Part 1 - Creating
an Effective Advert
Obviously, for your business to
succeed you MUST advertise it, for if you don't no one will know it
is there, and thus cannot employ your services and/or purchase your
products.
Now the key to advertising is doing it effectively to maximize your
results. So, how do we do that? We must start with what
exactly to advertise about your business.
What exactly should your
advert say to get those visitors coming to your site?
Look at your product or service. What NEED does it fill or
what WANT does it supply? If it does neither - you need to
offer another product or service. If it does one or the
other - that is exactly what your advert should say.
What's the best way to lay out your
advert? Start with portraying a need or want with which the
reader can identify - then state how you can fulfill it.
Now all the advert needs is a
summary. What is the best way to summarize your
advert? With a bang! How is your product and/or
service better than your competition - state that!
Then finally your advert should
direct the reader exactly where to go, so they can buy from you.
Let's use a fake product for
example. Let's say I sell cat food bowls. (I have some happy
Cats over here with my hypothetical product!)
>^..^<
Now, let's pretend the cat food
bowls I sell have cute whimsical cat pictures on them, and they
are ceramic to make them heavy, so kitty doesn't slide them across
the floor, and they are dishwasher safe, thrilling all cat and dishwasher owners. My competition doesn't offer the
whimsical pictures.
I'll start my advert portraying a
need or want - you can do it with either a question or a
statement. I'll do it with a question.
Hey Cat Owners! Are your cats
bored with their food bowls?
Bring your cats to the computer and let them choose from our
many cat food bowls featuring whimsical cats at their funniest!
Go here: www.whimsicalcatbowls.com
The body of the advert shows I
supply the need or want of cat food bowls, and it summarizes,
showing how my cat food bowls are better than the competition by
offering something a little better than ordinary cat food
bowls. Then the advert ends showing them directly where they
can go to find my site to purchase.
Notice the advert is only 4 lines
long. Your advert should NOT be longer than 5 lines.
The shorter your advert is the less is being said - which is
exactly what you want. And here is the
big PLUS - (a secret many do not know) - the shorter your advert
is - the more likely it will get read!!
You simply want to state a need or want, in which a visitor would be
interested, then state how YOU fulfill it, and how you fulfill
it BETTER than your competition, then show how the visitor can get
to your site to purchase from you.
THERE IS NOTHING else
your advert should say. SAVE the book for your actual
website. The advert is to get the readers attention - hey,
do you need or want this? Great, you can buy it from me, and
you want to buy it from me, because I offer it better this way.
Now come to my website to get it.
Notice, I didn't say anything about
the bowls being dishwasher safe, which is a BIG plus. Nor,
did I point out that they are heavy, so they won't slide across
the floor, when kitty eats. Every cat owner knows how
frustrating that can be, so that's a BIG plus too. I saved
those for the website. You want the website to show how your
product is even BETTER than it was portrayed in the advert.
This aids in closing the sell. I offered you this to come
here, but look - since you came you get even MORE.
When a reader clicks on your advert, then you know they are
interested in what you have to offer. Let the website then
do the selling. The purpose of the advert is to GAIN the
prospect to come to your site - NOT SELL YOUR ITEMS. This is
extremely important, so I'm going to say that again. The
purpose of the advert is to GAIN the prospect TO COME TO YOUR SITE
- NOT sell your items. That is
the purpose of your website - to sell your items.
This is the biggest mistake
advertisers make, (and I made it too, when I first got started),
is thinking they MUST sell their product from their advert.
Nope - that's the website's job! So, remember this - the
advert is to get the prospect to go to your site. Then your
site's job is to sell your product! Now, how do we set up the
website to do that selling? Go here: Set
Up Your Website to Sell
Now, that we have a great advert, does that mean,
you will get
100% clicks? No!! 99%? Absolutely not!
50%? Nope. 20%? No again. 10%?
Sorry. The average clicks are about 1% - sorry - hate to
burst your bubble! But it's true. Let's look at my
product. I'm selling cat food bowls here. So, we
automatically lose two prospects - people who do NOT have cats,
and people who do NOT have friends or families who have
cats. There's a huge cut in prospects clicking on my ad.
Now, who else do we lose?
People who have cats, and already have cat food bowls, and have
ZERO interest in buying a new one, whimsical or not - they just
don't care. So, who does that leave as prospects? Cat
owners who are interested in cat stuff, as well as their cats,
(that means they like items that show they like cats), and friends
and families of such cat owners. Wow - we lost a lot of
prospects - but there are many people out there that wear those
shoes, just there are many MORE out there that don't.
But - here's the thing. If
John Doe has a dog - and doesn't have any cats, has no intentions
of EVER getting a cat, has no friends or family members who have
cats - do you really WANT him to click on your advert and go to
your site? He's not going to buy anything. His visit
is a waste. So your advert is set up to target a particular
audience - and this audience has a beautiful name - a BUYING
AUDIENCE. Why have someone come to your site, if they're not
interested in what you have to offer?
So, that's why you set up your advert to sell to those who would
buy. That's who you DO want to click on your ad!
It's amazing to see how especially
new advertisers grow so upset, because they're not getting 1000's
of clicks! You don't want 1000's of clicks. If 999 dog
people click on my cat food bowls site and don't buy, or 2 cat
people click on my site and 1 buys - which of the two groups do I
want to click on my site? Obviously the group of only two
people. So, stop freaking about clicks, and keep targeting your adverts
to weed out non-interested visitors, and instead keep pulling
prospective BUYERS to click!! This is what leads to TRUE success.
Coming soon - do come back!
Part 2 - How to
Advertise Effectively that Effective Advert
To effectively advertise your awesome
advert that sends customers to your website you need to know where
to advertise, and how often to advertise.
Online, where is the
most effective place to advertise? Is it the
classifieds? Nope! Why? Because unlike your local
newspaper, that may list several hundred classifieds, the internet
opens the door to around the entire world, where millions upon
millions advertise, and your advert gets lost in a sea of ads!
Also, a newspaper can be kept, and one can return to your ad.
Online, there are so many ads, that your ad gets pushed down by
thousands of new ones, and if your ad isn't on top, and instead is
in the 540th position on page 13 - your ad is NOT going to be seen.
Offline, what is the most effective medium of advertising?
Television. Why? Your attention is captured for an hour,
a half hour, or a couple of hours, as you watch your favorite
television show, or a good movie. Next to that, what is the
next best medium? Magazines. Why magazines? Again
- your attention is captured because you are reading a magazine that
interests you.
So, since we don't have television
online - we go to #2 - magazines, or as online magazines are called
- ezines! Did you see that one coming? 
And it's for the same reason - people
aren't reading the classifieds online - they'd be there all day for
one thing, but they are reading ezines.
Okay that answers where
the most effective place to advertise online. Now, where
is the most effective place to advertise in the ezine?
Obviously the top ad or premiere ad,
which is the first ad, is the best position in the ezine, for it's
definitely going to be seen! If a publisher offers a contest
with your top ad, that's even better, for they are getting readers
to either read your ad or go to your website to answer a contest
question based on your ad or website. I offer those myself, as
you can see here: Premiere Ads
Now, there's another effective ad, if
ran wisely by the publisher, which is called the Solo Ad.
Which is a longer ad, that is only your ad, that is ran separately
from the ezine, and separately from all other ads. In other
words, here you're the star of the show!
But what is this running the ad
wisely? How is that done? Well, you don't want to run
your ad with a publisher that runs ten solo ads a day. Chances
are, those subscribers are sick to death of seeing solo ads, and are
just deleting them when they arrive in their inboxes. The best
way to have solo ads run are no more than one a day, three at the
maximum. And again, it's even better, well far better, if the
publisher sports a contest from your ad or your site, so that your
ad gets read, or your site gets visited. I offer those too,
and I average about three to four solo ads a week, no more than one
per day, as you can see here: Solo Ads
Now, that we've covered the two best
places in the ezine to run your ad, now how often
should we run the ad?
Answer - often! Why?
Obviously to get known! Have you heard of Verizon Wireless -
chances are, if you watch television, you most definitely
have. In fact, you can probably quote what the character says,
"Can you hear me now? Good!" And why do you
know it that well? Because they advertise and advertise OFTEN!
This is called Repetitive
Advertising and it is a MUST for success!
Now, let's go back to where and how
often one should advertise. Should one advertise in only one
ezine often? No way! You should advertise in multiple
ezines, and often! Why? Picture Verizon Wireless only
advertising on one station. Suppose you don't watch that one
station. What's happening here? They're not reaching you as an
audience with their advertisement. You don't want to miss potential
customers either, by locking into advertising in only one
ezine.
I even offer a way you can advertise in 12 ezines, and
you don't have to subscribe as you can see here: Elite
Renew for Two $ - and you can join as a monthly member, if you
desire, to get that all important Repetitive
Advertising, which keeps you advertising
often in multiple ezines.
The best Repetitive
Advertising you can do is daily! I will be offering
that through my game site PawPrint
Pets that is currently under construction. To advertise daily there for under a dollar a day,
some as low as $0.25 per day you will be able to here Advertise
with PawPrint Pets, again once the site is finished.
Here's a free place where you can
search through many ezines, that you may would like to employ for
your advertising needs:
Ezineville Members
Now, we have thus far, only discussed
paid advertising. What about free advertising? Is
it effective, is there a place for it? Yes, it's especially
effective to get that *often* advertising done! Especially if
you're just starting out, and funds are tight - do that free
advertising, often and in many ezines. Are the free ads as
effective as the paid ads? No, but they sure are much more
effective than not advertising at all, and it's good way to
combine with paid advertising to save you some funds, while still
doing multiple, repetitive advertising, and again, is a great way to
get started, should you have no funds!
Back to classified advertising online
- should you absolutely not do it at all? I just ruled it out
as not being the most effective place to advertise online. It
is another place to advertise, as many still place classified ads by
hand online, and they may see your ad when posting theirs. It
will be time consuming, as you will need to keep reposting, as your
ad will keep dropping to the bottom, as new advertisers come in and
post their ads. Ezines are the most effective place to
advertise, and thus are better than online classified ads.
To your success to Advertise
Effectively - God Bless!
In His Joy,
Seqkat
