Writing Sales Letters

A part of the culture that I joined when I launched ClickBank University was the world of direct response advertising.

What that translates out to is that the measure of your advertising piece or any other marketing activity lies not so much in the branding you build with your customers, but the sales you generate.

The primary instrument of direct response advertising is the sales letter.

You’ve seen them.

They are lengthy letters written from the marketer to the prospect, at once informing them of the features and benefits to be had by purchasing their product or service, and persuading them to act now and buy.

I used to look down my nose at this sort of marketing. I thought it was lowbrow and smacked of fast talking, hard selling hucksters using any and all means to nail down the almighty sale.

And in many cases I still see, that observation is true.

But my job now, as President of ClickBank University, is to persuade and convince ClickBank affiliates and publishers (or those who would like to become one) that they have the best chance of succeeding as a ClickBank marketer by joining ClickBank University, staying on as a member, and applying the teaching we provide to their business.

And my primary tool is the sales letter.

And I take on that task with a combination of fear and pride.

For one thing, I really believe in what I’m selling. I’m proud to be affiliated with my product. I do believe people will benefit from joining ClickBank University and am not bashful about saying so.

But I don’t want, nor feel the need to create a breathless letter that promises the world in order to make a sale.

I want to make a passionate argument to an intelligent person who is capable of thinking for themselves without bald, manipulative techniques or intelligence insulting prose.

I aim to write the kind of sales letter that would persuade me to sign up.

So that’s what I’m working on this weekend.

I’ve got a major relaunch coming up on January 15th, for which I want to put my best foot and my soundest arguments forward in order to win over as many new members as I can.

When I’m done writing it, I’m going to share it with you.

I’d love to hear whatever feedback you have to offer on it when you see it.

But in the meantime, I’m going to be putting together a 15 page or so sales letter along with a video tour of ClickBank University that will ensure that people considering us will see exactly what they’re getting when they sign on with us.

After all, customer satisfaction is what happens when reality equals or exceeds expectations.

And I aim to land a good number of satisfied, long term customers.

Take care,

Andy

Hi folks,

It’s been a while.

August to be exact. Just before I took off on my vacation.

I came back, got real busy with my pending launch of ClickBank University (which finally got off to a soft launch on November 1 and will have it’s major launch January 15th) and really didn’t devote any time to blogging.

My bad (as my teenage children are wont to say).

One of my New Year’s Resolutions was to blog at least every business day. Well, I’ve already failed on that count, but I realized today that I had some good habits that I developed over the past year that I HAVE successfully implemented on a daily basis, and have no problem keeping them going.

It all started when my Heart Failure Nurse Practitioner, Nancy Todd of Lahey Clinic, handed me a calendar a few years back and told me to weigh myself every single day and write down my weight… and notify her should my weight ever fluctuate more than a few pounds on a daily basis.

So every morning, I stepped on that scale, weighed myself, grabbed the pen attached to my calendar and dutifully wrote down my weight for that particular day. I never let myself eat breakfast or get going on anything else for the day unless that was done.

And that habit has persisted over the past several years.

Last fall, there were a couple of other things I needed to start tracking. Like whether or not I took a particular medication that day (as I sometimes forgot). So, as part of my daily regimen (which is a joke, because I’ve never really managed to develop much of one) I started writing down the first letter of the medication on that very date that I weighed myself, to make sure that I took the medication as well.

Then there was another medication another doctor prescribed that I was constantly forgetting. I added IT to my calendar, and soon, I had my weight, and the initials of two medications I was tracking on each day of the calendar.

Then Nancy said I need to be more diligent about my walking. I have a treadmill, but am so damned lazy that I often forego walking on my treadmill that day.

So, I added the W (for walking) on to my calendar, plus the number of minutes that I walked.

And over the past month, there were a couple of other habits that I wanted to keep, so I added the first initials for those on to that calendar on my bathroom door, and before you knew it, I was consistently doing all the things that I need to do in a day, and my day didn’t seem right if I missed even one of them.

Which brings me to the business side of the equation.

I have to admit that I’m horribly undisciplined.

I bounce from email to managing my accounts to working on my sales letter to building a sales page then back to email and on and on, I bounce throughout the day, and very often, the things that I most want to accomplish during the day — like blogging to Bourland.com or my ClickBank University blog — are never done. I’ve also managed to ignore my ClickBank University Forum, which is something I should do more than once a day.

So today it occurred to me.

I could apply the same principle of tracking the accomplishment of the most important things I need to get done — every day — on a separate business calendar.

With great relish, I could add a V for every video I create (very important activity for me), a BB for every post to my Bourland.com blog, a CB for every post to my ClickBank blog, a CBF for every post to my ClickBank University Forum, and so on.

I know this sounds weird, but I get a real rush out of jotting down those initials signifying that I got the job done. It somehow satisfies my inner 7 year old.

So today I went out and got a blotter calendar for my desktop at Staples. Set me back a whole $4.29.

And now, I can’t wait to go put a “BB” on my calendar.

One task down, many more to go!

See you a little more often than I have….

Take care,

Andy

My wife made the humiliating discovery the other night that there was a Facebook application called “Freebee” that has a certain “catch” that makes the “free gifts” it offers a highly undesirable option.

I’ve got the whole story on the video…

Having learned my lesson about attempting to force the issue of growing your friends list on Facebook, I’ve realized that there are a whole lot better ways to attract friends to you by making a positive contribution…

Here are some of my thoughts on the matter….

I thought I was going to have great news for you today, and in a small way, I do. The good news is: in about a day and a half, I was able to grow my network of Facebook contacts up to 300. The bad news, and how I did it… you’ll have to watch the video.

Thus far, in growing my group of Facebook friends to its current level of 175, I have generally approached people I know, people affiliated with groups and businesses I’ve been involved with, friends of friends that I know of, invitations I’ve received, and people affiliated with companies I have done business with.

So it’s a fairly small universe thus far…

I plan to take a new strategy that I detail here in this video, which I hope will grow my group for FB friends significantly.

I do NOT plan to spam. I will approach people politely and only those with whom I share common ground.

This experiment will go on for a few days, and then I’ll report back to you to let you know how my progress is coming along.

Hopefully, it will do quite well.

I see this as building out a network of friends with whom I can relate and do business…. kind of a human approach to marketing.

Wish me luck….

My biggest frustration as an internet marketer over the years has been trying to relate to a group of email addresses whom I send one way communications to and knew absolutely nothing about.

With my introduction to the world of Facebook, I’m seeing ways that I can actually KNOW who is on the other end, know something about them, their interests, their lives and their passions. And frankly, I do business a whole lot better with people who I have a relationship with, even though I may not necessarily have met them in person.