How The Trash Can Will Make You A Better Copywriter
The funny thing about copywriting techniques is that they can come to you at almost any time of the day.
This article, which points out in detail what I describe as the "trash can copywriting technique" was something I thought of after a very long 2 weeks.
I’d been working some ridiculous hours and decided to give myself the day to kind of relax, sit back and watch some DVD’s (on copywriting, marketing, persuasion etc.) and audios.
Deciding it was time to take a break, I went down to go outside and grab the mail while I made myself some pizza.
Reading the mail I got that day while making lunch, I slowly walked over to the trash can. When I got through roughly half of it, I realized something.
I'm doing the same thing I've seen other copywriters talk about!
Have you ever heard anybody talk about how you need to visualize your prospect standing over the paper basket with the mail in their hand?
And how you need to somehow captivate them enough to actually read your mail and not throw it in the trash?
Well, that's exactly what I found myself doing, and the only piece of mail I got that day which earned more than 2-3 seconds of my time was a check and a business magazine.
Anyway, I just thought I’d let you know that if you’ve ever heard that phrase…they’re not lying! People honestly do stand straight over the top of their trash can with the mail in their hand.
And if you don't realize it yet, even prospects online have a "virtual paper basket" sitting right at their fingertips. This rule applies not only to offline, but online as well.
Which brings me to a very important point…
How do you captivate someone enough to read your mail and not through it away?
And the answer is that you have to tell them a story.
You'll realize at the beginning of this article I described a little story of a few minutes of my life. If you're still reading this article it shows you were interested in it for some reason - probably because you wanted to figure out the end of the story.
That’s exactly what you need to do for your prospects. Tell them a story they’d be interested in hearing. Start the story off with something that will make them NEED to get to the end of the story to find out.
Make the story as captivating as you can, and make sure you give a “hint” to your product.
For example:
In the story you could explain a specific problem some person was having, then how they came over that problem and how your product helped them do it.
This is just one copywriting technique you can “take to the bank” to implement it immediately in your business and watch your profits soar.