I want to
start this post with a simple, yet profound question for you to ponder about
your own business…
“What is the one thing and first thing
you just do to get money in your business?”
The answers I
hear when I ask this question from a live audience ranges from “Create a
product” to “Make a sale.”
While these
answers seem to make sense, the very first thing you must do in order to get
money in your business is to GET THE
ATTENTION OF YOUR TARGET MARKET. It’s
the critical first step to any marketing effort.
My mentor,
Dan Kennedy, has this to say about this topic,
“It happens constantly and it is the
hidden secret reason why so many marketing campaigns fall way short of their
potential. Not because the offer isn’t
good or wouldn’t be welcomed by all the recipients; simply because many of the
recipients never know about it because we fail to command their attention.”
Reread Dan’s statement. It’s simple, yet profound. Basically you can have the best product or
service, yet if you are not getting the attention of your target market, you’re
going to go broke.
Not too long
ago I was visiting New York City. While there, I strolled over to Times Square. If
you’ve ever been to Times Square you know it’s
an overwhelming sensory experience.
There’s traffic noise, visual noise, people noise. It’s a bombardment and if you stay there too
long and your senses start to become numb.
Trying to
market your product or services today is no different than standing in Times Square and yelling at the top of your lungs. There’s no escape to all the marketing and
advertising noise people face. TV,
radio, billboards, newspaper and magazines, direct mail, banner ads, pop-up
ads, Google ads. 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.
Your
challenge is to cut through all the noise and clutter and create
top-of-the-mind awareness with your target market.
Sadly… most marketing
fails, because it is so “plain vanilla” and ordinary. People are busy. They’re jaded, guarded, and
skeptical. Some are cheap and down-right rude.
Lots of folks have no time, no patience, and
little interest in what you’re selling.
So how can you expect to get their attention by simply adding to the
noise?
YOU GOTTA DO THINGS DIFFERENTLY!
One of the most effective techniques to grab the
attention of your reader, either online or offline, is to use simulated
handwritten notes and doodles. In this
day and age of computer-generated everything, the power of handwriting stands out.
You cannot help but see this
technique used more and more. It’s in
the advertisements in your weekend paper; it’s on television commercials and in
magazine ads. I’ve even seen it used effectively on book covers. You are now starting to see its use on Web
sites, blogs and squeeze pages.
The use of
simulated handwriting goes back a long way in advertising, however, many
copywriters and marketers give me credit for this most recent and widespread
use of handwritten doodles with the creation of
CopyDoodles®.
As a matter
of fact, marketing guru, Bill Glazer called CopyDoodles, “the biggest enhancement I have seen in the last 10 years for people
that are writing copy for bumping the response and making the copy much more
interesting.”
Before CopyDoodles, the
procedure to add handwritten doodles was both time-consuming and tedious. Now you can add these powerful doodles to
your marketing in mere seconds.
Over the years, my clients
and I have done a number of split tests and across the boards the materials
that contain handwritten notes and doodles always perform better than those
without them.
Of course you have to know
how and when to use them appropriately (just slapping a bunch of CopyDoodles on
your materials without proper context can be counter-productive).
So why is simulated handwriting so
effective?
Legendary direct marketer and
author of Common Sense Direct Marketing, Drayton Bird, says, “The use of handwritten notes in the
margins can add variety and interest to the eye and brain.” Quite simply, the widespread use
of computers, word processing and laser printers has created “homogenized
marketing.” Meaning 95% of everything looks the same. When you introduce a handwritten or
hand-drawn element to the mix, it becomes very different in a simple, human-personality
kind of way.
The effectiveness of a simple
red handwritten note and doodle to a web page or direct mail piece can be huge
and over time this type of copy cosmetic technique can add thousands of dollars
to your bottom line. Try it and see for
yourself!
++++
Mike
Capuzzi
is a marketing strategist, author, speaker and newsletter publisher. Since 1998, he has been helping entrepreneurs
and business owners improve their marketing and response rates. He is the inventor of the wildly successful
CopyDoodles, which allows anybody to quickly and easily add handwriting
elements to their marketing. For a FREE
ebook on how to increase your marketing response and more information about
CopyDoodles visit
www.copydoodles.com.
