Carol Bentley

I’m forever going on about making your letters to clients and prospects interesting and information-packed. (Are you sick of hearing it yet? ) Well sorry, I’m not going to apologise for emphasising it (oh - I just did, sort of… didn’t I? )

No, seriously! Including useful tips, insider knowledge or understanding puts you at a higher level than your competitors, who do not do this, because you are giving value.

What’s better - is you are giving value without obligation because you are making it freely available without your prospect having to pay a single penny. And they come to regard you as the ‘go-to-expert’ when they decide to buy your type of product or services.

Adding Value

So what sort of thing is useful to your prospect; what gives your letter ‘added value’?

The actual content you can offer is different in your industry or profession compared to another. Let’s see if we can discover what would be useful for your target audience by going through a few questions:

1. When you have a face-to-face meeting with a prospect do they ask you questions? (What? Did I hear you say “Doh!” ‘course they do! )
   Alright, what questions do they ask?

   Are any of the questions generic to your industry or profession rather than specific to your product or service?

   Those are the ones you should be answering in your letter. And by doing so you are giving valuable information to your reader. (An added bonus is you might also be overcoming a possible objection the reader might have had).

2. Along a similar vein - what tips do you share with your staff and customers? Again look for the more generic gems. Include these in your letters.

   Remember, something very simple and obvious to you can be a real eye-opener to a person who does not have your experience or knowledge. Sometimes it’s easy to forget the wealth of expertise we accumulate over the years.

Offering free advice, from a position of knowledge, goes a long way towards encouraging people to decide in your favour when they decide to buy!

~ Carol Bentley

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You’ve worked hard to make sure everything is working properly. Whether it’s a process in your administration, in your production, in your marketing or on your website. Now it’s time to relax, safe in the knowledge that everything is running smoothly.

Think again!

That’s what I thought - but it was a false sense of security I shouldn’t have slipped into.

Here’s what happened…

You may have noticed that in the right panel of this blog there’s an invitation to recommend this website to your colleagues and friends. When you click on the link you are taken to another web page from where you can send a message to the people you want to tell. After clicking the ‘Send Emails’ button you are supposed to go to a ‘Thank You’ web page where you collect your gift for taking the time to send those recommendations.

Now that system was working fine. So I didn’t see any need to re-check it.

More fool me!

I discovered there was a problem when one of my readers kindly rang to let me know a 404 ‘Page Not Found’ error was coming up instead of the Thank You page. And there was a pretty good chance the recommendation emails were not being sent either.

Fortunately, thanks to the great IT support I get from my supplier, the problem was quickly resolved, and it is now working as intended.

Reviewing Systems

Of course looking at our systems doesn’t just apply to making sure they are still working - although that in itself is a good enough reason to keep a close eye on them. Improvements in our procedures and techniques are just as important. And that’s where asking your staff, customers and even suppliers can reveal some extremely valuable insights.

How long is it since you reviewed your systems; the ones that run like clockwork? Are they in place because they are the most efficient and effective method? Or are they used because “we’ve always done it like that!” Is it time to dust off the cobwebs and see if there are better ways?

I Asked For Your Help

My main method of delivering information is through writing; books, articles, email messages… these blog posts.

But my previous profession was developing and delivering training courses - so I’m perfectly comfortable with talking to people and showing how things work. It makes sense to incorporate all these coaching skills into any future materials or courses I create. But is that what people really want? Would using different presentation styles be better? Maybe, maybe not.

That’s why I decided to ask your opinion in last Friday’s post.

If you haven’t yet given me your thoughts, would you do me a favour and pop over to http://copywriting4b2b.opinion.sgizmo.com? Thanks.

And in the meantime… what areas in your business need a bit of oiling to make them run more smoothly?

~ Carol Bentley

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Are you having a conversation with your customers and prospects? Or are you lecturing them?

We are the experts in our field. And we want to be sure our prospects - and customers - fully understand the results our offer gives them.

So, just like the experts tell us, we ‘paint the picture’ in our letters or on our web pages; clearly describing all the benefits our features deliver. And it reads well, because we know what we meant to say. And we know the tone we are using to express our thoughts.

The problem we all have - yes, me included - is making sure what we’ve written is read correctly.

There’s two challenges we face:

1. The words we use. Are we friendly, persuasive and supportive without being condescending, dismissive or just downright ‘in-your-face’ annoying?
2. The emphasis that someone reading might put on the words you’ve given them.

I’m sure you know (or have read somewhere) that only 7% of our communication is in the words we use - the rest is made up of body language (55%) and voice tonality (38%)

So how do we get over these challenges in our writing, where we don’t have the benefit of body language or voice tone? Here’s a couple of techniques I’ve developed that you might like to use:

1. After writing your letter, sales page, email or message, read it out loud. If you can record your reading, so you can listen back, that would be even better. When you listen to your reading does it sound right? Do the words flow? Does it sound like you are having a conversation or does it come across as a speech or lecture?

   Writing in a conversational tone is not easy, which is why I so often recommend recording what you want to say and then transcribing it into your document. The words you use when you speak come across more naturally and, after using this technique a few times, you’ll find it easier to write in that style as well.

   Now, ask someone else to read the same message aloud. Does it still sound as you expected? Or has the message changed? If so, why? Words in the wrong order can change the meaning.

   Let me give you an example. On this website a pop-over appears if you visit the blog and are not subscribed. I recently changed the pop-over to offer a couple of reports as an incentive to subscribe.

   The wording I used for one of the reports was:

   31 Word Time Saving Tips for Sales Letter Writers

   I wanted the reader to know the report contains 31 tips on how to save time when you use Microsoft Word for creating sales letters. And that read OK, didn’t it?

   But when I looked at it again a bit later I realised it could be read as 31-Word Time Saving Tips for Sales Letters. Do you see the difference? The way someone reads it could be entirely different to what I meant! So I changed it to say:

   31 Time-Savers in Word for Sales Letter Writers

   It’s another good reason for putting what you’ve written to one side and coming back to review/revise it later!

2. Punctuation can sometimes create a problem as well. Pauses in the flow - created with commas, semi-colons, colons, dashes and other punctuation marks - may not be in the right place, or missing punctuation can completely change your message!
3. Formatting can change the emphasis on words. Here’s another example; read these sentences putting emphasis on the word in italics in each one:
   • I never said he stole the money
   • I never said he stole the money
   • I never said he stole the money
   • I never said he stole the money
   • I never said he stole the money
   • I never said he stole the money

   Do you see how changing the emphasis on a different word in each sentence changes the whole meaning?

   So how do you handle this challenge - the challenge of emphasis? It is more difficult when you are writing, compared to speaking. Using different formatting (as I did in the sentences above) can help. Use italics, bold, underline and capitals as well as careful punctuation.

   But again, I would strongly suggest going through the same ‘reading aloud and checking’ process as I recommended above just to be doubly sure it sounds OK.

The good news is once you’ve written a few letters or emails following these suggestions you’ll develop your own natural, conversation style. And I’m confident your prospects and customers will respond more warmly to you as result.

~ Carol Bentley

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Would you do me a favour?

I’m really close to finalising my Easiest Sales Letter Creation self-study programme, which is designed to help business owners get better results from the sales letters they send out.

The content is based on the material in my book, but before I sit back and say “Finished!” I want to be sure I’ve covered everything. And I thought “who better to ask than the folks who follow my blog?”

So, would you help me out by answering a few questions? Pop over to http://copywriting4b2b.opinion.sgizmo.com to answer the questions (and get a little more info about the programme).

Thanks.

~ Carol Bentley

Have you come across Twitter? There’s a lot of interest in Twittering; lots of people are getting involved. I can understand how it helps people communicate on a regular basis - especially socially. It certainly seems popular with younger people, almost as an adjunct to their mobile texting.

But how can that help in a business environment?

Well - it depends upon your business, how close a relationship you have with your customers or clients and how interested they are in what you are doing and vice versa. And, of course, it depends upon how open you like to be. I don’t think twittering suits anyone who prefers to be really private.

But I see it as a natural extension to blogging. It is in effect a micro-blogging facility.

The idea is to post short comments on what you are doing. Or where you are, or something you’ve found that was interesting that you want to talk about. It is an effective way of keeping in touch with people you care about and sharing your discoveries.

Mind you - it is also a good test of writing concisely - you only have 140 characters for each post! Now that will be an interesting challenge

So I’ve just opened a twitter account at http://twitter.com/Carol_Bentley and popped a few people on my ‘following’ list.

I’ll let you know how it goes… unless you want to experience it for yourself. If you do, go to http://twitter.com/Carol_Bentley and click the Follow button under my photo.

~ Carol Bentley

Questions asked in my recent survey included:

• “What’s the best way to market to potential customers when starting afresh with no prior customer list or contacts?”
• “Increasing visitors to web sites”
• “How to drive visitors to web site”
• “What should I do to make a big impact on-line and off-line without spending a fortune?”
• “How to get more clients”

All of these questions, in one form or another, are asking about finding more people who are interested in what is on offer. It doesn’t matter if your business is conducted on or off line; the challenge is the same - finding customers in the most effective and economical way possible.

And very often the way you can do that works well for both on and off line activities.

In his new report Ed concentrates specifically on finding new visitors, contacts, for websites. Effectively increasing the number of people you can market to. Many of his principles can be used in the off-line world as well.

In ‘Who Else Wants More Traffic Than Their Site Can Handle’ Ed goes through a 6-part strategy starting with an old favourite of mine. One that has proven to be very successful - for both Ed, me and many other business people.

I strongly advise you to pop over and grab your copy of the report - it doesn’t cost you a penny. You just have to agree to Ed giving you loads more valuable info when he makes it available.

Seems like a bargain to me! Go to http://www.NoBSTrafficTactics.com

~ Carol Bentley

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I don’t normally get involved in ‘political discussions’ but sometimes a decision seems too outrageous for words! And I think that is the case where the Red Arrows are concerned. [Info update… see the comments added below this post]

I received an email from a business colleague about the decision the Department of Culture, Media and Sport have made regarding the appearance of the Red Arrows at the 2012 London Olympics. Here’s the email. If you feel as strongly as I do then follow the link to the petition and add your voice.

The world-famous Red Arrows have been banned from appearing at the 2012 London Olympics because they are deemed ‘too British’.

Organisers of the event say that the Arrows military background might be ‘offensive’ to other countries taking part in the Games. The display team have performed at more than 4000 events worldwide, but the Department of Culture, Media and Sport have deemed the display team ‘too militaristically British.’ Red Arrows pilots were said to be ‘outraged’, as they had hoped to put on a truly world class display for the Games, something which had never been seen before. Being axed from a British-based event for being ‘too British’ is an insult - the Arrows are a symbol of Britain.

The Red Arrows have been excellent ambassadors for British overseas trade, as they display their British-built Hawk aircraft all over the world.

The Arrows performed a short flypast in 2005 when the winning bid was announced, but their flypast at the Games was to have been truly spectacular.

It is to be hoped that common sense prevails.

If you disagree with this decision, sign the petition on the link http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/RedArrows2012/?ref=redArrows2012

And tell me what you think… click comments below

~ Carol Bentley

When I asked “What’s your most burning question you’d like answered on this blog” in my recent survey there were quite a few people who asked about marketing their websites. From making the website visible, so people could find it - to attracting visitors - to marketing the website on a budget.

And as I pondered the best way to answer these questions - which were very much on the same topic - I remembered I had done something similar quite recently for a new, private client who was not familiar with web marketing.

I created a mindmap showing a web marketing strategy and wrote a brief overview of the different aspects of the strategy. And, because my client is rather busy, I recorded an audio of the report as well.

“Ideal for you guys” I thought. So I’m gifting the 3 files to you; the mindmap - in a PDF file so you can open it regardless of whether or not you use mindmapping software; the audio (MP3) and the transcript (PDF report).

Now - let me just point out one thing. Web marketing, as a subject, is vast. And I do not profess to be an expert in all the different ways you can do it. I’m sticking to my chosen area of expertise - the copywriting aspect - thanks very much.

However, I do have a broad understanding of how things fit together, purely because I need to know it for my own marketing activities. And that’s the approach you’ll see in this overview. I hope it helps.

Obviously I need to edit the audio (and report) to take out anything that is personal to my client but the information it contains points you in the general direction of what you need to consider. So it will be ready for you either tomorrow or Wednesday (16th April).

Subscriber Only Gift

Oh, and it is going to be on a password protected post. You will get the password to open the post in your announcement email. Sorry, if you are not subscribed you won’t get this. This is a ’subscriber only benefits’ post.

Of course if you subscribe before the announcement post then you will get the password too. Simply use the subscription box in the right panel or the one that appeared in the pop-over.

~ Carol Bentley

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There’s been a few problems behind the scenes with the blog over the last few weeks, which hopefully can be sorted quite quickly. So this is just a courtesy post to let you know that the site is scheduled for maintenance tomorrow (Sunday 13th) and may not be available if you visit.

If you are subscribed, I’ll drop you a line to let you know when it is ‘open for reading’ again. If you are not subscribed then may I invite you to do so so you always know when a new post is made and, of course, you get the two free reports described in the previous post.

Otherwise (fingers crossed) all should be OK by Monday - thanks for your understanding.

~ Carol Bentley

If you are already subscribed to this blog you got an extra email today with information on how to get your subscriber gifts - check your Inbox or filtered email folder if you haven’t seen it.

And if you are not a subscriber yet you can get these gifts too, as I’ll explain in a moment.

Why am I giving these gifts?

Well, all is revealed in my original post on 1st April - ‘I had a Doh! moment’. You see, I decided to add to the value of this blog by giving these gifts to anyone who decided to keep up to date with my posts by subscribing for the email notices.

And I do try to be fair-minded, so I didn’t want people who are already subscribed to miss out. Hence the email that was sent separately.

Subscriber Gifts

So what do you get as a subscriber?

Two Great Reports

Report 1:

Profit Mastery Series - Marketing: Paul Stewart Interviews Carol Bentley

In this 16-page transcript of the interview I had with Paul you read about:

• Why targeting your market is crucial
• How marketing can give a return on investment
• Making your customer your best friend
• Breaking the £1m turnover barrier (or whatever level you are currently facing)
• Three copywriting mistakes you should avoid like the plague
• Using AIDA-A in your sales letter

And

Report 2:

How to Banish, Forever, The Hair-Tearing Frustrations of Microsoft® Word® When Writing Your Sales Letters!
31 tips make your writing a lot less stressful!

These quick tips get rid of the irritation you feel when Word suddenly ‘does its own thing’ - you can make it behave as you want. And they save you a great deal of time. Tips apply to all versions of MS Word since version 2002.

Claim Your Gifts Now

If you are a subscriber - check your email notices.

If you are not yet a subscriber simply pop your name and email address in the boxes in the panel on the right and click the Tell Me! button or you can use the pop-up invitation if you prefer.

BTW - once you are subscribed you won’t get the pop-up box appearing ever again. That’s good news isn’t it?

~ Carol Bentley

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How do you get your creative juices to flow when you need to get that sales letter written?

When you are immersed in the day-to-day flow of your business it can be difficult to pull yourself away enough to allow those innovative, compelling words to materialise.

And sometimes we need to get back the imagination and free thinking of our childhood - see things through fresh eyes, with a new, vibrant perspective.

But how?

In my sales letter writing workshops I aim to get that free feeling in the delegates, before they even put pen to paper. Sure, I go through the ’science’ behind writing an effective sales letter (or advert)…

• craft eye-catching headlines
• structure the letter to follow my skeleton outline
• write a personal letter to your prospect
• paint the picture of what the reader gets - benefits - in a language that resonates with him

All of this is important. But facing a blank page or empty computer screen is a real dampener for many.

So I start off by giving everyone a small bottle of champagne.

What?!

Encourage people to drink - like a writing equivalent of dutch courage?

Absolutely Not!!

The bottle is champagne bubbles - the type you see at weddings.

Having fun - for some going back to the childhood pleasure of blowing bubbles - lightens your mood.

It generates laughter; lessens the sometimes sombre and serious mood of business. And thoughts and ideas start to percolate through.

And, happily, for many it does make writing easier, because writing about your passion; your business is fun! Isn’t it?

Give it a go - what have you got to lose? You might surprise yourself with a flow of creative writing that ‘hits the mark’.

~ Carol Bentley

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I read other blogs - but you already knew that. And some of them give me food for thought. But the posting I’ve just read made me go “doh!” slap my head and go a little pink with embarrassment.

Why? Because it reminded me of a fundamental method of encouraging people to take note of what you are doing.

You can read the post here (and my comment in reply): 5 Powerful Ways… It was the blue boxed paragraph in tip number 1 that made me exclaim.

As a result I’ll be changing my blog subscriber sequence to offer a gift, which hopefully, will encourage new visitors to subscribe.

A Gift for You…

If you’re already subscribed then I’ll make sure you get the gift as well.

I’ll send a link for it by email and put an announcement in a post on here so you can keep a look out for it. I’m not sure when I’ll do this because I want to check through all my material to find something useful for you. And this week is manic (it doesn’t help that my PA is on holiday too) so I may not get time to do it before next week.

But I won’t forget! Promise!

~ Carol Bentley

P.S. And NO! This is not an April’s Fool prank! (I’ve just noticed the date).