If you are serious about doing business online, it’s important to learn how to do online business advertising. Whether the traffic source is free or paid, if you do not understand the basics of doing online advertising, the traffic you’ve generated will be wasted.
Recently a ‘rich’ surveying company advertised with us. When I looked at the ad, I almost fainted. It was a simple sign up form, expecting people to sign up without telling them anything about the company or the offer. Isn’t it common sense to ask oneself “will I act on this ad?” before one spend money advertising the ad?
In today’s discussion on how to do online business advertising, I’m going to share with you 3 “MUST-HAVE” elements in your ad before you even start thinking where to advertise it.
Hope that helps.
1. WIIFM “in 5 seconds”
WIIFM stands for “what’s in it for me”.
If you don’t tell people what’s in it for them, they are not going to be interested in your ad, not to mention taking action.
The problem with many advertisers is that their WIIFM is scattered all over the sales copy. One has to seriously read through the sales copy to identify them. Unfortunately, most sales copies are not read and thus the WIIFM message is not delivered.
For effective online business advertising, your ad must address the question of WIIFM within 5 seconds after a prospect first look at your ad. If not, you are losing them, period.
This means your headline, subheadline and the first paragraph of your sales copy play an important role in deciding whether a prospect will continue reading your ad or simply leave the page.
2. Become their friends “in 10 seconds”
Once you successfully capture their attention with WIIFM, you next objective is to gain their confidence in you and/or your offer.
Common ways to achieve this include the follow tricks:
– adding testimonials, especially ones with photographs;
– showing your own photograph and disclosing your name, email address and even contact number;
– showing other proofs such as earning screenshots, samples of completed work etc.
3. “Impossible-to-miss” call for action
Lastly, you must tell your prospect what to do next.
The problem with many advertisers is that their call for action is hidden somewhere in the sales letter. If it takes even 10 seconds for the prospects to search for the call for action, most of them would rather click the close window button.
The 3 elements above are the bare minimum that you must have in your ad if you want to do any online business advertising.
In additional to these 3, try to build a list regardless of what online business you’re advertising. The main advantage of online advertising vs offline advertising is that it’s easy to capture clients’ database. In the world of business, winners are those who own the customers. Think Walmart vs wholesaler. Think Ebay vs its sellers. The ones with huge customer base win. Regardless of what business you’re in, you are in the business of building customers.
Great tips. A lot of common sense things in there but many things that people tend to forget.
I think sales copy is an extremely important point. It certainly pays to have a professional write copy for you. You would *normally* employ a designer to produce the advert design for you as that is something not all of us can do. The same applies for writing copy. Sure, most of us can write but there is a real skill in writing good sales copy!
Thanks for the tips! :)
This is good article for online business. The most important is the phrase “what’s in it for me”. Ye, sometimes about the phrase when writing the ad.
I think in today’s BroadBand World, it’s time to upgrade from photos to VIDEO where you can make real personal contact at the gut level much easier than with a still photo.
Yes, that’s very true and most advertisers forget that targeted traffic is good but needs a good converting sales copy/followup email series as well. There are still folks who buy 10k visitors for $100 and make Zero/Zilch/Nada profit :( That’s sad but it’s a fact. Advertisers make good money. So we have found a niche here now. To sell advertising for making money online. So no matter what happens to the Ad, we still make money :)
Good article. I am reminded of the 10 second rule to
capture attention every time I look at the analytics of
time on page. YIKES! Be to the point, compelling and brief.
This is awsome
Everything is about copywriting….
With powerful copywriting you can rule the world and sell anything you want…And is not difficult to learn
Thanks for your tips Ken!
Concise, clear cut, and to-the-point! The very last line says it all.
I really wasn’t sure what to expect when I joined. After looking around the site and reading the blog I was pleasantly surprised with the outstanding content and uniqueness of your ideas.
Yep…
I agree with you, thanks .
Hello Ken,
Yes siree, you hit the nail on the head! It’s amazing how many people get confused on the difference of WIIFM and will explain how great the product is and all about it and list all the bells and whistles. Then they will fail miserably on explaining all of the benefits and what the product can do for them….
Your article makes a lot of sense.
These simple tips, if followed,could give online advertising a better rap: consumers would know what the deal is! Thanks…
yes, very true, all too often one stumbles upon sales copy that is too long, unclear and even unappealing.
Hi Kenneth. Interesting post, I must say! The WIIFM concept is just too good! I agree with you, the content should cater to the readers’ requirements. A few weeks ago, I got my site optimized from Adwest Worldwide (http://www.adwestworldwide.com) and found excellent results. Besides changing the look of my website, they stressed on improving the content with specific keywords, to connect to the readers easily. I would recommend their efficient services to all those who are looking forward to getting their sites optimized.
Great Lessons Kenneth
Am always glad to read such wonderful posts
from you.
These 3 Tips are really a must do in succeeding
online, if properly done, the earnings will be
coming in easily.
Hi! I enjoyed reading your posts. I felt that your research techniques must be really cool. I’m running a small website and doing internet marketing, so I’m going through a lot of posts.
I agree with what you say. I personally think that using a blog can connect with people better than a sales page, plus people love free information (which means more sales for you!). You’d do pretty well if you could apply these to a blog or upload WordPress to your page…