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How To Write Eye-Catching Headlines that Transform Browsers into Buyers

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For your headlines to stop readers in their tracks, capture their attention through every word of your copy, and persuade them to click that “Add to Cart” button without a second thought, you need to master the “headline reading psychology” of your soon-to-be customers. Once you understand why magnetic headlines pull readers in, you’ll know how to do it for your own sales pages, every time. Follow along with me for the next ninety seconds and I’ll show you exactly how you can turn a casual browser of your sales page into an avid reader, curious to drink in your copy until ultimately hitting the “Buy” button. First, get relevant: Tell your readers’ they’re in the right place So many people create clever turns of phrase hoping to pull people into their sales copy and wonder why their catchy headlines just don’t work. The answer is simple: Readers are busy people, and they don’t have time to study your sales letter to see if it’s relevant to them. Instead, they rely on you to do that work for them. But how do you do that? The answer to that is simple as well: You ensure your headline is clear, not clever, telling the reader exactly what your sales copy is poised to deliver. Use specific keywords that show without a doubt that your page is relevant to people with a specific need or a specific problem – and don’t over-think it. If you’re a blogger, you probably already do this with your post titles, so apply that same thinking to your headlines. For example, look at the title for this post – it’s about “how to write headlines.” (Ever wonder why you always hear such high praise for “How to” headlines ? It’s because they’re extremely relevant by nature. Keep in mind, however, that a “how to” headline might not be the most powerful choice for your particular sales page. When it’s time to write your headline, think of the primary, top-of-mind problem or result your readers are after and make that the foundation of your headline. Do this right, and your readers will automatically know that they’re in the right place – and save your cleverness for later. Next, add the carrot: Attach a powerful result to your headline After you establish relevance to your readers’ immediate needs, you need to help your readers connect to a mouth-watering result that comes from addressing that need. The often quoted “How to ____ so you can ____” is a great example of bridging relevance to result. Never forget that your readers aren’t looking for products or services – they’re looking for beneficial outcomes, and the relevant keywords you write into your headline are often the means to that outcome. So ask yourself why your readers want to take that relevant action, and you’ll be guided to a promise or two that you can make in your headline. I’ll use this post as an example again – you’re reading this far because you want to know how to write headlines, but what you’re really after is getting people to buy from your sales page. Look at your browser title bar and you’ll see I worked that into this post’s headline as well. Finally, dress it up: Add emotionally stirring and action words to your headline Once you’ve married relevance to outcome, it’s time to add a little flavor to your headline by hand-picking compelling words to make those two features “pop.” In this post I modified “headlines” with the adjective “eye-catching” to add some life to the text. I’ve also used the powerful transitive verb “transform” to suggest actionable change, which intensifies the promise of desired results. Pick words that make the relevant keywords or the desired results seem more powerful and attainable – or simply add a third component to the headline like a timeframe or a variation of “easy” or “simple” (if it applies). I could go into additional examples here, but you’ll find all that you need in the Magnetic Headlines series. Take a few moments to read through the posts there with a more educated eye, looking for how each example uses relevance, results, and powerful modifiers to make you want to read each post to the very end. Which, now that you think about it, you’ve just done with this post. Sharpen your skills – how can you improve your own headlines? If you want to get better at writing sales page headlines today, take another ninety seconds right now and use these three tips on a recent headline you’ve created. In the comments below, show us your original – and improved version – and get those headline writing muscles working! About the Author : Dave Navarro is a product launch manager who can’t wait for you to join the 7,000+ people using his free workbooks in the Launch Coach Library (a crowd favorite in the Third Tribe forums).

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How to NOT Get Paid to Write Online (And Make Money Doing It)

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Fresh out of college, I landed a job writing one-page sell sheets for a marketing company for $50 each. On a rare excellent day, I might do as many as two of these. Soon after, I found a freelance gig that would pay me $300 per article I wrote for an inter-organizational newsletter. I got to interview people for that one. It was more work, but better money. Eventually, I hooked up with a pretty big industry magazine and was being paid $1300 for 2000-word feature articles. That was the big money. Magazine pay doesn’t go much higher until you get into the really big-name publications. I could often get two of those assignments at a time, but I needed to coordinate and interview around ten people for each article, so doing two in a month was a hell of a task. Today, I’m doing much better in my writing career. Since I started blogging, I’ve written hundreds of posts, both for myself and for other blogs. I don’t have to interview people anymore, so it goes much faster and I can write much more. The combined total I’ve been paid for all of those posts (including what I’ve been paid for writing sales copy, promotional emails, and so on) is zero dollars. And really, it pays the bills better than my magazine writing ever did. How to make “not getting paid” pay off I just recorded a call with Copyblogger Associate Editor Jon Morrow entitled “How We Make $2000 per Guest Post,” and the funny thing about that call was that I’d had the idea to write the post you’re currently reading before Jon came up with the hook for the call. I guess great minds think alike. See, newbie online entrepreneurs often want to “make money blogging,” and seasoned writers often come to the internet to expand their freelance businesses by doing online what they do offline: selling words for dollars. Both of those approaches assume a straight line between composing paragraphs and getting a check, but that straight line hasn’t reflected my experience in the blogosphere (and I’m in good company ). To put it succinctly, I don’t make money writing. I make money through a business, and that business does its marketing almost exclusively through writing. Writing for me is a means to an end. It’s a way to gain exposure, gain popularity and authority, and build trust. Once you have enough exposure, trust, and authority with your audience, they’ll consider buying products and services from you if what you offer them is good. The cool part? It almost doesn’t matter which category or niche those products or services fall into. It works like this: Writing -> Readers -> Exposure, popularity, authority, and trust -> The ability to sell stuff. Need a fancy term to make it legit? Call it content marketing . Notice that I’ve used the very specific noun “stuff” to describe what you’re able to sell to a well-matched, receptive audience with enough of those preceding magic ingredients. Information products? Yep. Software and services of all kinds? Yep. Hats? Maybe. Want to sell hats? Then write enough, in places where people who like hats congregate, to become a popular and trustworthy personality who happens to sell hats. Or makes hats. Or wears interesting hats. Or at least likes hats, and talks about hats a lot. Your audience has to be willing to pay for hats, but if they are, they’re going to buy from someone. If your writing has put you in front of them, and made you popular and trustworthy, they’ll buy from you. It works for just about anything. This is all about thinking outside of the nine dots. I came to the blogosphere as a humorist, but what I found was that people wouldn’t pay for humor. So what could I do with my funny writing? Why, sell consulting and website services, of course. I remember asking my readers at the time, “Can I be the funny guy who writes about business, and also build websites somehow?” Give what attracts, sell what people want to buy And the answer was apparently that yes, I could write humorously about business — and tattoos, and unschooling, and The Matrix — and build a large readership who seemed to like and trust me. And at that point, I could offer websites. And consulting. And info products. And likely waffles. If those folks needed a site and/or were hungry, they’d work with me rather than finding their website guy or waffle house on Google. When Jon and I did that call about making $2000 per guest post, what we meant was that guest posting is our primary (almost our exclusive) marketing strategy, and that on average, each post — each performance in front of a blog audience to build trust and exposure — resulted in around $2000 of income. That’s income that was created through writing, but wasn’t income we received for completing a writing assignment. You want to be a writer? Well, don’t confine your thinking to the obvious example of putting words together for pay. There’s a whole world of ways out there to make money as a writer… and the interesting part is that most of them mean you’ll be writing for free. About the Author: Johnny B. Truant is apparently a writer or something and is one of the two guys behind The Charlie and Johnny Jam Sessions . If you’d like personal help on getting paid to write for free, he’s got you covered .

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5 Reasons Why No One Is Reading Your Email Newsletter

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Five reasons? There may be seven thousand reasons why your newsletter won’t get the response you’re looking for. Most of those reasons have the same common problem, though: readers just don’t like it. And that’s probably because you’re making one of these five mistakes. Mistake # 1: Your newsletter isn’t helpful This is a big one. My wife signed up for a newsletter on Ayurveda, thinking she would get some helpful articles and ideas on a topic she was very interested in. All she ever got was a whole bunch of promotional stuff. Now, I know what you’re thinking. You know very well that non-stop shameless self-promotion doesn’t exactly endear you to others, and of course you’d never make every single newsletter into a pitch. Because you’re a Copyblogger reader, you know that your content has to be useful or it won’t get read. Yet most folks can’t help themselves. They mean to write something useful, they mean to be helpful, but they end up being self-promotional because it’s easier . It’s easier to say “Yoga class on Friday, 17th December” than it is to write yet another article about yoga. So they wind up being self-promotional by default — and since it was the easier option, they don’t think of it as being unhelpful to their readers. That doesn’t mean the readers don’t see it that way, though. Mistake #2: Your voice isn’t particularly compelling Voice is not everything, but it sure counts for a lot. When you speak to a friend over the phone, they sound excited and vibrant. Ask them to put down their feelings on paper and you often find what they’ve written just doesn’t sound like them. Their voice doesn’t show up in their writing, and that means their writing doesn’t really convey how they feel. Every artist, singer, and yes, writer has a signature voice . This voice needs to be authentic. If you’ve tried and failed to find your voice before, put down the pen and Skype a friend. Get them to ask you questions about the topics you’ll be writing about in your newsletter — recording every word, naturally. Then just blab away, and transcribe what you’ve said. I know this method sounds tedious. But it’s quicker than slaving over a boring newsletter that takes you two days to write, and still winds up completely devoid of voice. Voice matters. And you have one — you just have to get it on paper. But tone alone won’t save the day. Mistake # 3: You’re not telling stories Many people think their newsletter has to be full of perfectly organized and structured articles — and since they don’t know how to create those kinds of articles, they get frustrated and stuck when they’re trying to write. Structure isn’t the way to create a great newsletter. Stories are. As human beings, we’re entranced by stories from an early age. Start with stories about your clients. Write about what you’ve experienced in your industry and your thoughts about it. When you’re trying to elicit response, nothing gets your readers engaged like the color and drama of a good story. And how do you finish? Tell the moral of the story — just like you would in a real story. Explain what you learned or what you should have learned or what someone else could learn from this experience. The moral of the story also does double duty as the springboard for your call to action. Which brings us to Mistake # 4. Mistake # 4: You have a half-hearted call to action This week, you need to fill up your yoga class. In your newsletter, you’re going to ask a customer to write back or comment. You need that customer to respond. You can’t hope they will — you have to ask them to do it. You have to be pretty darned clear what you want them to do, too. Just saying “please respond” is far too vague. Your customers don’t know exactly what you want them to do or how to do it. Do you want them to click on a link? Tell them to click here (and also tell them why). Do you want them to write back and tell you you’re a god/goddess/schmuck? Use the words “just click reply to email me back and tell me I’m a god/goddess/schmuck.” Do you want them to buy? Tell them . Most folks just hope their customers will act on their own. And their customers mostly don’t — because they’re too busy to figure out how you want them to respond. You need to tell them. Just a little nudge will do. Of course, none of this will work if you’re a complete stranger. Mistake# 5: You don’t have a specific frequency Switch on your TV at 6 pm. What do you see? In most countries, it’s the evening news. And every evening it’s the same old news, but hey it’s consistent. Most newsletters aren’t. If you’re going to write a newsletter, then you’ve got to have a publishing schedule. You have to promise your readers that your newsletter will go out once a month, or twice a month or three times a week — whatever it may be. Your newsletters can’t go to Bermuda on vacation. They’re doing all the grunt work for you. Our newsletter has gone out since 2002 and has done so week after week without any stoppage. You want to stop? You are ill? Sorry mate, but that won’t wash well with your readers. Imagine the TV station canceling the news because some newsreader didn’t turn up. One of the big reasons for the lack of response is that your newsletter is a stranger to your readers. You can’t send them a newsletter whenever you feel like it and hope they’ll respond. Response is directly related to frequency. Muck up on frequency and the rest of the four points don’t even matter. So there you have it: Pure self-promotion won’t work — make it useful. Your tone of writing is critical. Record yourself if you have to, but connect with your own unique voice. If you can’t get your head around structure, use customer stories. Don’t be half-hearted about promotion — give a strong call to action. Without consistent frequency, your customers will forget who you are even if you do everything else right. Newsletters are a lot of work. There’s no point in doing them unless you see the response you’re looking for. And avoiding these five big mistakes will perk up your response in a hurry. About the Author: Sean D’Souza offers a great free article on ‘Why Headlines Fail’ when you subscribe to his Psychotactics Newsletter . Be sure to check out his blog , too. P.S. Have you checked out Internet Marketing for Smart People , the Copyblogger email newsletter? It features a free 20-step course that will build your business, so you really should click here and subscribe .

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The 7 Secrets of Running a Wildly Popular Blog

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Did you ever wonder why some blogs attracts tons of readers and others don’t? Of course you’ve wondered. We all have. Because if you’re reading this blog, you almost certainly have a blog of your own. You think it’s great, and you want lots of other people to think it’s great too. So what’s the answer? Why do some blogs become more popular than others? There are lots of reasons why people flock to certain blogs, but I think one of the most important is that popular blogs are written by popular people — the sort of people who attract others. And becoming a popular person isn’t just a matter of fate or genes. It’s something you can work on. I’m not saying content isn’t important when you’re creating a popular blog. Content for the best blogs is almost always top-notch, interesting, and informative — and that takes work. But a blog isn’t just about work or great content. Think about the most popular person you know in your personal life. What is it about them that attracts other people? Brains? Skill? Knowledge? These things could be part of it, but don’t you also know popular people who aren’t the smartest, the most skilled, or the best-educated? When giving the commencement speech to the Vassar class of 1983, Meryl Streep said this: Real Life is actually a lot more like high school. The common denominator prevails. Excellence is not always recognized or rewarded. What we watch on our screens, whom we elect, are determined to a large extent by public polls. Looks count. A lot. And unlike the best of the college experience, when ideas and solutions somehow seem attainable if you just get up early, stay up late, try hard enough, and find the right source or method, things on the outside sometimes seem vast and impossible … In other words, success isn’t necessarily about competence. It’s often about likeability. People like to spend time with people they like. The same applies to blogs. Success often depends on likeability. How you come across. Your vibe. Your attitude and personality. And if I were to break this down into specific tips, I’d say there are 7 secrets for making your blog (and you) more popular. 1. Have a conversation People don’t like to be lectured or talked down to. They just like to talk. And a blog is really a form of conversation between you and your readers. Even if people don’t always directly communicate with you or leave comments, the tone of your posts should be more or less conversational. Don’t write like you’re delivering a sermon. Write like you’re chatting with a friend. Keep it easy and informal. 2. Lighten up You don’t have to tell jokes, but it’s smart to keep things light-hearted. Consider the Men with Pens blog. James always has a lot of fun when writing a post, and her sense of humor makes the information more readable and entertaining. Your readers are probably having a tough day. Their desk is groaning under the weight of all their projects. The economy is crappy and their life is full of responsibility. If they read your blog and come away feeling just a little happier, they’ll keep coming back. 3. Be yourself After all, people are not coming to your blog just to acquire knowledge. They’re dropping by to visit you . Which means you have to be there. That means revealing a little about yourself, sharing the occasional personal photo, posting videos where you talk to your readers, letting people know what’s going on with you. For example, in a recent Pro Copy Tips post, I mentioned that I visited Las Vegas for my sister’s wedding. I show a photo of me standing in front of the famous welcome sign on a sweltering afternoon. I mention playing the slots and losing a little money. (Only a buck. I’m not much of a gambler.) And all this served as an introduction to thoughts about how writers take risks, so it remained informative and focused on the reader. 4. Be nice Yes, your mom was right. You have to be nice. Don’t be a diva. Answer your emails. Respond to comments. Be polite even when a reader makes the occasional stupid remark or a troll flames you for no good reason. The people who are rude to you are having a bad day, or a bad life, and they want to share their frustration and anger with you. But it’s their problem, not yours. They want to provoke you. Don’t let them. If anyone gets out of control on your blog, don’t bicker about it. Just delete the comment and move on. 5. Get over yourself When you think about it, blogs are really kind of egotistical . You have to think pretty highly of yourself to assume other people want to hear what you have to say day after day. There’s nothing wrong with a healthy ego, but your blog really isn’t about you. It’s about your readers. It may seem counterintuitive, but the more you cater to your readers needs, the more popular and profitable your blog can become. The more you give, the more you get. The world is full of self-centered and stingy bloggers. Don’t be one of them. (I realize this might seem to contradict #3. There’s a delicate balance there. You want to share enough of yourself to make a connection, but still keep your focus on your audience.) 6. Help people Isn’t this the whole point of a blog, especially one that’s wildly popular? Why do you visit Copyblogger or Lifehacker or Chris Brogan , or any of the other top blogs? Because they offer you lots of stuff without necessarily expecting something in return. The people who run these blogs are constantly thinking about how they can help you. Again, think about the people in your personal life. You probably know that one person who is always willing to help, no matter what you need. Why do you keep going back to that person? Because you know they’ll say “yes” when most others will say no. Helpful people are popular people. 7. Stop trying so hard Yes, you need to work at your blog. You should write good posts. You should offer solid information. You might even put in long hours. But don’t push too hard. Relax. Enjoy it. Make it part of your life. If you’re desperate for success, that desperation will show. It’s like dating: there’s a fine line between wooing someone and stalking them. I mean, have you ever had someone get a crush on you and start trailing you like a puppy? It’s annoying. And a little creepy. No matter how much you want success, just remember that it comes fast for some and slower for others. There’s a moderately popular blog I used to enjoy. Then the people who run it announced a product. From that day forward, every post was about their product. Every link pointed to a sales page. The blog was no longer a conversation. It was a relentless sales pitch. I don’t visit any more. Meryl Streep was right. Life is like high school. And success has a lot to do with being popular. So … be popular. About the Author: Dean Rieck is one of America’s top direct marketing copywriters. He shares his writing and freelancing know-how at the wildly popular Pro Copy Tips .

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The Two Vital Attributes of Quality Content

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“Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful” ~William Morris, poet and designer Imagine the household you would have if you got rid of every item that was neither useful or beautiful. Gone would be the plastic doodad with no known purpose, the ugly frame your great-aunt gave you, the Special Free Offer© you never opened, the collection of someday-useful peanut butter jars . . . Every room would be so much more pleasant to be in, and every tool so much easier to find. What if you applied the same rule to the content you wrote? Every email, sales letter, blog post, and comment you wrote would have to be useful or beautiful. Or both. Does that sound a little . . . scary? Most copywriters are fine with this, in principle. (Remember the first law of content marketing ? Every piece of cookie content should reward the audience for reading: by solving a problem they have, or by entertaining them. Sounds pretty similar, doesn’t it?) The main problem people have with this advice is they don’t trust their own judgment. They’re unsure if what they’re writing is useful or beautiful. And of course, some people are certain their writing would make James Joyce weep and Dale Carnegie gnash his teeth, while their readers are wondering what this pretentious and useless fluff piece is all about. Are you unsure? Never fear! Here are some guidelines to help. How do I know if my content is useful? 1. Write content that suits your audience Your content must match your audience’s level of understanding . Experts won’t consider entry-level content useful and beginners won’t get much use out of advanced discussions. Your audience must have the required resources — time, energy, money, potato chips — to use the content. Telling new parents about a relaxation technique that requires eight hours a night of uninterrupted sleep? Not useful. Your content must relate to something your audience cares about . I’ll never find content on how to dress in corporate style useful, because I don’t care about dressing in that way. 2. Write specific content Generalisations aren’t useful. Vague: Scooters need oil on a regular basis. Specific and useful: Refill your scooter’s oil tank to the indicator line with two-stroke motorcycle oil every third time you refill the petrol tank. 3. Write actionable content Useful content creates action . If your readers don’t do something as a result of reading your content (change their mind, buy something, tear up their desk calendar, dance a boogaloo, write a better headline , pick a fight, talk to their children, set a goal, start a collaborative experience ), then the content wasn’t useful. Your content must encourage, advise, mentor, support, bully, or dare your audience into acting. And you must, must, must include a call to action in every piece of content you write. How do I know if my content is beautiful? This is the point where people get uncomfortable. Don’t worry! You don’t have to produce sonnets to write beautifully. Experiences that provide pleasure or meaning are beautiful. Johnny B. Truant writes posts that are beautiful, although he’ll likely laugh in your face and pour jam down your pants if you say so. They’re beautiful because they’re funny and vigorous and meaningful. If you’re not Johnny, here are some tips. (If you are Johnny, hi Johnny!) 1. Write meaningful content If you write your content with emotion , it’s more meaningful. Ever read a “Thank you for subscribing” email with sincere gratitude in it? (I read one that was so beautiful I saved it. Really.) If your feelings don’t match the anticipated emotion it’s even more effective: an angry product review, an excited tax letter, a sympathetic auto-responder . . . Be vulnerable . Instead of writing about the mistakes some people have made, write about the mistakes you made. And what they meant to you. Write about the bigger implications . Fixing a dripping tap is ordinary. Learning to perform house maintenance as a sign of your new independence is meaningful. Real benefits are meaningful. Creating more wealth, more connection, more options, and more purpose are some of our most meaningful activities. 2. Write pleasurable content Write to inspire emotion in your readers: make them smile. Make them cry. Make them wistful. And make sure they know they’re not alone in feeling that way. If you know your audience well, you can write mass communication that feels personal , where every reader thinks you’re psychic because you’re writing Just For Them. Everyone enjoys the pleasure of feeling understood. Use the tools in your linguistic toolbox to make the writing entertaining : play with alliteration, hyperbole, rhythm, flights of fancy, metaphor, perspective, storytelling . . . whatever feels natural and unforced to you. It’s hard to beat the pleasure of seeing your name in print. Praise your readers in public, hold them up as an example, thank them, or mention them as an inspiration . . . and do it by name. Do you want to take it even further? Think of a piece of content that’s critical to your success, like your sales letter. What if you applied the same rules to every paragraph of that content? What if you judged every word ? If you wrote your sales letter and removed every word that wasn’t useful or beautiful: You couldn’t use weasel words like “actually” or “amazingly” or “absolutely.” You’d have to use evocative, beautiful words and images. The writing would be muscular, short and punchy (Like Hemingway would write it). You’d become a thoughtful student of copywriting , so you knew how to make each word as useful as possible to create the result you want. It would kick ass! Do you think you could improve the usefulness and beauty of your content? Tell us how you plan to do it in the comments! About the Author: Catherine is wicked passionate about helping people to start and grow an awesome website: she’s even published a manifesto about it. When she’s not adding five-minute missions to BeAwesomeOnline.com , she can invariably be found on Twitter .

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The Two Vital Attributes of Quality Content