Anyone can master the art of copywriting if they work hard enough at learning the skills and techniques necessary to write for an audience.You have the perfect opportunity with an online market to test out your words to see what works, and what doesn’t when it comes to the style of your copy. Here’s what not to do:

Don’t leave out your Call to Action!

Some online entrepreneurs are so busy touting the awesome benefits and bonus packages of their offer that they forget to ask for the sale! With an Internet audience, especially, you have to be bold enough to go that extra step and tell them what action to take to improve their lives.

Don’t stop at just asking them to buy your product, show them how to do it! Most ads you see today are just a summary of the product.

Skin Firming Lotion, for instance, tells all about howm youthful the product will make you appear to be, it shows the bottle in a colorful close-up shot, and perhaps a woman’s face that looks to be wrinkle-free.

But where is the Call to Action? Sometimes, there’s not one. And that makes the audience flip to the next page in a magazine, with a “that’s nice” attitude. You have to give your audience more.

Don’t let them walk off your site with a “that’s nice” attitude! Give them the incentive they need to take action now, not when they might need it more in the future. Magazine ads sometimes use coupons as their CTA.

That coupon is an incentive in itself – it has an expiration date, a discount, and it automatically lets people know that your objective is to get them to buy it and try it.

For an Internet business, you might throw in a limited-time bonus offer – if they order NOW, they get 5 extra items. Order LATER, and lose them!

You don’t want to create a page that has actionless ad copy. Your sales will suffer, and the customers will move on to someone who understands how to craft a CTA.

Don’t give them all the time in the world.

You want your profits, and you want them now! Don’t give your market a chance to come back later – they almost never will! Instead, implement a sense of urgency in your copy that makes them realize the advantages of ordering the first time they visit your site.

You have to put some gentle pressure on your visitors and eliminate any reservations they have with your copy so that they’ll take out their credit
card and place an order immediately.

Think like your customer and figure out what elements of your offer,  if any, would cause them to have reservations. Look at pricing, the ordering process, delivery methods, benefits (are they strong enough?), drawbacks (if any).

If you see any blatant aspects of your copy that would turn off the reader, change them! You have the freedom and ease to alter your text any time you want on the ‘net.

If your payment process is confusing, or doesn’t allow for the main credit card types of purchases, then you may need to go the extra mile in implementing a shopping cart on your site.

If you see that one part of your offer is not fleshed out enough, then detail it even further so that your customer knows that all he or she needs to know in order to make an informed decision to buy.

Don’t deliver the right words to the wrong audience.

If you’re not targeting the mass market, then your copy will have to be created to speak to one particular target market. If that’s the case, then you want your words to speak their language.

Longer copy sometimes gives you the chance to include a variety of audiences in one area, but a smaller ad has to be very specific in engaging the right kind of people to drive profitable traffic to your site.

One option is to develop a series of ads for your online copy. Your home page could be your main sales presentation, but the ads you place on and off the ‘net to drive traffic to your site could be individualized to each specific market.

Blue collar workers, for instance, could be driven to your site with very
different copy than it would take to get a corporate executive to visit it.

Don’t waste time on words that yawn.

The moment your copy is viewed as boring is the moment which you’ll lose a visitor – and a sale! Make sure your content speaks about the most amazing
benefits, and the strongest points of your product.

If you’ve explained each plus in detail, then move on – don’t overdo your
explanation, if it’s apparent the reader will have all of the information he or she needs to decide to buy.

Likewise, you need to avoid rushing through your text. If you state a benefit and then don’t show the customer how it would work for him, then he may not take as much interest in it.

Remember that your copy is all about your customer – NOT your product!

Once you draft your first copy, print it out and mark it up with red ink. Take out every sentence, word, or phrase that doesn’t offer a powerful value to your text.

Don’t have one long piece of copy.

Because you’ll be working with web-based copy, you have the luxury of crafting it at any length you see fit. What’s usually 1-page in a print direct mail piece can be 5, 10, 15 or more pages when printed out from the Internet!

To accomplish this in an effective manner, you need to break your copy up into chunks of information that are easy to digest for your customers.Craft each section so that one idea flows smoothly into the next.

Use plenty of subheads and bulleted lists that help make the information easy to consume. That way, they can move forward without spotting one lengthy menacing chunk of text that makes them want to skip ahead.

In fact, it’s important that you use subheads to draw attention to your
product’s most promising features. Some consumers go to a site and scan the headings to see if there’s anything worth reading about.

Make a powerful point in your headings and readers will be more inclined to continue reading each section, and ultimately, to buy into your offer. Make sure that the first sentence under each subhead continues on from the main idea.

Subheads give the visitors a quick understanding of the overall benefits and uses of your product. It keeps him interested while you persuade him with the remaining bulk of the content.

You can even use a question in your subheads that make the viewer wonder about the answer – so they have to continue reading. This is where it’s very important to relate to your audience on a personal level.

You can also make a statement, but once you do, there’s nothing to create an interactive atmosphere on your site.

Don’t pass up the opportunity to capture contact information.

You never want to pass up the opportunity to build your future sales. Not only do you want to upsell your clients by trying to get them to buy an even bigger package during their very first purchase, but you want them to buy from you again and again!

Even if you only have one product at first, you’ll still want to capture their name and email address so that when you do find other products or services to sell, you’ll have a list of contacts to approach who you know are interested parties.

You want them to give their information voluntarily for future communications – don’t trick them into giving it when they might not want to be contacted.

How do you do it? Pop-up windows with enticing copy are a good way to court your clients. Offer them a freebie – like a subscription to your weekly or monthly newsletter, or a short e-book on a topic related to the product or service you’re selling.

All they’ll have to do is type in their name and email, you capture it, and you drive them back again and again using well-crafted autoresponders!

An email autoresponder is an automated system that will let you send out tidbits of useful information, product announcements, or other content in an effort to build your profits! You don’t have to drive them back to the same site they purchased from.

Send them to your other sites, or your affiliate sites to sell them something else! Always make sure that each recipient has a way to end the autoresponder series if they wish to do so. If you continue sending them, you may find yourself in violation of your ISP’s rules and regulations.

Use your autoresponder series to give a guarantee, offer a freebie, tout the benefits of a new offer, and develop a relationship with the reader.

For more information on email autoresponders click here.
To make a pop-up window click here.

Don’t let your copy out of the gate without testing it first.

If you’re new online, then you might find out what works by trial and error. But you can eliminate excess time by enlisting the help of friends, family, and associates to give their honest opinion of your text.

Let them know that this is business, and no feelings will be hurt if they offer constructive criticism. And then, don’t let your feelings get hurt! Learn from what others are telling you, and then revise your copy accordingly.

If you’re paying for ads online in various pay-per-click search engines, track the results of the copy that works and that which doesn’t.

Almost every business has a mirror storefront on the ‘net. Everywhere you look – in magazines, on TV, and even the sides of public transportation vehicles, you see a URL for various companies.

All of them are doing the same thing you’re about to do – test your copy to see what attracts the largest piece of the Internet Consumer Pie.

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