It’s time to open the traffic floodgates, so you drop some money on targeted ads and the visitors start trickling in.

A few days and 312 clicks later, you still don’t have a single sale. You think to yourself, “Something must be broken” – so you run through your entire sales process and place a test order on your cart.

Hmmm… everything seems to be working.

You ask a few friends to review your sales copy, but they all tell you “it looks fine.”

You wonder if maybe it’s the ad you’re running or the keywords you’ve selected, so you test your ads, test different traffic sources, test headlines, test prices…

5 days and $300.00 later, you’ve got 1223 clicks and only 1 sale. What the heck gives?!!

Your website is sucking wind, and you don’t know why.

This is usually about the time I get a phone call or email. After reviewing hundreds of sales letters, I can say with confidence it’s most likely because your offer is missing one or more of the following ingredients:

1. Credibility and trust: Your offer must be credible and believable. There are many methods for introducing credibility in your sales process such as testimonials, proof, case studies, multi-media presentations, product demonstrations, and many more we covered in depth in our Copywriting Course.
2. Desire: A big part of this is understanding exactly what your potential customers want and what’s causing them grief, pain or feelings of lack. With this knowledge you can craft your sales copy to invoke an emotional response. You essentially have to tap into the mind of your market to be able to create desire.
3. Urgency: Human beings are procrastinators by their very nature, and your website visitors need to know why they should make the decision to buy a priority. You may only have one chance to get the sale, and your job as a marketer is to motivate them to take action NOW.

If your campaigns aren’t converting and you aren’t getting the kind of sales you’d like, it’s time to take an honest and objective look at your sales copy and ask yourself some important questions such as…

• What can I do to make my offer more believable?
• What kind of proof can I provide?
• How and where can I use testimonials to demonstrate the results of others?
• Does my sales copy invoke an emotional response?
• How can I create a sense of urgency to get more people to take action?

You’ll find many of these questions answered in our copywriting course, along with very specific step-by-step instructions on how to craft an offer that includes all 3 of these factors.

Tim Erway

This session was on the step in the sales funnel I know all too well: writing a sales letter that converts.

Actually, I thought I had the topic pretty well covered with what I had prepared:

• four ways to make your letter compelling without using hype
• the all-important option of putting the person behind the business in the promotion
• 11 steps, in detail, on writing a killer sales letter
• and last but not least, I put the super-valuable topic of testimonials under the microscope.

We talked about how to look at testimonials; what makes a good one; what makes a bad one; and the three most effective kind of testimonials you can use to increase conversions.

I just left one little thing out. Probably the most important one, now that I look back on it a day later:

… how to GET testimonials!

Fortunately, Tim had a little experience in that area.

Well, more than a little

He shared a DYNAMITE method for collecting testimonials.

Not one or two.

Not a dozen or so.

A method he used in one of his businesses to collect SEVERAL HUNDRED testimonials… WITHOUT even emailing or talking to the people who gave them!

That’s why this seminar is important. The interactive aspect – not only between me and Tim and Jesse, but also with the live questions from our students.

There’s still time to get in, by the way. All teleseminars are recorded and available for download from inside our membership site.

I am convinced that dollar-for-dollar, this is by far the most valuable teleseminar series I have ever given.

If you’d like to sign up while we still have the low introductory price, go to http://www.thecopywritersguild.com

David Garfinkel

Some people seem to take an almost perverse delight in crossing every t, dotting every i, never jaywalking, always following the instructions on the shampoo bottle to the letter, and drinking 8 glasses of water every day.

This class is not for them.

Don’t get us wrong. We like people who follow instructions and obey the law. We see value in being thorough. We’re into pedestrian safety just as much as the next guy.

But — and this is key – we’re BUSY.

So we’ve been forced to come up with the most efficient, powerful, time-saving ways to do things in our business.

And if someone wants to work hard and take a long time to learn how to write copy that makes money, we’re not the guys.

In case you think I’m being totally sarcastic, look around. There are plenty of courses out there that would have you struggling for weeks before you even get your first piece of copy out.

Of course they don’t advertise that fact. But I’ve had their graduates come up to me after 1 2-hour presentation and tell me they got more out of what I gave them than what they got out of eight weeks with "Institute A’s" program.

My main thing is, I’m busy. I assume you are too. And impatient. We both are. So let’s get right to it!

Last night on the first session of the 8-session teleseminar series, we talked about all kinds of time-saving tips you’d probably like to know about.

We went over Tim’s ingenious way to get copy flowing, really, in a matter of seconds, with only a couple clicks of the mouse (and it involves free resources on the Internet).

I shared a headline time-saver you wouldn’t believe is just hanging out there on the Internet — free — for all to see.

We revealed a free swipe file that is literally crackling with energy! It’s better than a six-pack of Red Bull!

Fortunately, you can still get in the class and fit it into your own schedule, because everything is recorded and available online for you to use at your convenience.

This is a GREAT way to get yourself ready to take off in your business in the New Year!

Learn Copywriting

David Garfinkel

(It was a true story, but it was amazing.)

He had a sales letter he had to write. It was a relatively short and straightforward letter. His fee was reduced compared to longer, more complex sales letters… but, he was still making as much as many people make working two full weeks or even a month. In the U.S.

He expected the letter would take him a couple of days, but…

… it only took him a couple of hours, and, his client was thrilled with it.

I can’t say this is normal.

And, I can’t say this is something that happens with all my mentoring clients, or if it’s a feat I could repeat myself… or even if he could do it again exactly that fast.

I’m not even saying that he made this tremendous productivity leap solely based on what he learned from me, because I know he had access to some other unique and powerful information that sped up his process.

But what I can say is I am well known for methods and shortcuts that speed up peoples’ writing processes, and everyone who works with me ends up writing better copy, more easily and more quickly.

If you heard either of the preview calls Tim Erway, Jesse Jameson and I did, I think you’ll see why that’s true.

The main reason is — while I put my heart into everything I write — I use my head to develop simplified ways to do the same thing most people do the hard way.

And — here’s the important part — I also use my head (and 19 years on performance-based teaching, coaching and mentoring experience) to make it easy for anyone to take what I’ve developed and put it to work for them.

To save time writing copy. To get better response. To feel more confident. For real.

You have an opportunity to tap into that special skill I seem to have developed. Tonight we start the Copywriting Mastery Guild teleseminar series.

What we are doing is not only going to help you write copy better and faster, but it’s also going to help you zero-in on how to write exactly the right kind of copy every step of the way in the sales funnel process.

What does that mean?

Simple.

You’ll learn techniques for writing better AdWords ads.

Which are different from techniques for putting together more compelling squeeze pages, which get prospects on your list. But you’ll learn those, too.

Which are different again from how you put autoresponders together that warm up your list to buy. And you’ll learn those, too.

And even more!

This is a unique opportunity to get some incredibly powerful, new information at a price that will pay for itself practically the first time you use it.

In fact, we’re so sure it will work that we have a unique guarantee.

Take a look:

http://www.thecopywritersguild.com

Hope you will join us in the Copywriting Mastery Guild!

David Garfinkel

"The Old Gray Lady" was what insiders used to call The New York Times (maybe they still do… I’m so far away from that world now I have no idea) … and what I mean here is the newspaper industry has gone through a complete and utter transformation since the last time I worked on a newspaper, which was 1989.

What has happened since then, of course, was The Internet.

All great sweeping generalities, true… but what does this have to do with you and copywriting?

A lot, actually.

Tuesday Google took the wraps off a plan it’s been working on for a long time. The most popular search engine announced it is starting a 3 month trial to help sell print ads for newspapers… including, wouldn’t ya know it, The New York Times, the Chicago Tribune and The Washington Post.

Newspapers as mainstream and old-school as they get.

Meanwhile, Web site Craigslist has removed millions of dollars ad revenue over the past several years from the newspaper industry.

It’s almost starting to look like the Web giveth and the Web taketh away, doesn’t it?

Well, if you look at things that way, you’re not looking far enough. Consumers and their eyeballs are the reasons why ad dollars go where they go. Not "The Web" or any other vague generality.

But, here’s what’s so vitally important to you:

To continue to prosper in your business — or to start really prospering in the first place — you’re going to need to know copy like you’ve never known it before.

And just as important, you’re going to need to know the fine points of writing copy for an AdWords ad, and how that’s different than a Craigslist ad… and how the copy works in each piece of a sequence like this:

1. AdWords ad
2. Squeeze page
3. Autoresponder message
4. Sales Page
5. Order Page
6. Follow-up autoresponder

… because there’s a different objective, and a different psychology, for copy in each of those six pieces.

What you’ve just seen in that list is what is known as a sales funnel. You may have already known that, but, do you know how to write the best copy for each stage of the sales funnel?

That’s what makes the Free Interactive Copywriting Mastery Teleseminar tonight different. We will tell you how to approach each stage.

Possibly for the first time, you’ll have a clear sense of how these parts of a sales funnel work together, from a copywriting point of view.

Please join us… it’s free.

To register, go to

http://www.thecopywritersguild.com

David Garfinkel

Today is election day in the U.S., and what can happen is anyone’s guess.

So let me say something that is definitely "politically incorrect" no matter what your politics are — what happens today at the polls simply doesn’t matter.

To you as a business person.

I say that because my business has continued to grow, no matter what the economy, ever since I learned to get results with my copywriting.

Same for everyone else I know who knows how to get copy results.

You see, if things are good, people are in a buying mood, and you can sell to their desires.

If things are bad, people are scared, and you can sell to their worries and concerns.

If things are uncertain, people are also uncertain, and you can sell to their uncertainty.

Does this sound too cynical for the way you look at things?

If it does, just look at your own human nature.

You don’t stop buying things when the direction of the economy changes. But you buy from a different mood and perspective, and you buy for different reasons.

Someone who is successfully selling to you what you buy must have struck a chord at those times when the economy shifted. Because you had to read some copy or listen to some sales pitch before you said yes.

That is why I strongly encourage you to learn about copywriting, or learn more about copywriting, at your earliest possible opportunity.

And that opportunity just might be starting this Thursday, when the Copywriting Mastery Teleseminar begins.

You will learn what you need to know to have a GREAT 2007… no matter what happens in Congress, or in the state house, or in your local elections.

No matter what happens on Wall Street.

No matter what happens at the Great Statistics Mills!

If you want to take a step forward to become master of your own business destiny, go to

http://www.thecopywritersguild.com

David Garfinkel

He said that while he had enjoyed the preview call last Thursday, he wondered why he should take the Copywriting Mastery Guild teleseminar starting Nov. 9 — what he would get out of it that he couldn’t already get from the $2200+ worth of products he had bought from me.

A fair question. Wouldn’t you say?

Here’s what I told him:

"It would be worth your while to take the course now because it will add to your ability to use what you learn from Breakthrough Copywriting and Copywriting Templates, which you got at WGMS.

"The main purpose of the Teleseminar Series is to show you the exact steps to monetize your copy through building a sales funnel that you optimize every step of the way. It’s a systems approach that’s very easy to understand and implement.

"My materials are systematic and time-saving as well, but they don’t focus on steps in the sales funnel the way the teleseminar series will."

Translation: You’ll learn how to make more money with your copy by using what you learn in the Copywriting Mastery Guild Teleseminar, because you get specific, turnkey tips for making money with copy in three separate segments of the customer lifecycle:

• as you generate leads
• as you convert leads into customers
• as you develop the lifetime value of each customer

The second question really touched me. It was from a friend whose business supports mine as an outsourced service. She said her son, who is in high school, is very successful in writing, and she wondered if she should sign him up for the Copywriting Mastery Guild teleseminar beginning Nov. 7.

It was an interesting question. No doubt that copywriting skills will pay a young man in the workforce better than any other kind of writing skills. But would a teenager be interested in copywriting? I’ve met even younger kids, bright and sincere, who gave me their business cards with titles like "Entrepreneur-in-Training" on them.

Writing advertising copy was the last thing I could have imagined myself doing when I was in my teens… but, that was when dinosaurs still roamed the earth and all toothbrushes were manual.

So I’m not in a position to judge.

The one drawback my friend and I agreed on is a younger person would not have the life experience to draw on to write the same kind of copy an older person who is a UL graduate (University of Life) would have.

But so what?

That’s never stopped me, and I know tons of people who have developed experience as they go.

The only real question is one of desire, of motivation. If he likes the idea as much as Mom does, then why the heck not?

And if you like the idea, then you should check it out, too: http://www.thecopywritersguild.com/

David Garfinkel

But I have identified three types of testimonials that really work in increasing your conversions of prospects to customers.

On the Free Interactive Copywriting Mastery Teleseminar Thursday night, we started with a million-dollar-copywriting mentoring client of mine, Mike Morgan, talking about being mentored. What he said ended up being a testimonial. For extra credit (if you listened to the teleseminar), put your opinion in as a comment, as to what kind of testimonial he gave.

(If you didn’t happen to catch the teleseminar, you can listen to it online here: Copywriting Call)

Later on the teleseminar, I mentioned the three types of testimonials as one of the 11 steps you need to write a sales letter that converts. Here they are:

1. The expert testimonial This is when you get a well-known name in your field to endorse you. If you had a real estate site, a positive testimonial from Donald Trump would be gold for you. If you had a fantasy football site, you could do worse than to have Coach Lou Holtz say something good about your site. If you had a corporate business site, a favorable testimonial from a Wharton School professor would definitely help your conversions.

Same for everyone in any industry. If you can get a recognized leader to approve — in writing — of what you’re doing, this goes a long way to reassure prospects that they should become your customers.

2. The user experience testimonial.

These talk about what it was like

•   to work with you
•   to buy from you
•   to get technical support or customer service from you
•   to use your product

… and so on.

These kind of testimonials relate your experience as a customer to prospective future customers. Most testimonials are like this. But they’re usually not as strong as they could be, because they don’t talk about experience that a prospect will see as valuable before they have done business with you.

It’s important to look at a testimonial through a prospect’s eyes to see if it will have the effect you want it to have.

3. The user results testimonial These are probably the most valuable testimonials you can get for most products and services. You have to be very careful about using these when you have a financial or medical product, as there are strict federal laws about what you can and can’t say. Getting into the details of these regulations are beyond the scope of this blog post, and besides, I’m not a lawyer.

For just about any other kind of product, though, a user results testimonial is incredibly valuable and, generally speaking, less risky. Make sure the results your prospect is talking about are true, not made-up.

Now… that’s some detailed information you’ve probably never heard about testimonials, isn’t it? It will add a lot of conversion power to any copy where you put the information to work.

It’s just a small sample of what’s on the free teleseminar and what you get in the Copywriting Mastery Guild teleseminar series coming up next Thursday. To find out more, go  listen here

David Garfinkel

Tim and I have both done lots of products and helped other people promote their products.

And I personally have four copywriting-related digital and physical products, a published book, and a CD set with Jay Conrad Levinson (Guerrilla Copywriting) that you can buy online right now.

But what we’re doing with this teleseminar is completely different than anything either Tim or I have ever done before… or seen anyone else do, anywhere.

Here’s why:

Everyone has to start somewhere. And many entrepreneurs start new businesses from scratch on a regular basis.

Our program is the first one ever that takes you through the copywriting stages starting with the very beginnings of a new business “getting leads and turning them into customers” all the way through building a multi-million-dollar business, adding upsells, developing long-term customers, improving sales volume and profit margins.

Big words, but easy ways to do it. To grow a business into a huge, profitable company!

As we know how to do, from experience.

And you can learn yourself.

Now, you don’t have to build a million-dollar business. Maybe you’d be happy with half a million a year. Maybe even $100,000 or $200,000. It could be that you’re doing this part time and a few thousand a month of supplementary income would make you happy.

That’s fine!

You don’t even have to be starting a business. You can apply portions of what we’re doing to little “weak links” in your business as it is now. And you could end up making thousands, even tens of thousands of dollars more a month in extra income.

Because what we’re talking about is the fastest, easier, most effective way to turn ideas and words into dollars!

Listen. Not only will I break the copywriting process down into easy-to-digest, easy-to-implement pieces…

…but Tim is going to show you how to take what you’ve got and make it more profitable…

… every step of the way!

Check out The Copywriting Masters Guild.

We started out with some Speed Copywriting secrets, including the mysterious "Rule of 7" one of my friends used to lock in a couple million dollars of sales on a web promotion.

I’ve never heard of it from anyone but him and never seen anyone else use it as effectively. I had to get special permission to include it on the call.

But we covered a lot more than great copywriting techniques.

We also went into some of the "nuts and bolts" issues that multiply your income on the Web…

• Getting traffic
• Squeeze pages
• Autoresponders
• Upsells
• And last but certainly not least, testing and tracking

Actually, we covered more than that.

We also had a lot of people who wanted to sign up right away for our Interactive Copywriting Mastery Guild, which starts next Thursday.

To lock in your place (while there’s still room), go to
www.thecopywritersguild.com

And if you missed the call, fear not!

We’ll have a recording posted by the end of the weekend. Check back on this blog for a link to Thursday night’s call.

David Garfinkel