What To Research
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Now, what exactly should you be researching?
Everything that’s critical to making the most compelling case for your getting your customers to take the action you want.
Here’s a list of everything you need to research in order to have all the raw material that will eventually become a highly profitable sales piece:
1. What makes up the purpose of your copy?
Do you want to get leads or make a direct sale?
Will you sell directly or use a two-step model?
2. What is the major goal you’re trying to achieve?
Look to the future six months from now. If this project could accomplish just one critical task, what would it be?
What additional purposes would you wish to accomplish with this project?
Is there anything about your product or company that will lend credibility to your sales pitch?
This could include awards you’ve won, how long you’ve been in business, results your product produces, etc.
But a word of caution is due here. These factors are only useful when they demonstrate a true benefit for your customer. Your advertising piece is not an avenue for bragging or boosting your ego. Not if you want to sell as much as possible.
The only purpose of gathering this information is to see if you can use it as leverage to get your customers to take the action you want as quickly as possible.
5. What product or service will you be marketing?
This might sound obvious, but from marketing pieces I see every day, it really isn’t.
One of the biggest mistakes I constantly see is a marketing piece that doesn’t seem to know what it’s selling. Sometimes it’s a piece that’s selling a service, but does little more than tell you about how long the company has been in business, a complete history of all the officers of the company, or some other irrelevant information.
Another big mistake is copy that tries to sell too many products at once. For the most part, unless you’re creating a catalog, your sales piece should focus on one product only. Occasionally this rule can be broken, but it takes an experienced hand to do this without significantly weakening your sales pitch.
6. What are each of the features of your product?
How many assorted variations are there?
Assorted colors?
How does it work?
Is it effectual? Economic?
Simple to learn and utilise?
7. What relevant facts and figures have been gathered about your product?
Have some reports been prepared that furnish facts and designs that can support your claims?
Is there an manufacture trade council that will grant you significant facts, charts, graphs, and statistics on your product?
How does it equate to your competitions’ products?
8. What are the leading benefits your prospect acquires from your product?
The difference between a fact/feature and a benefit is this: A fact/feature is something the product does, while a benefit is something it does for you.
Another important point to keep in mind is that benefits are directly related to features. You can usually list all of your facts/features first and then go through your list and identify the corresponding benefits.
Here are some examples of fact/features and their corresponding benefits:
Fact/feature: Deluxe Autowasher reduces water use.
Benefit: You save money.
Fact/feature: Wash, wax, and rinse with the same unit.
Benefit: Extremely easy and convenient to use. You save countless hours every month.
Fact/feature: Sturdy, polished aluminum construction.
Benefit: Unit will last longer, saving you money for years and years.
As you can probably tell, doing a thorough job of researching benefits is an absolutely critical task, because the benefits you deliver to your customer are the driving force of any sales copy. Your goal then is to list every possible advantage your customer gets by using your product.
9. What major benefits do your customers get from doing business with you rather than doing business with your competition?
Or from your product rather than your competition’s products?
When you identify which benefits you provide that your competitor does not, you acquire an effective marketing advantage. I call this advantage your CSA, or Crucial Selling Advantage.
What puts you separate from the pack?
Why will your purchasers want to do business with you instead of somebody else?
Your CSA can be something about your company or your product. But like every aspect of marketing, it’s always stated from the standpoint of how it benefits your customer.
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