see, even if no one wants to talk about it.


COPYRIGHT © 2008, Charles Brown

Michael Stelzner, in an April 2007 article on his Writing White Papers blog, wrote about 5 Reasons White Papers Are Marketing Super Weapons.

As always, Michael shares some excellent insights into why white papers are so effective as a marketing strategy. Although a year old, I still wanted to mention this article sites because he sites five different sources to show why white papers are:

• 1. A highly effective way to generate leads,
  
  
• 2. Read more than other marketing materials,
  
  
• 3. Highly viral marketing tools with high pass-along readership,
  
  
• 4. Rated high by business leaders as a key source for helping them make decisions,
  
  
• 5. Popular resources for businesses looking for solutions to problems.

One of the reasons I agree with Michael's assessment of the value of white papers is that they are usually (or at least should be) written in an objective, non-pushy style.

Now as soon as I wrote those words, I immediately thought of several bad examples I've come across recently, but the point is still the same. A well-written white paper is permiated with objectivity and credibility. The audience for white papers are people who want to find out ways to solve a problem. And this group will sniff out a thinly-disguised sales piece in a New York minute.

A very easy way to maintain the credibility of your own white paper is to avoid the words "is" and "are."

Such as, "The XBG widget is the best product on the market." Take out the word, "is" and you now have to provide proof and supporting information to make your claim. Such as, "Widget Manufacturers Report ranks the XBG widget as the best model they've seen in a decade."

White papers are all about credibility and objectivity. When done right, they truly are marketing super weapons.

COPYRIGHT © 2008, Charles Brown

A lot of businesses have noticed their competitors posting white papers on their websites and have become aware of the tremendous increase in the number of them being written and circulated on the internet. So it's only natural that they ask, "What products or services could be marketed better with white papers?"

According to Perry Marshall, a well-known writer who specializes in white papers, almost all papers are written for the b2b (business to business) market. Few, if any, are for the business-to-consumer market.

Marshall goes on to say that there are three types of situations when a white paper is called for:

1. When your company is introducing a new product or service. This is especially true when what you offer is intended to solve a problem the customer may not fully understand or appreciate.
   
   
2. When your company sells a product or service that is complex and requires a white paper to explain in simple terms what you do. Often your buyer will have to explain your product or service to others within her organization and your white paper will aid in that communication.
   
   
3. When your company sells an expensive product or service. When a major expenditure is involved, someone's job may be at stake if the money is not spent wisely. A white paper is a vital part of the due diligence process for that person or team. Just having your paper in their file demonstrates that they sought out information before making the purchase.

All this means that a white paper must have an air of objectivity to it. Unfortunately, to many people the term "white paper" has become synonymous with "thinly disguised sales pitch."

Yes a white paper must transition into a persuasive document and end with a call for action, but it must first establish itself as a document that can be trusted to present the facts without an undue slant.

White Papers are Problem-Solving Documents

One way to approach this is to begin with a problem that must be solved. Studies have shown that we are much more motivated by the fear of loss or avoidance of pain, than we are by the promise of gain. So spending time focusing on a problem, why some solutions will not work or are extremely costly, is time well spent.

And, if written without hyperbole, it does not disrupt the sense of objectivity you want to project.

Admit Flaws and Limitations

A second way to establish credibility and objectivity is to admit some shortcomings with your product or service. Clearly you want to use this method sparingly, but the key is to not try to present what you sell as the best thing since white bread, because it is not. Instead use its flaws and limitations to position it in the market place.

I remember going on a family vacation to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina when I was 10 yeas old. My parents had driven all day and were tired (my brothers and I just wanted out of the car to go swimming).

But when we got to the beach, all the name-brand hotels had their "No Vacancy" signs out. So we drove to the second street from the beach and my parents found a humble little place with a sign out front that said, "Not Fancy – But Clean."

That was all my exhausted parents wanted. They felt that even if we only stayed one night and changed hotels, it would be worth it to find a place to stay for now.

And sure enough, the hotel lived up to its claim and was clean, comfortable and very pleasant. We stayed all week and never changed to a different hotel.

And I learned a valuable copywriting lesson about positioning what you sell by admitting what it isn't.

Praise a Competitor

A third way to build credibility and demonstrate your objectivity is to say positive things about your competition. Again, you don't want to go overboard doing this, but think of using this idea hand in hand with the previous point of admitting your product or service's flaws.

For example, a law firm that specializes in working for small business franchise owners, could easily admit that one of their competitors has an expertise in the area of corporate mergers.

Even if this other firm is a competitor in other areas, by making a positive statement about that firm's expertise in mergers, the first firm can position itself as being an expert in the own area of franchise law.

Jay Levinson advocates this idea in his Guerrilla Marketing books. The point is not to send your own business away to an other firm, but to position yourself, by re-positioning your competition.

This in effect not only tells your reader that you are objective enough to say good things about competitors, it also allows you to position your competitor as they other guy who does something else.

************

Be careful about what kind of white papers your company produces. If they come across as thinly disguised sales pitches, you will lose all the credibility you had hoped to gain. Of course you are writing your white paper to sell something, but this is not the format to push too hard. This is a document that must maintain its air of objectivity above all else.

COPYRIGHT © 2008, Charles Brown

This is the big dilemma for companies who need to produce and market white papers. The natural choice to write your company's white papers would seem to be an engineer or technical person with an understanding of the nuances of the product or service being presented.

However, at the risk of gross generalization, insiders have a notoriously difficult time breaking free of their field's jargon, which they need to communicate with their peers. The same technical language that helps them do their work, makes it hard to make difficult concepts understandable for outsiders.

Certainly there are many engineers, lawyers or other highly specialized people who are excellent writers and communicators, but they are in the minority.

On the other hand, an outside writer may have difficulty mastering the technical concepts that are at the heart of a white paper. Those of us who were English majors chose our field for a reason. That reason being we wanted to steer as far away from the science and engineering fields as we could.

There are, however, ways for the non-technical writer to grasp and communicate even the most difficult concepts to the average reader.

• First, the writer needs strong interviewing skills. A good interviewer can coax layer upon layer of information out of anyone. In this regard, the white paper writer is like a journalist who must become a minor expert on a lot of topics in order to report on them to the general public.
  
  
• Next, the writer must develop good research skills. I never go into an interview without first doing as much research as I can on the topic I will be writing on. The more knowledge I have acquired beforehand, the better questions I can ask during the interview, and the clearer my final white paper will be.
  
  
• The non-technical person doesn't assume some facts are obvious. On several occasions I have had the opportunity to teach workshops or classes on various subjects. Interestingly, when I personally had difficulty learning the subject matter, I was better able to teach it. Why? Because I had to work hard to learn the material and therefore I knew what areas could be misunderstood or confusing.
  
  
• The writer should look for the "stories" involved with a product. What problems did an actual customer face before using the product and how did it solve those problems afterwards? What challenges did the research and development team face and overcome in the process of developing the product? These stories are the building blocks for excellent case studies that can be used in the final white paper.
  
  
• The writer must not lose sight of the fact that a white paper is, first and foremost, a persuasive document. Technical details come in second to influencing the reader to take action. The best way I know to persuade is to find out what the reader wants and show them how to get it. This means anticipating every possible question and every possible objection and crafting a compelling response to each one.
  
  
• Finally, the writer as an outsider is better able to distinguish features from benefits. It's an old story, but to insiders, the mere mention of the "XYZ widget with its turbo booster conductor coil" means fuel economy. But the outsider who is always willing to withstand rolling eyeballs and ask, "What does the XYZ widget with its turbo booster conductor coil do?" can learn and communicate the fact that this device will save the customer 35% of its annual fuel costs.
  

Obviously, there is no absolute right answer to the question of whether a technical insider or a non-technical writer / outsider is better able to write a quality white paper. Situations vary and there are advantages to either choice. So examine your options and take a hard look at your needs and the talent you have available for the project.


COPYRIGHT © 2008, Charles Brown

Recently I've noticed a big increase in businesses contacting me to write white papers for them. I think it's no coincidence that these calls are coming my way during what looks to be a long and difficult economic downturn.

White papers are remarkable and effective selling tools that smart companies have been using for a long time, but when the economy gets rocky, they may be even more vital in bringing in new business.

Companies that offer a complex product or service, or solve complex problems, will particularly find that white papers can drive business their way . Most often companies using white papers for their marketing are in technical or engineering fields. But I am also seeing law firms, architectural firms, energy companies, consulting firms, medical equipment companies, pharmaceutical companies, lobbyists, manufacturers, banks and investment houses, and accounting firms using them.

But as diverse as these industries are, they all have one thing in common: They will have to compete even harder to attract new business in the coming economy. For them, and actually for any business, white papers are becoming an essential marketing tool.

Michael A. Steizner, the author of "Writing White Papers: How to Capture Readers and Keep Them Engaged," says that a good white paper reads like an informative magazine article, while at the same time it is a persuasive document. In other words, it is both highly readable and it sells by offering solutions to real problems the audience is experiencing.

One rule of thumb that has helped me when writing white papers is to remember that only about half of the readers will be technical people who speak the jargon of the field I am writing for. My job, therefore, is to make difficult concepts easy to understand for those non-technical people, without losing the technical audience in the process.

Some of the ways I have found to approach this balance are:

• Use case studies. Just as a good magazine article includes stories to illustrate what is being written about, case studies bring the problem and solution to life for the reader. Additionally, case studies add credibility and involve the reader emotional level.
  
  
• Focus on the problem your product or service solves, not the product or service itself. Readers, frankly, are not all that interested in you, your company or your wonderful gadgets until they can see what they will do for them.
  
  
• Emphasize, I really mean emphasize, benefits. Like all marketing documents, benefits are the be all and end all. Ask yourself, what will this widget do for the reader? What pain is the reader experiencing or what pain does the reader want to avoid? What does the reader want to gain? What will change for the reader if she solves this particular problem?
  
  
• Admit flaws. This may sound counter-intuitive, but admitting your product or service's limitations can be one of the biggest credibility boosters you can use. Especially if you admit the flaw in a way that it also sets up a powerful benefit. For example if you are a law firm that has a very narrow practice niche, telling what you don't do can be used to demonstrate that you do your one thing very, very well.
  
  
• Create a before and after scenario for the reader. Unlike a case study, which is a factual story about a real client, you can also write a story in which the reader is the main character. Complacency often rules the day because it is human nature to simply cope with a problem rather than solve it. So pour a little salt into the wound of the existing situation by reminding the reader of the cost and pain of the unresolved problem. Then paint a picture of the reader's company enjoying the benefits of your solution.
  
  
• Demonstrate the risk of not taking action. Paint a realistic picture of what will happen to the reader's company if things keep going the way they are now. While every product or service has a cost, most of the time there is an even bigger cost of NOT buying it. Make sure your reader is aware of this cost for inaction.
  
  
• Write to the reader as a person, not merely as a company. This simply means your white paper should be interesting, informative and easily understood. It also means this person will be taking on a personal risk if he makes the decision to buy from you. Take these personal needs into account.
  
  
• Provide useful, valuable information. Think of including elements of the white paper's more humble cousin, the tip sheet, in the body of your paper. Over and over again, I have found that white papers that have a section of frequently asked questions (FAQs) or bullet point lists of tips and ideas are the papers that get saved and passed along.

The best white papers focus on the interests and problems of readers. Alternatively, poorly-written papers merely focus on the products and services the company would like to sell, without concentrating on the customers' pain and needs.

Remember, for all the information you must convey in your white paper, in the end it is still a document designed to persuade and sell. And in this economy, it is even more important to keep this in mind.

COPYRIGHT © 2008, Charles Brown

Let's face the facts. Even if the president doesn't want to use the "R" word, we are already well into a tough economy. That means it is going to be harder for professionals like doctors, lawyers, consultants, accountants and others to attract new clients or get more business from their existing clients.

However there are a few steps professionals can take to still get business coming in the door, regardless of the economy:

1. Create "bait" information pieces like white papers, tip sheets or other booklets that provide valuable, free information for prospective clients.
   
   These bait pieces are soft sell devices like, "8 Ways to Save on Property Taxes," "5 Ways to Avoid Getting Sued," or "How to Keep Your Children Well This Winter."
   
   But a hard sell piece like, "10 Reasons Goode, Hailey and Knight Should Be Your Accounting Firm" is not a good bait piece.
   
   
2. Turn every advertisement into a direct response ad – even Yellow Page or directory ads.
   
   There are two types of advertisements, "awareness" ads and "direct response" ads. Awareness ads just tell prospects that you exist and if they have nothing better to do with their time, to give you a call.
   
   Direct response ads entice readers to take action, such as to call your office or visit your website in order to get your white paper or tip sheet. When you advertise this way, you can actually measure how effective the ad is and make changes along the way.
   
   
3. Build a list. When people respond to your direct respond ads, collect these "opt in" leads to build a list. This concept is called "Permission Marketing" (based on the book by that name written by Seth Godin). This list of people who have requested your free information may become your most valuable resource, so take good care of it.
   
   
4. Make your website a resource for people who are prospective and existing clients. Don't be afraid to give away free information, but create more white papers, tip sheets, checklists, frequently asked questions (FAQs), and case studies about some of your clients success stories.
   
   It may sound counter intuitive to give away free information, but you will find that it pays dividends. It gives visitors a reason to keep coming back to your site and it establishes your credibility as an expert in your field.
   

For those of us who sell our services and knowledge, a tough economy is a time to roll up our sleeves and work smarter. But if you do work smarter, use direct response advertising, build a list and create a website that your prospects view as a resource, you will be rewarded while your competitors tread water.

COPYRIGHT © 2008, Charles Brown

This is the year law firms, professionals and service providers finally start seeing real results for their marketing efforts. This will be the year that their advertising, direct mail and websites finally start bringing them the targeted new business and new clients they really want to work with.

How? Because I believe those people who market professional services will finally wake up to the fact that "Multi-Step Marketing" is far more effective than "One-Shot Marketing."

Why One-Shot Marketingwhite Isn't Working For Law Firms or Other Professionals

As a former lawyer myself, most of my attention is focused on marketing ideas for law firms, but what I am about to say is equally applicable to other professionals, service providers and even sellers of products if their expertise is part of the package that comes with their products (large B2B computer systems or software programs would be an example).

One-shot marketing is when you see an ad or visit a website that asks you to contact the company for more information.....and that's it. That simple (and often understated) request for a contact is the only call to action such an ad or website makes.

One-shot marketing gets one, and only one, chance to influence the prospect to act. And if that ad doesn't dramatically reach out and grab the reader's interest, it will be forgotten in 2 seconds.

Look at most of the ads in the Yellow Pages or in business news publications. Do any of them just reach out and grab you that way? Do any of them offer anything really different from their competitors' ads? Rarely.

Why Law Firms and Other Professionals Must Adopt Multi-Step Marketing

As the name suggests, "Multi-Step Marketing" takes advantage of multiple contacts with prospects. When you see an ad, a website or a direct mail piece that offers you a free DVD, CD, white paper, report or ebook on a topic that is currently a source of problems for you, that is the beginning of a multi-step marketing program.

When you request that free information because it sounds relevant to problems you need to solve or changes you want to make, you are "opting in" to the marketer's mailing or email list. This is called "permission marketing" because you are giving that company permission to contact you again. In so doing, you have identified yourself as a prospect with at least some level of interest in what that company does.

If the free information piece you receive from that company is well written and seems to offer a solution to your problem, you may decide to do business with them on the spot. In most cases, this information will help you form the opinion that this company is an expert in this area. It may also position that company as the front runner in your mind in case you ever decide to do business with someone in that field.

But you may not decide to act right now. It is what happens next that truly delivers the remarkable success for multi-step marketers. Over time, you will receive occasional follow up mailings and information. If you weren't ready to do business when you first received the information, your circumstances may change over time.

The long term effect of repeated contacts by the company (because you gave them permission to market to you) is that this company increases its positioning in your mind as THE experts in their field and as THE company you are most likely to do business with when and if you decide to act.

Multi-Step Marketing Helps Law Firms and Professionals Measure Their Marketing Results

Law firms and other professional services have a very difficult time measuring how effective (or not) their advertisements, websites or direct mail really is.

How do you know which calls were produced by your Yellow Page ad, the ad you put in the local newspaper, from your website or from other sources?

Multi-step marketing gives professionals an instant tool to determine how well an ad or website is doing. The number of requests for the white paper, DVD or other information product is the measurement of how effective your ad or website is.

You can even give the same product different titles so you can test whether one ad generates more inquiries than another.

Multi-step marketing eliminates the feeling that advertisers often have of stumbling around in the dark.

Will my "prediction" for 2007 come true? Well I intend to do my part to get the word out to law firms and others who need to hear about multi-step marketing. I'd also love to hear from you. What experiences and recommendations do you have?

COPYRIGHT © 2007, Charles Brown

What is the one thing your business cannot do without? What one single priority outranks all others?

Whether your business is a small one-man operation or a huge, Fortune 500 behemoth, generating new leads for new business is your single most important imperative.

Without customers or clients, you have no business. And without a constant stream of new leads, you will eventually have no customers.

According to a recent survey, lead generation is the number one goal for businesses in 2007.

Generating leads to acquire customers and drive sales will be top of mind for b-to-b marketers next year.

According to BtoB’s “2007 Marketing Priorities and Plans” survey, acquiring new customers is the No. 1 marketing goal for 2007, cited by 62.3% of respondents.

That said, how are you planning to generate leads for your business in 2007?

Two immediate ideas that can get your lead generation project off to a fast start in 2007 are:

1. Create Free Information Products. These can be everything from white papers to tip sheets to ebooks to free DVDs. This strategy recognizes that all buyers go through an information gathering stage in their buying process (the exception of course is impulse purchases, which is a topic for another article). Think about the last time you bought a new car, new house or helped a child choose the right college to attend. You probably looked up a lot of information on the internet, possibly you questioned people who had direct experience with your various possible choices, or you asked the companies for information.
   
   The single caveat of this approach is to avoid selling for your competitors. Don’t just offer information that sells the entire category. If you do that, your reader may choose anyone who offers what you offer. You must sell yourself without being too self-serving in the process ( a fine balancing act, but one that can be done).
   
   Offering free information is a strategy that recognizes that each buyer has a unique buying cycle and procedure. This approach allows you to enter their consciousness at any point along that buying cycle and become a trusted resource for valuable, non-self serving information.
   
   
2. Turn Your Website Into a Lead Generating Machine. It costs most businesses $10 to $20 for every qualified visitor that lands on their websites. I would argue that if you have a choice between getting a visitor to buy something now vs. leave his or her contact information, you are better off getting them to create a lead. When someone has opted in to receive future emails from you (ie “permission marketing”), you have multiple chances to sell and then sell again. This person can become a repeat customer for life. But if you try to hit the home run every time someone visits your site, you only get that one chance to sell and at best may only sell one thing.

Lead Generation is a huge topic and I will revisit this subject many times in the coming year. But for now, I would like to leave you with some resources you will find helpful.

• Brian Carroll writes a blog entirely devoted to the topic of generating b2b leads. He offers a lot of great ideas that you can never keep up with. If you can only put one our of ten into practice, you will do well.
  
• Michael Stelzner writes a great blog on marketing with white papers. He has also written an excellent book on the same topic called: Writing White Papers: How To Capture Readers and Keep Them Engaged.
  
• Anne Holland has written a very good article on Marketing Sherpa in which she offers some very practical insights and ideas on how to generate leads.
  
• Another article by Anne Holland is about lead generation mistakes that get in the way of effective marketing. Anne is nothing if not candid, and her insights are always worth reading. They are also the kinds of mistakes we can all make, so her article is a good cautionary piece.

I’m interesting in hearing about your ideas and insights on the topic of lead generation. What do you think about this topic?

COPYRIGHT © 2006, Charles Brown

Recently one of the readers of this blog posted a comment about Grant Griffiths, a lawyer in Kansas who has abandoned advertising altogether in favor of writing his blog (thanks Whitney). See the article at Kansas Family & Divorce Lawyer. This is a great article for anyone who sells their knowledge, skill or expertise, because this attorney credits his blog for giving him a number one Google ranking under the keyword, "Kansas family law."

One of the reasons I tend to harp on the flaws I see in law firm advertising in this blog is because I used to practice law. As both a former private practice attorney and a copywriter, I can say that law firms have the worst marketing of any industry or profession I know of.

Whether you are looking at ads placed in the Wall Street Journal by 700 lawyer "blue chip" firms or the Yellow Page ads placed by small main street firms, the ads are almost always dismal. I swear these people wouldn't know a benefit if it came up and bit them on the nose.

And they all follow the same format: "we are a trusted name in admiralty law," "we can get you money if you are hurt in an automobile accident," "we handle cases in elder law, personal injury, corporate law, mergers and aquisitions, DUI defense, etc."

The ads are either empty boasts or laundry lists of the areas of law they practice. (And by the way, you probably won't find the same firm practicing admiralty law, mergers and aquisitions and DUI defense).

So how CAN a law firm market itself effectively without diminishing its professionalism? Easy, write and give out free information pieces.

If you are a lawyer start saving all the memos and briefs you write. Also save your research notes and cases you find interesting as you prepare for court. With few exceptions, these materials can be rewritten for lay audiences and turned into white papers, tip sheets, brochures, articles for your website, or articles you can submit to trade magazines, etc.

You can also start a blog like our friend in Kansas. Write two to three paragraphs a day on your field of practice and in not too many months your site will have a very high number of visitors every day.

Frankly, I would like to see the day when I do at least two-thirds of my copywriting work for law firms. I know from personal experience that it is a wonderful profession when you are working with clients you like and doing the kind of work you believe in. But it is an extremely stressful way to make a living if you have to accept unpleasant clients or take on unpleasant cases just to keep the doors open.

COPYRIGHT © 2006, Charles Brown

Michael Seitzer, an authority on marketing with white papers (and a fellow Dilbert fan) put up an interesting post on his blog last week. The post, Inventing Facts To Fit Your Purposes, begins with a quote from a recent Dilbert cartoon strip.

If you follow Dilbert (and why wouldn't you?) his dog, named Dogbert, is an evil genius whose life mission is to exploit everyone around him. In this recent strip, Dogbert brags about making up facts to support his marketing claims. Michael brings up this cartoon as a starting point for a discussion on ethics in marketing with white papers.

Marketing and selling have well-deserved bad reputations. If you read, watch or listen to many ads, you can't help but wonder how all these competitors can be, "the best," "the leading," "recommended by more doctors," etc.

We read ads and other marketing materials like white papers with honed skepticism. We assume the facts, statistics and claims are at best, strategically selected, or at worst, made up.

Contrast this with openly admitting flaws and negatives up front.

Dan Kennedy is one of my freelance copywriter heroes. In his book, The Ultimate Sales Letter, he shows several examples of how admitting these weaknesses up front helps to create a more powerful sales message.

Open admissions does several wonderful things for your marketing materials:

1. First, admissions enhance your credibility. It immediately causes your readers to crack open their protective shields just a little bit. You will still have to earn their trust with the benefits you introduce, but at least they will give you a chance.
   
   
2. Admissions set up your benefits. No one expects you to pay for expensive advertising just to bad mouth your product or service. They know that if you are willing to admit some flaws, you will soon have some positives you will be mentioning. This builds up anticipation and gives them a reason to pay attention.
   
   
3. Admissions help you to position your product, service or company against your competition. You can't be all things to all people, and you lose credibility when you try. Instead, by openly acknowledging your weaknesses, you put the spotlight on your strengths.
   

Dan Kennedy finds making admissions up front so powerful and so compelling to the reader, that he claims to look for flaws, just so he can admit them.

Possibly that's going too far (although who am I to argue with Dan Kennedy?) but honest and open admissions can go a long way to gaining credibility every one of your competitors lack.

COPYRIGHT © 2006, Charles Brown

Today’s post is about great moments in expensive, wasteful advertising.

I am looking through the November 6-12, 2006 issue of the Fort Worth Business Press for ads that actually give readers reasons to act. As you can imagine, these ads are hard to find.

American Express has a full page ad that does pretty well. It has three benefit statements that say:

“I get a cash rebate of up to 4% on American Express Travel.” I earn company-level award points on all our purchases.” And, “I save automatically with cash rebates from leading suppliers.”

Following these benefits is the headline which reads, “My company is mid-size, but I save big.”

And that’s all. The main feature of the ad is acres and acres of white space with a small blurb at the bottom a picture of the American Express ExtrAA Corporate Card and a Picture of a paper airplane made out of a $100 bill.

I give them credit for actually stating benefits. What a novel idea in big corporate advertising! But the white space? White space never sold anything. Never.

The next wasteful ad is for the law firm of Blaies & Hightower, L.L.P. The only positive thing I can say about this ad is that they only spent money on a half page.

Other than that, it shows three very serious-looking lawyers in expensive suits and six lines of copy that says nothing:

“When the stakes are high, you need more than legal knowledge. … You need the strongest commercial litigation and personal injury trial lawyers on your side. .. Attorneys who lead the courtroom with integrity and honor.”

The sad thing is, someone actually thought these were benefit statements.

Neither ad called for action on the part of a potential customer/client. They gave contact information and that’s all. But that is futile without giving the prospect a REASON to contact them.

Neither ad made a concrete offer. There were no promises of a benefit in exchange for an action from the prospect. The Blaies Camp; Hightower ad was exactly the same as every other law firm ad we’ve ever seen. For all I know, the same serious-looking lawyers appear on all of them. And you just have to love the line, “Attorneys who lead the courtroom with integrity and honor” as a masterpiece of copy that says nothing.

What both these ads need is an injection of direct response techniques. American Express can offer a free guide to corporate financial strategies that would show a corporate officer how to save money on all company expenditures, how to manage day-to-day cash flow and maximize the rebates they offer.

Blaies & Hightower could offer a report, a case study or a white paper on any one of the areas of law the practice. These could contain tips on how to avoid litigation, what new government regulations effect businesses or how to profit from recent trends in the law.

By offering free information products, neither firm would diminish the brand image they are striving for (and actually in my mind, they would stand out in a positive way). But not only that, these white papers, guides or booklets could generate leads and build a list of potential customers/clients for these firms.

The sad truth is both these ads were incredibly wasteful. White space sells nothing and copy that says nothing, sells nothing. Better luck next time guys.

COPYRIGHT © 2006, Charles Brown

Just when I had all but given up on lawyers’ advertising, along comes one attorney who really knows how to get it right.

As a former attorney –turned freelance copywriter, I have always paid special attention to how law firms market themselves. And, with very few exceptions, how badly they do so.

But yesterday, when I opened up a copy of the Fort Worth Business Press, an insert fell out that caught my eye. It was a 5 ½ x 8 ½ postcard written by Clark R. Cowley, who practices intellectual property law for the law firm of Whitaker, Chalk, Swindler & Sawyer, L.L.P. (Whitaker Chalk) in Fort Worth, Texas.

What is so refreshingly unique about Mr. Cowley’s postcard/insert, is that instead of it making a list of claims to be the best, biggest or most experienced (which is what most law firm advertisements do) he actually demonstrates his expertise and knowledge by providing the reader with free information.

The back of the card is sort of a mini-white paper on the topic of legal remedies to Cybersquatting. “Cybersquatting” is the bad faith registration of Internet domain names identical or confusingly similar to another company’s trademark or business name. According to Cowley, “the cybersquatter’s motive is often to hold the domain name hostage in hopes of selling it to the rightful party, or to post unflattering, obscene or scandalous material on that site to diminish the rightful party’s business reputation.”

Cowley then briefly lists four legislative acts or regulations under which the party can seek a legal remedy.

The whole card is brief, demonstrates Mr. Cowley's knowledge and expertise, conveys an image of professionalism, is completely free of puffery, and leaves the reader wanting to learn more.

And what is even more encouraging is this card is one of a series that Whitaker Chalk puts out called “brief legal seminars.”

In a recent article called Freelance Copywriter Secrets: Can White Papers and Image Ads Get Along?, I wrote about how deplorable typical law firm advertising is.

On one hand, you have the ads from personal injury lawyers who want to help you get more money from an insurance company if you’ve been injured in an accident (here in Texas, we have one guy who calls himself the “The Texas Hammer,” need I say more?). On the other extreme, are the ads from firms who are so concerned about maintaining a highly professional image, that their ads literally say nothing at all.

If the other “Brief Legal Seminars” are as well crafted as this one is, I think we can assume Whitaker Chalk is on the right track.

Could this ad be improved? Yes, I would first urge this firm to write a series of full white papers on these same topics, and offer them free to any legitimate inquirer.

In this way, they have a second opportunity to demonstrate their expertise. But even more important, they can build up an opt-in list of people and companies who are interested in these topics.

White papers give a strong boost to any business’ image of professionalism, knowledge and expertise. But they are more than learned discourses on a certain subject. They are also powerful marketing pieces that give the reader compelling reasons to do business with the author.

Michael Stelzner, in his book, Writing White Papers, calls white papers a cross between a magazine article, with its ability to make a technical issue understandable to the non-professional; and a brochure, with a convincing sales message.

Unfortunately, Whitaker Chalk has missed their opportunity to compile a list of opt-in subscribers who want more information. Creating such a list would become enormously valuable as a source of new, qualified clients. As Seth Godin, in his book Permission Marketing points out, these are people who have “raised their hand” to indicate they want to receive this sort of information. An opt-in list also builds loyalty among the subscribers even before they become clients.

But all in all, I would have to rate this little card from Whitaker Chalk as one of the best law firm advertisements I have seen in a very long, long time.

P.S. To any law firms needing someone to write compelling white papers: There are very few copywriters who also have a background as an attorney. If you need a writer who brings both fields of expertise to the table, please call me today at the contact information listed above. Charles Brown

freelance copywriter, white paper writer, writing web content, copywriting tips

We freelance copywriters are often an analytical bunch. Always trying to tinker with ad copy to see if it can be made better. This includes our own copy as well as the work of others.

For example, David Garfinkel, in his September 4, 2006 blog post at http://world-copywriting-institute.typepad.com/ provides an excellent analysis in the article, "An Expensive Ad that Almost Gets It.”

Before we look at what David says about this ad, let me set the stage: I firmly believe that elements of direct response can be successfully incorporated with so-called “image ads” that are designed to establish a dignified brand.

For example, brokerage firms like Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley do this all the time. You frequently see their ads offering booklets on their market forecasts and white papers on their analysis of the economy. Despite the heavy restrictions placed upon financial services marketing, these ads manage to do three things simultaneously:

1. convey dignity and a brand image,
   
   
2. present a strong sales message, and
   
   
3. generate leads for their salespeople.

Direct Response vs. “Advertising Art”

Regular readers of my blog may recall my story of a copywriting job I didn’t get. The client was a high profile interior design firm in Florida that catered to a very affluent clientele.

The ad agency that interviewed me had created a beautiful two-page spread depicting a home most of us can only drool over. It truly was an example of advertising art.

The trouble was the copy. It relied only on a single sentence that frankly said nothing at all. This sentence was presumably intended to arouse so much curiosity that people would flock to the client’s store or tie up the entire South Florida telephone system trying to call in. (no website address was mentioned on the ad).

When asked for my input, I suggested that the client create an information piece such as a booklet full of decorating ideas. My thinking was that such a booklet would not only have high, perceived value to the reader. It could also, in the process of offering numerous how-tips, generate additional sales for the client’s design services as well as specific items of furniture and wall decorations.

I then suggested the beautiful ad could feature the booklet as a free offer to anyone who called or stopped in. (Of course, they would have to provide their names and contact information in order to receive the booklet, thereby creating a list of prospective customers for the client).

Alas, the creative types felt my ideas would detract from the beauty of their layout and would smell too much of “salesmanship.” I didn’t get the assignment, the ad ran exactly as I had seen it, and appeared only one time in a very high-profile magazine.

Trying To Sell The Law Firm

Fast forward to the article in David Garfinkel’s blog. The ad shows a picture of Craig Newmark, the founder of the hugely successful craigslist.com. The ad’s headline, PEOPLE WHO MAKE GREAT COMPANY’S WORK, seems to offer insights into how people like Newmark create and grow successful companies.

Presumably, the ad seeks to attract clients to the law firm with an implied promise that the firm will help entrepreneurs become as successful as Craig Newmark.

Disappointingly, the ad offers zero benefits to the reader and breaks the headline’s implied promise. The ad concludes will the thundering dud of a sales message, “Perkins Cole: Legal counsel to great companies like craigslist.”

What if the firm had written a white paper on the legal needs of small, growing companies? What if the white paper fulfilled the promise of the ad’s headline by providing how-to information on how entrepreneurs can grow their companies with help from knowledgeable law firms? And what if this white paper was featured in the ad as available free to any reader who asked for it?

Why White Papers and Image Ads Go Together

White papers convey the dignity such a law firm is trying to project, but they are also valuable sales tools. They promise - and absolutely must deliver - valuable how-to information, or analysis helpful for readers’ decision making. They target certain types of readers who, because of their interest in this topic, identify themselves as potential clients.

Here are a few ideas that should help you create a marketing campaign based on both white papers and image ads:

• Begin with a clear idea of what decision you want your reader to make. This applies to both the ad and to the white paper. With the ad, you obviously want qualified readers to contact you, provide their address and/or their email address and telephone number. With the white paper, you want them to make a decision to contact you for an appointment. Not having this clear idea will cause major problems later if your work fails to lead the reader to a decision.
  
  
• Don’t forget to talk about benefits. Even with image advertising, benefits are essential. Yet image ads routinely shy away from talking about benefits. Too salesman like, I suppose.
  
  
• Make a promise and fulfill it. The headline of your ad, the ad’s copy, the free offer, the title of the white paper and every single word inside the white paper, should make a promise to either solve a problem for the reader or to help the reader realize a desired change. And after all that is done, deliver on that promise.
  
  
• Generate leads. I have written before on the value of 2-Step advertising, and why it delivers more sales than one-shot ads. Although my article, Freelance Copywriter Secrets: Why 2-Step Ads Make More Sales, is not specifically written about image advertising for professional service providers, you may still find it to be helpful on this subject. One of the primary reasons to use a direct response device is to generate a list of prospective clients, who “opt in” to receive your follow up emails and letters. With a list of such people, your marketing becomes a continual matter of re-contacting interested, qualified prospective clients.
  
  
• Create a series of white papers. Become known as the law firm, design company or professional services organization that has the right stuff. Within a law firm, for example, many lawyers have different specialties, each worthy of a multitude of white papers. Stuck for ideas on what to write about? Just look at what problems clients want to have solved for them. Each problem can result in a new white paper.

Image ads and white papers make the perfect marketing marriage. The more valuable information you give away, the more new business and new profits come back to you.

freelance copywriter, copywriting tips, freelance commercial writer

Free information is the secret weapon of the modern freelance copywriter. The web is first and foremost an information resource that bestows success upon those marketers willing to generously share their knowledge with those who seek it.

In addition to the obvious benefit of positioning the marketer as an expert, free information also creates a connection (possibly even a bond) between the giver and the recipient of this knowledge. In other words, when the time comes for this seeker of information to transact business, who do you think is best positioned to receive that business?

There are many ways a freelance copywriter can use the giving of free information to further a client’s marketing goals. For example:

1. White Papers. For higher level services like law, consulting or engineering firms; white papers examine a topic in great depth and demonstrate superior expertise in that area.
   
   
2. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs). These lists of questions and answers can be posted as a resource page on your web site or can be compiled in the form of a printed brochure.
   
   
3. Article Banks. These very popular sites are also called “article submission sites,” and are exchanges between web masters and newsletter publishers who need content, and authors who want to build recognition and achieve expert status. You, as the author, submit your articles with links that point back to your website. Publishers can then reprint your articles on their sites as long as they reprint them in their entirety. Over time, a single well-written article can “go viral” and generate dozens or hundreds of links back to your site.
   
   
4. Booklets. Booklets are generally between 8 to 25 pages that can be given to prospective customers or even sold for a profit. Noted author Robert Bly, recommends that you print a price on the cover of your booklet even if you intend to give them away. The price increases the perceived value of the booklet and also gives you the opportunity to sell them for a profit if someone who is not a potential client asks for copies.
   
   Paulette Ensign credits a single booklet for launched her business, gaining her free publicity and bringing in clients from all over the world. The link to read a very informative interview with Ms. Ensign is: http://www.getmotivation.com/interviews/paulette-ensign.htm.
   
   
5. Blogging. Don’t miss out on all the benefits publishing a blog can offer you. A blog is merely a web site that is updated with new posts on a frequent basis and allows readers to post comments or link back to your posts. Not only do blogs offer a steady stream of new information to your readers, the commenting feature creates a community around you and your site.
   
   
6. Web Content. People will visit your site if they come to regard it as a resource. Make your site as information-rich as you possibly can by writing as many articles as you can on your topic, and then keep adding new articles to keep your site fresh. People visit, bookmark and return to sites that provide them with the information they seek.
   
   
7. eBait. this is the term I use for a free information product like an ebook, that is used to induce people to opt onto your email list. An eBait information product is the heart of the concept called ”Permission Marketing”, a term coined by Seth Godin in his book by that same name. In Godin’s words, Permission Marketing is a way to get people to “raise their hands” and volunteer to receive your marketing messages.
   
   Once you have captured a sizeable list of email subscribers who have opted onto your list, you have created a very powerful lead generation tool that enables you to send these subscribers repeated follow up messages.
   
   eBait information pieces can also be used as an inducement for people to request additional information from one of your print ads. This is the initial phase of what is called "2-step" or "multi-step" advertising. Check out my article called Freelance Copywriter Secrets: Why 2-Step Ads Make More Sales, to see why studies overwhelmingly find that this type of advertising out pulls single exposure ads.

Needless to say, these seven ideas are only the tip of the iceberg for the creative freelance copywriter. Moreover, you may also be able to recycle much of your information in several of these forms. The same articles you post to article banks can also be posted to your blog. Or the booklet that you physically hand out to prospects face to face might be the same eBait product you offer free to people who opt onto your email list.

Find and use as many ways to give away free information and your business will prosper.