Skip to content

www.jonsblog.com

Work at Home – Home Based Business Opportunity Guide "The REAL Approach to Work from Home Business Opportunities"

Archive

Archive for January, 2010

1. Thoroughly understand how each of the keyword matching options function and how to use negative keywords. Most people don’t use negative keywords nor content matching, and both are easy to setup and can make a huge difference in improving your CTR.

2. Split Test Ads. Develop various headlines and descriptions and split test them by always running two ads against each other. Google splits the traffic between the two ads. You can see which ad has a better CTR and keep that one. Edit the ad with the lower CTR by trying a new headline, different ad copy, or a variation of both. Constantly trying to improve on your best performing ad will lead to incremental and consistent improvement in your CTR.

Here’s how you do this: In the Campaign Manager, in the Ad Group, above each ad there is a link, “Create New Ad”.

Click on it and create a second Ad for each campaign. Make it different than your first Ad. Use the same keywords in your Ad as you have in your keyword list. Try using different verbs. One tiny change in one word or even capitalization can vastly increase your CTR. By improving your CTR, your cost per click will decrease, and the reduced cost per click will lead to a higher ROI.

3. Wean out the poor performing keywords. After your campaign has received 25 or 30 clicks, look at its keywords. You will want to wean out the poor performers and put them in their own new campaign.
Write two new Ads so they’ll rotate against each other and again keep the Ad with the higher CTR and replace the other with a new ad. You want all of your best performing keywords in their own campaign.

4. Changing the capitalization on some of the words in your ad can improve the CTR. Try capitalizing the first letter of every word in your ad, including the first letter of the URL. Play with capitalization as it really does make a difference in your CTR.

5. If you have the word ‘free’ in your ad, try it without it. Instead you might want to set the word ‘free’ as a negative keyword.

To set a negative keyword, you simply add it to your keyword list with a negative sign in front of it. For example, if you are promoting web hosting. You might have these keywords in your keyword list:

webhosting
hosting
web hosting
-free

Notice in the list above there is the negative keyword “-free”. That means that your ad will not display if someone searches on “free” and one of the other keywords. So for example if someone searches for “free webhosting”, your ad would not be displayed.

6. Use regional targeting if it is appropriate. One of my campaigns promote a refinance lead program. I’ll not only have Adwords ads with states or city names in the title and or ad copy, but I’ll also use Google’s regional targeting system to target specific ads to appear only in a certain region.

7. Don’t use irrelevant offers. Not only does Google disable your ad if they catch the false enticement, but they just don’t work. They might get you some clicks but they won’t convert to sales. Because once the person has clicked through and they see that it is a false advertisement, they’ll leave.

8. This is actually a tip that will increase your conversion rate, which means more sales:

Offer people exactly what they’re looking for as soon as they arrive. Choose the best page for them to land on and setup your affiliate link so that it takes them to that page (See pg. 55 for an explanation of how to do this). Don’t send them to the home page where they have to navigate around. They won’t.

For example, if you are promoting a pay per lead program, you want to send them to the page that describes the program and has the form to sign up, or a page with the description and a prominent visible link to the form to signup.

You don’t want to send them to the home page of the website and then make them wade through the site looking for that program and signup form. They won’t. They’ll just hit the back button and search again.

For example, say you are promoting a pay per lead program for cell phone service. You find a merchant like letstalk.com that pays you $20 a signup. They offer a free cell phone with cell phone service.

So you put up an Adwords ad with a headline like: Free Cell Phone, or Free Nokia Phone.
For this example, when someone clicks through your ads, you want them to land at the page that explains that they get a free cell phone when they signup. And there should be a link to signup, or the signup form itself.

Don’t just send them to the letstalk home page where they would have to navigate around the site looking for the promotion.

Also, you don’t want to send traffic to a website that doesn’t convert. Spend a little time on the merchant’s site you are going to promote, and pretend that you just clicked through your Adwords ad. When you see the webpage that you land on, what are you thinking? What is your first impression? Is it what you were looking for? If you were really interested in that, would you be enticed to buy or signup?

We’re going to discuss a concept known as “Bottom Feeding”.

Don’t let the negative connotation associated with the term “bottom feeding” sway you from trying out this method. It’s a time proven method that anyone can do in order to bring in a couple of hundred extra dollars a day. It takes a little bit of work to set up and get running but once you have it running you can basically leave it on Auto Pilot.

There are several niches that exist that are well searched and have a high profit margin for successful advertisers. Because these niches are well searched and have a high profit margin, the CPC prices for keywords in these niches are sometimes relatively high if you want to be in the top 10-20 ad placements. Since these niches are so well searched you can still get clicks even if you bid low on the CPC. You won’t get as much traffic to your ad but your click through rate should be as good as the top advertisers who might be paying as much as a dollar or two per click.

The advertisers who are paying top dollar for their CPC are relying on high volume sales in order to justify their top dollar expenditure. If you can get away with paying as little as $0.25 or $0.10 for you CPC and you sell only a few items (due to the low amount of traffic you receive for bidding so low) it will still be a very successful campaign sometimes getting a return on investment up to 500%.
Step by Step instructions for setting up a profitable “Bottom Feeding” Campaign:

Step 1. Find a Niche

Find a niche that is well searched and has a high profit margin for actualized sales. I find the easiest way to do this is to go to an affiliate service provider that sells information products or digital product (both products usually have high profit margins built into them) such as Clickbank.com or Paydotcom.com. Browse the different Categories and products for sale in the categories. Look for products that are selling well and have a high pay out.

Most of the top selling products are in niches that have high searched keywords on Google so we can assume that they would be good candidates for our “Bottom Feeding” approach. While looking through Clickbank, when picking a niche, make sure that there are several different products available to promote, so you can test and see what products sell the best. I suggest picking a niche that has at least two products to promote. I notice that weight loss is a hot selling item and that there are several products available to promote in this niche.

Step 2: Create a short keyword list

In order to see if our niche is a well searched keyword niche on Google we want to create a short keyword list. In order to do this lets go to Yahoo Search’s Keyword Selector Tool:

http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion

and type in a keyword related to our product. For this example I’m going to simply put “lose weight” in the tool and see what it spits out.

The term “lose weight” was searched 295,479 times last month. Wow, “lose weight” is well searched. We are looking for niches that have keyword searches above 20,000 jointly for the top keywords in the niche. The search phrase “lose weight” definitely falls into a heavily searched niche. If we take the most related keywords and add the searches together we are going to come up with the following data related to “lose weight”.

Keyword Searches

Lose weight 295479
How to Lose Weight 42235
Lose Weight Fast 3419

Once again, we can see that the “lose weight” niche is a very well searched keyword niche.

Step 3: Check Yahoo Search’s Max Bid Tool

Now let’s see how competitive the market is for our keywords. In order to do this, go to Yahoo Search View Max Bid Tool:

http://uv.bidtool.overture.com/d/USm/search/tools/bidtool

The top 8 advertisers are paying anywhere between $1.00 and a $1.27 per click for the “weight loss” keyword. This let’s us know that there is a lot of competition for our keywords. For the “Bottom Feeding” method this is great sign that we have found a good niche.

Step 4: Use Google Ad Words Traffic Estimator

Now that we have found a well searched niche, and we know the competition is stiff for the top advertisers, let’s see if we can “Bottom Feed” off this niche. We can use the Traffic Estimator found in Google Adwords to see if we have found a good niche. We are hoping that we can generate somewhere between 50 to 400 clicks a day by bidding low.

Let’s see what happens when we put in our three keywords into the traffic estimator. I usually put the keyword, phrase match and exact match into the estimator. For this example I would put the following into the keyword estimator to get a good idea of how many clicks a day I would get for my keywords.

how to lose weight
lose weight
lose weight fast
“how to lose weight”
“lose weight”
“lose weight fast”
[how to lose weight]
[lose weight]
[lose weight fast]

When I run the Traffic Estimator at $0.10 CPC, Google estimates that I will receive somewhere between 47-71 clicks per day. From experience, I know that the traffic estimator is usually very conservative with its estimations. To start with, I haven’t built a full keyword list; I only used three keywords to test the market. Once I build a full keyword list, my clicks per day will be much higher than what the estimator predicted. Another thing to remember is that my CTR is usually higher than the average advertiser on Google, so I’ll receive more clicks than what Google predicts with its estimator. I estimate that I will receive at least 300 clicks a day for this campaign.

Step 5: Pick a Product

I don’t want to pick just one product to promote but at least two for testing purposes. When I look on Clickbank I see that there are several weight loss programs to choose from.

Look for products that pay out the most in commission and have a high $earned/sale so that you can make a good profit for each item sold. I try to at least make $20.00 per sale.

When looking over products to promote look at the usual statistics to see if it is a good product such as % refd (percent referred) and grav (gravity). If a product has a high referred statistic as well as a relatively high gravity, it will probably be a good product to promote.

Next look over the different sales pages and pick products that have good sales pages. You want to make sure the sales page will do a good job at selling the people you bring through your ad campaigns. You can also look to see if any of the sales pages have an affiliate link. Sometimes the affiliate pages will list statistics of how well the sales pages convert. I find that the numbers are usually a little exaggerated but they might give you a general ball park figure.

You want to pick out 3 different products so you can test them against each other to see which ones have the best conversion rates. It’s hard to know what pages convert the best unless you actually test it yourself.

One other thing I do when I pick out products is I do a search in Google to see if anyone else is promoting the product with Pay Per Click advertising. So for this example I type “lose weight” into Google and I click on the more sponsored links tab found below the Adwords ads to get a list of all the products that are being promoted through Adwords.

When you click on “More Sponsored Links” Google will take you to a page that lists all of the ads running for a particular keyword. For a search term like “lose weight” there will be several pages of listed advertisements.

If you find that someone is already advertising the product via adwords then look for another product. Google only allows one ad per URL per search term, and since we don’t want to compete with high bid prices, stick to products that aren’t being advertised via Adwords. This will usually cut out some of the best products but that’s ok since we are “Bottom Feeding”. Note: If a product is being advertised via Adwords make sure to look at the ad copy so you can get ideas for your ad.

Step 6: Create Ad Campaigns

When you create an ad campaign for this method, make sure to add a lot of keywords to your list. Also make sure to ad several Ad Groups so you can keep your keywords very tight and relevant to your specific ads. In order for the “Bottom Feeding” method to bring in a couple of hundred dollars a day you will need to find several niches and set up several campaigns and Ad Groups. In order to save time and work efficiently I suggest using the “Ditto” method (taught in the Writing Ads section) to create the headline and ad body.

Make sure to enter in a low bid price for your keywords with the expectation that you will be able to lower you bid price even further due to a high quality score and CTR.

Step 7: Test Different Products

Once you have your Campaigns and Ad Groups set up send anywhere between 300 to 500 visitors to each of the products one at a time. After you have done that you will know which product is the best selling. If the niche is good you can sometimes sell three or four products at the same time.

Conclusion for “Bottom Feeding” Method.

Most of your ads should cost you very little per day, maybe $5.00 to $20.00 dollars and should render you a return from anywhere between $25.00 to $40.00 dollars a day. Your goal should be to clear at least $20.00 a day from a particular niche. No one retires on $20.00 dollars a day, but if you have several niches that you work with you can bring in hundreds of dollars a day. Like I said in the beginning, the nice thing about doing the “Bottom Feeding” method is that once it’s set up, you don’t need to check on it very often. Once or twice a week is probably all that you will have to focus on the campaigns. If you are willing to put in the time up front researching and finding the right niches you could very easily, after a few months of testing, have several “Bottom Feeding” niches that collectively bring in a couple of hundred dollars a day in profits!

Click Here to learn about the Google Cash Detective!

The following is a list of steps on maximizing an AdWords campaign. It was taken from Google Cash 3 by Chris Carpenter.

1.Read and Learn Google’s Optimization Tips.

https://adwords.google.com/select/tips.html

2.Google AdWords provides matching options for search terms, allowing you to refine your ad targeting, and reducing your cost-per-click (CPC).
Click Here to view Google’s new multimedia online tutorial of keyword matching options.

3.Until you gain more experience, be careful paying more than 5 cents per click. Refine and narrow your phrases until you get a low rate. At only 5 cents per click, for many keywords your CTR will be too low. I often start off bidding more than I would like to, to get my ad in the top results. Then as clicks start coming in and when I have a CTR greater than 1%, I work on refining my Ad. Then I lower my CPC and hopefully hold my position because of my good CTR.

4.In the beginning, set your bids low. As you gain experience and learn to determine what your maximum bid rate should be – then you should raise your bids to generate more traffic.

5.To start, enter a low daily budget, like $5. This is a great way to test the waters without losing your shirt.

6.Once you have setup a test campaign or two and you have tested the waters, you will want to increase your daily budget limit. A common mistake is keeping the daily budget limit too low after initial testing.

You should set your daily budget limit high. In my experience, you only end up paying a fraction of your daily budget.

If you set your daily budget limit too low, your campaign will be shut down once you reach your limit, and your ads won’t be displayed. You want your ad to be displayed every time someone searches for that keyword.

If you’re bidding on expensive keywords, keep a close eye on your campaign as you could spend a lot of money very quickly.

As you’re starting out, avoid bidding on expensive keywords. As you gain experience you might want to bid on some more expensive keywords. You’ll just want to keep a close eye on your campaigns and affiliate stats and make sure you are earning more than you are spending.

Here’s how to figure out how much you can spend per click and still break even.

First, figure out your conversion rate. Conversion rate = total # of sales divided by total # of clicks.

For example, if you made 20 sales or sign ups from 1000 clicks, your conversion rate would equal 1/50, which means 1 sale for every 50 clicks.

Now multiply your product or signups commission by the conversion rate and that will give you your break even Cost Per Click.

So let’s say for example that your commission is $25 per sale or signup.

That’s 25 times 1/50 which = $0.50

That means that you can afford to pay 50 cents per click and still break even. If you spend more than 50 cents per click you’ll lose money. And if you spend less than 50 cents per click, you’ll earn profits.

7.Put your keyword list together first, then draft your ad.

8.Target key phrases, don’t use generic terms.

9.Use keyword(s) in the title and body of your ad to increase CTR.

10. Test two ads at the same time. Google AdWords allows you to run two different ads with your keywords which will enable you to compare ad performances. Keep the ad with the higher CTR and replace the other ad with a new one.

11. Test and adjust the Ad copy as you go. Constantly tweak your ad copy to try to improve the CTR.

12. To achieve a higher CTR, use exact keyword matching by putting your keyword/s in square brackets:

[buy vitamins]
[vitamins]

Your ad will not appear for queries that include other keywords. For the example above, the ad would not appear for free vitamins or discount vitamins. It would only appear for the keywords: buy vitamins, and vitamins.

13. Be sure to create negative keywords for the terms that do not pertain to your promotion. This gives you more control over who sees your ads so that you don’t suffer an unnecessarily low CTR because your ads are showing for irrelevant searches. Further, you won’t risk paying for clicks that are unlikely to produce well-targeted results.

If your keywords are negative-matched, your ad won’t show if the user’s search includes that word. Add the negative character (-) in front of the keyword you’d like to exclude. For example, if your keyword is satellite dish and your negative keyword is -free, your ad will not show when a user searches on free satellite dish.

14. Always include both singular and plural versions of keywords.

15. Add more keywords and more groups of keywords as you think of them.

16. Create a separate Ad Group and ads for your misspellings list, another one for your abbreviated keyword phrases, and so on. Organizing closely related keywords into their own Ad Groups improves keyword relevance and click through rates. This practice makes your campaigns easier to manage.

17. Make sure your Affiliate ID is in your affiliate link. Double check your Affiliate URL link to test its accuracy. After creating your Adwords ad, test it to make sure you end up at the desired page.

18. After your campaign has been running for a couple of weeks, try rewriting ads with low CTR’s.

19. Keep in mind that you can stop your AdWords from running at any time by clicking on the “Pause Ad Group” link.

20. Ramp up your efforts during the Holiday Season. From November 1st to Feb 1st you will see a dramatic increase in clicks and better conversion rates. In other words, more people buy during that time. Try to have as many AdWords running as possible during those very lucrative months.

21. Popups: Google will disapprove AdWords that go to sites with pop-ups on the landing page. At first look, this seems like a big problem.

Imagine that you want to promote a website, but they have a pop-up on their home page. You know that as a result your AdWords ad eventually will be disapproved.

Whenever I find this, I get a little excited because it is a big deterrent for many people. When people see that, they move on and look for another website to promote. If I find such a site, and think that it will convert well and offer a profitable campaign, I sign up for their affiliate program.

Often, I can find a link or create a link to one of their pages that does not have a pop-up. If I can’t create such a link, I just send them an email and ask them for a link to their website (with my affiliate ID in it of course) that goes to their page without a pop-up. It is in their best interest to provide me this link, because I am sending them targeted traffic.

So look at this as an opportunity, there will be much less competition!

22. An Important Note for International Users

If you are in a country outside of the US and you do a search on www.Google.com you will not see the Google AdWords that are targeted only for the US.

For example, I live in Mexico part of the year. When in Mexico, if I search on Google.com for the keyword: mortgage – there are only two AdWords. That is because I am seeing AdWords that are either targeted for Mexico or for All Countries. In order to see the AdWords that are only targeted for the US, I visit:

http://www.proxify.com

Then in the field at the top of the website I enter:

www.google.com

Then I do my search and I see the US AdWords.

Another thing you can do is to setup your internet connection to go through a proxy server.

Visit:

http://www.proxy4free.com/index.html

Here you will find a list of proxy servers in different countries.
Choose one for the US.

In your Internet Explorer, click on Tools, Internet Options, Connections,
then if you have a dialup connection click on Settings next to it.

Otherwise if you have a broadband connection click on the LAN Settings.

Then enter the proxy server IP address (number) you got from the website above.

Then the next time you open Internet Explorer it will go through that proxy server in the US and Google will think you are in the US and will show you the US adwords.

When setting up your Google AdWords campaign, Google requires that you first write the ad, and then choose your keywords and phrases. However, there is a better way. I recommend that you first select your keywords and phrases and then write your ads. This allows you to write your ads in accord with the keywords you choose.

I always research keywords first, then I write the ad and setup my Google AdWords Campaign. If you find yourself setting up your AdWords Campaign before you have had time to write ads or do keyword research, then just create a bogus ad, and pause your Ad Group, so you can move on to the next step. Return later to revise your ad.

In the keyword research step you grouped keywords into relevant groups. You’ll want to write ads for each of these groups of keywords. Then when you bid on keywords, you will specifically use those keywords in the ad copy so that your ads correspond to the keywords in their respective Ad Group. Match your ad copy as closely as possible to the keywords in each family of keywords that are contained in individual Ad Groups. This will give your ads a higher relevancy score which will result in a lower cost per click.

Google has some basic AdWords guidelines to consider while writing your ad. Your headline must be less than 25 characters (including spaces). You are given an additional 2 lines for text. Each line is limited to 35 characters (again including spaces).

As you can see, you have a fairly limited space in which to entice your customers. Use it wisely!

This is not the time to sell your product. This is the time to attract your customers, spark their interests and get the clicks. Your first eye catcher will be your headline.

After your customer has clicked though your ad, the merchant site will list all the important features of their product or service. Get to know these features and ask yourself “How do these benefit the customer?” For example, if you are placing an ad for a legal documents site, their features may include:

Legal documents available for immediate download.

Lowest prices on or off the Internet.

Over 10,000 documents available from real-estate to taxes to wills.

Now examine each feature and ask yourself “How does that benefit the customer?”

Legal documents available for immediate download.

Benefits = You don’t have to leave the house. It saves you time, etc.

Lowest prices on or off the Internet.

Benefits = Saves you money

Over 10,000 documents available from real-estate to taxes to wills.

Benefits = Saves you valuable time. We will have what you need. No need to go to the government office. Just a quick download to your computer at home, etc. etc.

To pick out the most effective benefits to include in your headline you must see things as your customer would. When writing your ad, don’t just think like an affiliate, but also think like a customer. Consider what brought the customers to your ad and what benefits they can gain from your product or service.

Utilizing your keywords is one simple method to pinpoint your customer’s interests and needs. If the customer reached your ad by typing in Tiffany Lamps then Tiffany Lamps in your ad will surely catch her eye.

Begin writing your ad in sentence and/or paragraph form. State what it is your customer should know. Then reduce it and refine it.

Let’s practice with the Legal Forms example. Here are some things you want your customer to know. Remember, we will focus on benefits to the customer.

You’ll save valuable time and money. We have all of the legal documents you need in one place. We have 100,000 documents. Downloading is easy and quick. Your documents are available right now!

Now let’s reduce it. We will take out all the superfluous words we don’t need.

10,000 Legal Documents

Quick and easy downloads

Save time and money

See how easy that was?!

When you begin crafting your ads don’t worry about getting it “right” or perfect on the first try. Let the ideas flow. You can use the technique above by firing up your favorite text editor like notepad or Microsoft Word. Type out your thoughts, and let the ideas flow.

This post is an excerpt from Google Cash 3 by Chris Carpenter, and serves to provide you with a very basic understanding of how the Google Cash system works.

You write small Google AdWords Ads promoting companies, products and services.  In your AdWords Ad is a link that, when clicked, takes the user to the product or service that you are promoting.  Your Affiliate ID is passed along with it.  When the customer that clicked through your ad buys something on the site, or fills out a registration form, then you receive a commission.  If the customer did not buy at that time, no need to fret, many merchant sites place a “cookie” on the customer’s computer for a certain period (such as 180 days).  That means that, within the next 6 months, anytime the customer goes back to the site and buys or registers, you get a commission.

In the past, to be successful in Affiliate Marketing it took considerable time and money. Now, with my concepts you can start earning money immediately without having to build a website. Once you’ve found a very successful program you may want to build a quick webpage (a landing page) to get even more profits, but it’s not necessary to begin receiving commissions.

Here is how the process works:

….. 1. Find a product that you want to promote (Step #2).  For example, I found an Auto Insurance program that pays $30 per lead.

….. 2. Join the Affiliate Program and get the link with your Affiliate ID embedded in it (Step #3).

….. 3. Next, make a list of keywords that people would likely consider when searching for that product or service. (See the techniques discussed in Step #4).

….. 4. Write some effective ads for Google AdWords (More on this in Step #5).

….. 5. Log in to your Google AdWords account and submit some ads with their corresponding keywords.  Put the link with your affiliate ID in it into the destination URL field, and put a bid in for the keywords on your list at 5 cents each (Plenty more on this in Step#6).

The Auto Insurance example generates about 500 clicks (visitors) each week from the Google AdWords at a cost of $50 and generates at least 5 Auto Insurance Leads each week. 5 leads times $30 equals $150. Subtract the $50 Adwords costs and that equals $100 profit per week. That’s $400 of profit a month for something that took 25 minutes to setup. And some months are much better.

Sounds pretty easy right? Of course, each step has thousands of pointers that can make you more profits, but that is a basic overview of how the Google Cash system works. You guide customers to the product or service they want, the merchant provides the product or service, and you simply collect the commissions!



Of all the marketing techniques out there, I would consider this to be the most rewarding and time-effective. The problem, though, is that PPC is often looked upon as being a little too expensive for the average affiliate marketer. But the truth is that you can leverage PPC advertising even if you only have a few bucks to start out with. The key here is strategy.

While there are plenty of PPC providers out there today, I don’t think any of them even come close to the big 3: Google, Yahoo!, and MSN. Most people find that traffic from Google AdWords generally provides higher ROI (return on investment) than the other two. And I definitely recommend that you start out with it and then branch out to other providers once you make enough money to reinvest in your business.

Just in case you didn’t know, Google’s AdWords (http://adwords.google.com) starts off by letting you create an ad for your website, and then select keywords that you want to target. When people search for these keywords, your ads appear on the right hand side of the regular search results, in the “sponsored results” section. When someone clicks on your advertisement, you pay Google a certain amount.

The Best Bang for Your Buck

To make the most of your PPC campaigns, there are three vital things you must do:

#1: Choose the right keywords.

I consider pay-per-click advertising to be a step up from regular print advertising because it lets you choose whom you want to target. What you want to do is reach real buyers and not just window-shoppers, or info-seekers.

For this reason, you should never target big terms like “bodybuilding” or “golf” or even better focused ones like “physical training” or “golf equipment”. If you remember, we already covered keyword research in some depth in the Market Research section at the beginning; make sure you use that and generate plenty of long-tail keywords to use in your campaigns. This is where the money is at.

An example: I plugged the phrase “fishing supplies” into the Google Keyword Suggestion Tool. Look at just a few of the juicy long-tails that Google came up with:

Fly fishing supplies
Saltwater fishing tackle
Salmon fishing supplies
Fishing boat supplies
Salt water fishing supplies
Fishing rods and reels
Daiwa fishing rods
Fishing tackle UK
Collapsible fishing rods
Fishing rods for kids
Fishing supplies San Francisco
Antique fly fishing rods
Mitchell fishing gear

I’ll bet you I can build a whole website around each of these keywords! Why? Because each is a whole niche in its own right.

#2: Include campaign-negative keywords.

Google (and many other search engines) have a handy feature that help you include negative keywords in your selection. These negatives will be ones that you want to avoid displaying your ads on, and any searches that have these words in them will not display your ad.

For example, if you’re marketing a product on army fitness training, you might want to include “free” as a negative keyword. It’s obvious that anyone looking for free information isn’t likely to make a purchase and should be filtered out of your campaigns. Negative keywords are marked with a – (minus sign) before them.

#3: Write compelling ads.

The key to really being successful when it comes to pay-per-click marketing is to treat it just like you would a regular print advertisement. Remember that regardless of your advertising channel, you are looking to reach real people.

On most PPC programs, you are usually limited to about 25 characters in the title of your ad, and 35 characters in the body. This is much like a classified advertisement, only much shorter. Think as if you were paying a premium price for a classified ad in a print magazine. What would you write to make sure you have the maximum impact on your prospects?

Here are a few sample advertisements. Remember that at the end of the day, it’s always the most creative marketer that takes away the gold:

Regular, boring ad example:

Cheap Fishing Supplies
Quality fishing rods
Massive discount upto 50%

Creative, high-performance ad example:

Fish Are Smarter Than You Are
Outsmart those little
Dweebs with our supplies!

Another boring ad:

Military Training Manuals
Excellent army training
Ebooks by expert authors.

Another creative outperformer:

Army Training Will Kick Your Ass
Unless you come to us.
Then you’ll do the kicking.

I might have missed the character limit somewhere but these are the type of ads that really sell when it comes to PPC. The key: get creative.

When you starting out with pay-per-click, I highly recommend that you read the respective company’s user manuals which you’ll find on-site. They’re always very helpful and rival the best PPC guides on the market today.

Click Here to learn about the Google Cash Detective!

SEO Complete Solution

Search engine optimization or SEO is arguably the most essential way to drive targeted traffic to your website because it leads to improved search engine placement. Optimizing the benefits of a well-designed web site will result in much more traffic coming to the website thereby generating income for the company publishing the website.

With this fact in mind however, optimizing your website might cost you thousands of dollars if you are not skilled in this area. Good search engine optimization that leads to improved search engine placement will, on the other hand, bring you a much higher return on the investment of either time or money you put into it.

Listing sites to other Web Directories, Articles Sites and Press Releases not just making links to your site also send traffic from those websites. Also these links counted as votes for your site in Search Engine Ranking to display your site on top search results.

SEO Complete Solution optimizes your site and submits it to High PR Directories, Article Sites, Blog Reviews, DMOZ Listing, Link Baiting Service, Press Release, Social Bookmarking, Search Engines and other many Search Engine Optimization services.

Find out more about SEO Complete Solution

Additional Tips and Information

By now, you’ve got the basic concepts of crafting a great sales page. Take notes on these
pointers to make sure your landing page is as effective as possible.


Keep it Short

A very important practice to keep in mind when you’re creating landing pages is that your
copy should be as short and simple as possible. Following the K.I.S.S. principal of “Keep It
Short & Sweet” (or Keep It Simple, Stupid!) is key here.
Also keep your copy simple and easy to read. It is important that your visitors are able to
understand what you’re trying to say on their first reading. In most cases, you should be able
to convey one key idea effectively in just one or two lines of writing. Also, you can use
context-specific images near difficult blocks to text to convey your message, as long as they
do not distract from the content.
If you do need to include longer copy, make sure it’s organized properly. Even if you’re in a
very technical industry, and your visitors are used to pages heavy with text, they may not
actually be willing to read them. So, divide any distinct ideas you might have into separate
paragraphs and use highlighting, bolding, coloring, etc. liberally. Provide them with useful
headings, sub headings and bulleted lists. This is a great way of introducing key ideas to your
visitors.

Make your Copy Exciting

Keep your copywriting clear, and write vividly. You should be aiming to write in a light,
unassuming tone of voice. If what you have written is boring or overbearing, what you are
trying to convey will not get through to your readers as you intend it to. You want to make
your visitors excited at the opportunities the product will provide for them.

What To Do When You Simply Cannot Write a Sales Letter?

Try as we all may, sometimes it might just not be coming together properly. You want to
create a sales letter, but you just can’t find the words. You think and think and think but to no
avail. It’s a really annoying situation and can happen to anyone, anytime–even the best of us.
However, there’s a great way to get your creative juices flowing.
Ask questions
Are you really in tune with the product you’re trying to promote?
Let’s suppose you’re selling a treadmill. It isn’t enough if you’re just an affiliate; you really
need to know how it feels to use it. When can you use it? What are the limitations and side
effects? Knowing and caring about the product gives you the passion to tell the whole wide
world about it, to praise it, to love it, to flaunt it.
Next, record the reasons why it’ll help you. Will it make my life easier? Will it add value?
Will it solve a problem? Also, is it too expensive? Is it too ugly, and so on?
List everything. The good, the bad, and even the ugly. You need to find out the why people
will buy this item from you. What is so unique about the product or service?
Once you’re done, all you need to do is take a look at what you have penned down and make
a list of all the ideas you have. List them in order of priority. Then choose the most significant
idea on the list; combine that with what you think is the main motive for someone to buy the
product. Now turn that into a headline.
Let the ideas on the list pour into your landing using subheading or highlights when you need
to stress a point. Soon, your page will have almost written itself.

Final Sales Copy Checklist

Here’s a final checklist of the most important copywriting guidelines that you should always
keep in mind when writing sales copy. It helps to read it now, and maybe once you’ve
finished the sales copy, come back and check through it again to make sure your work is the
best it can be.

  • You must always target the wants, needs, and desires of your prospective clients.
  • Avoid the crowd mentality. Write to specific people. You should write to a real and living person. Write the copy as if you’re writing to one friend, not to thousands of people.
  • Research your prospective targets until you know everything about them. How do you target a specific group of people if you don’t know who you’re selling to? You must realize your market’s wants, desires, and aspirations. You must know what motivates them and what doesn’t. Once you know that, it will be far easier for you to write a killer landing page that converts visitors with ease.
  • People buy benefits and not features. You should begin by distinguishing the benefits from the features. The sales letter should be able to influence your reader to buy your stuff based on the grounds of what benefits the product/service derives and not based on its features. It is the benefit the buyers buy and not just the feature in isolation.
  • Hook your readers with the first line itself. Your sales letter should be crisp and catchy. The headline should not just make the reader read the first line but also continue with the rest of the landing page.
  • Provide the reader with specific and relevant information. Don’t go around in circles explaining the product. List specific benefits, especially in bulleted points and tell them how their life would be easier with the benefits that are being offered.
  • Write in a conversational tone. The basic aim of your sales letter is to sell. To serve that end effectively, it must be written in a conversational tone. Always talk directly to your prospect. Lose any embellishments. Nobody is grading your literary skills; just your salesmanship.
  • Appear unbiased while writing your copy. People hate to be cornered into buying by salespeople. They feel cheated even if, in actuality, they are not. Therefore, if your landing page manages to convince them that your basic intention is to help them find the perfect solution to their problem, your job is almost done.
  • Test your landing page. Try and ask yourself, if someone was writing the same letter to you, would you be convinced enough to spend your hard-earned money on it? If not, improve it until it feels right. Then put it out and test it. Constantly reapply and improve upon your results.
  • Be sure to groom your landing page. I’ve said it already: appearance matters. Use user-friendly fonts and templates that will make it visually appealing. You can use bullets and highlighters to break the clutter. Include relevant images occasionally to keep the reader interested.
  • Tell the reader precisely what to do. What do you want the reader to do next? Does he have to enter his details into a form and sign up to your list? Or does he have to place an order? Or call for more information? Schedule an appointment? Eat a hamburger? Notify him accordingly. Don’t ever presume he knows. It’s amazing how many landing pages fail to take the visitor by the hand and lead him through the sales process.
  • Use a P.S. or P.P.S. In this area, you’d want to include the three or four most important selling points from the entire copy. Almost everyone reads P.S.’s so make use of the real estate available to you.

Conclusion

By now, you’ve read a whole bunch of information. It’s probably overwhelming, and seems
like a lot to absorb by now. Hopefully you’ve been able to take some notes, or at least
remember the key points of this guide. Go back and skim through the guide again, re-reading
any sections that you don’t entirely remember.
As with all aspects of Google Cash Revolution, you can improve on even the best version of
your sales letter by referencing the information located in the “Split Testing & Analytics”
component of this system. Aspects such as the headline, P.S. boxes, benefits, and layout can
all be tested to find the best performing variation.
Details such as font size and color, product images, background colors, and so on make a big
difference as well. Those details are listed in the “Landing Page Design” component.
I can guarantee that if you follow all of the advice in this guide, and keep testing and
improving upon your copy, you will be able to achieve double-digit conversion rates in no
time flat. Best of luck in your ventures!

Making the Reader Want Your Product

Creating desire for your product will naturally happen if you properly highlight what the
product will do to better their lives, and provide substantial evidence to support your claims.
It’s important to remember that every word and every sentence in your landing page is
important. If you let your reader’s attention stray even for a moment, they will quickly lose
interest. You need to hold their attention continuously, while making your case for the
product or service you’re promoting.
One good way to do this is by starting off with an exciting story that ties directly into the
product’s benefits. If you’re doing this, I recommend that the person in the story be you, and
not a friend of yours, or someone you once helped.
For example, if you’re promoting an acne cream, think of what your target visitor’s life might
be like. She might be a teenager who never gets much attention because of her acne problem.
Maybe some of her friends constantly make fun of her, or she’s picked on constantly. It might
not be a good idea to bill yourself as a teenager, but there’s no reason you can’t be someone
who had the exact same problem three years ago and vowed to come up with a perfect
solution to it, for the benefit of everyone like herself.
In this situation, you would be allowing the reader to relate to you personally, while giving
extra attention to the problems associated with acne. You’re aiming to agitate their pain by
discussing how embarrassing acne is, how it dampens their social lives, and so on. Then you
reveal the solution to the reader (which is to use your product).
Keep in mind that as you write, you aren’t selling a product; rather a benefit or set of benefits
to the buyer. Nobody is interested in buying “face cream”, instead, they are interested in
buying what the product gives them, which is clearer skin.
When a person buys a Rolls Royce, they aren’t buying transportation or a “car”, they’re buying
the feeling the car will give them, and the prestige they get from owning it. Nobody whats to
buy tooth whitener, instead, they want to buy white teeth and the good looks they will get
from having those teeth.
We touched on this a bit before, just remember that people are buying benefits of the
product, not the features of it.
Can you imagine how well a product would sell that gives people the power to make $2,500 a
month just for a few hours of work? What about something that gives the reader the perfect
relationship that they’ve always dreamed about? If you boast benefits like this, and provide
evidence that the product you’re promoting can do this for them, you will have an incredible
number of sales.


Attracting the Attention of Skimmers

In a perfect world, every person that visits a landing page would read the entire page, start-to finish.
However, you probably know from personal experience that is rarely the case.
Most of your visitors merely skim a letter before deciding if they want to read further or place
an order. With a few techniques, you can attract the attention of skimmers, and draw their eye
to exactly the details you need them to see. When this is done properly, you’ll make sales
just from people skimming the page!
Doing so is quite easy. As people skim your page, you just need to emphasize key comments
and sentences to attract their attention. You can do this by placing subheadings (with a larger
font, different color scheme, etc.) throughout your copy to break up the text, plus emphasizing
phrases with bold lettering, bigger font, coloring, and highlighting.
However, ensure that you don’t overuse these elements. If you emphasize too much of your
copy, not only does it look unprofessional, but the emphasis is actually lost. As a rule of
thumb, one item per paragraph or every-other paragraph is a good saturation rate.
Just make sure you are emphasizing the proper elements of the page. What a skimmer might
take in from just reading the emphasized elements of a several-page-long sales letter is similar
to a bullet-point list of facts. Just in skimming the page, they can take in several benefits of
the product (including the “key benefit”), the proof, the guarantee, a testimonial or two, and
the button that shows them how to order.
This is all many people need to see before deciding to purchase! If they they decide they want
more details, there’s a lot more content for them to read.


Using Bullet Points

Bullets are amazing, because they cater to just about any type of audience that you want to
target. They provide emphasized benefits for skimmers with short attention spans, as well as
easy-to-read content for people who are taking the time to read the entire landing page..
Nearly every successful sales letter you come across will include bullets which highlight the
features and benefits of the product or service. Bullets may be simple, but they can be a very
powerful selling feature.
If you simply placed the entire list of features and benefits within regular paragraphs, only
those few who are reading every word of your page would catch them. Skimmers would
entirely glance over them, and they might not sink in for those people that do read them.
Much of the selling in your body copy happens within your bulleted lists of benefits. Often,
you may see a very successful sales page that has one, two, or more straight pages of bulleted
benefits. As odd as it may look, it can do a great job when used with a product that has a ton
of various benefits.
This is the part of the landing page where you are really able to stir desire in your prospect as
he can see what your product will do for him. The bullets are so important that you should
spend a great deal of time crafting this list of benefits. Indeed, you can consider each bullet a
mini-headline where you use your “power words” and promise a benefit in each bullet. If you
list a feature of your product, try to weave in a corresponding benefit.
If you’re creative, you can come up with a lot of benefits for almost any product. If you’re
promoting an ebook or report, one feature is that the report might be short, perhaps only 40
pages or so. The benefit is that it’s a quick and easy read for busy people – no fluff!
In addition to weaving together benefits and features in your bulleted list, you’ll also want to
arouse curiosity whenever possible. You can have a bullet that looks something like this:

  • See Page 87 to Discover Which Diet Aid Doctors Everywhere are Calling the ‘Miracle Fat Burner!’

The reason the above bullet works is because it’s specific (see page 87); it uses power words
(“discover”); it’s backed by an authority figure (doctors); it uses social proof (“doctors
everywhere”); and it arouses curiosity.
If you were looking to lose weight quickly, chances are a bullet like this would certainly
arouse your curiosity and push you to buy the report. Think about the product you’re
promoting and how you can create benefit-packed statements and bullets that create desire
and arouse curiosity.
Essentially, you should write a lot of bullets and then choose the best ones. Here are some
more tips for writing great bullet points:

  1. Each bullet point should highlight only one thing about the product.
  2. Keep the bullet points short. You do not want to do a long drawn explanation. That is the job of the rest of your text. Just keep it simple.
  3. You do not have to write perfect sentences. You can use fragments to say what you need to.

Getting Readers into a Buying Mood

Here’s one of the biggest secrets to create compelling copy: people buy because of their
emotions, and then justify their purchase based on logic. People don’t buy a Rolex because it
keeps very accurate time. They buy Rolex watches because of the prestige that comes along
with wearing it.
It is the emotion that makes him want the watch, and ultimately what makes him click the
order button.
It’s this way with every one of your prospects, no matter what you’re selling. You need to put
your reader in the right emotional state. Make them get emotional as they envision using your
product.
And then, mention the more technical features of the product too, so that the logical portion of
their brain can justify the purchase.
For example, let’s look at a cookbook. Logically, you’d buy a cookbook so that you have a
variety of meals to serve your family. However, emotionally, there’s a part of the prospect
that enjoys the praise she imagines receiving after cooking a particular delicious dish.
Keep this in mind as you craft your letter. Your goal is to get the prospect to imagine
themselves receiving the promised benefits of using your product, and whatever emotions
they’ll feel as they do so.
As you make your case and put your prospect into this emotional buying mood, be sure to
give the prospect enough factual information so they can back their buying decision up with
logic.

Proving Your Case

At this point, we’ve covered how to craft a landing page that pulls the reader into the copy,
right down to your list of benefits where you make them want what the product can do for
them. And then, you know how to get your visitors into a buying mood and make it easier for
them justify their purchase.
However, there is one issue that still needs to be addressed. Anyone can say anything on the
internet, and no matter how realistic your claims sound, most people will not believe you until
you prove your case to them.
As you build your case you need to do the following things:

  • Prove your case using facts and figures
  • Be specific to increase credibility
  • Provide testimonials (even if you’re an affiliate).

As far as facts and figures go, consider some of the examples you see in TV commercials:

  • A popular chewing gum advertisement says “four out of five dentists prefer this brand of gum.”
  • Aquafina recently created a television commercial that talks about how many times they filter and purify their water.
  • Dove soap talks about having ¼ moisturizing cream in it, and being 99.9% pure.

All of these are good examples of using facts and figures to talk about your product. You can
talk about facts directly related to the product, or you can talk about a measurable change
people experience when they use the product (ex: “95% of people who followed this diet lost
10 pounds in two months).
As an affiliate, you can often get facts and figures such as this from the affiliate program’s
website.
It’s also a good idea to use some sort of case study where you share specific, measurable
results obtained by users. Ex: A study by the XYZ Institute of Technology found that over
70% of all toy poodles contract <abc> disease after the age of 7 etc. This is a fictional
example, but you have to be careful to provide only real, verifiable case studies or
experimental results as proof of your claims.
You can also add credibility to your landing page by using odd numbers, which seem more
believable.
Dove example that they claim to be 99.9% pure. For all practical purposes they could call
their soap 100% pure. But Dove chose to say 99.9% pure, as that’s a more believable and
credible figure.
Let’s suppose you’re selling something to an internet marketing audience. Instead of saying,
“you can make up to $1500 in your free time,” be specific and say, “you can make up to
$1567.33 in your free time.” The more specific the number is, the more believable it is.
Finally, one of the very best ways to prove your case is to provide testimonials from others.
As an affiliate marketer, it can be pretty hard to gather actual testimonials from people
who’ve bought the product you’re promoting. But there are a few things you can do to easily
get real testimonials:

  1. Pull testimonials from the merchant’s sales letter. Most merchants won’t mind your using the testimonials on their sales page to promote the product. You can also add something to the effect of “actual, unsolicited testimonial from merchant website”and everything should be fine.
  2. Ask your list to send in honest testimonials in exchange for a bonus. If you have a list already and you’ve sent out a product recommendation, you can offer a free bonus to your list in exchange for an honest testimonial from people who’ve bought the product.
  3. Offer rebates. If you don’t have a list, or would like to get testimonials from people
    who aren’t on your list, there’s an easy way to track who has purchased the product.

What you do is set up a separate landing page that offers cash rebates to anyone who
will buy the product from your affiliate link. Then you create a form where people
who’ve purchased from your affiliate link can come back and enter their receipt
number into. When they do this, you’ll also have them enter their name and email
address. Then, they will receive a cash rebate on the product that they purchased. A
few days later, you can contact them and ask if they’d be willing to send in a
testimonial (in exchange for an awesome bonus like in the previous technique).
Once you get enough testimonials, you should put them on your landing page immediately
following specific claims.
For example, let’s suppose your landing page for a diet e-book talks about how many
pounds people can lose using your program. Immediately following this claim, you can
use a testimonial that supports it–specifically, where a past customer talks about exactly
how much weight he/she lost in what time frame.

Overcoming Objections

You’ve created an attention-grabbing headline; you’ve opened with a brilliant lead-in
paragraph, you’ve provided many benefits to the product, and packed in a killer guarantee.
And yet as the reader goes through your copy, he/she is bound to have preformed questions
and objections. If you were in a face-to-face sales situation, it’s easy to handle these
objection,s because you answer them as the prospect raises them. It’s a little more difficult in
writing, since you have to anticipate and address their objections.
However, with the right sales copy, you can defuse any negative feelings they might have,
and make them eager to purchase your product!
For example, if you’re trying to promote exercise equipment, one objection that is likely to be
raised is, “Will this fit in my home?” To that end, you need to tell the reader the exact
dimensions of the equipment, as well as mention its space-saving design.
The most common objection, however, is usually price. To counter that objection, you can
take the price down to its smallest increment. Being an affiliate, maybe you can offer rebates,
but there isn’t much else you can do to affect the price of the product or service. What you
can do, however, is present the cost in a way that makes it look much more attractive.
For example, instead of saying that a service is $27 per month, you can say that it costs just
90 cents per day–less than a cup of coffee at McDonalds!
Another way to effectively present the price is to use decreasing figures. You’ve probably
seen something like this used on a television infomercial. Here’s an example:
“What would you expect to pay for something like this? The product itself, with my $500
worth of bonuses, and your exclusive access to my database worth $399, you would normally
pay $1,200 for this package. However, with this special limited-time offer, I’m not even going
to charge $500. In fact, you won’t pay $350, or even $100. Order right now, and you can get it
for only $59. But you have to order right now.”
Your target market will have its own unique set of objections. For the best results, talk to a
few people from your target market and try to sell them your product. Take note of what
questions they ask you. If even one or two people ask a question, chances are others in your
market will ask that same question as they read your copy. You can also participate in related
forums and see what objections seem to constantly pop up whenever a commercial name is
brought up. Then counter these in your landing page with appropriate benefits.
If you don’t want to take that much time, you can feed off of what is already on the affiliate
owner’s sales page, but it helps to do you own research.

Using a P.S.

If you’ve been reading sales letters on the internet, you may have noticed that practically
every one of these has a P.S. down at the bottom. You may also see a P.P.S. after that, and a
P.P.P.S. after that. This is because every good copywriter understands the importance of a
P.S.
The P.S., short for postscript, is a little tidbit at the end of your copy. Unlike in letters you
write to your friends or family, the postscript is more than just an afterthought when it comes
to sales pitches online. The P.S. is usually a short paragraph which summarizes your copy and
makes sure the most important parts are reiterated.
Also, the P.S. is your last chance to ask for the order. The P.S. is something that you shouldn’t
skip, and it’s something that should be given some effort. One of the reasons that a P.S. is so
important is that everyone will read it. People read the P.S. because it is at the end; it is short
and straight to the point. In here, you need to talk about how the reader needs to order right
away. Tell them again about any special features or offers. Make the P.S. seem like something
very important.
If a person has not made the purchase by the time they get to the end of the landing page, your
P.S. has to be great to get them to go back and hit the buy now button. Your P.S. has to speak
to them in a way that the rest of your copy doesn’t. However, regardless of this, it is very
important that it should never seem desperate. Your readers shouldn’t see it as a plea, but
rather as you not wanting them to lose out on this great offer.
The trick is to list out the 3 or 4 most important points of your landing page and create a
heavy sense of urgency in your P.S. It should be very short and very concise.
Here are some examples of good P.S.’s:
P.S. Don’t forget that when you buy now, you will get a special bonus with your order. You
don’t want to wait until the special bonus offer is gone. Remember, only the next 23 orders
get this free gift!
P.S. This offer is good for only a limited time. You have only 3 days until this special price is
gone forever. Don’t hesitate; order now!
P.S. Remember: you get the 90 day money back guarantee with your purchase. If you are
unsatisfied for any reason at all, you can get your money back with no questions asked. You
have nothing to lose, so order now!
These examples create a sense of urgency and they help remind the customer why they need
to buy today and not give it a second thought.
Of course, with the product you’re promoting, you can be more specific and make the P.S. a
little more detailed. Additionally, you can break up the information with a few more P.P.S.’s
if need be.
Also note how key points of the P.S. are in bold or underlined. Skimmers almost always read
the P.S., so having details emphasized will cater to them.

Creating the Sales Copy

That’s about all of the theory we’re going to cover ahead of time. As long as you’re trying to
think like your target customer, and picture exactly what situation they are in, you’re ready to
dive right into crafting the sales copy.

Let’s now look at the actual process of writing copy. This is the most important part of the
course, so ensure you read it thoroughly. You might even consider taking notes, and
skimming this section again once you’re done to make sure you didn’t miss anything. Without
further ado, let’s begin digging into the sales copy.

Any well-written sales letter roughly follows the following layout order:

  • a. Headline
  • b. Sub-headline
  • c. Greeting
  • d. Lead paragraph
  • e. Body
  • f. Closing

If there is a logo or graphics you have or plan on using, place them landing page only if they
are really pertinent to what you are offering. It’s important to remember that you are not
selling your logo, but the benefits of the product and what it will do for your customer. Any
images on the site should not be flashy, and shouldn’t draw the reader’s attention away from
the sales copy. The words will sell the product, not the pictures.

The Headline

The headline is the most important part of the entire sales letter.
If it doesn’t do its job, which is to immediately capture the reader’s attention, the rest of your
landing page is worthless because chances are good that it won’t be read in the first place.

Your headline isn’t meant to sell the reader on the product, however. That’s what the rest of
the page is for. The headline is simply what you use to grab the reader and pull them into the
rest of your copy.

Ideally, the headline should be less than 30 words long. It should be catchy, it should grab the
reader’s attention, and give them a general feeling of what the landing page is all about. The
job of a good headline is to list the product’s most important benefit, and often to make a
solid guarantee.

Most products will have many benefits to the reader. The key here is to identify the single
biggest benefit associated with the product you are promoting, and promise this benefit to
readers if they keep reading.

In order to know what your biggest benefit is, you also need to be aware of what is important
to your target market. For someone looking a credit repair book, for example, the biggest
benefit would obviously be improving their credit score. A great key benefit for an anti-aging
cream might be to “Look 10 Years Younger Overnight!”.

In addition to figuring out what’s important to your prospects, you’ll also want to consider
some more “universal” wants of people. For example, people want quick and easy solutions
to their problems. Words like “Free”, “Fast” and “Easy” always grab attention.
Also keep in mind some of the other power words that you can use to stop people in their
tracks. The word “You”, for example, is a very powerful word. It shows people how
something directly relates to them.

Additionally, words like “new,” “introducing,” and “break-through” tend to capture plenty of
attention. People like to be on the cutting-edge and have the latest-and-greatest.
Words like “secrets, “revealed” and “discover” are also very powerful words to use in your
copy. Most people want to feel like they’re about to be told something nobody else is aware
of.

Here’s a list of a few other proven “power words” that tend to be quite effective in attracting
attention and building interest:

  • Breakthrough
  • Discover
  • Discovery
  • Easy
  • Free
  • Guaranteed
  • Hidden
  • Incredible
  • Love
  • Master
  • Money
  • New
  • Powerful
  • Profits
  • Proven
  • Results
  • Revealed
  • Scientific
  • Secret
  • Shocked
  • Shocking
  • Ultimate
  • Uncovered
  • You
  • Your

At this point, now that we have covered some basic headline-writing techniques, let’s jump
straight in to creating the headline. The best way to start out is not simply to write a headline,
but to write as many headlines as you can think of, then choose the best one from the list.
Since this is the most important part of your landing page, it only makes sense to spend a
good amount of time crafting the very best headline you can.

If nothing else, the additional headlines can be tested using multivariate testing techniques to
enhance your landing page’s performance (see the component titled “Split Testing &
Analytics” for more information).
For our example product, let’s use a cosmetic wrinkle cream. The product is designed to help
users smooth out laugh lines, eliminate crow’s feet, wrinkles, and so on. Perhaps you’d start
out with a headline like:

“Here’s How to Eliminate Crow’s Feet and Laugh Lines.”

This is far from a killer headline, but it has got to start somewhere. Reading this headline, the
first problem we can see is that it only lists a feature associated with using the cream, and not
a direct benefit to the customer.

To go any further, we need to make a list of some of the benefits of using one of these
creams. Overall, it’s safe to assume that smoothing-out and eliminating wrinkles makes you
look younger. It’s also common opinion that someone who looks younger is happier, more
attractive, and more likely to get attention from the opposite sex.

Using these benefits, we can tweak the example headline into this:

“Here’s How to Eliminate Crow’s Feet and Laugh Lines to Make You Look Younger.”

That’s progress, but it’s still far from a perfect headline. It doesn’t offer a lot of detail, and
doesn’t sound too compelling. Instead of simply saying “younger,” let’s say get more specific
and say “Ten Years Younger”:

“Here’s How to Eliminate Crow’s Feet and Laugh Lines Quick and Easy to Make You
Look Ten Years Younger.”

This is improving, but now it’s long, awkward to read, and the wording doesn’t draw you in. It
still needs work. Let’s improve on it by adding in some of the “power words” listed
previously.

Let’s take the word “Discover”, and the word “Secret” and see what we can come up with.
Furthermore, let’s try to refine “quick and easy” to the specific period of time it might take a
person to apply the product per day.
Here’s what we end up with:

“Discover the Secret of Looking Ten Years Younger… in Just 5 Minutes a Day!”
The headline we get is much more compelling, the wording is smooth, and it is very easy to
read. Let’s brainstorm a few more while we’re here:
“Here’s an Anti-Aging Cream that Makes You Look So Young and
Beautiful that Your Husband will Call You his Trophy Wife!”
“In Just 21 Days from ?ow, You’ll look so Young that People
Will Mistake Your Teenage Daughter for Your Sister!”

The key here is to come up with as many headlines as you possibly can before you quit. No
matter how silly and idea may sound, go ahead and write it down anyway. You can always
toss it out later.


Types of Headlines

We’ve looked at the core process of writing a good headline, but there are actually different
types of headlines. I’m going to describe the most common of these below, and although
some of them work best for specific products, you can use any of these in your copy –
regardless of what market you’re targeting, or what you’re promoting.

  • Direct headlines. This type of headline is blunt and straight to the point. The reader should clearly know what is being sold and what the great offer is just by reading the headline. This is the type of headline we’ve been providing examples of so far.
  • Indirect headlines. This type of headline raises a question, which can then be answered by the body of the sales letter.
  • News headlines. This type of headline is laid-out like an announcement, like something you might read in a newspaper. For example: “Attention: Toy Poodle Owners! Groundbreaking New E-Book on House Training Promises To Discipline Your Dog in Just 2 Weeks or Less!”
    ‘How-to’ headlines. This type of headline is very popular. It works well at selling almost any type of infoproduct. Basically, the headline starts with the words ‘how to’ and goes on from there.
  • Question headlines. Since you’re making landing pages, most of the people land on them after clicking on an ad of yours. This clearly means they have a burning problem or a question that they’re looking to have solved. A question headline attempts to reflect that exact same question that is going through the reader’s mind. Ex: “Who Else Wants to Make $1634.27 Every Week, Working Right from Home with Zero Investment?” This creates an “intuitive” feel and intrigues your visitors to read further.
  • Command headlines. This type of headline basically tells the reader to do something. The trick to this type of headline is to use strong words that will trigger action in the reader. Ex: “Quick! Sign up to my “Poodle Master” list right now and get free instant access to over $400 worth of poodle-training material absolutely free! Only 4 slots left!”.
  • Numbered headlines. These are usually relatively easy to come up with. Numbered headlines are basically meant to highlight a certain number of things the reader will learn or benefit if they read on, for example: ‘Here Are 5 Top Secret Ways to Lose 10 lbs of Belly Fat In 2 Month Or Less!’

Headlines should be printed in very large print (the largest font size on the entire landing
page), and should avoid being too long. The headline of no more than 30 words should fit in 2
to 3 lines.

The Sub-Headline

The sub-headline is optional, but will usually increase sales when used properly. It serves as a fill-in between the headline and the opening paragraph. It’s printed as a line or two of smaller font directly below the the main headline. The sub-heading is an extension of the headline.

The sub-headline doesn’t have to be as bold as the headline, since the headline needs to be the most noticeable statement on the page, but it should still grab the reader’s attention. Your goal here is to make the subhead as catchy as possible. It’s a note that grabs further attention and gives a hint that there is much more to come if the visitor will just continue reading.

To write a good sub-headline, think of it as a headline with a very specific point. The subheadline can provide more information regarding what the headline detailed, or it can be a very general statement, such as “Attention Toy Poodle Owners!”.

The Greeting

Below the headline, the sales copy should immediately open up with the greeting. At this
point, many copywriters let readers know who is writing the letter.
You’ll see notations like “From the desk of Alex Smith”. Sometimes the marketer will display
their picture here as well. Doing so is a great technique, since allowing the visitor to see who
is talking to them rapidly builds a great deal of trust.
Of course, this technique should only be used if you have a professional photograph that you
look nice in, that goes well with the product you’re selling. If you’re 16 years old and trying to
market a product teaching people to buy-and-sell real estate, you might do more harm than
good by posting a picture, since people would be more likely to trust someone who looks like
they have decades of experience in the industry.
The next component of a good sales page is often the salutation or greeting. It’s best to use a
salutation that identifies them as part of a specific group and captures their attention, such as
“Dear Internet Marketer” or “Dear Soccer Fan.”
It’s not a requirement to open your landing page like a letter, but it is a solid method to use.
You may instead opt to simply jump right into the body of the page, and that’s fine, but do try
to included at least a few paragraphs within the sales copy laid out like a letter from you.

The Body

This is where all the selling takes place. The headline, as you know, is a primer to the body of
your landing page copy. While the headline’s job is to generate attention to what you’re
saying, the body’s job is to capitalize on that attention to begin producing interest in the
product.
Essentially, the body copy has the following objectives:

  • Use the same tone as the headline and elaborate upon it.
  • Detail the benefits of the product, and if possible, offer proof of the claims made in the headline.
  • Provide some details about the features of the product.
  • Build credibility in who you are, and what you’re saying.
  • Eventually, create a craving for the product being promoted, and make the visitor want to buy it.

The Opening Paragraph

The first part of the body copy is your opening paragraph. Ideally, this should be short and
concise. The first sentence and paragraph should be very easy-to-read.
If you haven’t used a direct headline with a big benefit in it, do so in your opening paragraph
– preferably in your first sentence. This is where you will begin to make the reader see why
he or she must read the rest of the copy and ultimately accept your offer. In fact, when done
right, the reader will be excited to read the rest of your sales copy!

Your starting paragraph is going to highlight the problem the customer is facing. It is going to
bring the focus to the benefits of the product and why the reader’s problem can be remedied if
they just take the right steps. Anything you say in your starting paragraph will later be backed
up by other areas of your copy. In many ways, it’s like a more detailed headline.

You should also aim to build a rapport between yourself and your reader in the lead
paragraph. Here are some basic rules to keep in mind as you begin to write it:

  • Keep it conversational, focused and simple.
  • Make it a one-paragraph story if you can. People relate well to stories. Stories have a way of drawing people in and making them feel “at home.” You should be able to evoke some reaction in them that makes them nod in agreement. It is a key sales tactic to get the customer agreeing — because once they start agreeing, it is easier to close the sale.
  • Keep it very relevant. It should have a basic point to it that is clear. Don’t ramble on and confuse your visitor.
  • You can also try answering a question. If your headline asked a question, your starting paragraph needs to provide the answer to that question. You can explain the situation, ask further questions, and then explain how the product you are promoting can help.

There is no rigid formula to a lead-in paragraph, and a think-outside-the-box approach can
work, but your landing pages will produce better responses if you follow these rules.


The Rest of the Body

After your visitor is done reading the lead paragraph, he will be very curious in the rest of the
copy. This is what you’re going to capitalize on at this point.
The rest of the body contains your sales pitch that’s backed by statements which emphasize
the features and benefits of your product, testimonials from satisfied users and other forms of
proof (such as screen shots of earnings, documents supporting the claim, clinical trials, etc).
You can also include additional sub-headlines throughout the body that emphasize other big
benefits, a guarantee policy (this is critical), and finally a call to action and an order button.
We’ll talk about these components in more detail shortly.

The aim of the body is to leverage your visitors’ interest (already grabbed by your headline),
pull them into your letter, and keep them reading until the call-to-action, where they can place
their order.

The Guarantee

Any product must have a great money-back guarantee, or you will miss out on a vast number
of sales. The money you will have to return by making good on your guarantee is nowhere
near as much as you will lose by not having a guarantee.

It’s good to hype the guarantee as much as possible. “Remember, you have a full 30 days to
return this, for any reason at all, and I’ll give you every cent of your money back. In fact, I’m
even going to let you keep my bonus product just for trying out the system!”.

30 days should be considered the bare minimum. Many people only offer a return period of
this length, thinking it will reduce returns. Surprisingly, return periods of 60 or 90 days often
provide a lower return rate. If someone intends on returning they product, they don’t feel the
rush to return it right away since the return period is so long. Then, by the time 60 or 90 days
rolls around, they have often forgotten about it.

No matter what the length of the return period, a guarantee is a requirement.